DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.4377#0337
APPENDIX No. II.
ON THE ALA 15 A STICK VASE [NSCKEBED WITH THE
NAME OF XERXES. PLATE VII.
BY MB. s. BIBCH.
TnE alabaster vase bearing the name of Xerxes,
which was found in the Mausoleum, is one of a
elass called by the ancients alabastra, from the
material of which they were made. These vases
were used to contain precious unguents and cos-
metics, which alabaster11 was thought to preserve
better than any other material.b Such jars were
manufactured by the Egyptians from the earliest
period to which we can tract1 back their history,
one having been found which bears the name of
Cheops (Khufu).0 The oldest of these vases are
made of transparent alabaster, without streaks or
veins. Under the twenty-sixth dynasty there
was a preference for yellow alabaster, ribbed with
hands, which show the successive deposits of sta-
lagmite, and the alabaster was cut so as to exhibit
this stratification in rings concentric with tin1
mouth of the jar.
0 This seems to lie the stone called Chernites by Theophrastiis.
— Do Lapid. Opera, cd. Schneider, i. p. OSS. Pliny, 1 \. N. xiii. i. \ 3.
•' Tlieophr. De Odor. Opera, ed. Schneider, i. p. "47.
"It has heen shown from recent discoveries, that the walls of
the temple of Shafra, or Chefren, placed behind the Great Sphinx.
wcic lined with Blabs of alabaster.
2 x •?.
ON THE ALA 15 A STICK VASE [NSCKEBED WITH THE
NAME OF XERXES. PLATE VII.
BY MB. s. BIBCH.
TnE alabaster vase bearing the name of Xerxes,
which was found in the Mausoleum, is one of a
elass called by the ancients alabastra, from the
material of which they were made. These vases
were used to contain precious unguents and cos-
metics, which alabaster11 was thought to preserve
better than any other material.b Such jars were
manufactured by the Egyptians from the earliest
period to which we can tract1 back their history,
one having been found which bears the name of
Cheops (Khufu).0 The oldest of these vases are
made of transparent alabaster, without streaks or
veins. Under the twenty-sixth dynasty there
was a preference for yellow alabaster, ribbed with
hands, which show the successive deposits of sta-
lagmite, and the alabaster was cut so as to exhibit
this stratification in rings concentric with tin1
mouth of the jar.
0 This seems to lie the stone called Chernites by Theophrastiis.
— Do Lapid. Opera, cd. Schneider, i. p. OSS. Pliny, 1 \. N. xiii. i. \ 3.
•' Tlieophr. De Odor. Opera, ed. Schneider, i. p. "47.
"It has heen shown from recent discoveries, that the walls of
the temple of Shafra, or Chefren, placed behind the Great Sphinx.
wcic lined with Blabs of alabaster.
2 x •?.