DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.4222#0044
34
ROYAL TOMBS OF THE 1st DYNASTY.
CHAPTER V.
t&ei
THE INVENTORY PLATES.
Pls. XXXII.—XLV.
31. In examining a period so little known,
and so important, as that of the development
of the kingdom, nothing should be slighted;
and in even the smallest matters of decoration
every fragment should be recorded and added to
our knowledge. To describe objects in detail is
useless without figures, and therefore a written
inventory is merely a tedious legal formality,
useless for practical archaeology: and the
efficient record is such an outline of every
intelligible fragment, that it can be identified
in future, can be recognized as joining pieces
already known, and can be studied as a whole,
comparing one tomb with another. This I
have given on the fourteen plates named above :
there every object (not given already in photo-
graphs) is outlined, or sufficient samples are
shown of any large and uniform class, such as
the arrow points.
It Avill be best to notice first such changes as
can be traced from tomb to tomb in each class ;
and then to make some notes on the plates
separately.
The buUs-leg supports begin in prehistoric
time ; one grave at Naqada (No. 3) had a couch
supported on bull's legs carved in wood about
15 inches high ; they had been entirely eaten
by white ants, but yet the form could be traced.
The date of this is about s.d. 66 (see Diospolis
Parva for this mode of dating), or perhaps five
or six centuries before the 1st Dynasty. Hence
there is a long past in the history of this form,
and the use of it in the royal tombs is highly
conventional, and remote from its original
design. Changes can be seen in the historic
time. The use of this form disappears in the
reign of Qa, last of the 1st Dynasty, and no
such decoration is seen in the tombs of
Perabsen and Khasekhemui except one very
different fragment in wood (xlv. 6). Yet the
idea revived, as it is the constant type of the
legs of seats in the Old Kingdom (see Medum
xiii., L. Denlc. ii. 10, 84, 85, 86, 109) ; the
lion's legs, however, began to supplant the older
form in the latter part of this time (L. Denlc. ii.
90, 110), and became usual in the Xllth
Dynasty (L. Denlc. ii. 128, 129), and on in the
XVIIIth Dynasty (throne of Hatshepsut), and
till the Roman time.
Unfortunately most of the perfect examples
have been removed to Paris, and their history
lost; so it is only from the remains here that
we can glean the changes. The wavy line
around the leg appears under Mena (xxxii. 9),
and continues to Merneit (xxxix. 2), after
which it ceases. The number of discs or
divisions under the feet decreased as time went
on ; the maximum in each reign is :—29 under
Mena, 19 under Zer, 18 under Merneit, and 14
under Den and Mersekha. The general size
diminished, as the largest leg is from Sma
(xxxii. 5), and the later ones seem only fit to
support caskets and not actual seats.
The arrow points of ivory are common in the
earlier part of the 1st Dynasty ; but none Avere
found in the tomb of Qa or later. They are often
Ms.
ROYAL TOMBS OF THE 1st DYNASTY.
CHAPTER V.
t&ei
THE INVENTORY PLATES.
Pls. XXXII.—XLV.
31. In examining a period so little known,
and so important, as that of the development
of the kingdom, nothing should be slighted;
and in even the smallest matters of decoration
every fragment should be recorded and added to
our knowledge. To describe objects in detail is
useless without figures, and therefore a written
inventory is merely a tedious legal formality,
useless for practical archaeology: and the
efficient record is such an outline of every
intelligible fragment, that it can be identified
in future, can be recognized as joining pieces
already known, and can be studied as a whole,
comparing one tomb with another. This I
have given on the fourteen plates named above :
there every object (not given already in photo-
graphs) is outlined, or sufficient samples are
shown of any large and uniform class, such as
the arrow points.
It Avill be best to notice first such changes as
can be traced from tomb to tomb in each class ;
and then to make some notes on the plates
separately.
The buUs-leg supports begin in prehistoric
time ; one grave at Naqada (No. 3) had a couch
supported on bull's legs carved in wood about
15 inches high ; they had been entirely eaten
by white ants, but yet the form could be traced.
The date of this is about s.d. 66 (see Diospolis
Parva for this mode of dating), or perhaps five
or six centuries before the 1st Dynasty. Hence
there is a long past in the history of this form,
and the use of it in the royal tombs is highly
conventional, and remote from its original
design. Changes can be seen in the historic
time. The use of this form disappears in the
reign of Qa, last of the 1st Dynasty, and no
such decoration is seen in the tombs of
Perabsen and Khasekhemui except one very
different fragment in wood (xlv. 6). Yet the
idea revived, as it is the constant type of the
legs of seats in the Old Kingdom (see Medum
xiii., L. Denlc. ii. 10, 84, 85, 86, 109) ; the
lion's legs, however, began to supplant the older
form in the latter part of this time (L. Denlc. ii.
90, 110), and became usual in the Xllth
Dynasty (L. Denlc. ii. 128, 129), and on in the
XVIIIth Dynasty (throne of Hatshepsut), and
till the Roman time.
Unfortunately most of the perfect examples
have been removed to Paris, and their history
lost; so it is only from the remains here that
we can glean the changes. The wavy line
around the leg appears under Mena (xxxii. 9),
and continues to Merneit (xxxix. 2), after
which it ceases. The number of discs or
divisions under the feet decreased as time went
on ; the maximum in each reign is :—29 under
Mena, 19 under Zer, 18 under Merneit, and 14
under Den and Mersekha. The general size
diminished, as the largest leg is from Sma
(xxxii. 5), and the later ones seem only fit to
support caskets and not actual seats.
The arrow points of ivory are common in the
earlier part of the 1st Dynasty ; but none Avere
found in the tomb of Qa or later. They are often
Ms.