Wilkinson, John Gardner: Topographie of Thebes, and general view of Egypt: being a short account of the principal objects worthy of notice in the valley of the Nile, to the second cataracte and Wadi Samneh, with the Fyoom, Oases and eastern desert, from Sooez to Bertenice (London, 1835)

Chap.I.] ANTIQUITY OP THE ARCH. 81

period the vacant burial places of their royal prede-
cessors.

At the opposite or eastern extremity of this val-
ley, are several tablets of the first Amunoph, and
other monarchs of the eighteenth and nineteenth
dynasties; and from hence a short path leads over
the hills to the secluded valley of Dayr el Medeeneh,
behind the Qoornet-Murraee. Here several tombs
of the early date of the same Amunoph, which claim
the attention of the chronologer rather than the
admiration of the traveller who seeks elegant de-
signs or interesting sculptures, extend along the
brow of the north-west hill; and a series of pits
and crude brick chambers occupy the space between
these and the brick inclosure of a Ptolemaic temple
to the east. Among the most remarkable of these
tombs, is one* containing the members of Amu-
noph's family and some of his predecessors ;| an-
other^ whose crude brick roof and niche, bearing
the name of the same Pharaoh, prove the existence
of the arch at the remote period of 1540 B. C.; a
crude brick pyramid § of an early epoch; and a
tomb,|| under the western rocks, which offers to the

* Marked m in the Survey.

f Given in Mr. Burton's " Excerpta," and in my " Extracts,"
PL 5. Also in the " Hieroglyphics" of the Royal Society of Li-
terature, PL 91.

| Marked /; but, as I have since opened its real entrance, its
position is to be looked for close to No. m.

§ Marked h. It is vaulted. | Marked i.

G