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)

394 ItUJNS OF ATHRIBIS. [Chap. VJ.

could not have happened so early as generally
supposed.

The hieroglyphics present, on the other face of
the same block, the ovals of Tiberius Claudius
Caesar Germanicus; and in another part of the
temple I observed that of Ptolemy, the elder son of
Auletes; nor is it improbable that the era of its
foundation will date considerably earlier. The name
of Atrib is traditionally retained by the inmates of
the white monastery; but they also designate these
ruins by that of Medeenet Ashaysh. At the east
face of the mountains, about half a mile beyond
Athribis, are the quarries from which the stone of
the temple was taken; and below are several small
grottoes that have served for tombs, and were once
furnished with doors, secured as usual by a bolt or
lock. On the lintel of one of them is a Greek in-
scription, purporting that it was " the sepulchre of
Ermius, the son of Archibius." It contains the
scattered residue of burnt bones.

At Soohag are the mounds of another ancient
town; and the mouth of the modern canal to the
south is constructed with a care unusual in a country
subject to the indolent Turks.

E'Khmim, on the east bank, is the site of Chem-
mis, or Panopolis, in Coptic, Chmim, formerly one
of the most considerable cities of the Theba'id. A
long inscription, bearing the date of the twelfth
year of the emperor Trajanus Germanicus Dacicus,
points out the site of the temple of Pan, who, as we