Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1876-08-23
Egyptian Researches.

DIR. Birch, of the British Museum,
thinks the origin of the Egyptian race
is enveloped in mystery. The Egyptians
at the earliest periods represented them
selve as ''men," and mythically were
supposed to have been created by the
gods, or to proceed from the eye or
mouth of the demi urges. As early as
the third dynasty, their type has been
recently, recognized as European, dis
tinct from the Nigritic and Semitic
races. Philologically considered, the
ancient Egyptian language belongs 10
the Semetic and not the Aryan family
of speech, and favors the hypothesis of
an early Semetic wave of emigration
which flowed into Egypt; but the only
solution that remains is the considera-
ton that the Egyptian was type pro-
duced by fusion of different races after
period of miscegenatiOn and climac-
teric influence, and varying afterwards
with the political relations.
Nor is there any indication of an abori-
ginal race subjected to a more powerful
one, or reduced to servitude, and the
existence OF stone period, as it has
been called, in the valley of the Nile,
during which an uncultivated race rose
gradually to a higher developement.
Geological considerations, too, do not
aid TO any great extent in determining
the highest chronological limit of in
habited Egypt. The Egyptian belongs,
after all, to the recent race of men, and
has nothing to distinguish his first ap-
pearance on the earth's crust from races
actually existing. There is no trace of
evolution or development. Even the
earliest monuments exhibit some of the
finest arts, and there is no evidence of
the primeval savage race inhabiting the
banks of the Nile and plains of the Del
ta gradually ascending in the scale of
civilization.
In the investigation made i'll this his
tory nothing has been too insignificant
for notice. 1t is not a history compiled
from payri or literary documents alone.
A portion of il is inscribed on the walls
of the courts of Egyptian temples, or
on the sides of the propylaa, the gates
or the doors of which were the triumph
al arches of Egypt. Here the hero
glyphic details of war are blended with
sculptures representing the incidents of
Egyptian campaigns, the list of van
eL.r3 MI anI eAnnIInra1 aIrlps
The eldest Of all treatises copied on the
walls of the court of Caranak, remains
long after the original engraved on a
plate of silver has forever disappeared
in the crucible of time.
Yet even these are secondary in i'm
portance to that research which has
opened every tomb and joined the bro
ken clue of history and contempo-
raneous monuments inaccessible to the
Egyptian and unintelligible to the
Greek historians of the country. Criti-
cism in this respect has supplanted ira
dition. Not only rocks and metals,
however but the most fragile of all ma
terials, papyrus, has handed down de-
tails of Egyptian history. About 1000
rolls and fragments have been discov-
cred and preserved. Unfortunately,
the Turin papyrus, the canon of histo-
ry or list of all the kings with their sue
cessions, years, months, and days of
reign, and in some instances the dura-
ton of their life. has only escaped the
ravages of time in tatters, and it is i'm
possible to patch them together.
1t is supposed to be a system compiled
from all extant and contemporaneOus
sources, representing the idea of the
date of the world as known to the
Egyptians. Much difficulty exists in re-
conciling these data with Cynchronistic
history. Still it is wonderful how
many of the important outlines
of Egyptian history have been discov-
cred. a great deal still remains to be
done to fill up defective portions, for
the subject is by no means exhausted.
Fresh and younger students would find
a new and attractive inquiry of novel
kind reward the efforts of research.
Il