The Wellington enterprise. [volume] (Wellington, Ohio) 1867-188?, 1882-05-10
DRIED MONARCHS.

has been greatly stimulated by the
famous discovery of royal mummies
made ut Thebes LAST summer. The adj
dition to the Boolak Museum of nearly
forty collins, together with fragments
of coffins and innumerable other objects,
would in any case have been remarks
BILE event. But when it is added that no
fewer than ten of these collins contain
these the bodies of Kings, and that among
are comprised some of the greatest
monarchs who ever filed the throne of
Pharaoh, We can understand that peo-
pie who care little to thread the intrica-
once be excited by that curiosity which
royalty always arouses-even royalty
dead and buried for thirty centuries.
The building in which the finest Egyp-
tian collection extant Is housed can not
be considered worthy of its Contents.
Though considerably improved from
what Il was before Sir Rivers Wilson's
tenure of Office, 1t is still far from safe,
and during the last inundation was In
the utmost danger, owing to the failure
of an embankment higher up the river.
The care these old Kings bestowed
upon what they called their sseverlast--
ing habitations," /" has availed only to
preserve their bodies as q show for the
stranger of 5000 years later. Little
win the modern Investigator reverence
the dead. To him each coffin with its
contents is merely an archaeological
monument, worthless except as possibly
throwing light on some historical ques-
tion. When all the wrappings are re-
moved, Thothmes will be as Rameses-
brown, bituminous mummy, indistin-
guishable from any of the countless SINH
lar mummies abounding in European
museums, or strewing with fragments
the hillsides of Sakkara. Perhaps M.
Maspero and his coadjutors, or the
present ruler of Egypt, may think it but
due to departed greatness to make a
sepulcher where at least the corpses
may be decently deposited. The great
interest and Importance of this discov-
cry are, confess, overshadowed in my
mind by q feeling of regret that remains
which thirty centuries and more have
respected will now be probably be
looked upon as rubbish, to be got rid of
at the next high Nile.
To any one with q knowledge, how
ever slight, of the history of Egypt, the
mere names of the Kings whose mum
mics have been brought into the garish
light of this nineteenth century are full
of associations of the highest interest.
The series commences with gigantic
coffin, painted white, and bearing long
inscription in black on the breast. II
contains the body of the patriarch of
the Egyptian Royalty of what Mariette
distinguished as the s New Empire. -
Many remember the name of Tfaaken
Raskenen, about whom such q tantaliz-
ing little fragment has been published.
He preceded Aahmes, the first King of
the famous eighteenth dynasty, and the
fragment which Is in the British Museum
tells ous of the beginning of his contest
with northern King, Apapi, who dwelt
In the City Of Haver, and is generally
recognized as one of the Hyksos or
Shepherds, about whom so much has
been written, but about whom so little
is known. Raskenen was the father, It
is now al but certain, of the Queen
Aah-hotep, whose jewels were exhibited
in Paris in 1868, Her-husband appears
to have been Kames Uaz-Khaper-Ra,
q successful General, sometimes spoken
of as himself, perhaps in her right, a
King, and she was the mother of Aah-
mes, the founder of the eighteenth
dynasty. The inscription on the coffin of
Raskenen contains no historical record,
except his name and q prayer to the gods
of the dead on his behalf. Beside him
lies his grandson, Aahmes-the coffin
of whose mother, Aah-hotep, was al
ready in the Museum; the lid removed,
and the royal mummy swathed in
wreaths OF what 5000 years ago were
fresh loftus-fowers. They are faded
and dry now, and so fragile that atouch
destroys them. seen
Next to King Aahmes is his wife, in a
crimson coffin, her body wrapped in
grave clothes of pink cambria, with
bands of white, so fresh, so delicate in
color, that no effort of mine suffices to
realize the fact that Nefertary must have
died long before Moses was born. Close
to her and her royal husband is their
son, Amenhotep l., his face covered
with a brilliantly painted mask, and his
body, like that of his father, wreathed
with flowers and leaves. On his breast
his name is written with q singular vari-
alton, referring apparently to his love
for his country, "Amenhotep united
with Egypty." 1t recalls Napoleon's
whom he had loved so well, (" but had,
we must hope, some better foundation
in fact. Attracted perhaps by the flow
ers wasp entered the royal coffin at
the last moment before it was closed
and was found among the wreaths. By
the side of the great Amenhotep rests
the body of his young brother, Se-Amen,
and near him coffin inscribed with the
name of his sister, the Princess Set-Amen,
which, when opened, was found to con-
tain nothing but q bundle of reeds packed
so as to resemble the outline of the
human form surmounted by an infants
skull. This is not the only example of
such deception among the number of
the supposed mummies. s
A little behind the rest is an empty
coffin It bears the name of Thothmes
l., but contained the body of Penetzen,
the King who reigned six or seven
hundred years after the extinction of the
eighteenth dynasty. Nothing can show
more plainly than this appropriation the
comparatively inferior position of the
late King. The mummy of Thothmes
II. is safe, but that of his famous sister,
Hatasoo, does not appear. Another
Queen, who bore the same throne name,
Maka-Ra, was at first mistaken for her.
Thothmes III. is here, however, and.
strange to say, owing to the fault of the
embalmers, or to come other cause, IL
became necessary to unroll his mummy
soon after it reached the museum, as
mildew had begun to appear. No orna,
ments were found on this royal corpse,
but it wrapped in a shroud Of cambria
so fine as to compare favorably with the
| finest now made in Ulster.
The interest of every visitor to Boolah
reaches its highest point as the coffin Of
Rameses III. is reached Yet here.