The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1916-10-06
SOLVE MYSTERY 0FETH!OP|A'S OBSCURE HISTORY Egyptian Expedition Finds Ten Large Statues
 Of Rulers.
TEMPLES UNEARTHED
 BUILT IN 16OO B. c.
Find Last Votive Offerings Gifts of Worshippers
 Of Meroitic Age.

Of Meroitic Age.
 Cairo, Egypt, Oct. 4-Important
 discoveries which are said to have SUD- piled much of the hitherto obscure his
 tory of ancient Ethiopia were made re-
 gently by the Egyptian Expedition sent
 by Harvard University and the Boston
 Museum of Fine Arts under the di-
 rectorship of Dr. George A. Reisner.
 well known as an Psychologist.
 ! In an interview with a representa-
 tive of The Associated Press, Dr. Res
 finer said that during excavations at | Gebel Barkal material bearing on the
 whole period between 1900 B. c. and 100 A. D. had been found and. that prospects were that further excava- tion would bring to light objects of still greater importance.
 Among the more important finds
 have been ten large statues of kings of Ethiopia Five of these were near ly complete and five were lacking the heads but it is believed these will be found. The expedition has also un- covered the foundations of temples built by Egyptian kings of the Eigh- teenth Dynasty and shown that the sphinxes of Amenophis III, and other monGnents of that period found at Barkal belong to these temples and were not brought here in later times as some historians have assumed. De- scrib1ng the work, Dr. Reisner said: "Gebe1 Barka1, which is in the dis trict of Napata, lies 250 miles up the Nile from Kerma in the province of Dongo1a- Napata was the capital of that kingdom of Ethiopia whose ar mics are mentioned in the Old Testa- ment as the opponents of Assyria in the latter part of the eighth century before Christ Gebel Barkal is an up- standing table mountain of sandstone, visible for great distance. From the moment it appears in the Egyp- tan inscriptions it is marked as the Holy Mountain Its selection was no doubt due to it's proximity to Napata, the great city which must have lain on both sides of the Nile. The site of Napata was peculiarly fitted for a great role in the political and commer- cia1 activities of ancient times It lies at the head of the navigable stretch of river between the third and fourth cataracts, at the end of the relatively rich agricultural area of the province and at the junction of five caravan roads through the desert. <
 '"The extent of the city has not yet been determined but there are traces of ruined buildings on both sides of the river. There are at least four groups of pyramids that is, royal cem- eteries in the neighborhood, and the two most distant groups are nearly 20 miles apart In this long stretch, which may be assumed to contain the city of Napata, it is Gebel Barkal and it's immediate neighborhood which has always drawn the attention of modern scholars Beside the mountain stand two groups of pyramids and under the perpendicular face of the rock on the river side six or seven temples have been traceab1e, one of which was very large. These temples have in past times yielded a remarkable series of sculptures and inscriptions which have gone to enrich the museums of Cairo, Lon6on. Paris and Berlin and form the greatest source of our knowledge of history of Ethiopia.
 "Our expedition reached Gebel Bar ka1 from Cairo on January "A, last. We worked there three months, em- blowing a force of about 300 local workmen, and left just in time to es- cape the hot weather. Many peo- pie had worked on the pyramids but no one had yet discovered the plan of the structures and no one knew how to get into them Fortunately at Gebel Barkal there were two com- pletely ruined pyramids of small size which offered the easiest opportunity of solving this mystery. We found in the case of each a stairway on the eastern side leading down to cham bers under the pyramid. With this hint we attacked the larger pyramids and within month we had found the entrances of 25 pyramids and had cleared the burial chambers of all but one.
 "AI the chambers had been repeat ed1y plundered in ancient days for gold. Nevertheless we gathered'a mass of material from which we were able to reconstruct the forms and charac- ter of the greater part of the pottery, implements, and other things charac- teristic of the period. This reconstruct ed group pointed clearly to the first century before Christ as the time in which had lived those little kings who had built these monuments, but in view of the scanty material for com parisop this conclusion may be cen tury away from the truth.
 ."The most interesting objects were red-glazed bowls with relief pattern. red glazed plates. polished vessels of opaoue red or variegated glass. ann phorae, initiating the Rhodian in form and material, a bronze jug with two handles, each ending in a mask, four bronze vessels, piece of wood carved in relief and a wonderful gold brace let with a laquer decoration in Egypto- Meriotic style.
 Towards the end of February the full force was turned on the excava- ton of the temple area The back part of the great temple and almost the whole of the other temples were in a seemingly hopeless state of de- struction. Half a dozen expeditions had dug desultory trepches in these and the natives had used them as ouarries for centuries. In hunting for a suitable place to throw the refuse, we cleared a space beside the first pylon. We found ourselves, how ever. inside the temple enclosure and on the living floor of the Meriotic pe- riod (about 100 B. O To our great surprise, in a hole in this floor, we came on the edge of a pile. of frag- ments of large royal statues Of the nor{od TpveSfipatiOD show