Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1920-11-24
Relics from Egypt
and Babylonia Ar
rive at Uni. of Chicago

dIlO DdUylOIIld al
rive at Uni. of Chicago
Chicago. Nov. 2s-Fresh from the
Near East. 81 big boxes of relics Of an
Gent Egypt and Babylonia are now
being unpacked at the University of
Chicago. They were brought recently
after an adventuresome trip by DR.. J..
H, Breasted. professor of Oriental his
tory and Egyptoidgy. In the judg-
ment of museum officials here. they
make the Oriental museum at the Uni
versity of Chicago the finest Of its
kind in the United States.
The university professor and his staff
of four were the first white men to
cross the Arab state after it was pro-
claimed, going from Bagdad to Aleppo.
At times the expedition travelled at
great personal risk.
The aim of the party was to sur
vey the most important buried cities
of the Near East in regard to the work
of excavation. DR.. Breasted said he
saw ancient cities, now merely mounds
VI EulIlS, Thai were not Oh lHe map
and were totally unknown to science.
Because of his knowledge of condi-
tions in the country behind Syria, DIR.
Breasted was asked by the British
government at Cairo to go on diplo-
matte mission to the British foreign
Office at London and at the expense of
changing his plans for returning home,
he did SO. DR.. Breasted disclosed here.
The traditional friendship of the
Arabs for the English has now turn
ed to hatred, DR.. Breasted reported.
This. he said, was due TO the British
giving over Syria to the French after
they had promised the Arabs their own
kingdom in recompense for the, help
they gave the British against the
Turks.
British political agents were being
murdered by the Arabs in Mespotamia
while the University Of Chicago ex-
petition was in that country. DR.. Breas-
ted said. He related that British
colonel who knew the Arabs in
timately was later killed at the identi-
cal camping place the university par
ty had stopped at a short time before.
THE English rule in Mespotamia is
however the greatest blessing that ever
came to the country DR.. Breasted
said. at is accomplishing wonders in
quieting the turbulent Arabs and in
bringing in civilized conditions. Amy
one who knows the Near East cannot
fail to rejoice at the British occupa-
ton, and most of all the archeologist."
At,;c l. h4
British. the party determined to push
on without protection across the des-
erts to the Mediterranean. They for
tunate!y found the Arabs friendly to
Americans.
One of the prizes brought back to
the Chicago oriental museum is an As
syrian prism chronicling the destruc-
ton of Sennacharib's army before
Jerusalem. This great Assyrian king
and sorely troubled Hezekiah, king of
Judah. 1t is related in the Book of
Isaiah that Hezekiah sent for the proph-
ct Isaiah, that Isaiah prophesied that
Sennacharib would not enter Jerusalem
but would return to Assyria by the
way that he came. and that the Assy-
rian's army suffered a great destruc-
ton.
This is a six sided prism containing
the royal annals of Sennacherib," DR..
Breasted said. 'It relates the chief
campaigns of his western wars and
chronicles this incident told Of in
Isaiah. There is similar prism in
the British Museum. but ours is three
years older. and it is the first in the
United States
A flint knife blade with a sharp edge.
which DR.. Breasted characterized as
the finest piece of Clipped stone known
to man. is another of the prizes of the
collection. Still another is small
blue vase from Egypt. where glass was
first used. which the professor said
showed the first artistic use made of
glass.
A picture of early Egyptian home
life is afforded by group of % figures
found in an Egyptian tomb. Servants
making bread. washing. making music
on q drum and doing other familiar
things about the house 1000 or 5000
years ago, go to make up the most
complete group of the kind. it is said.
that has ever been uncovered in one
tomb.