Frenchman Champollion

Frenchman Champollion, a little later, with the result that the firm foundations of the modern science
of Egyptology were laid. Subsequently such students as Rosellini the Italian, Lepsius the German, and
Wilkinson the Englishman, entered the field, which in due course was cultivated by De Rouge in
France and Birch in England, and by such distinguished latter-day workers as Chabas, Mariette,
Maspero, Amelineau, and De Morgan among the Frenchmen; Professor Petrie and Dr. Budge in
England; and Brugsch Pasha and Professor Erman in Germany, not to mention a large coterie of
somewhat less familiar names. These men working, some of them in the field of practical exploration,
some as students of the Egyptian language and writing, have restored to us a tolerably precise
knowledge of the history of Egypt from the time of the first historical king, Mena, whose date is placed
at about the middle of the fifth century B.C. We know not merely the names of most of the subsequent
rulers, but some thing of the deeds of many of them; and, what is vastly more important, we know,
thanks to the modern interpretation of the old literature, many things concerning the life of the people,
and in particular concerning their highest culture, their methods of thought, and their scientific
attainments, which might well have been supposed to be past finding out. Nor has modern investigation
halted with the time of the first kings; the recent explorations of such archaeologists as Amelineau, De
Morgan, and Petrie have brought to light numerous remains of what is now spoken of as the predynastic
perioda period when the inhabitants of the Nile Valley used implements of chipped stone, when their
pottery was made without the use of the potter's wheel, and when they buried their dead in curiously
cramped attitudes without attempt at mummification. These aboriginal inhabitants of Egypt cannot
perhaps with strict propriety be spoken of as living within the historical period, since we cannot date
their relics with any accuracy. But they give us glimpses of the early stages of civilization upon which
the Egyptians of the dynastic period were to advance.