Petrie MSS 1.

4 - Petrie Journal 1884 to 1885 Page 31

<Dec. 8,>

more pot handles again []

[] on double handle
[] Helmeted head []
and inscription
[] round balaustium
[] around balaustium [] on double handle
[] around balaustium
[] round bunch of grapes []
[] around balaustium
[] [ ]
on double handle on double handle Here is 57, beside others
illegible at first sight, all in one morning.

The wakil brought in a lovely Greek vase, formed
of a head of Herakles in the lion’s skin; he asked me
for a price, so I I said 2/6 & got it at once.
Petrie MSS 1.4 - Petrie Journal 1884 to 1885 Page 32

And yet more handles []

[] Bull’s head []
full face
[] around balaustium [] head of Apollo
head of Apollo []
[] (sic!)

If they continue pouring in at 100 a day

I do not know what I can do with them; I
trim them down so as to reduce the bulk as
much as possible. But I can’t refuse them
for no one can say that inscribed handles
from Naukratis are not worth 2/6 a hundred.
I got something better however; three weights ,
a bronze [] 462 grs, same standard as 8 others
of that shape which I bought before I came here;
another bronze [] 304 grs or two kat of the
heavy value; & a stone, similar, 65 grs or half
shekel. Also a quantity of pieces of delightful
archaic pottery; two square handles with men’s
heads [] of this style. Many pieces
Petrie MSS 1.4 - Petrie Journal 1884 to 1885 Page 33

of the rouge-crimson & black on buff ground,

griffins, hogs, &c; & fine winged harpy in
black on red-brown of later date. If we can only
get some such things perfect they would be
splendid. I do not hear of any tombs hereabouts;
but such must exist. I have now seen early &
generally archaic pottery in every place where
the digging has gone deep, & I cannot recognize
any real distinction between different parts
of the town.

I have not written anything for some

days, for it seems impossible to get on.
For four mornings we went over the
mounds looking for workers, & could
get none. This is just harvest time for
the durra or maize, & everyone who
will work is in the fields, leaving only
a few loafers about who will not do
anything. About a dozen have
nibbled at the question, but gone off
because I do not offer higher pay. I
begin to doubt if I shall get any for
2 ½ piastres, & shall offer 3 in future: they
ask for 4 or 5. On the market day here I
went & over-hauled the weights of the
silver dealers; I got out their weights in
use eight ancient ones; [black stone []
612 grains = 5 shekels of 122 : black stone []
Petrie MSS 1.4 - Petrie Journal 1884 to 1885 Page 34

246 grs = 2 shekels : bronze [] (regular

Egyptian form) of 700 grs (but worn) = 5 kats.
four Cufic? weights [] 2221, 901, 850, &
460 grains, evidently 5, 2 & 1 of the unit.
Also a medieval weight?, bronze, octagonal,
of 245 grains. Also a man brought a
black stone weight [] of 788 grs. = 6 shekels
or 1/10 mina, which I do not remember
before.]

I found one of the Pyramid Arabs here

who first told me of the place; so I had
a talk to him, & agreed that if he staid
away, & kept away the other Arab
dealers <who come> from the Pyramids so long as
I was here, I would give him gold
bakshish when I left, more or less
according to whether I bought more
or less. In fact I have bought him out
& made him act police for me to keep
the others away. If we did not do so, I
might lose most of the things; & his getting
anything from me depends of on his efficiency
in the agreement. So he asked to have
it in writing, that I should have any
dealers that came there imprisoned, &c, &c;
& with that wherewith to terrify his
acquaintances, & a couple of francs in his
pocket, I dismissed him. I am glad to have
settled this before the digging season begins.
Petrie MSS 1.4 - Petrie Journal 1884 to 1885 Page 35

As I cannot get on with anything else, I have

been going about the neighbourhood. I went
to Tell Afrin a large mound 6 miles S
W S W of here (marked, but unnamed, on the map)
It seems to have been a great city of the XXVI
dynasty, covering over half a square mile.
The bricks are 15 to 16.5 x 7.2 to 7.9 x 4.4 & 4.5
which shew about this age; & the scraps
of drab-green pilgrim bottles are of this
date. Nothing It must have been ruined
in the Persian wars, as nothing of Greek
or Roman age is found. Very little bronze is
found, & no late pottery is to be seen; but
they get fine scarabs & images of pottery &
of stone here. There is a central citadel
made – like that at Tell Yehudiyeh – by sand
heaped up in crude brick walls. There are
straight walls of brick around the town, &
a long road paved with fine limestone
(now all dug up) running through the town
about 10° N of W. The whole site has been much
excavated for sebach, insomuch that that parts are
now 40 feet below the sandmound. There are
many large walls of buildings, & in parts a great
quantity of limestone chips. There is a natural
gezireh or piece of desert on the south & west.
I went to El Mesin, but there is nothing there.
Petrie MSS 1.4 - Petrie Journal 1884 to 1885 Page 36

I also went to a most promising name

“El Hagar el Mahruk” the burnt stones;
but there is not a scrap of ancient stone,
burnt or unburnt, to be seen, except a red
granite corn rubber. The village called
Zarrak on the map, is really Rezáf el Gabra.
I had a drenching coming back from there
this morning, the first rain we have had.

At the mosque of Nebīreh there are

some ancient stones. A fine Romano
Greek altar, circular, with bulls heads
& garlands, in blue limestone. A
red granite pillar cut out of an inscribed
block, of which remains

[] possibly part of

Usorkon, but the
2nd sign is [] & not []/< [] >

There is a byzantine capital in white

marble; & 5 Roman marble <columns, one with Corinthian> capital in
the mosque. These shew that Naukratis
was still of importance in Roman
Petrie MSS 1.4 - Petrie Journal 1884 to 1885 Page 37

times. I

[I have not done much in pot handles, as I thought

I might be preventing people from coming to work
by paying them thus; so I discouraged them,
but only lost my handles thereby. The few I
have got are []
[] This last is strange
spelling []]

There are some curious objects; of which I have

picked up three; discs of pottery, one plain,
two others rather convex, 1 ¾ to 2 ¾ diam,
with two holes pierced through near one side.
The most carefully made is thus,

section
[] [] grooves on
flattened
edge
(only on this
largest one)
Petrie MSS 1.4 - Petrie Journal 1884 to 1885 Page 38

These remind me of Schliemann’s images,

but there is no trace of a beak to any
of them. Of course I shall keep all I can
see. I have also another marble whorl,
& some in pottery : no trace of figuring
on them, & by the two nicks in the edge of
the first marble I think they must be
spindle whorls. These whorls are up to 3 ¾ ins
diam. A large plummet in red pottery
is not common. I found a scrap of hieroglyph
on red granite on the mound, shewing that
Egyptian things exist here; it appears to be
[]; also a piece of a very large basalt
weight of the usual type [] which was 5 ins
across & 3 ¼ high; this would be over 4 lbs,
probably 500 kats, when perfect. I bought a
pretty Roman terracotta of a soldier boy, bearing
a large oval shield reaching from neck to
feet & a dagger. Also the upper part of a fine
XXVI dyn ushabti of one [] or
variant []; Ra can hardly be read at
the end thus, perhaps it is Asherepetakhi.
Asherenpetakhi; his mothers name is given []
Aa-aenha. He was chief of the works []
This was found here, & also shews that there
was an Egyptian town here, beside Naukratis.
I have been expecting Mr Griffith these two days,
& went to Teh el Barud to meet him, but all in
vain.
Petrie MSS 1.4 - Petrie Journal 1884 to 1885 Page 39

<Dec. 11>

I went again to Teh el Barud to day, Thursday,

& this time Mr Griffith came; we waited
some time at the station to try & get camels
to carry the baggage, but none would go
as the rain had made the roads so slippery;
so at last we packed up what he most
wanted on a donkey & brought it over
leaving the boxes to come another day.
As he is quite ready for it we are to start
tomorrow for Sais, walking over with
traps on a donkey, stopping one day, &
coming back next day. We shall take
Said & Mohammed with us leaving Abu
Saud & Abd es Salam in charge here. As
we may not be back in time for the
mail I shall post this at Teh el Barud
on the way. We had an hour or so
on the mounds of Naukratis this afternoon
on the way. They say the shekh has a
spare room at Sa-el-Hagar so we
shall not need the tent.

I had a card from M. Naville to day, saying

that he was at Tawileh, & as he wished to
see me asking what I was doing. I replied
that I should be glad if he would come over
here any time, but that I should be away for
four or five days at Sais.
Petrie MSS 1.4 - Petrie Journal 1884 to 1885 Page 40

8. Nebireh. Decr 21/84

Mrs Petrie
8. Crescent Rd
Bromley
Kent–
[This page was not photocopied.]
Petrie MSS 1.4 - Petrie Journal 1884 to 1885 Page 41

<Dec: 11/84.>

We had settled to start for <Sais,> Sa-el-Hagar, but

the morning was so threatening that we were
in doubt about it. However it looked as if
it would clear & so we started about 9.
I posted my letter on passing Teh el Barud
as I might not return in time for the mail.
I got letters from home, but none with
document about the San monuments as
promised last mail by Mr Poole. All three
papers came right; we went on for Nekleh;
I much wished to go a more direct way
to Sa, but they insisted that that was the
way for the ferry, so I could but submit.
The result was that we took an inordinate
time, & it was dark before we bl reached
San el Hagar. We had to cross a canal, &
also the Nile, which took a long time, in the
ferry boats. By dark we were still a mile
or two off, & Said was too frightened to go in
the dark, so enquiring for the nearest
Shekh’s house he went to ask for
hospitality. I had wished to take tent &
be independant; but Said assured me
that the Shekh of Sa was so certain to
take us in, that there was no need, &
so now we had to take our chance.
Happily our chance at this village of Godabeh
was to fall on the house of Yusuf Bey Hetateh
& though he was in Cairo his son Khalifeh Hetateh
was there and was giving judgment in the gate
Petrie MSS 1.4 - Petrie Journal 1884 to 1885 Page 42

as we came in. Of course we were made

welcome & sat on the seat of judgement.
This was a large room raised about three
feet – on one side of the gateway (the right
of a on entering) with a seat all round it.
The plaintiffs & defendants stood in the
passage below, & state their cases &
received judgement from the shekh seated
on a corner of the dais: much in this fashion
“Bring three dollars at once” “But
your honour I have not three dollars”.
“But you must”. “But there is not the
money”. “Then bring two dollars”. “Yes, oh!
my lord, but I must go home for them
& I will bring them tomorrow”. “In the
morning”; “Yes in the morning”. “Is that
one word” (i.e. without prevarication) “Yes
one word” “ Get along then” (Etla barra)
He moved but slowly away, so very forcibly
he was told Etla barra. Then after
several men had been thus disposed f of
(all in the dusk by the light of one lamp
hanging in the archway) the judgements
had to be read over in a sing-song voice
by a clerk squatting in the corner of the
dais-room; continually checked by the shekh
stopping him & giving a different turn to a
sentence. Meanwhile across all this I was
being questioned by a man who was
Petrie MSS 1.4 - Petrie Journal 1884 to 1885 Page 43

sitting on the opposite side of the shekh to me,

& talking across the shekh. At first I thought
he meant mischief & wanted to pick some
hole in my doings, but I soon found that
he was only curious & fairly intelligent. He
was a staff officer, with some general ideas
on the existence of a school of hieroglyphics,
of various people who could read them, on
photography (of which he said he had done some
himself) & on there being such a thing as a
triangulation survey of the country, & the
officials connected with it – Gibson – & Mason.
We got on swimmingly after a time, they
insisted on our feeding there as they
said that Col. Moncrieff & others always
did so (I had only asked for sleeping
room, & said I had all my things with me);
& then at last dinner came in for us there
alone in European manner, the officer
Griffith & myself, in a room into which he
has conducted us. Then after dinner a
younger brother of the shekh came in, also a
very bright lively fellow; & I had to do all
the talking in Arabic as well as I could, for
no one understood a word of English. I did
not think that I could have held out so
long, but they were sharp enough to keep to
a simple vocabulary such as I used, & I could
generally catch their meaning somehow. Then
Petrie MSS 1.4 - Petrie Journal 1884 to 1885 Page 44

the shekh’s brother asked if I played cards,

(this I only caught by his sign for shuffling) & as
I did not he had out the back gammon board,
& beat me completely in the first game,
which I returned by doing him quite as
thoroughly in the second. Afterward the shekh
came in, & soon after we were shown to
our room, where to our surprise were
two iron bedsteads with mosquito curtains.
Here we had a good sleep, & turning
out next morning early, left before
any but the servants were astir. Said
did not reckon that it would give any
offence to do so, & I wished to avoid
losing time. We reached Sa-el-Hagar
by about 9, & setting our things in an
empty ruined farm yard lighted the
stove, & had a first look at the mounds
while it boiled up. The great walls of
the city, enclosing a space about half a mile
by a third of a mile I should guess, are
mostly in place, & about thirty feet high,
while in part of the interior is a great
mass of ruined houses. After returning for
breakfast we had a long ramble all over it,
& out to a low heap on the S/<N>.E. where is
the lower part of a broken sarcophagus lid; it
is in black basalt of the finest work of the
XXVI dynasty. This we copied, & then, after
seeing more of the ruins, had a slight lunch,
& started off to cross the Nile that afternoon
Petrie MSS 1.4 - Petrie Journal 1884 to 1885 Page 45

on the way back. I did not wish to stop at

Sa-el-Hagar this night as it was so very
dirty & smelt so filthy. I heard that the
shekh had had a letter about me from the
Mudir at Damanhur, & was quite prepared
to look after me if I did stop. However, we
crossed the Nile at a much lower place &
far more direct than before, & came to
a village, Bittukh; here we found another
grand shekh’s house, belonging to Hadji
Mabruk Bey ed Dīb. He was as hospitable
as the previous shekh, & it happened that we
just lighted by accident on the two biggest
shekhs of the district, two of the four Beys
<next> under the Mudir. I had hoped to pitch
on small men, of whom we could just
have a room, feed ourselves, & not
find them above a small bakhshish. Well
after sitting an hour or so in the gate,
while Yusuf Bey sat attending to business,
we had dinner all together, Yusuf & five of
his people, Griffith & myself & Said & Muhammed
invited as well. We sat on chairs round
a big round tray & dipped our spoons
or our hands in the central dish, & paid
no regard to the knife & fork which Yusuf
had provided for each of us, tearing up &
gnawing legs of fowls in a fashion which
Petrie MSS 1.4 - Petrie Journal 1884 to 1885 Page 46

he thought highly proper on our parts.

After dinner I had a little talk with him &
a Syrian who is round here trading. The
Syrian says that he has several things
(including inscribed gold rings) found at
Sais, & promised to send them over to
Nebireh for me to see. Then we went
to our room, & soon a levée (or
rather dormée) came in to see &
hear our doings, mine were in at
once, while Griffith wrote journal, &
Said & I kept them in talk. There were
several of the Harry the 8th type of Egyptian,
beside various strange characters: – a
lithe, subtile-looking Indian lad, who
told me that he was from Hind, that he had
his papers with him, & with sundry pointing
& mysterious sign-language to help his
lame Arabic told me that he did not
care for the shekh, that the shekh could
beat the fellah & get money from him,
but that he could not touch him because he
had his papers <(i.e. as a British subject)> & did not care a snap of the
fingers for the shekh. He was a servant of
the Syrian travelling dealer, whom Said
dubbed a Yehudi to the Indians disgust.
Petrie MSS 1.4 - Petrie Journal 1884 to 1885 Page 47

Then there were sundry negro servants

who accepted my general offer of a taste of
quinine, as I was taking a dose; & one
of whom rolled in contortions on the
floor when he tasted the bitter of it, &
pulled many & dirty lumps of sugar
from his pocket, & broke many scraps
off them to sweeten his mouth with
afterwards. At last they all disappeared
& we went to bed, Griffith in an iron
bed stead with red silk curtains, while I
preferred my roll of blankets on a divan,
& Said & Muhammed slept on the floor.
After a good night we made an early
start & had breakfast after an hour
or two by the side of a canal, boiling up
stove as there was no wind. Then on
again until near Teh el Barud. Griffith
found his watch was still at Bittukh, &
had to turn back with Said to fetch it; I went
on with Muhammed & the donkey to Nebireh.
There while reading in the afternoon in
came a police officer & four men who
had been trying to find me for four
days, not having exact directions as to my
Petrie MSS 1.4 - Petrie Journal 1884 to 1885 Page 48

whereabouts. The officer was a very quiet

reasonable pleasant man, not at all like
that old brute Ibrahim of Fakus; I wrote a
letter thanking Baker Bey for the attentions
& saying that just a <single> guard at night was all
that appeared in the least necessary for a
permanency, though of course a visit from
the police thus has an excellent effect. This
was to show that the officer had duly carried
out his instructions.

Then when I had got supper going, in

came Griffith & Said, the watch of course
was all safe. They had seen some antikas
at Teh el Barud, at a Greek’s, which I must
go over tomorrow & inspect. There seems
some more chance of workmen now,
but the durra is not finished yet. I am
offering 3 piastres now; & I got a letter
from Dr Grant saying that wages in
Cairo are 4 piastres at present.

Finished
13, Decr/84

9. Nebireh.
Dec. 25.

Mrs Petrie
8, Crescent Rd
Bromley,
Kent –
Petrie MSS 1.4 - Petrie Journal 1884 to 1885 Page 49

Monday 15 Dec

Went into market in morning

getting eggs, butter, date, sugar cane, oranges,
&c; & – best of all – some more weights.
One bronze [] is 265 grains or a heavy two
shekels; & two cufic [] of 427 & 226
grains or ounce & half ounce. After writing
up the report on Sais, I went over with
Said to Teh el Barud, to see some antikas
there. I found a letter at the P. O. saying
that Mrs Amos & Maurice were going to
come over on Wednesday, to which I replied
by card. The antikas were a fine bronze
head <& shoulders> of Horus, <5 ins high> hawk headed with disc on head, &
the whole richly inlaid all over with gold, with
a cartouche on the breast, which must I think be
of Aahmes []. Most unhappily it had been
all scraped to clean it, the gold was all scratched,
& the cartouche so damaged that I can only
guess at it by nothing else being more
possible to fit it. They wanted ₤8; I would
have given ₤5 at once if the cartouche had
not been damaged, but as it was I did not
say more than ₤3; possibly we may agree
over it someday. Also a slab of sculpture
from an early tomb; of three figures of no
interest: some small objects of which I bought
a couple of scarabs; and a leaf of a parchment
book, written either in Greek or Coptic; but so
full of nam contractions that I could not make out
more than the name of saints occurring at
Petrie MSS 1.4 - Petrie Journal 1884 to 1885 Page 50

every entry []

[], &c, &c. It seemed as if it were
a calendar of saints; the entries being only
two to four lines each. The dealer told me
that it was one leaf out of a book of 165; it
is finely written in red, two columns, on
both sides of the leaf, writing about 5 x 8 ins.
If Greek it would be of about 8th cent I
should imagine, but Coptic may have
continued uncial much later. I offered a
couple of pounds for the book in any case,
but said I did not know what it was or
the value of it. I shall look in again in a
few days & see if I can see it all; it may
contain other things beside the hagiology.
As I saw a lot of men in market & had a
long talk to them about work here, &
wages, &c, & told them to come up tomorrow
if they would, I was in hopes of getting
workers at last. So on Tuesday I was out
early with Abu Saud & others, but not a
soul turned up. This is very disgusting, but
as there is not a man digging sebach on the
mound, & I am told that there are hundreds
digging when not otherwise engaged, it is
clear that all available labour is still
occupied with the harvest. The durra is