Early Pre- covering had it been required. In the remains of their settlements have been found
Period**1 various implements and articles of domestic use— cooking-pots, querns, and spindle-whorls,
(sequence- as Well as the flint hoes with which they tilled the ground. But it is, of course, only from
5c)es 3010 the contents of the tombs that it is possible to reconstitute the complete picture of their
life and to judge of its variety and complexity.
Structurally the graves of the Early Predynastic period may be divided into three
classes. The earliest are round holes, cut three or four feet down into the desert marl and
only just wide enough to accommodate the body, which was never mummified but was merely
wrapped in goatskin or sheepskin and reed matting, and laid in the contracted ‘ embryonic
posture. These are succeeded by oval or oblong pits five or six feet in depth, from which
a third type was evolved owing to the necessity for a methodical disposition of the bulky
jars and numerous small objects interred. The pit was now cut back at the bottom for
a foot or two into the rock, and in the recess thus formed was laid the body wrapped in
its cloth and sheepskin and mat, while the pottery and the larger of the other objects
were placed in the pit beside it.
The character of the tomb-equipment proves that this primitive folk had at least the
same general idea of a future life as their successors, who believed that the dead continued
in the lower world to follow such occupations as had engrossed them during life.
With the men were buried their weapons of war and the chase, beautiful flint knives and
lances, or solid maces of finely polished stone, with sometimes a model of a boat, or clay
figures of men and animals. The women were adorned with their ornaments and
supplied with the accessories of the toilet. For necklaces they had strings of beads
made of carnelian, steatite, haematite, serpentine, garnet, and lapis lazuli; or sometimes
of such rarer materials as glazed stone, silver, or even gold in the form of a thin leaf
moulded over a core of clay. In their hair they wore ivory pins and combs carved in
the form of animals or birds, and on their wrists they had bracelets of ivory or shell.
Generally, too, they took with them to the underworld the palettes on which malachite
was ground for face-paint; the slates which served this purpose are carved in many
different forms of birds and beasts, and often still show a stain of green in the hollow
produced by the pebble rubber. Finally, with men and women alike were buried stone
vases and quantities of fine and coarse earthenware vessels. Both the pottery and the
stone were worked freehand without the aid of wheel or lathe, and the grace and even
the symmetry of the finest examples must arouse the highest admiration. To fashion
stone without the aid of any mechanical appliance demanded infinite skill and
perseverance when the materials were not only the soft limestone and alabaster, but also
such stubborn rocks as basalt, syenite, porphyry and breccia. The block was
laboriously ground out with sandstone or emery; its surface was dexterously polished,
and eventually it was shaped into a twy-eared hanging vase, a cylindrical jar or shallow
bowl.
The pottery, which affords a peculiarly interesting study, is incomparably finer than
any which was made in subsequent times when the wheel was in general use. It may
be considered as falling into seven different classes, which include an almost infinite variety
of forms. Three of the classes are closely related, and comprise haematitic wares
treated by different methods. The simplest variety has a uniform red colouring, obtained
by firing the pots in such a way that the air circulated freely about them, so that the
haematitic facing was subjected to no chemical alteration. A second class was produced
by a modification in the process of burning; the pots were partially buried mouth
downwards in the ashes, and the consequent limitation of the air reduced the haematite
to magnetic oxide, forming a lustrous black border to the brilliant red of the remaining
surface. These two kinds of ware were probably of indigenous origin, though the
existence in later times of an analogous red technique in Syria, as well as in North
Africa, suggests that they represent a very widely diffused ceramic tradition. The
Bronze age of Cyprus is prolific in similar types, which, however, were probably produced
under Egyptian influence. A third variety is distinguished by its peculiar decoration,
the plain red surface being painted with white patterns and designs, which are of the
greatest interest, since they belong to a style which is perpetuated in modern Algeria,
and may be traced throughout the geometrical art of North Africa from the Mediterranean
to the Niger.
Curiously similar to the last in respect of ornamentation, though otherwise wholly
different in character, is a fourth class, which is unquestionably a foreign importation.
This is a black slip ware with incised designs filled in with white, which is of extreme
rarity in Egypt, but has been found in abundance on the Spanish site of Ciempozuelos.
It occurs also in Sardinia, in Crete, and at Hissarlik, and closely resembles the black
incised pottery of prehistoric Bosnia as well as the similar fabric which was reintroduced
into Egypt just after the Twelfth Dynasty.
A remarkable type of jar makes its first appearance about halfway through the
Early Predynastic period. It is characterized by horizontal ledge-handles placed one
on each side of the vessel at the point where it attains its greatest diameter. These
handles are treated as an ornamental feature, and are moulded with the finger into
bold undulations. Precisely similar wavy-handled pots have been found on pre-Jewish
sites in Palestine; and though attributable to a much later time the Palestinian examples,
which can hardly have originated independently, are doubtless connected directly or
indirectly with those which are now under consideration. No contemporary foreign
source is known from which they could have been derived, and they may therefore
be regarded as the survivals of an earlier style which was either the parent or the
close relative of the Predynastic Egyptian.
A handsome and attractive _ pottery, which had a great vogue in the Middle
Predynastic period, is not infrequent after the first stages of the Early Predynastic. It
is decorated with designs and figures painted in a dull red on the rough yellowish
clay. The earliest patterns are imitated from cordage and from marble; spirals then
became very popular, and were succeeded by plant forms and by rude pictures of boats,
of human figures and of animals. Besides these more decorative kinds, a rough-faced
pottery of very coarse fabric was manufactured in a great variety of shapes, and is
particularly familiar from the numerous large jars filled with the ashes of funeral feast
or sacrifice which normally accompany the interments of this time.
L ate Predynastic (sequence-dates 50 to 70).
The Late Predynastic is so intimately connected with the Earlier Predynastic period
that it is almost an act of violence to divorce the one from the other. For the particular
purposes of this volume, however, it was necessary to make some such division. We
wished to arrange our series in such a way as to be able to examine the question whether
the people of the Protodynastic time were or were not identical with those of the
Predynastic. In order to do this it was advisable in the first instance to exclude those
middle stages which might be merely transitional, and therefore misleading from the
l^O- MACIVER C
Ea rly Predynastic
Period
(sequence-
dates 30 to
50).
Late Predynastic
(sequence-
dates 50 to
70).