Show AN EARLY Newly Di Discovered Mummy lived in I Prehistoric Times TIle The re reThe The Egyptian gallery at the British museum has Just come Into possession of oC the mummy of a man JAan which may maywell maywell maywell well be the oldest body of any ant human being bein The facts fact concerning it are briefly summed Bummed up in inthe Inathe the following I inscription reproduced from the case cafe containing the mummy Body of a man who was buried burled in a I shallow oval grave hollowed out of sandstone on the west bank of the Nile in Upper Egypt E Before burial the body was 18 treated with a preparation of bi bitumen bitumen bitumen and was arranged In the posture in which it now lies on its left side Hide with the hands before the face and the knees drawn up nearly on a level with the chin The grave prave which has been roughly imitated by the model here ex cx exhibited exhibited was co covered ered with slabs of un unworked unworked Unworked worked stone and in it beside the body bod were w re disposed dispo ed flint knives and a num number number ber her of vases va partly filled fined with the re remains remains remains mains and dust of funeral offerings The man probably belonged to a fair skinned light haired race which may maybe maybe maybe be regarded as one of the aboriginal storks stocks of Egypt whose who e settlements are usually found on the west bank of the Nile The style of or the flint implements found in the Ule grave glave indicate that the theman theman theman man lived in the Uee th later neolithic period of Egypt that is JE in remote ages long lon before the rule rul of Menes Mene the first his historical historical historical king ef Egypt The grave prave was first seen by a wan wandering wandering dering Arab he e reported his discovery to a British iclal o who immediately sent lent a couple of or Egyptian soldiers to guard it day and night until it could I be safely safety removed The body is not a mummy of the ordinary historic Egyptian Egyptian tian Unit period pe od such as that of oC Rameses II the father of the pharaoh of the Exodus It was never bound up in linen or orea cased ed in any painted coffin but was merely coated with a preparation of bitumen the Arabic word for which is hence our word mummy To reach the period when this thia man hunt hunted hunted hunted I ed along the banks of the Nile it is necessary to travel backward in time through the modern period since Eliz Elizabeth Elizabeth ElIzabeth I abeth through Mediaeval M Europe through the w whole hole history of Rome and Greece pint past the time of the earliest king the museum mu eum possesses past even Menes the earliest king to which Egyptian records make any ref reference reference reference who according to Mariette Marietta ruled about B C Then we are among amon two prehistoric races one the conquerors and the he other the conquer conquered ed out of which sprang the Egyptian race of the earliest dynasties It is with these remote stocks storks that this man nina manis is connected Considering the condi conditions conditions conditions I in which he was found it is evi I 1 Ident Ident dent d nt that he was associated a o e with Ith a late I period of the new ne stone age of Egypt I j I He is buried in a characteristically neo I grave the graves of this period I are covered with rude slabs of stone and nut has neolithic pots and flint implements implements I ments beside him They are like other neolithic pots and chipped flint weapons one ons and knives found in lit other parts of the world The fine thin Hint knives were wen perhaps in the grave as 3 I part of oC a funeral ritual They should be compared with the Egyptian flints I in the prehistoric section of the muse museum um urn they are almost identical with those found in the grave There is of course no inscription of any kind on the pots knives o or 01 grave Ye all having baYing been made long before the invention of a written language It is curious to I note that certain ancient Egyptian doe doc documents mention traditions of oC a race I called the who had red hair I and blue eyes This man has distinctly I auburn hair He was buried on the western shore In later times every Egyptian was buried on that side of the river and Egyptian models of the death boats beau on which the bodies were ferried over the stream may be seen in ift the Egyptian gallery lle |