32. Coin of Naukratis. 1: 1
town, underlaid by a bed of ashes, which apparently showed that the first settlement outside of the camp was a cluster of mere booths. Here I found a scarab factory, where they had made the scarabs of white and blue paste, so well known in Greek cemeteries in Rhodes and elsewhere. Hundreds of earthenware moulds and many scarabs were unearthed, and this factory is the leading point for dating the early town. The work of the scarabs is manifestly a Greek imitation of Egyptian style; and the names of the kings upon them show the dates to come down to the time of Uah-ab-ra (Apries), but not a single example of Amasis was found, proving the factory to have been extinct before his time. Probably the great defeat of the Greek troops by Amasis was a severe blow to Greek work for the time; although Naukratis reaped the benefit of the annihilation of the other Greek centres (such as Defenneh), by being tolerated and having the exclusive privilege of trade. The first autonomous coin of Naukratis yet known was found in the town; with heads of Naukratis and of the hero Alexander.
33. Iron Tools. 1, Sickle; 2, 3, Chisels; 4, Axe; 5, 6, Chisels; 7, Axe; 8, Fish-hook; 9, Arrow-head; 10, Hammer. 1: 8.
The old town had been so laid bare by the native diggers, that it was possible to form a tolerable plan of the streets and houses. The street lines were distinguished by the rubbish thrown out, mostly remains of food, shells, and bones; while in later times, from the fifth century, the streets were regularly mended with limestone chips and dust; and often one may trace the section of a puddle hole filled up with chips and levelled. Among the houses many fine pieces of vases were found, and a small hoard of early Greek silver coins and lumps of silver. But the most interesting matter was the history of tools, shown by the variety of iron tools; we here meet, for the first time, what may be looked on as practically our modern forms of chisels, &c.; and we see what a debt we owe to European invention, when we compare these with the bronze tools of the Egyptians which preceded them.
The cemetery has not yet been entirely found; a portion of it, mainly of the Alexandrine age, was cleared by Mr. Gardner, on a low mound to the north of the town, alongside of the canal; but it was not rich, and the principal objects were the Medusa heads, moulded in terra cotta, which were affixed to the wooden coffins. Probably the greater part of it is beneath the modern village.
The potteries of Naukratis were famous in the time of Athenaios, and long before that also, as we see by the great heaps of burnt earth and potters’ waste, and by the distinctive style of much of the early pottery. On comparing the characteristic styles of this place with those of Defenneh, also inhabited by Greeks of the same period, it is plain that most of the vases found were made here by a local school of potters. And though the clay is apparently of Greek origin, yet it would be immeasurably easier to import a ton of clay as ballast in a boat, than to move about a thousand brittle and bulky vases.
We will now sum up the results of this discovery, in its general connection with other antiquities. The site now found fills a gap in Egyptian geography; and it shows us how the Greeks were posted near the capital of that age,—Sais, but toward the Libyan frontier, where defence was needed; moreover they dwelt on a canal, which could be used by Greek traders at all seasons of the year, and which kept them apart from the Egyptians on the Nile. The plan of the town shows the fort, which became the