Social life in ancient Egypt / by W.M. Flinders Petrie.

  • Flinders Petrie
Date:
1923
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Social life in ancient Egypt / by W.M. Flinders Petrie. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    to the head of the water at Maskhuta-Hero, and thence by natural shallows, enough for light boats. Necho attempted to dredge or cut a canal sufficient for ships, but, failing that, he built them in the Mediterranean and Red Sea. Darius certainly carried out a great canal, as his series of fine granite monuments shows, and it is im¬ possible to suppose that when the water in it came near the Red Sea, any difference of level would be imagined. The evidence of Herodotos, that Darius completed it, shows that the story of Diodoros and Strabo is only transferred from Necho. Only Diodoros states that a canal was cut by Ptolemy Philadelphos from the Pelusiac mouth, i.e., a canal from the Mediterranean ; and this seems to be due to some confusion, as there is no other evidence for it. The highest ground traversed by the direct modern canal is 52 feet high ; but an ancient canal might have followed the present fresh-water Abbasiyeh canal to El Qantara without any great difficulty, so the ground levels do not prohibit our accepting the statement of Diodoros. On the opposite side of Egypt there are some surprising works for water in the Oases. A deep bed of sandstone is saturated with water which cannot rise owing to impervious shale beds over it. On sinking through these, an artesian flow rises to the surface, and pours out
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