ings must be as old, at least, as the
oldest human remains which have been found in Egypt. To attempt to
measure by years the remoteness of the period when these were committed
to the earth, is futile, for no date that could be given them is likely
to be even approximately correct, and they may as well date from B.C.
12,000 as from B.C. 8000. Of one fact, however, we may be quite certain;
that is to say, that the oldest human remains that have been found in
Egypt bear upon them traces of the use of bitumen, which proves that the
Egyptians at the very beginning of their stay in the valley of the Nile
made some attempt to preserve their dead by means of mummification.
[Footnote: See J. de Morgan, _Ethnographie Prehistorique_, Paris, 1897,
p. 189.] If they were, as many think, invaders who had made their way
across Arabia and the Red Sea and the eastern desert of the Nile, they
may have brought the idea and habit of preserving their dead with them,
or they may have adopted, in a modified form, some practice in use among
the aboriginal inhabitants whom they found on their arrival in Egypt; in
either case the fact that they attempted to preserve their dead by the
use of substances which would arrest decay is certain, and in a degree
their attempt has succeeded.

The existence of the non-historic inhabitants of Egypt has been revealed
to us in recent years by means of a number of successful excavations
which have been made in Upper Egypt on both sides of the Nile by several
European and native explorers, and one of the most striking results has
been the discovery of three different kinds of burials, which
undoubtedly belong to three different periods, as we may see by
examining the various objects which have been found in the early graves
at Nak[=a]dah and other non-historic sites of the same age and type. In
the oldest tombs we find the skeleton laid upon its left side, with the
limbs bent: the knees are on a level with the breast, and the hands are
placed in front of the face. Generally the head faces towards the south,
but no invariable rule seems to have been observed as to its
"orientation." Before the body was laid in the ground it was either
wrapped in gazelle skin or laid in loose grass; the substance used for
the purposes of wrapping probably depended upon the social condition of
the deceased. In burials of this class there are no traces of
mummification, or of burning, or of stripping the flesh from the bones.
In th