a curious survival from long past ages. After the time of the XIIth
Dynasty stone was no longer used for tools or weapons, except for the
sacred rite of making the first incision in the dead bodies before
beginning the operations of embalming; for this purpose, as Herodotus
tells us, an "Ethiopian stone" was used. This was no doubt a knife of
flint or chert, like those of the Neolithic ancestors of the Egyptians,
and the continued use of a stone knife for this one purpose only is a
very interesting instance of a ceremonial survival. We may compare the
wigs of British judges.

[Illustration: 014.jpg FLINT KNIFE]

We have no specimen of a flint knife which can definitely be asserted to
have belonged to an embalmer, but of the archaistic flint weapons of the
XIIth Dynasty we have several specimens. They were found by Prof. Petrie
at the place named by him "Kahun," the site of a XIIth Dynasty town
built near the pyramid of King Usertsen (or Senusret) II at Illahun,
at the mouth of the canal leading from the Nile valley into the
oasis-province of the Payyum. These Kahun flints, and others of probably
the same period found by Mr. Seton-Karr at the very ancient flint
works in the Wadi esh-Shêkh, are of very coarse and poor workmanship
as compared with the stone-knapping triumphs of the late Neolithic and
early Chalcolithic periods. The delicacy of the art had all been lost.
But the best flint knives of the early period--dating to just a little
before the time of the Ist Dynasty, when flint-working had attained its
apogee, and copper had just begun to be used--are undoubtedly the most
remarkable stone weapons ever made in the world. The grace and utility
of the form, the delicacy of the fluted chipping on the side, and
the minute care with which the tiny serrations of the cutting edge,
serrations so small that often they can hardly be seen with the naked