A Discovery at Sakkarah

Pyramide de Sakkarah

Here is a bit more from Amelia Edwards' account of her 1873 voyage in A Thousand Miles Up the Nile. The night before, they had docked at Bedreshayn and in the morning the party took the long ride on donkeys to the ancient site of Sakkarah outside of Memphis.

And now, having dismounted through compassion for our unfortunate little donkeys, the first thing we observe is the curious mixture of debris underfoot. At Ghizeh one treads on only sand and pebbles; but here at Sakkarah the whole plateau is thickly strewn with scraps of broken pottery, limestone, marble, and alabaster; flakes of green and blue glaze; bleached bones; shreds of yellow linen; and lumps of some odd-looking dark brown substance, like dried-up sponge.

Presently someone picks up a little noseless head of one of the common blue-ware funereal statuettes, and immediately we all fall to work, grubbing for treasure -- a pure waste of precious time; for though the sand is full of debris, it has been sifted so often and so carefully by the Arabs that it no longer contains anything worth looking for.

Meanwhile, one finds a fragment of iridescent glass -- another, a morsel of shattered vase -- a third, an opaque bead of some kind of yellow paste. And then, with a shock which the present writer, at all events, will not soon forget, we suddenly discover that these scattered bones are human -- that those linen shreds are shreds of cerement cloths -- that yonder odd-looking brown lumps are rent fragments of what once was living flesh! And now for the first time we realise that every inch of this ground on which we are standing, and all these hillocks and hollows and pits in the sand, are violated graves.

A Little Cruise Up the Nile circa 1873

A dahabeeyah on the Nile (1891)

I was surprised and delighted to discover that the library had a copy of A Thousand Miles Up the Nile by Amelia Edwards. Surprised because it was originally published in 1877 and delighted because this copy, in an age when the library has a tendency to discard books with a vengeance, has managed to still be on the shelf since it was purchased for the system in 1983. Thirty years ago!

The year is 1873 and Ms. Edwards and her traveling companion (who is identified only as L.) have taken refuge in Cairo quite by accident; because the weather that year in Europe had been so rainy. They have escaped to warmer climes and have secured for a cruise up the Nile a 100-foot dahabeeyah, or houseboat, known as Philae. Here is how she describes their first moments on board:

And now we are on board, and have shaken hands with the captain, and are as busy as bees; for there are cabins to put in order, flowers to arrange, and a hundred little things to be seen to before the guests arrive. It is wonderful however, what a few books and roses, an open piano, and a sketch of two, will do. In a few minutes the comfortless hired look has vanished, and long enough before the first comers are announced, the Philae wears an aspect as cozy and home-like as if she had been occupied for a month. 

As for the luncheon, it certainly surprised the givers of the entertainment quite as much as it must have surprised the guests. Being, no doubt, a pre-arranged display of professional pride on the part of dragoman and cook, it was more like an excessive Christmas dinner than a modest midday meal. We sat through it unflinchingly, however, for about an hour and three quarters.

Later, after the guests have left and the boat is underway:

Happy are the Nile travelers who start thus with a fair breeze on a brilliant afternoon. The good boat cleaves her way swiftly and steadily. Water-side palaces and gardens glide by, and are left behind. The domes and minarets of Cairo drop quickly out of sight. The mosque of the citadel, and the ruined fort that looks down upon it from the mountain ridge above, diminish in the distance. The Pyramids stand up sharp and clear. 

We sit on the high upper deck, which is furnished with lounge-chairs, tables and foreign rugs, like a drawing-room in the open air, and enjoy the prospect at our ease.