It is clear from the evidence of the monuments and of ancient writers that, of old, reeds were far more common in Egj'pt than now. The b3'blus or papyrus is almost or quite unknown. Anciently it was a com- mon and most important i)lant : boats were made of its stalks, and of their thin leaves the famous paper was manufactured. It appears to be mentioned under two names in the Bible, neitlier of which, however, can III.— F
be proved to be a peculiar designation for it. (1.) The mother of Moses made N'C'i PDn, "an ark'' or "skiff" "of papyrus, "in which to put her child (Exod. ii, 3), and Isaiah tells of messengers sent apparently from farthest Ethiopia in N'2:i~"b2, "vessels of papy- rus" (xviii, 2), in both which cases X^5 must mean papyrus, although it would seem in other places to signify " reeds" generically. (2.) Isaiah prophesies, " The papyrus-reeds (m~i") in the river (nixi^), o" the edge of the river, and everything growing [lit. sown] in the river shall be dried up, driven awaj' [by the wind], and [shall] not be" (xix, 7). Gesenius renders iTi:^ a naked or bare place, here grassj' places on the banks of the Nile. Apart from the fact that little grass grows on the banks of the Nile, in Egypt, and that little only during the cooler part of the j'ear, in- ' stead of those sloping meadows that must have been in the European scholar's mind, this word must mean some product of the river which with the other water- plants should be dried up, and Mown away, and utter- l_y disappear. Like the fisheries and the flax men- tioned with it, it ought to hold an important place in the commerce of ancient Egypt. In can therefore scarcel}' be reasonably held to intend anything but the papyrus. See Paper Reed.
The marine and fluvial product ^j^O, from which the Red Sea was called C|^&~C^, will be noticed under Red Sea. The lotus was ancientl3^the favorite flow- er, and at feasts it took the place of the rose among the Greek and Arabs : it is now very rare. ■
IX. Zoology. — Anciently Egypt was far more a pas- toral country than at present. The neat cattle are still excellent, but lean kine are more common among them than they scenj to have been in the days of Joseph's Pharaoh (Gen. xli, 19). Sheep and goats have always been numerous. Anciently swine were kept, but not in great numbers ; now there are none, or scarcely any, except a few in the houses of Copts and Franks. The Egy[)tian oxen were celebr'ated in the ancient world (Aristot. Bist. Anim. viii, 28). — Horses abound- ed (1 Kings X, 28) ; hence the use of war-chariots in fight (Isa. xxxi, 1 ; Diod. Sic. i, 45), and the celebrity of Egyptian charioteers (Jer. xlvi, 4 ; Ezek. xvii, 15). Under the Pharaohs the horses of the countiy were in repute among the neighboring nations, wlio purchased them as well as chariots out of Egypt. Thus it is commanded respecting a king of Israel: "He shall not multiply horses to himself, nor cause the people to return to Eg3'pt, to the end that he should multiply horses: forasmuch as the Lord hath said unto you, Ye shall henceforth return no more that way ' (Deut. xvii, 16), which shows that the trade in horses was with Egypt, and would necessitate a close alliance. " Solomon had horses brought out of Egypt, and linen j'arn : the king's merchants received the linen yarn at a price. And a chariot came up and went out of Egypt for six hundred [shekels] of silver, and a horse for a hundred and fifty; and so for all the kings of the Hittites and for the kings of Syria did they bring [them] out by their hand" (1 Kings x, 28, 29). The number of horses kept by this king for char- iots and cavalrj' was large (iv, 2G ; x, 26 ; 2 Chron. i, 14 ; ix, 25). Some of these horses came as j'early tribute from his vassals (1 Kings x, 25). In later times the prophets reproved the people for trusting in the help of Egypt, and relying on the aid of her horses and chariots and horsemen, that is, proltably, men in chariots, as we shall show in speaking of the Egj'ptian armies. The kings of the Hittites, mentioned in the passage quoted above, and in the account of the close of the siege of Samaria by Benhadad, wliere we read, " The Lord had niade the host of the Syrians to hear a noise of chariots, and a noise of horses, [even] the noise of a great host : and they said one to another, Lo, the king of Israel hath hired against us the kings
EGYPT
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EGYPT
of the Hittites and the kings of the Egyptians to come upon us" (2 Kings vii, G) — these kings ruled the Hit- tites of the valley of the Orontes, who were called by the Egyptians SHETA or KHETA. The Pharaoh's of the 18th, 19th, and 20th dynasties waged fierce wars with these Hittites, who were then ruled by a great king and many chiefs, and whose principal arm was a force of chariots, resembling those of the Egyptian army. — Asses were anciently numerous ; the breed at the present time is excellent. — Buffaloes are common, and not wild. — Dogs were formerl}' more prized than now ; for, being held by most of the Moslems to be extremely unclean, thej^ are only used to watch the houses in the villages. — Cats are as numerous, but less favored. — The camel has nowhere been found mentioned in the inscriptions of Egypt, or represented .on the monuments. In the Bil)le Abraham is spoken of as having camels when in Egj'pt, apparently as a gift from Pharaoh (Gen. xii, 16), and before the Exo- dus the camels of Pharaoh or his subjects were to be smitten bj^ the murrain (Exod. ix, 3 ; comp. 6). Both these Pharaohs may have been shepherds. The Ish- raaelites or Midianitcs who took Joseph into Egj'pt carried their merchandise on camels (Gen. xxxvii, 25, 28, 36), and the land traffic of the Arabs must al- waj^s have been by caravans of camels ; but it is prob- able that camels were not kept in Egj'pt, but only on the frontier. On the black obelisk from Nimrud, now in the British Museum, which is of Shalmanubar, king of Assj'ria, contemporarj'- with Jehu and Hazael, camels are represented among objects sent as tribute bj' Eg3'pt. They are of the two-humped sort, which, though perhaps then common in Assyria, has never, so far as is known, been kept in Egypt. — The deserts have always abounded in wild animals, especially of the canine and antelope kinds. The wolf, fox, jackal, hj'ena, wild cat, weasel, ichneumon, jerboa, and hare are also met with. — Anciently the hippopotamus was found in the Egj^ptian Nile, and hunted. This is a fact of importance for those who suppose it to be the behemoth (q. v.) of the book of Job, especially as that book shows evidence of a knowledge of Egypt. Now this animal is rarely seen even in Lower Nubia. — The elephant may have been, in the remotest historical period, an inhabitant of Egypt, and, as a land animal, have been driven further south than his brother pachy- derm, for the name of the island of Elephantine, just below the First Cataract, in hierogh'phics, AB . . "El- ephant-land," seems to show that he was ancientl}* found there. — Bats abound in the temples and tombs, filling the dark and desecrated chambers and passages with the unearthly whirr of their wings. Such deso- lation is represented by Isaiah when he says that a man shall cast his idols " to the moles and to the bats" (ii, 20). See each animal in its place.