VIEW

OF

ANCIENT AND MODERN

EGYPT;

WITH

AN OUTLINE OF ITS NATURAL HISTORY.

BY THE RIGHT REV. M. RUSSELL, LL.D. AND D.C.L.,
(OF ST JOHN'S COLLEGE, OXFORD);

Author of "Palestine, or the Holy Land," "Nubia and Abyssinia,"
"History and Present Condition of the Barbary States," "Polynesia," &c.

With a Map, a Portrait of Mohammed Ali by Jackson, and Ten other
Engravings by Branston.

SIXTH EDITION.

EDINBURGH:

OLIVER & BOYD, TWEEDdale courT;

AND SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, & CO., LONDON.

MDCCCXLIV.

HARVARD COLLEGE LIBRARY

FROM THE LIBRARY OF MRS. ELLEN HAVEN ROSS JUNE 28, 1938

Printed by Oliver & Boyd, Tweeddale Court, High Street, Edinburgh.

R

PREFACE

TO THE THIRD EDITION.

THE object of this volume is to present to the reader, in a condensed form, an account of all that is known respecting Egypt, both in its ancient and its modern state. The history alone of such a country could not fail to be highly interesting to every one who has any curiosity to mark the progress of the human race in civilisation and learning, and more especially the beginnings of society at the earliest period to which the writings of uninspired annalists can carry back the mind of the contemplative student. It has indeed been our main endeavour to represent the genius and astonishing acquirements of the old Egyptians through the medium of the great works of architecture, statuary, and sculpture, which are still to be found on the banks of the Nile. In this part of our undertaking we have spared no pains to illustrate the descriptions of the Grecian, Roman, and Arabian historians, by a reference to the actual condition of that singular country in our own times; attempting by these means to supply to the reader of Herodotus, Diodorus Siculus, Strabo, Pliny, and Abdollatiph, a light reflected from the ruins of those splendid monuments which they were the first to make known to the great body of their less-informed contemporaries.