in Table-case M in the Fourth Egyptian Room. In division 4 of the same case is a good collection of Coptic crosses, pendants with figures of St. George, etc., from Panopolis. Several very fine examples of linenwork from Coptic graves and churches will be found in Table-cases E and J in the Third Egyptian Room, and a handsome bier cloth in Wallcases 70 and 71, in the Second Egyptian Room.

Soon after the Arabs had conquered Egypt, they found it necessary to keep a strong garrison at Syene, the modern Aswân. In order to relieve the soldiers of the garrison from the duty of a pilgrimage to Mekkah, an order was issued from Fostâț, the first Arab capital in Egypt, near Old Cairo, that a pilgrimage to Aswân counted as a pilgrimage to Mekkah; hence for some two or three hundred years Aswân was regarded as a holy place, and pious Muslims were brought there from all parts to be buried. A collection of gravestones inscribed in Kufi, or Kufic, a form of Arabic writing, from the old Muḥammadan cemetery at Aswân, is exhibited in the Second Northern Gallery (Wall-cases 52-54). The oldest example is that of Azhar, son of Abd as-Salâm, who died in the year of the Hejira 252 = A.D. 866.

The Arab dynasties which ruled Egypt and the Sûdân between 656 and 1517 are as follows:

The Arab domination came to an end in 1517, when Selim, sultân of Turkey, conquered the country, and Egypt became a Turkish Province, or Pashalik.

286

A LIST OF THE PRINCIPAL KINGS OF

EGYPT.

PREDYNASTIC PERIOD.

Kings of Lower Egypt.

6 Neheb.
7 Uatch-nār, or Uatch-Ant.
8 Mekha.
9 ..... a. [10 ff. wanting).