Part 8

The third skull, that of a child of two years of age, corresponds in general form with the preceding, without having the African characteristics quite so obviously expressed.

It therefore follows, from all the evidence we possess in relation to the Copts, that, as a people, they partake sensibly, and sometimes largely, of Negro lineage.

An inspection of the royal portraits preserved in Rosellini, shows several heads which are obviously of the Coptic form; those, for example, of Sabakon and Tirhaka, of the Ethiopian dynasty, and of the queen Metumva, of an earlier epoch. (Plate XIV.) The same lineaments, though in less degree, are also obvious in the effigies of Sheshonk (Shishak) and Osorkon II., of the twenty-second dynasty, and in a few others of different periods of time. I wish it to be understood that I do not say these sovereigns were of Coptic lineage; but merely that their physiognomy, as expressed on the monuments, has the Coptic character. The history of the Copts remains an enigma in Egyptian ethnography.

7. THE NUBIANS.

It seems necessary, in further elucidation of this subject, to submit a few additional facts and observations in reference to the Berbers, or present inhabitants of Nubia, in order to show their relative position to the ancient occupants of that country. As the celebrated Burckhardt saw them in almost every locality, we shall mainly content ourselves with his graphic delineation. The Berbers, says he, are of a dark red-brown complexion, “which, if the mother is a slave from Abyssinia, becomes a light brown in the children; and if from the Negro countries, extremely dark. Their features are not at all those of the Negro, the face being oval, the nose often perfectly Grecian, and the cheek bones not prominent. The upper lip, however, is somewhat thicker than is considered beautiful among northern nations, though it is still far from the Negro lip. Their hair is bushy and strong, but not woolly.” The same intelligent traveller subsequently speaks of their language, respecting which he was certainly well qualified to judge; he assures us that the people south of Siout are ancient Bedouin tribes, who speak a very pure Arabic; and he makes a nearly similar remark respecting those who inhabit the river banks from Dongola to Senaar, and thence westward to Bornou, although they speak many different dialects.[103]

It is well known, however, that there are whole tribes in Nubia whose language is not derived from the Arabic; and these may be more nearly allied to the primitive population. “The inhabitants of Dar Dongola,” says Dr. Rüppell, “are divided into two principal classes, namely, the Barábra, or _descendants of the old Ethiopian natives of the country_, and the races of Arabs who have emigrated from the Hedjar. The ancestors of the Barábra, who, in the course of centuries have been repeatedly conquered by hostile tribes, must have undergone some intermixture with people of foreign blood; yet an attentive inquiry will enable us to distinguish among them the old national physiognomy which their forefathers have marked upon colossal statues, and the bas-reliefs of temples and sepulchres. A long, oval countenance, a beautifully curved nose, somewhat rounded towards the tip, proportionately thick lips, but not protruding excessively, a retreating chin, scanty beard, lively eyes, strongly frizzled but never woolly hair, a remarkably beautiful figure, generally of middle size, and a bronze colour, are the characteristics of the genuine Dungolawi.”[104] He adds, that the same traits of physiognomy are generally found among the Ababdé, the Bishareen, and partially among the people of Shendy and Abyssinia.

It must be acknowledged, however, that we can hardly expect to find the genuine Egypto-Ethiopian lineaments in any considerable number among the modern Nubians. Placed as the former were, between the Egyptians on the north, the Indo-Arabian nations on the east, and the Negroes on the south and west, and this, too, through the long period of several thousand years, their features must have become sensibly modified, even in the earliest times, by that blending of race which was inseparable from their position; and as the Koldagi and other Negro tribes have, at different times, established themselves in large bodies in Nubia, we need be at no loss, I conceive, in accounting for any traces of Negro lineage in some Barábra communities of the present day.

Dr. Prichard considers “the descent of the modern Nubians, or Barábra, from the Nouba (a Negro nation) of the hill country of Kordofan, to be as well established as very many facts which are regarded as certain by writers on ethnography.” With every deference to that distinguished ethnographer, we may inquire, what became of the pre-existing inhabitants when the tribes of Kordofan colonized Nubia? Were they destroyed or expelled? History makes no mention of either; and we are justified in the opinion that an amalgamation of races took place, whence some of those diversities of organization observable in the modern Nubians. That this intermixture of races has continued to the present time, the reader will find abundant evidence in other parts of this memoir; yet I cannot here refrain from adding an observation from Cailliaud, who, remarking on the shortness of life among the people of Senaar from disease and dissipation, declares that the number of Negroes which pours into the country, and the fruitfulness of the women, are the resources which serve to repair the vast and continual waste of population.[105] I may be told that this is proving too much. A sensible writer, and one who has ingeniously and instructively investigated the Nubian question, remarks as follows:—“The Arab tribes near Shendy may still, perhaps, justly boast of the purity of their blood; but, generally speaking, within the limits mentioned above, the slave or Negro population is about a sixth of the whole, and continually amalgamating with it. While nature kindly endeavours to wash out the stain, every caravan from the south or west pours in a new supply of slaves, and restores the blackening element.”[106]

This author, however, in his desire to ascribe to climate the chief agency in the transformation of the Negro into the Nubian, seems to overlook the fact that while the Negroes flow into the country on the one side, the migratory Arabs invade it on the other, thus furnishing inexhaustible materials for the blending of the two races. I fully acquiesce, as before hinted, in the accuracy of the following opinion, as applied to a large proportion of the modern Nubians; namely, “that they are descended, not from the possessors of Ethiopia in its flourishing period, but from the prædial and slave population of the country, increased by colonists, and raised into a nation by peculiar circumstances between the third and sixth centuries of the Christian era.”[107]

8. THE NEGROES.

We have the most unequivocal evidence, historical and monumental, that slavery was among the earliest of the social institutions of Egypt, and that it was imposed on all conquered nations, white as well as black.[108] So numerous was this unfortunate class of persons, that it was the boast of the Egyptian kings, recorded by Diodorus, that the vast structures of Luxor and Karnak were erected by the labour of foreigners alone. Of Negro slavery, in particular, the paintings and sculptures give abundant illustration. “Black people,” says Sir G. Wilkinson, “designated as natives of the _foreign land_ of Cush, are generally represented on the Egyptian monuments as captives or bearers of tribute to the Pharaohs;” and the attendant circumstances of this inhuman traffic appear to have been much the same in ancient as in modern times. It is curious, also, in a numerical point of view, to observe that Arrian, who wrote in the second century, gives three thousand as the number of Negroes annually brought down the Nile in his time; while Madden, writing in our own day, and consequently sixteen hundred years later than Arrian, estimates the present number in nearly the same words. If it be allowable to make these data the basis of calculation for the past thirty-five centuries, it will follow that upwards of ten millions of Negroes have been brought as bondsmen into Egypt during that period. This I regard a reasonable calculation; for in the present wasted and depopulated condition of the country, the demand for servants and slaves must be far below what it was in the flourishing epoch of the Pharaohs.[109]

This vast influx of Negroes into the valley of the Nile must necessarily have left its impression on the physical traits of the Egyptians themselves; in modern times, as seen in the Copts, and in more distant periods, as proved by the Negroid heads, in which both the configuration and expression are too obvious to be mistaken. But it may be inquired, how does it happen that Negroes or their descendants should be found in the catacombs, if they constituted a menial or slave-caste in Egypt? In reply, it may be observed that persons of this race have been capable, in all ages, of elevating themselves to posts of distinction in the east, and especially and proverbially those who have belonged to the class of eunuchs.[110] It is also important to observe, that so tenacious were the Egyptians of the rights of their offspring, that they admitted them to equal privileges with themselves, _even when the mother was a slave_; and these usages extended to inheritance.[111]

The preceding facts, without multiplying more on the same subject, amply account for that interminable amalgamation of the Caucasian and Negro races which has been going on in Egypt from the remotest times; while they also explain that incidental social elevation of the Negro caste, to which the monuments and catacombs alike bear witness.

This blending of races is farther illustrated in the present population of Nubia. The traveller Burckhardt remarks, that the slaves sent down the Nile, and those transported to Arabia, bear but a small proportion to the number kept by the Mahommedans of the more southern countries of Africa. At Shendy, for example, from one to six are seen in every family; and the custom prevails as far as Senaar, and westward to Kordofan, Darfour and Bornou. All the Bedouin tribes who inhabit or surround these countries are well stocked with slaves, nor does the number diminish in the very remote provinces of Houssa and Begarmeh; and we are told by the same intelligent observer, that the result of this promiscuous intercourse is a mixed progeny, which blends the characteristics of the Arab with those of the Negro.[112]

Negroes are abundantly represented on the pictorial delineations of the Egyptian monuments of every epoch. Complexion, features, and expression, these and every other attribute of the race, are depicted precisely as we are accustomed to see them in our daily walks: indeed, were we to judge by the drawings alone, we might suppose them to have been executed but yesterday; and yet some of these vivid delineations are nearly three thousand five hundred years old! and, moreover, as if to enforce the distinction of race by direct contrast, they are placed side by side with people of the purest Caucasian features.

The delineations of the Negro which are supposed to be of the most ancient date have not yet been identified with the epoch to which they belong. Such are those in a tomb at Thebes of the age of Amontuonch, an “unplaced king,” who is supposed to date prior to the sixteenth dynasty, and consequently more than two thousand years before Christ.[113] There is, however, a difference of opinion on this point; but we can refer with confidence and certainty to the celebrated “Procession” of the age of Thotmes the Fourth, at Thebes, in which Negroes are represented as tribute-bearers to that monarch at a period which dates about seventeen hundred years before our era.[114]

Sir G. Wilkinson describes a painting in a catacomb at Thebes of the age of Amunoph the Third, in which that personage, seated on his throne, receives the homage and tribute of various nations. Among these are represented several “black chiefs of Cush, or Ethiopia,” whose presents consist of rings of gold, bags of precious stones, “a camelopard, panthers, skins, and long-horned cattle, whose heads are strangely ornamented with the hands and heads of Negroes.”[115] The author justly adds, that the latter effigies were probably artificial; for the people of Cush would scarcely have decapitated their own people to adorn their offerings to a foreign prince: yet at the same time these melancholy symbols were obviously designed to express the most abject self-abasement and vassalage.

Other Negro delineations which can be identified with the age to which they belong, are found on the monuments of Horus, Rameses the Second, Rameses the Third, &c. in various places in Egypt and Nubia; and the first of these kings, (who dates with the nineteenth dynasty,) is represented standing on a platform which is supported by prostrate Negroes.[116]

For the purpose of illustration, we select a single picture from the temple (hemispeos) of Beyt-el-Wàlee, in Nubia, in which Rameses the Second is represented in the act of making war upon the Negroes; who, overcome with defeat, are flying in consternation before him. From the multitude of fugitives in this scene, (which has been vividly copied by Champollion[117] and Rosellini, and which I have compared in both,) I annex a fac-simile group of nine heads, which, while they preserve the national features in a remarkable degree, present also considerable diversity of expression.

The hair on some other figures of this group is dressed in short and separate tufts, or inverted cones, precisely like those now worn by the Negroes of Madagascar, as figured in Botteller’s voyage.

In the midst of the vanquished Africans, seated in his car and urging on the conflict, is Rameses himself; whose manly and beautiful countenance will not suffer by comparison with the finest Caucasian models. The annexed outline, (for all the figures are represented in outline only,) will enable the reader to form his own conclusions respecting this extraordinary group, which is believed to date about fifteen hundred and seventy years before the Christian era.

9. THE MONGOLIANS.

It has been contended by Depauw, and others that the ancient Egyptians were of the Mongolian race. I find nothing like Mongolian features in any embalmed head in my collection, unless some general resemblance can be traced in a solitary instance from Thebes, (Plate XII., Figs. 1, 2,) which, however, partakes more obviously of the Semitic form. This observation sustains the opinion of Professor Blumenbach, who in comparing the Egyptians with the several races of men, asserts, that “they differ from none more than from the Mongolian, to which the Chinese belong.”[118]

That the Chinese had commercial intercourse with the Egyptians in very early times, is beyond question; for vessels of Chinese porcelain, with inscriptions in that language, have been repeatedly found in the Theban catacombs.[119] Yet in every instance wherein we detect Mongolians on the monuments, they are represented as foreigners and enemies. The annexed wood-cut, with the small and somewhat depressed nose, shaven head, and crown-lock, scanty beard, moustache, and sallow complexion, seems clearly to indicate a man of that race. It is copied from a drawing in Rosellini, in which Rameses the Third is represented fighting against the _Sheto_ or Scythians, among whom the Mongols appear to be allies or mercenaries.

REMARKS.

Since the physical characteristics of the ancient Nilotic population, as derived from history and the monuments, coincide in a remarkable manner with the facts derived from anatomical comparison, it becomes in the next place necessary to offer some explanation of these results; or, to show at what periods and under what circumstances several different branches of the Caucasian race were blended into a single nation possessing more or less the characteristics of each, and this again modified in degree by another race wholly different from either. It is in the first place necessary to recur to the fact of the very long occupation of Egypt by successive dynasties of Hykshos or shepherd kings, and that these were not of one but of several nations—Phenicians, Pelasgi, and Scythians; while to these followed, at a long interval, an Ethiopian or Austral-Egyptian dynasty. Each of these great revolutions must have tended in turn to the amalgamation of the Egyptians with other nations; and this result may be referred to three principal epochs, independently of several subordinate ones.

THE FIRST EPOCH embraces the dynasty of the Hykshos or shepherd kings, commencing before Christ two thousand and eighty, and having a duration of two hundred and sixty years.

It is important, however, to observe, that Josephus quoting Manetho, makes the Hykshos dynasty last five hundred and eleven years; and the learned Baron Bunsen, whose work has not yet appeared, extends it to 1000, beginning B.C. 2514.[120] The shorter period is that of Rosellini; but the longer one is perhaps most consistent with facts, and at least makes room for those various dominations which, in the lists of Manetho, precede the eighteenth dynasty; which last, headed by Amunoph the First, drove out the intrusive kings. During this long period the legitimate sovereigns were exiled into Ethiopia; and it is evident, that had Meroë been any other than a province or dependency of Egypt, it is hardly probable that the Egyptians,—kings, priests, and people,—could have found a safe asylum in that country during the long period of their exile. It is expressly stated by Josephus that the shepherd kings lived at Memphis, “and made both the upper and lower country pay tribute.” It would appear, however, that during the greater part of the Hykshos dynasty, the Egyptians retained possession of the Thebaid: nevertheless the occupation of Lower Egypt by their enemies, must have effectually precluded all communication with other countries excepting Ethiopia, southern Arabia and India; which fact will account for a vast influx of population from those countries, (and consequently from the slave-regions of Africa) into the Upper Nilotic provinces.

It is moreover reasonable to suppose that even after the expulsion of the Hykshos, multitudes of Egyptians would remain in Ethiopia,—that country wherein whole generations of their ancestors had lived and died; at the same time that great numbers of Meröites, influenced by a variety of motives and especially by social alliances, would descend the Nile into Egypt.

It is moreover evident that while the Egyptians became thus fraternized with the nations of southern Asia, and the motley races of the Upper Nile, the provinces of Lower Egypt would be overrun with the Caucasian tribes of Europe and western Asia; for these, either as cognate with the Hykshos or as allies in their service, must have been in immense number to have conquered so populous a country, and especially to have kept possession during so long a period. It is to these events, then, that we attribute that blending of nations which appears to have been coeval with the early ages of the Nilotic Family, and which amply accounts for the ethnographic diversities every where manifest on the monuments.

THE SECOND EPOCH is comprised in the Ethiopian Dynasty of three kings, which lasted forty-four years, beginning B.C. 719.

These Meröite or Austral-Egyptian kings, during their intrusive occupation of Egypt, would naturally, and indeed necessarily engage the neighbouring tribes, and especially such as were hostile to Egypt, as mercenary soldiers; and there are more than conjectural grounds for believing that the Negroes themselves were thus employed. We are told in the Sacred Writings (2 Chron. Chap. xii.) that when Shishak king of Egypt, who is identical with Sheshonk of the monuments,—went up against Jerusalem, he took with him “1200 chariots, and three-score thousand horsemen: and the people were without number that came with him out of Egypt; the Lubims, the Sukkiims and the Ethiopians.” Of this multitude we may presume that the horsemen, and people in chariots were part of the Egyptian army; the Lubims and Sukkiims are by most commentators regarded as Libyans and Meröites, while, as the Ethiopians are placed last on the list, and are designated in the Hebrew original by the name of _Cush_, it is not unreasonable to suppose that they were Negroes. This view is sustained by a passage in Herodotus,[121] who states that in the army of Xerxes which invaded Greece was a legion of _Western Ethiopians_, “who had hair more crisp and curling than any other men.”[122] Now if the army of Xerxes embraced a legion of African Negroes, it would not be remarkable if the Egyptian troops should have been composed in part of the same people; which, indeed, with respect to the Ethiopian dynasty, may be assumed as a thing of course: for the Meröites would naturally avail themselves of every expedient to establish their power by augmenting the number of their exotic confederates, and by extending to them those privileges which had once been sacred to particular castes. For these and other oppressive acts, the Meröite kings were hated by the Egyptians; and no sooner were they expelled than their names were erased from the monuments.[123]

THE THIRD EPOCH dates from the conquest by Cambyses, B.C. 525, and continues through the whole of the Persian dynasty, or, in other words, until the Ptolemaic era, B. C. 332,—a period of nearly two hundred years.

Every one knows that the Persian dominion in Egypt was marked by an utter disregard of all the established institutions. No occasion was omitted which could humble the pride or debase the character of the people. The varied inhabitants of Europe, Asia and Nigritia poured into the valley of the Nile, abolishing in degree the exclusiveness of caste, and involving an endless confusion of races.

The prelude to these changes and misfortunes can be traced to the reign of Psammeticus the First, who permitted to foreigners, and especially to the Greeks, a freedom of ingress which the laws and usages of the country had previously denied them. The same policy appears to have been fostered by the subsequent kings of the same dynasty, until its consummation by Amasis; (B.C. 569) when, in the language of Champollion-Figéac, Egypt became at once Egyptian, Greek, and Asiatic; her national character was lost for ever; her armies were filled with foreign mercenaries; the throne was guarded by European soldiers, and continual wars completed the destruction of a tottering kingdom.[124]

CONCLUSIONS.