CHAPTER XII

THE MAKERS AND SELLERS OF FORGED ANTIQUITIES

AS I have already said, the majority of the makers of forged antiquities are to be found among the very adaptable “up-river men.”

At Qus lives the maker of gold reproductions. Most of the wooden forgeries come from Gurna and the scarabs from Luxor. In the villages near to Deir-el-Bahari are made the porcelain vases and figures, whence come also the stone heads and statuettes. A number of composition figures are made in the Delta, and may be met with at Zagazig and Benha.

A few years ago the forgers used to make and sell their own work, but now that they are becoming rich and rising in the social scale they are content to leave the selling part of the business to others and themselves stay at home to carry on the making of further imitations.

In appearance they are tall, broad-shouldered men with keen, clever faces and long soft fingers, direct descendants of the ancient Egyptians, with very dark skins, thin lips and persuasive manners.

One member of the family usually leaves his village in the month of October, and with his bundles of carefully wrapped up reproductions drifts lazily down the Nile on a trading boat. Arrived at Cairo, he takes up his quarters with a friend, and the next day may be seen in one of the principal streets with his hands full of strings of beads and his pockets bulging with some of the results of the summer’s work.

Dressed in a dark blue galabeyah, with a white turban and red slippers, he makes an imposing figure. He has a smattering of various languages, in which “Real antīcas, gentleman,” looms large. Also he has an intimate knowledge of the various coinages and generally manages to come out on the right side in making a deal—at least, I never heard of one who owned to the contrary. He possesses largely the gift of perseverance and is like a sleuth-hound in tracking down a possible purchaser. In this he is assisted by the bowabs and servants, many of whom are his own blood-relations or friends.

It must be remembered that most of the servants in Egypt are Berberines, from Nubia, and as the cultivable land up the Nile is in places reduced to a few hundred yards, and travelling by boat is cheap, it will be seen that the men can easily get to know each other well even though miles of the Nile waterway may separate the villages.

But the “up-river man” is not the only itinerant seller of antiquities. A donkey boy may have found out that he can make more money by selling antīcas to his patrons than he can by running after his donkey, even though the bakshīsh be included; so he ponders over this until it becomes an obsession and fills his thoughts day and night. No longer will he remain a donkey boy, he determines; he has a good arbeyah or cloak and decent slippers, and a long black cloak will hide a multitude of unwashedness.

Visions of untold wealth spread themselves out before him. A man he has heard of got £12,000 for a papyrus, and £40 for a gold-mounted scarab is an ordinary price. By a merciful dispensation, Allah has given the Nazarenes into the hands of the Faithful. So he chooses riches; for, after all, money means strength and honour in his village, and perhaps—who knows?—one or more wives who will be beautiful as the houris of Paradise of whom he heard the Mullah discourse in the mosque only the last Friday. The prospect is dazzling and fills the boy’s brain. Rich and powerful, men will look up to him with respect, he will possess feddans of land and children will rise up around him.

He clasps his hands and looks at a donkey distastefully. Did he ever run miles across the desert behind such uncleanliness? Why, even Allah had named it “ass,” which means, as he has been told, “a fool” in the language of those who buy antīcas. Why had he slumbered and why had his eyes been shut in the past? Here was wealth, only waiting for him to seize it. It was not too late; he would force fortune to come to him.

So thinking, the boy sat gazing with unseeing eyes at the scene before him. Girls passed and giggled. “He hath seen an Afrit,” said one. “Nay, a woman hath cast her eyes on him,” said another. He heard and frowned, then bending forward, took up a stone and threw it at a passing dog. The yelp of pain brought him back from the dream world. His resolve was taken; he would become an antīca-seller and, “Inshallah,” might perhaps reap fortune at one swoop.

So the plunge is taken, the summer is spent in gathering together his materials and arranging to sell for others on commission; and the following season the erstwhile donkey boy, his pockets bulging with small tin boxes containing his wares, haunts the neighbourhood of the hotels where live the buyers of antiquities.

Genuine antiquities are few and not to be had without considerable outlay, so in the boxes mixed with the real fragments lie the imitations.

It was just such a boy as this who came to my notice some years ago, and one day I saw him arrested by the police and conveyed to the Caracol (police station). Upon making inquiries I was informed that he had been taken up for annoying people by pestering them to buy scarabs. Later in the day I saw him leaning disconsolately against a wall outside the Caracol.

“Well, how much have you to pay?” I asked.

“Fifteen piastres” (about three shillings), was his reply. “Or”—and he shrugged his shoulders—“or I stay three days in prison.”

“Have you paid the money?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“I have none.”

Now this was untrue, for, otherwise, how could he give change to purchasers?—and these boys will rarely risk losing a sale for the want of change. This I pointed out to him, and spoke of the shame, but he shook his head obstinately. Prison has no taint for these men, it is merely an incident in the day’s work. On the following morning, when he was to surrender, I saw him again, his pockets no longer bulging, his clothes clean washed, his cloak brushed, and wearing his new red slippers. He was going to prison.

Calling him to me, I handed over the amount of the fine, saying, “Go and pay it at once and get to work again.” The boy looked sullenly at the three shillings; it was a lot of money to give to the prison authorities, and that was not the way to get rich. Then he saluted and walked away.

After three days he returned and asked to see me. Solemnly he produced a piece of dirty rag, untied it, and handed me back the three shillings.

“What is this?” I asked.

The boy grinned. “Well you see, sir, when I got to the prison, the officer who takes the money had gone away. I waited there for one day, and then he came back. When I pay the money I give him two shillings, but he look at a paper and say ‘Three.’ I say ‘No; three shillings or three days in prison. You were away when I come. I stop here one day, and here are two shillings.’ He say, ‘No, three.’ Then I wrap up the money and stay two more days in prison; after that I come out, and here is your money.”

Obviously there was only one thing to be done, and he departed with a broad smile and the conviction that he had done a good day’s work. One cannot help feeling that such a boy ought to succeed.

On another occasion I saw the same youth strolling about his village when I knew that he should have been in prison for a contravention of the law. Calling him, I inquired how this came about.

“I have business in my village,” he said, “so my brother he come to the prison and take my place. I give the policeman one shilling, I come out to do my business, then go back again.”

Let me say that this took place years ago, and I do not think he would get out of prison so easily now; but even quite recently I heard of a sale of antiquities running into hundreds of pounds, one of the parties to the transaction being in prison at the time.

* * * * *

Then there are the more prosperous sellers with their feet firmly set in the path to fortune, who combine the selling of forged antiquities with dealings in the real articles. Sometimes a dragoman varies his legitimate business by bringing before the notice of his party antiquities which he declares are genuine, or introduces a seller, who at the conclusion of the bargain hands over to the dragoman a fair percentage of the spoils. His part in the transaction may be limited to the introduction of the seller and the assurance that “This man very good man, dig in the tombs, lady. Don’t be afraid, he very honest.”

Lastly there is the polished seller, tired of mien, suave of manner and high in price, producing only upon pressure his store of treasures. Apparently casual about selling anything, he is probably the most dangerous, for if no business is done, one leaves him feeling very mean, and conscious of having committed an offence in doubting the authenticity of the articles shown by him.

Nor does the silence of your guide on the way home tend to relieve the feeling of oppression and smallness, until perhaps by some good fortune one meets a man who knows; then the feeling changes to one of relief at the escape and wrathfulness at the attempt that has been made to swindle you.