Forged Egyptian Antiquities by T. G. Wakeling

Author:T. G. Wakeling [Wakeling, T. G.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781717278227
Google: J_9ktgEACAAJ
Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform
Published: 2018-04-22T16:09:14+00:00

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Once, when in a great hurry, I was stopped by a young lady, who produced what looked like a damaged scarab, on which she asked my opinion. The light was very bad, and I had no time to spare, so I gave but a glance at the thing. She told me that she had found it at Abou Roash Pyramid. I wanted to be polite, and said that I thought it was a real scarab, but that it had by some chance been in the fire. She thanked me, and I hurried away. At dinner that night she told the story to a large and appreciative table, and handed the specimen round for the guests to see. She had made the thing with a penknife out of a piece of soft rock, and had coloured it with paint. I must admit that, when seen in a good light, the work was very rough, and that I ought not to have been taken in; but let any one who thinks himself wiser be placed under similar circumstances and see what happens. I have found, too, that the female sex is very apt to lay traps for the unwary male, whenever he affects, rightly or wrongly, to possess a superior knowledge upon any subject.

Mr. Weigall, the author of “Life and Times of Akhnaton,” told me that one day a lady showed him a scarab which she said she had bought from a little boy, who told her that he had stolen it from Weigall’s excavations. She finished up her story by saying, “And I am sure it must be true, for he had such an honest little face.”

Here is another scarab story. A friend was once in the Khan Khaleel bazaar in Cairo, and was approached by a young man in native dress who offered for sale a handful of scarabs. My friend, who is an expert and very well known, was considerably astonished at the man’s impudence, for they were the common green scarabs made in great quantities at the present day to sell to the native women, and these are now being exported even as far as the Sudan. After a few pointed remarks, it seemed that the man was acting in good faith. He was very much taken aback by my friend’s ridicule, and immediately ran off to a native who was dressed in European clothes and seated outside a shop about fifty paces away. A violent quarrel was started, the end of which my friend did not wait to see, but it was quite clear that the scarabs had been sold by the shopkeeper under some sort of guarantee that they were genuine antiquities.

In some cases scarabs are brought straight from the manufactory and placed upon the market. In other cases they are buried in dung-heaps to give them the odour of antiquity, then taken out, oiled and rubbed with dirt, which makes them look old and worn. Then the man will carry them about with him for a considerable time, and eventually they are ready to be offered to the unwary collector.

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