Section Xiv.—Recent.

We may divide the Recent period into two epochs, Prehistoric and Historic, always remembering that the line of demarcation is not much more distinct than that between Recent and Pleistocene.

O.—=Prehistoric.=

The abundance of worked flints on the desert just within and around the site occupied by the Fayûm lake in late Pleistocene and prehistoric times, shows that the shores were eventually inhabited by people who made and used these primitive tools. That the edge of the lake was abundantly wooded is shown by the thousands of well preserved tamarisk stumps met with at the present day in situ (Plate XIV) in the clays throughout the former margin of the lake.

The implements occur chiefly along the margin of the highest level of the old lake, and have probably in many cases been buried in the lake clays until the present time, which would account for their beautiful state of preservation. We have not, however, yet actually detected them enclosed within the clays, although commonly found lying on the clean wind-worn surface. From the fine degree of workmanship we may undoubtedly refer these flint implements to the Neolithic or later stone-age, although the exact date is doubtful. That they were made and used while the lake still stood at its highest level seems certain, but as we have shown above, the lake, as a sheet of water up to 23 metres above sea-level or thereabouts, probably existed far anterior to the Egyptian historic period. They might, on the other hand, as far as the evidence from the position of the lake goes, have been used by the inhabitants of the lake-margin down to the great reclamation which took place in Ptolemaic times. As it seems impossible to date them by comparison with flints of known age from any Egyptian period, we may perhaps conclude that they are at least of older date than the earliest Egyptian records.

P.—=Historic.=

In historical times, under conditions almost identical with those of the Nile of to-day, there would have been an annual inflow during the flood and outflow back to the Nile when the latter subsided; during the inflow a constant supply of Nile mud was brought into the lake and deposited on the surface of the earlier alluvium, continually augmenting the thickness of the latter and raising its surface, until in the central area marshy land began to appear. In the XII Dynasty this natural backwater of the Nile, which acted as a more or less efficient regulator of high and low floods, was brought under human control by Amenemhat I, and a considerable area of land reclaimed from the shallowest part of the lake, or that part of the country now lying near Edwa, Medinet el Fayûm, etc. The new artificially controlled lake was called Moeris, and its wonders are mentioned by Herodotus, Diodorus Siculus, Strabo and Pliny.

The actual position of Lake Moeris has been the subject of much discussion, the late Linant de Bellefonds having asserted that it was a high-level lake, quite distinct from the Birket el Qurûn, occupying the gap in the hills by which the Bahr Yusef enters the Fayûm, its encircling bank commencing at Edwa and passing through Biahmu, Medinet, etc. Sir Hanbury Brown has, however, completely demolished Linant’s theory, which is shown to be absolutely untenable; and has proved conclusively that the ancient Mœris occupied the greater part of what is now the cultivated land, as well as the area covered by the present lake and a considerable part of the surrounding desert, the reclaimed land being in fact part of the very district Linant supposed the lake to have occupied. Since the publication of Brown’s work complete corroborative evidence has been forthcoming from two distinct sources, one archæological, the other geological. The latter has already been mentioned.

It was clear from the map of Claudius Ptolemy that the route through the Fayûm to the Oasis Parva left Bacchias near the north end of the lake, and passing between Arsinœ and Lake Mœris, reached Dionysias near the other end. The archæological researches of Messrs. Grenfell and Hunt have shown that Bacchias occupied the site of the modern Um el Atl close to one end of the Birket el Qurûn, while Dionysias was probably in the neighbourhood of Qasr el Banat or Qasr el Qurûn. Thus the Ptolemaic Lake Mœris was almost identical with the modern Birket el Qurûn. Neither did the sites excavated yield a trace of anything older than the third century B.C. Theadelphia and Philoteris were founded in the reign of the second Ptolemy, when a great reclamation of the land from the lake took place, and probably Euhemeria, Dionysias, Karanis and Bacchias date from the same reign.

The archæological evidence is thus briefly summed up by Grenfell and Hunt: “Originally the lake filled the whole basin of the Fayûm, the first reclamation being carried out by Amenemhat I, who built the great dam at El Lahûn, where the Bahr Yusef enters the province, and recovered the high ground near the entrance as far as Biahmu, and a point between Abshawai and Agamiin. This remained the Pharaonic province until the time of Herodotus, when the water still came up to the colossi at Biahmu. Subsequently all the land now cultivated below the level of the Pharaonic province was reclaimed, chiefly in the reign of Ptolemy Philadelphus, when Lake Mœris was reduced nearly to the size of its modern representative, the Birket el Qurûn”.

As mentioned above, the Pleistocene fauna of the Fayûm differs in one or two particulars from the fauna of the present day. The commonest living molluscan forms include the following:—

Corbicula fluminalis.

Neritina nilotica.

Cleopatra bulimoides.

Hydrobia stagnalis.

Valvata nilotica.

Melania tuberculata.

Planorbis Ehrenbergi.

P. marginatus var. subangulata.

Blanckenhorn has pointed out that in this fauna Hydrobia stagnalis, as a typical brackish water form is of special interest. The species appears to have established itself in the Birket el Qurûn in modern times, as it has not been found in the youngest alluvium of the lake, nor is it known in the modern Nile fauna.

Except for the gradual accumulation of silt over the bed of the Birket el Qurûn—sand and clay carried in by the wind and the fine sediment borne by the feeder canals—the only modern deposits of any importance are those of blown sand. The extensive arenaceous deposits of younger Tertiary age, forming the greater part of the continent from the latitude of the Fayûm to the Mediterranean shores, yield as a result of the action of denudation a constant and abundant supply of the raw material. The sand carried southwards by the prevailing winds accumulates as dunes in the lowest parts of the depressions, on the slopes of cliffs, and in all the less exposed localities. Wind swept areas remain free or are only gradually encroached on by slowly growing linear dunes originating in the wind-shadow of some protecting hill or ridge. An unique example of such a dune is to be seen at the south end of the well-marked ridge a few kilometres east of Gar el Gehannem (Plate XV).

The main accumulations of blown sand are in the southern part of the Fayûm; large areas of the floors of Wadis Rayan and Moêla are covered with dunes, while in their immediate neighbourhood the material has accumulated to such an extent as to blot out entire cliffs and valleys; immediately to the west of Gharaq a considerable area is covered with small but steep dunes; and finally must be mentioned the great linear belt of sand, known as the Ghart el Khanashat, which starting from a point about midway between the Wadi Natrûn and Mogara comes to an abrupt termination some 24 kilometres before gaining the northern escarpment of the Fayûm depression (see page 23).

As might be expected in an area like the Fayûm, where sedimentary rocks of every type are met with, and where the wind never wants for a sufficient supply of the necessary sand, superficial erosion is everywhere well marked. We do not propose to study here the action of wind-borne sand and it will be sufficient to mention two localities where the effects are best seen; one is in the neighbourhood of Garat el Esh, where the most remarkable scoring and grooving is to be seen on the two beds of limestone capping the upper and lower cliffs of the Middle Eocene; the other is the Zeuglodon Valley, and here the sculpturing of the sandstone of the Birket el Qurûn series is of the finest and most unique description.

THE BIRKET EL QURUN NEAR THE WESTERN END.]

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Also Einiges über Bau und Stellung der Zeuglodonten, Zeitschr. d. Deutsch. geolog. Gesellsch. Jahr. 1903.

Compare Fraas Neue Zeuglodonten aus dem Unteren Mitteleocän vom Mokattam bei Cairo, Geol. u. Palæont. Abhand. Neue Folge Band VI Heft 3. Jena 1904.]

Personally, we cannot see the slightest evidence in support of this. Where the basalt occurs as a hard band it usually causes steep cliffs as at Widan el Faras, owing to its protecting the underlying beds from denudation. To the west, in Jebel el Qatrani, its thickness and hardness determine the character and steepness of the escarpment below.]