Already it is manifest that some of the articles are quite without parallel in any existing collection of Egyptian antiquities. Parallels to most of them, probably to all, doubtless existed, and we can well imagine that even the finest things may have been far surpassed by the magnificence of a really great Pharaoh, such as Amenhotep III; but these splendours of the culminating period of the Empire no longer exist, or at least have not yet come to light, and we were obliged to form our conception of them from reliefs and paintings, and to fill in the details of their magnificence from our knowledge of the grandeur of the monarch for whose use they were made. Now for the first time we can see the actual creations themselves, and even if they belong, not to one of the greatest of the Pharaohs, but to a comparatively undistinguished monarch, still they represent the art of a period not far removed from the historic culmination of Egypt’s greatness, and it is quite within the bounds of possibility, as we shall see, that some of the most striking of them do indeed belong to the greater age of Tutankhamen’s ancestors, rather than to his own. Of all the articles so far removed from the tomb, the one which has attracted the most attention, and excited the most admiration, has been the Royal Throne, or Chair of State, which was found in the outer chamber. “It is one of the wonders of the world,” was the comment of Professor Breasted on his first view of it, and there seems to be little doubt that this enthusiastic praise is well deserved. Within the last quarter of a century, two of the royal thrones of two of the greatest empires of the ancient world have been brought to light, and the simple dignity of the Throne of Minos, discovered by Sir Arthur Evans in the Palace of Knossos, forms a most effective contrast and foil to the gorgeousness of the Throne of Tutankhamen of Thebes, from which it may be separated in date by not much more than a century, the Cretan throne being the earlier, and indeed the earliest royal throne known to exist.