gem of Egyptian art, which was found in a grave near Gurna, and is now in the Louvre;[2237] and lastly the draped alabaster statue of Queen Amenerdis (or Amenartas) in Cairo, the wife of the Aethiopian King Piankhi, who began to absorb Egypt by 721-722 B. C., just before the twenty-fourth dynasty.[2238] After the early dynasties, the Egyptian type of statue was reduced to a fixed and mechanical canon, which was used over and over again with lifeless monotony. In all these statues, whose dates extend over a period of many centuries, we note the same technical characteristics which are observable in the Greek “Apollos,” with the exception that the latter are always nude and lifelike. These characteristics may be summarized thus: long hair falling down over the shoulders in a mass;[2239] shoulders broad in comparison with the hips; arms hanging down stiffly by the sides[2240] or crooked at the elbows;[2241] hands closed, with the thumbs facing forward and touching the ends of the index fingers; the left leg slightly advanced and the soles placed flat on the ground; high ears,[2242] and the upper body and head turned straight to the front.[2243] Only minor differences in the two types appear. Thus the left foot is always further advanced in the Egyptian than in the Greek statues, so that the former appear to have less movement and life.[2244] Since there is no trace of this type in Mycenæan art it seems impossible not to conclude that in some way, doubtless through Ionian sources, it was originally borrowed from Egypt. The imitation of the Egyptian models, however, was never slavishly done. The Greek artist immediately rendered the type his own by making it nude,[2245] and by transmuting the abstract lifeless schema of the Egyptians into a highly individualized one characterized by life and vigor.[2246] This Egyptian influence, it must be remarked, was operative only in the initial stage of Greek sculpture; it was soon lost, as the Greek artist came to rely upon himself. F. A. Lange has truly said: “_Die wahre Unabhaengigkeit der hellenischen Kultur ruht in ihrer Vollendung, nicht in ihren Anfaengen_”.[2247] [Illustration: FIG. 80.—Statues of Ra-nefer and Tepemankh, from Sakkarah. Museum of Cairo.] After this digression we will return to the statue of Arrhachion. Dr. Frazer was unable to decipher the inscription upon the breast with certainty, but made out the following letters, the last four of which are plainly visible in the photograph: ΕΥΝΛΙΑΔ. He believed them to be archaic and the first instance of an inscription on this class of statues. He thought that the name was that of a man, which favored the view that the “Apollo” statues represented mortals rather than gods. The letters form a combination manifestly not Greek, and so may have no significance; it is even possible that they were engraved in modern times.[2248] In any case we have the statement of Pausanias that the inscription was illegible in his day.