The Egyptians thought that by a use of words of magical power, the models placed in the tombs, whether of boats or houses or granaries, could be transformed into ghostly representations of their originals on earth. “The boat,” adds Dr. Budge, “was considered to be such a necessary adjunct to the comfort of the deceased in the next world, that special chapters of the Book of the Dead were compiled for the purpose of supplying him with the words of power necessary to enable him to obtain it. Thus, ‘Tell us our name,’ say the oar-rests: and the deceased answers, ‘Pillars of the Underworld is your name.’ ‘Tell me my name,’ saith the Hold: ‘Aker’ is thy name. ‘Tell me my name,’ saith the Sail: ‘Nut,’ (_i.e._, heaven) is thy name,” &c.[2] But let us make a survey of the development of the Egyptian ship from the time prior to the Dynasties until the third or fourth century before the Christian era. Ancient Egyptian history has been divided by scholars into three periods—the Old Kingdom, the Intermediate, and the New Kingdom. These again have been subdivided into Dynasties, of which the First to the Tenth are covered by the Old Kingdom, the Eleventh to the Seventeenth, by the Intermediate, and the Eighteenth to the Twentieth, by the New Kingdom. Afterwards the various Foreign Dynasties of Mercenaries formed the Twenty-second to the Twenty-fifth. The Twenty-sixth was the time of the Restoration, the Twenty-seventh to the Thirty-first represented the time of the Persians. This will assist us in following the changes that came about in the ships with the progress of time. We have already drawn attention to the illustration of a ship, or rather sailing boat, in Fig. 3, belonging to that remote period anterior to the Dynasties. There can be no possible doubt as to her being intended by the artist, who painted this design on the amphora, for a sailing vessel of some kind, though the mast and square-sail are set much further forward than is found later in Egyptian ships. There is a figurehead on the extreme point of the stempost. Below is a small platform, possibly for the look-out man whom we see later in Egyptian ships armed with a pole for taking soundings. Right aft is a small cabin for the owner or distinguished traveller. Probably she was a decked ship and steered by one or more oars from the quarter. The reader will notice a great similarity between the stern of this vessel and that of the Bœotian sailing boat shown in Fig. 11.