The Fayûm and Lake MœrisBrown, R. H. (Robert Hanbury)
History
The Fayûm and Lake Mœris
Brown, R. H. (Robert Hanbury)
Fayyum (Egypt) -- Description and travel; Moeris, Lake (Egypt)
“Depuis Linant et Lepsius, aucun savant sérieux, du nombre des
géographes et des Égyptologues, ne s’est opposé à l’opinion
émise par ces deux illustres auteurs.”
Apparently Brugsch Pasha does not class Dr. G. Schweinfurth, Mr.
Flinders Petrie, and Mr. Cope Whitehouse as “savants sérieux,” for they
have expressed themselves as opposed to the Linant theory.
Lieut.-Colonel J. C. Ross, C.M.G., late Inspector-General of Irrigation,
Egypt, justly renowned for his power of comprehension of the levels of
any part of the country, which he studied professionally, at one time
gave much of his attention to the Fayûm, and especially to that part
which was known as Hod-el-Tuyûr, and which is the depression embraced in
the area which Linant calls a plateau and in which he localised his
supposed Lake Mœris. I think I may say, without fear of contradiction,
that Colonel Ross’s examination of the ground in question was much more
thorough and more prolonged than that of M. Lepsius; but whereas the
latter did not hesitate to accept Linant’s theory and to style it the
most brilliant and certain discovery as regards the position of Lake
Mœris, Colonel Ross on the contrary rejects Linant’s theory and
thinks that the lake was north of the Edwah bank and not south of it.
Mr. Petrie has also clearly expressed the same views as Colonel Ross
on this point.
I too have had advantages of studying the ground itself and the way
the water runs, such as few have had, and have come in for the legacy
of Colonel Ross’s levellings and maps.
The names of Linant and Lepsius do not therefore carry with them
sufficient authority to override the facts, which are ascertained to
be such by a more thorough examination of the country and a better
knowledge of the physical features of the province.
Irrigation officers may, perhaps, not be classed as “savants,”
but they have at least as much right to be heard as any other body of
experts on such a subject as Lake Mœris, which is more than anything
else an irrigation question, and one that has especial interest of
a more or less practical nature at this time, when the question of
the construction of Nile reservoirs for the storage of the surplus
waters of the Nile is under consideration.
COPE WHITEHOUSE THEORY.
Mr. Cope Whitehouse, who has a personal acquaintance with the
Fayûm, and has studied the question of Lake Mœris, though with
a prejudice in favour of giving the Wadi Raiân a leading part,
would possibly have been inclined to hold the same views as I do,
had it not been for his anxiety to recommend the Wadi Raiân for
future use by magnifying its imaginary past performances. But as
his views about the Wadi Raiân are the essential and distinctive
part of his theory, we do not agree.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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