It is quite clear, therefore, that the Ancient Egyptians realised the importance of desiccation as an essential element in the preservation of the body. Moreover, they were familiar with a number of different means of ensuring this end:—(1) by burial in dry sand; (2) by exposure to the sun’s rays; (3) by removing all the softer and more putrescible parts of the body; (4) possibly by massaging and squeezing out the juices from the body; (5) by the free use of alcohol (palm wine) and large quantities of powdered wood; and (6) by the aid of fire. Dr. Alan Gardiner tells me that the most ancient Egyptian writings, such, for example, as the Pyramid texts, afford positive evidence that the Egyptians recognised the fact of the desiccation of the body in the process of embalming, for their scribes tell us, in the most definite manner, that the aim of the ceremony of offering libations was magically to restore to the body (as represented by the statue above ground) the fluids it had lost during embalming (Blackman, =5=). If then the Egyptians of the Pyramid Age recognised the importance of restoring the fluids to reanimate the mummy or its statue, it is quite clear they must have appreciated the physical fact that their process of preservation was largely a matter of desiccation. It is a point of some interest and importance to note in this connection that the essential processes of mummification—(1) salting, (2) evisceration, (3) drying, and (4) smoking (or even cooking)—are identical with those adopted for the preservation of meat, and (5) the use of honey is analogous to the means taken to preserve fruit. In fact, the term used by Herodotus for the first stage of the Egyptian process of mummification is the term used for salting fish. It would be instructive to enquire in what measure these two needs of primitive man in North-East Africa mutually influenced one another, and led to an acquisition of knowledge useful to them for the preservation both of their food and their dead relatives! To the constituent elements of the “heliolithic” culture may now be added the practices of anointing with oil or unguents, the burning of incense and the offering of libations, all derived from the ritual of embalming. In considering the southern extension of Egyptian influence it must be remembered that as early “as 2600 B.C. the Egyptian had already begun the exploitation of the Upper Nile and had been led in military force as far as the present Province of Dongola” (=62=, p. 23). For several centuries Nubia and the Soudan were left very much to themselves. Then during the time of the Middle Kingdom Egypt once more exerted a powerful influence to the South. At the close of that period Egypt was overrun by the Hyksos.