NAUCRATIS, AND THE RELATIONS BETWEEN GREECE AND EGYPT DURING THE VIIth

AND VIth CENTURIES B.C.

Author(s): MATTHEW HANRAHAN
Source: University Review , Spring 1961, Vol. 2, No. 5 (Spring 1961), pp. 46-57
Published by: Edinburgh University Press

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/45241618

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 MATTHEW HANRAHAN

NAUCRATIS, AND THE RELATIONS

BETWEEN GREECE AND EGYPT DURING
THE VHth AND Vlth CENTURIES B.C.
PART I

the history of Naucratis begins with the foundation of the " Fort of the
Milesians/' Milésión teichos1, on the Canopic branch of the Nile, near Sais,
the capital of the Delta. The Fort, which later became Naucratis, was
established by the Milesians and quickly became the wealthy emporium of
the new trade between Greece and Egypt.
The foundation of the Fort falls within the great age of Greek expansion
and colonisation, but it was in no sense a colony. Like the majority of the
establishments founded by the Milesians, it was a trading station (emporion)
which some years later became the site also of a permanent fortified camp,
garrisoned by Greek mercenaries in the service of Egypt. This settlement
of Milesian traders was not, however, the beginning but the resumption of
long interrupted relations between Greece and Egypt. As early as the days
of the Third Egyptian dynasty (circa 3,000 B.C.) Crete, the first great
thalassocracy and commercial nation of the Mediterranean2 was sending her
ships up the mouths of the Nile into the Delta where their crews bought or
plundered the products of Egyptian industry. Close trade relations between
the two countries existed for centuries. The ancient Egyptian unit of weight,
the "kit," was in common use in Crete3. Tradition has it that the vast
port4 of the island of Pharos, of which gigantic traces still remain, was dug
under Cretan supervision. During the confusion and misery caused by the
invasion of the " accursed " Hyksos (c. 1700 B.C.) Egypt was closed for
probably more than a century to the sailors of the Aegean. But when the
XVIIIth Dynasty (1580-1350 B.C.) had re-established calm and security
in the country, and Egypt had carried its conquests far to the North and to
the South into Nubia, Crete was again sending its ships and merchants to
the Delta. Cretans and Greeks from the " Isles of the Sea " and " Northerners
from all lands " settled in Egypt. Their presence in the country is attested

'Strabo XVII. I. 18.

2Glotz. "La civilisation egéenne." p. 215 seq.
3Id. p. 222.
4Homer. Ody. IV. 454.

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EGYPTIAN ART 47
by the documents and monuments5 which frequently refer to such names as
Kef ti of Crete, the people from Alasia (Cyprus), Yaunna or Maunnia
(Ionians), Akawasha (Achaeans), and many others. Thothmes III6
(1500-1447), who aspired to the conquest of the world, was nevertheless
obliged to use Cretan ships (the ships of the Kefti) to transport the wood
of the Lebanon to Egypt7. But with the collapse8 of the Minoan and later
Mycenaean civilisation these relations had come to an end. Miletus was
now, five or more centuries later, with her emporium in the Delta,
re-establishing the ancient commerce between Egypt and the Aegean and
reviving the commercial tradition of Minoan sea-power.
The first traders may have come to the Delta about 700 B.C. - some
writers mention a date half a century earlier. We know that Tefnakhte and
his son Bocchoris9, the powerful dynasts of the Delta, who ruled at Sais
towards the end of the Vlllth Cent. B.C., drew a great deal of their wealth
and power from the dues and profits on commerce with the Aegean.
St. Jerome says that Ionian Greeks from Miletus established a trading station
at Naucratis as early as 749 B.C.10. Athenaeus in the Deipnosophistai11
tells the story of a certain merchant of Naucratis who, having been saved
from shipwreck on his return journey from Cyprus, in gratitude dedicated
a statue of Aphrodite to the Goddess in her temple at Naucratis in the
23rd Olympiad (688 B.C.). Much importance may not be attached to dates
in stories of this kind, but we can see that Athenaeus and his readers had no
difficulty in believing that Naucratis and its temples existed as early as the

inscriptions found at Karnak and the temple of Medinet Habu (Breasted,

44 History of Egypt " III. 572-88, IV. 35). A painting in the tomb of
Rekmara, chief minister of Thothmes III, represents " the peoples of
the isles of the sea " bringing gifts to the Pharaoh as humble tributaries.
The theory that " the peoples of the sea were Phoenicians," as was
formerly belived, is no longer accepted.
6The obelisks in Rome, New York and London (Cleopatra's Needle) are
memorials of his reign.
7Breasted, 44 Ancient Records of Egypt," Vol. II Nos. 472, 573.
8Hall, Annual of British School of Athens, VIII. pp. 170-178. Meyer says
that the raids of 44 4 the peoples of the sea ' mark the end of a period in
the history of the Mediterranean world." (How & Wells, Vol. I, p. 421).
*Diodorus I. 70-79.
10Hall, 44 Oldest Civilisation of Greece" p. 271, thinks that this date, based on
the authority of the 44 utterly untrustworthy " Eusebian list of Thalas-
socracies, is much too early. Strabo says that the Milesians founded the
fort epi Psammitichou - a phrase which would seem to mean 44at about
the time of Psammetichus," rather than 44 in the reign of Psammetichus,"
epi Psammitichou. Hall comes to the conclusion that the Milesians came
to Egypt between 700 and 650 b.c., but considerably before the latter date.
11 VII. 283. Athenaeus was himself a citizen of Naucratis and lived about
200 A.D.

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48 UNIVERSITY REVIEW
first half of the Vllth Cent., and the foundation of the Fort must have been
much earlier. Excavations on the site of the ancient Naucratis12, carried
out by Petrie and others, tend to confirm that primitive Greek settlements
existed there as early as these dates. The original settlement may not have
been a very permanent place. Probably the buildings were only of wattle
and wood. It was not until much later that permanent houses of bricks and
mud would have been built. Petrie, from the evidence of excavations on the
spot, believe that the period of temple building began somewhere about
650 B.C. By this time the settlement had grown considerably in size and
importance, and it now received a new influx of traders and soldiers from
Ionia, Caria, and Lydia.
In the Vllth Cent. Greek mercenaries were to be found in the service of
most of the rulers of the Near East. Lesbians, among them Antimenidas,
the brother of the poet Alcaeus13, were serving in the armies of Babylon,
Carians with Gyges, the king of Lydia14, and Ionians with Alyattes, the
conqueror of Caria15. These were the adventurers and malcontents for whom
the rustic life of the colonies of the West had no appeal. They were the
successors of the brigands and pirates who had in earlier times ravaged and
plundered all the coasts of the Eastern Mediterranean16. These " men of
bronze," as the mercenaries were called because of their superior armour,
won the trust and confidence of their new masters and were amply rewarded
in money and lands for their loyalty. There were other Greeks for whom
neither a life on the land nor the strict discipline and hazards of military
life had any appeal. These were the traders who followed in the wake of
the mercenaries, and set up their booths and bazaars round the Greek camps.
Beginning with the import of such articles as wine and oil from the homeland,
which were in demand amongst the troops, they soon built up a profitable
exchange trade between Greece and the countries of the Eastern
Mediterranean.

How Greek mercenaries came into the service of Egypt in the middle

12 All earlier accounts of Naucratis and Graeco-Egyptian relations during the

the Vllth and Vlth Cent, have to a great extent been superseded by the
knowledge made available by Petrie's excavations which are described in
the following works: Petrie-Gardner " Naukratis " (Egypt Explor.
Fund (two volumes), London, 1886-88). Hogarth-Lorimer-Gardner
" Naukratis," (London, 1903). H. Prinz, " Funde aus Naukratis " (Klio,
Beiheft VII. Leipzig, 1908).
13 Alcaeus. frs. 19, 33.
14Her. I. 8-14.
15Ib. VIII, 26.
16Compare Homer's description of Greek raids on the Delta (Ody. XIV, 216 ff)..

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EGYPTIAN ART 49
of the Vllth Cent, is told by Herodotus17. At this time, Psammetichus18
(664-610), a vassal prince of Lower Egypt, had declared himself independent
of Assyria and was attempting to restore Egyptian independence. But he
was defeated and had to take refuge in the marshes of the Delta. From
here he sent to consult the oracle of Latona at the ancient city of Buto19,
which in the words of Herodotus " is the truest oracle the Egyptians have."
He received the answer that Vengeance would come from the sea when
" men of bronze " should appear. When certain Carians and Ionian pirates,
who had been driven by a storm on the coasts of the Delta, suddenly appeared
in brazen armour plundering the countryside, Psamtik perceived that the
oracle was accomplished. He enrolled them in his service and with their
help overcame his enemies, and became king of Egypt, Psammetichus I.
Later, with their help, between 658 and 650 B.C., he cleared the Assyrian
garrisons out of Egypt, and laid the foundations of Saïte Renaissance. From
Assyrian annals20 it seems probable that these were the mercenaries sent by
Gyges, King of Lydia, who at this time was anxious to combine with the
Ionian Greeks and Egypt against the common danger from Assyria.
Psammetichus also used the brazen men to defend his frontiers. He built
two camps - one on the Pelusiac branch of the Nile at Daphnai (Tell
Defenneh) to protect his Eastern frontier against possible renewed attacks
of the Assyrians. Daphnai was garrisoned by Carians and Ionians in
separate camps (" stratopeda "), one on either side of the river21. The site
of the ancient Daphnai has also been excavated by Petrie22. The other
camp was established on the site of the Fort of the Milesians to defend his
Western frontier. No doubt the camp was outside the town itself, and
separate from the commercial quarter, as, Herodotus tells us, was the case
at Daphnai. On this site, or somewhere in the neighbourhood, was built
the city of Naucratis which within half a century of its foundation had become
one of the most important centres of the Mediterranean. The defence of
the Southern frontiers was entrusted to Egyptians. According to Diodorus23
many of the Egyptian troops at Syene (Assouan) deserted into Ethiopia from

17Her. II. 137, 151, 152.

18Psammetichus was one of the Dodecarchy, thus described by Herodotus:
"The Egyptians established twelve kings - having divided Egypt into
twelve parts.
19Buto was situated in the North-West of the Delta on the Sebennytic branch
of the Nile.
20Breasted, "History of Egypt." Vol. I, p. 566. Radet, "La Lydie et le
monde grec aux temps des Mermmades," p. 179.
21Her. II. 30, 154.
22The excavations are described in "Egypt Explor. Fund." Vol. IV, (1888),
pp. 47-48.
23Diod. I. 67.

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50 UNIVERSITY REVIEW
jealousy of the favour shown by the King to the Ionian mercenaries. As
another instance of the favour shown to the early Greek settlers, and to
facilitate the relations between Egyptians and the foreign soldiers and
merchants, Psammetichus put Egyptian children under the care of Greek
teachers to be instructed in the Greek language, and from those who learnt
the language, " the present interpreters24 in Egypt are descended." Perhaps
it was from descendants of such as these that Herodotus himself gathered
many of the popular stories and folk-tales during his visit to Egypt.
During the reign of Psammetichus the Greeks were free to go anywhere
in the country. The new trade routes between Egypt and the Aegean made
it possible for Greek travellers - statesmen, poets, philosophers and others - to
visit this new and strange Egyptian world. The name of Psammetichus, the
Phil-Hellene, became known throughout the Greek world, and Periander of
Corinth, in admiration for the restorer of Egyptian independence, named his
nephew Psammetichus25.
Throughout his reign Psammetichus continued to welcome Greek
mercenaries into his armies, and his example was followed for more than
a century by his successors. Even in the reign of Psammetichus and within
a few years of the re-establishment of Egyptian independence, Egyptian
economy had begun to revive and Egypt was regaining her place as the
commercial centre of the Mediterranean. The early traders and merchants
who had set up shops round the Greek camps to supply the needs of their
Greek countrymen were now finding wider scope for their activities with
the expanding economy of Egypt and the continued favour of the Pharaohs,
and merchants from all parts of Greece were entering the country.
Psammetichus was succeeded by his son, Necho II (610-594)26. He, too,
acknowledged his gratitude to the Greek troops, as we learn that after his
victory over Josiah at Megiddo he dedicated to Apollo in the temple of the
Branchidae near Miletus the corselet which he had worn during the
campaign27. He also used the services of the Greeks in many of his great
works, such as, the exploitation of the gold mines which he had re-opened,

24Her. II. 151. 154.

25He succeeded Periander, and was the last tyrant to rule in Corinth (585-2).

Necho II
26The kings of the Saite dynasty and approximate dates are as follows : -
Psammetichus (Psamtik) ... ... ... 664-610
Psammetichus II (Psammis) ... ... ... 594-589
Apries (Hophra) ... ... ... ... 589-570
Amasis ... ... ... ... ... 570-526
Psammenitus (Psamtik III) had (been on the throne only a few months
when the Persians invaded Egypt.
27Her. II. 158, 159. IV, 42. The result of his victory was short-lived. The
Assyrians a few years later drove the Egyptians out of Palestine.

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 EGYPTIAN ART 51
and the canal which was to join the Red Sea and the Nile on which, it is
said, he employed 120,000 workmen28.
The reign of Psammetichus II (the Psammis of Herototus, 594-589) is
notable for the expedition to the South which reached as far as Ipsamboul
(Abu Simbel) where some of the Greek mercenaries engraved their names
on the leg of one of the colossi of Rameses II, and to this forgivable act of
vandalism we are indebted for one of the most ancient specimens we possess
of the Greek alphabet29. The letters are about two inches in height, and
so deeply chiselled and still so clear as to leave little doubt about the actual
reading of the inscription. Psammetichus' Phil-Hellenism was so well known
in Greece that a delegation from the Eleans asked for his judgment on the
fairness of their administration of the Olympic Games30.
Apries (Hophra of the Bible, 589-570) is said to have had up to thirty
thousand Greek troops in his army31. He seems to have been completely
under the influence of the Greeks, and was accused of preferring strangers
to his own subjects. A small Greek vase of the kind known as the
" aryballos," found at Naucratis, shows him wearing a Corinthian helmet
on which is his name in hieroglyphic characters. His Phil-Hellenism cost
him his throne. He was defeated and taken prisoner by Amasis (570-526)32,
the leader of the nationalist and anti-foreign revolution.
Amasis33, having come to power on the wave of nationalist feeling, had
to make, as was to be expected, concessions to popular sentiment. But
realising how indispensable his foreign troops were to the maintenance of
the country's independence against the threatened attacks from Persia, he
had to find some means of retaining their support while at the same time

28Necho, it is said, stopped work on the canal because of the adverse oracle.
Darius who succeeded Cambyses on the Persian throne finished the canal
that Necho had begun, thus making a continuous waterway from the Nile
to the Red Sea. Herodotus followed the course of the canal to the docks
on the Red Sea. An earlier canal, dug during the XlXth (1300 b.c.) had
silted up by Nechos time.
29Her. II. 161. Hicks and Hill "Historical Greek Inscriptions," No. 3. Roehl.
"Inser. Graec. Ant." No. 402. Some epigraphists consider that these
inscriptions belong to the reign of Psammetichus I, who occupied Elephan-
tine (Her. II. 30).
30Her. II. 160.
31Ib. II. 163.
32Apries was later killed in battle in trying to regain his throne. It was of
him that Jeremiah prophesised: " Thus saith the Lord, I will give Pharaoh
Hophra into the hands of his enemies, and into the hands of those who
seek his life."
33The adoption by Greeks of Egyptian names, such as that of Psammetichus
and Amasis, indicates how widespread in Greece was the contemporary
knowledge of the events of the Saite dynasty. A Greek artist who
painted vases at Athens about this time carried the name of Amasis.
D

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52 UNIVERSITY REVIEW
taking account of the xenophobia of his own subjects. He closed the Greek
emporia34, and restricted Greek commerce to the Canopic branch of the
Nile and to the port of Naucratis, which now became the compulsory
residence of all the Greek merchants in Egypt, just as in recent years
European traders were assigned to the " treaty " ports of China. Greeks
were still able to travel freely in the country. Samians, for example, were
allowed to visit the oracle of Amon in the " Island of the Blest " (The Great
Oasis of Siwa)35. But as a result of the decree of Amasis Naucratis was
now the only centre in which the Greeks were permitted to exercise the
commercial, political, and social privileges of a separate community. Amasis,
by transferring all Greek commercial activity to the West and concentrating
it at Naucratis, gave the Greeks all the opportunities for a more rapid
expansion of their trade and influence. Thus Amasis found a compromise
which pleased both sides, a rare achievement in the history of diplomacy.
The success and prosperity of Naucratis, with its rapidly expanding
population and trade, had now become the concern of all the Greek world.
Egyptian national and anti-foreign feeling which compelled Amasis to
impose such restrictive measures on the Greeks in Egypt did not prevent
him from maintaining the closest ties with the rest of the Greek world. He
became a close friend and ally of the Greeks of Cyrene and took a wife
called Ladice from that city. On the rebuilding of the temple at Delphi36,
he subscribed a thousand talents of alum. He sent offerings of statues and
finely woven corselets of Egyptian linen to the temples of Hera of Samos
and Athena of Lindos. He exchanged gifts and for many years maintained
an active correspondence with Polycrates of Samos who at this time was
one of the most powerful rulers in the Greek world37. Egypt and the Greeks

34The Greek garrison at Daphnai was transferred to Memphis and Sais as

King's Guards (Her. II. 154). Herdotus, who visited Daphnai more than
a century after its abandonment, could still see the ruins of the mer-
chants' homes, and the slips on which they built and repaired their ships.
According to one of the Egyptian chronicles Amasis also assigned to the
mercenaries a part of the lands and revenues of the temples of Bubastis,
Memphis, and Heliopolis, and a Carian quarter to Karikon at Memphis
is mentioned. (How and Wells, Vol. I. p. 244).
35Her. III. 26. Paus. V.15. II.
36The shrine at Delphi had been burned to the ground in 548, and the work
of restoration had been undertaken by the Athenian Alcmaeonidae. The
best quality alum came from Egypt. It was used for dyeing and also, it is
said, for rendering wood fireproof.
37Her. II. 180, III. .39, 40, 43j. Amasis advised Polycrates to avoid the jealousy
of the gods by throwing into the sea his most valuable possession - advice
which he followed by throwing into the sea the famous ring made for
him by Theodorus which returned to him in the belly of a fish. The
Nemesis which he had flouted with his arrogance and wealth was accom-
plished wher he perished on the cross in 522 b.c. (Her. HI. 120-125).

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EGYPTIAN ART 53
had a common interest in uniting in a common front against the danger
from Persia. The conquest and occupation of Lydia in 546 was a clear
warning of Persian intentions, and it was hoped that the land and naval
forces of Polycrates, when the final Persian assault came, would be the
" avant-garde " of Greek resistance. Amasis, who clearly foresaw the danger
from Persia, died in 526, and it was in the reign of Psamtik III, his son,
that the final blow fell.

The army of Cambyses (Kambujuya), led by the treacherous Phanes38 of

Halicarnassus, who had been in the reign of Amasis a commander in the
Royal Guard at Memphis, crossed the desert, and at the battle of Pelusium
defeated Psamtik's army (525 B.C.). Psamtik's Egyptian troops were
slaughtered or fled, and only the Greek mercenaries offered any serious
resistance. Even their morale had been impaired by the Persian conquest
of the Ionian cities and Polycrates had deserted the cause of Egypt and
placed his fleet in the service of Cambyses. Memphis was occupied by the
Persians, Psamstik III39 was deposed, and Cambyses became the new Pharaoh
of Egypt. With the Persian conquest of Egypt40, and the Persian wars which
followed, the links between Greece and Egypt were broken except for the
brief periods when Egypt with Greek help struggled for a time against
Persian domination. With the conquest of Persia and Egypt by Alexander
(336-332) Naucratis is again and more closely than before in contact with
the Greek world.

The foundation of Naucratis marked the beginning, or rather the

resumption after many centuries of close relations between Egypt and the
Greek world. During the four centuries which were to elapse between its
foundation and the arrival of Alexander in 322-21 B.C., Greek influence
continued to increase until it was checked by the Persian invasion. But
even under Persian domination it persisted, and it was to Greece that

38Greek troops, in revenge for the desertion of Phanes, slaughtered his children
before the battle in sight of the Persian army. A vase in the shape of a
"lebes" which Phanes dedicated to Appollo at Naucratis was found by
Petrie. The inscription reads : Phanés me anethéke. (Egypt Explor. Fund.
PI. 33.). A coin found at Halicarnassus bears the inscription (Phaenos
emi sèma), "I am the sign of Phanes." It may have been one of the
coins struck by Phanes to pay his mercenary troops. (How and Wells
Op. C. Vol. I. p. 256).
39Psamtik was well treated !by Cambyses until he started to intrigue against
Persia. " He was compelled to drink the blood of a bull and died
immediately " (Her. III. 15). With him the XXVIth Egyptian dynasty
came to an end.
40For a detailed account of the relations between the Greeks and Egypt from
the conquest of Cambyses to that of Alexander, see "Mem. de l'lnst.
franc, d'arch. orient, du Caire " (Vol. XLVIII. 1922).

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54 UNIVERSITY REVIEW
Egyptian leaders41 turned for help against the invaders. During these four
centuries Naucratis, with the short-lived settlements at Daphnai and
elsewhere, played an important part in the history of Egypt, and at the
same time remained intimately connected with the life of Greece, not only
in trade and commerce, but with the literature and literary activity of Greece
and the islands of the Aegean, and all the Greek colonies of the Eastern
Mediterranean. Its beginnings were under the rule of the Assyrians. Its
soldiers helped Psammetichus, the founder of the XXVIth Dynasty, to
regain Egyptian independence. It contributed much to the century of
Salte Renaïsance which ended with the Persian domination, which, in its
turn, came to an end with the absorption of both Persia and Egypt into the
empire of Alexander.
The excavations of Petrie in 1884 have fixed for us the site of Naucratis
at the village of Kom Ga'ef near Tell Nebireh in the district of Damanhour42,
but the date of its foundation43 cannot be fixed with the same certainty. In
antiquity many writers wrote on the history of Naucratis, but their works,
except for fragments, have all been lost44. In spite of the detailed accounts
by Strabo and Herodotus45 which we still possess, it is uncertain when
Naucratis took the place of its forerunner, the original emporium of the
Milesians. It was probably some time previous to 650 B.C., the date at
which, according to Petrie, the era of temple building began. When
Psammetichus established his Greek camp in the neighbourhood (c. 651 B.C.),
and when news of the favour shown by him to the Greeks reached their
homelands, the settlement received a fresh and greater influx than ever before
of traders and soldiers from the Ionian cities and the Greek islands - an
immigration which continued throughout the XXVIth Dynasty.
The city was situated on a canal leading from the Canopic branch of the
Nile to Lake Mareotis, or on the river itself, epi toi potamoí, as Strabo says.
With the advantages of its position and the wide privileges granted to it by
the successive Pharaohs, it had every facility required to promote an active
and extensive commerce. Its rapidly increasing prosperity attracted merchants
from all parts of Egypt and Greece. In the primitive settlement three
communities only46, those of Samos, Miletus and Aegina, were represented,

41The last native Pharaoh of Egypt, Nekhtanebo II, was driven from the
country by the Persians and fled to Ethiopia.
42Further excavations were carried out in 1899 and 1903. A hamlet in the
neighbourhood called Naukrash seems to preserve the ancient name.
43How and Wells, "Comm. on Herod." Vol. I. pp. 253-4.
^Apollonius, Charon, Philistos, Hermias, Aristágoras, Hecataeus (F.H.G. Vol
IV. pp. 313, 360, 477).
45Her. II. 135, 178, 179. Strabo XVII. I 18.
^Her .II. 178. All the "nations" of Naucratis were from Asiatic Greece.
Aegina was the only " nation " from Greece proper.

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EGYPTIAN ART 55
each with its own particular sanctuary. But when the decree of Amasis
made Naucratis the only official community and trade centre of the Greeks
in Egypt, the founder " nations " were submerged in the constant inflow of
new arrivals. The enlarged city had now to accommodate immigrants from
nine cities of Asiatic Greece. They were Ionians from Chios, Teos, Phocaea,
and Clazomenae, Dorians from Rhodes, Cnidus, Halicarnassus and Phaselis,
and Aeolians from Mitylene. Naucratis had become an international city,
the prototype of Alexandria, the Shanghai of the ancient world47.
The city was divided into two - the native quarter to the South, and the
Greek quarter to the North. Within the port were four large docks, with
the temples48 rising up in the background. The great ť temenos,' the
Helleneion, was built by the offerings of all the Greek states. It was a hall
of assembly, the city hall, in which the common treasury was kept. In it
the mart inspectors enforced the regulations governing all the trade of the
city. The strength and size of the building could also give at least temporary
protection to the Greeks against acts of violence which must always have
been feared from a people who hated, by immemorial tradition, everything
foreign49.

The joint enterprise of the Greeks, helped by native labour, made Naucratis
an industrial centre whose exports were always far in excess of its imports.
The pottery and fine porcelain50, scarabs51 and statuettes, metal work in

47Glotz. " Histoire grecque." Vol. I. p. 205. How and Wells Op. C. Vol. I.
p. 255.
48The original temples were built to Apollo of Miletus, Hera of Samos, and
Zeus of Aegina, but Petrie's excavations have found traces of temples to
all the deities of Greece.
49Strabo, XVII. I. 8, speaks of the obstruction by Egyptian officials which the
early settlers had to meet.
50Egyptian and Egyptising faience figures from Naucratis and Naukratite
pottery have been found in great numbers at such places as Kameiros in
Rhodes and at all the sites of the Greek colonies in the Black Sea (Revue
archéologique," 1911. Marshall, " Discovery in Greek Lands (1920. p. 43).
5 Scarabs were small objects made of stone or glazed ware in the form of the
scarabaeus beetle. They were manufactured throughout Egyptian history
until the advent of the Ptolemies. The scarab was an emblem of the
resurrection and immortality. The scarabaeus is a dung beetle which
lays its eggs in the droppings of animals, then rolls the dung into a ball.
Thus the representation of the scarabaeus pushing the ball of the sun
between its horns - into the other world in the evening and back to earth
in the morning. Scarabs were always popular in the countries of the
Eastern Mediterranean.
Egyptian objects, especially scarabs, bearing the names of the
Pharaohs made it possible to establish synchronisms between the Aegean
and Mycenaean periods and the Egyptian Dynasties, as early Greek
chronology, Ibased on the Olympiads, dates only from VIQth Cent

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56 UNIVERSITY REVIEW
iron and copper, produced in its factories, found a ready market abroad. In
addition it sent to Greece such native products as salt and alum, alabaster,
papyrus, Egyptian linen and corn52, as well as serving as an entrepot for
more expensive products of the East - perfumes, ebony, and ivory. Egypt
was able to supply the settlers with all their needs, but, in the midst of plenty,
they still demanded the wines and oils of the homeland53, an import trade
which seems to have been entirely in the hands of the Lesbians and Milesians.
Naucratis was an autonomous city where the Greeks lived under Greek law.
The constitution 54 seems to have been partly Ionian, partly Dorian. The
chief magistrates were called " timouchoi "55, but all the citizens had the
right to appeal to the higher judgment of their "mother-city"56. Already
in the Vllth Cent. Naucratis was among the important capitals of the
Mediterranean, but it was in the reign of Amasis that it reached the peak
of its prosperity. It was then in every sense a cosmopolitan port, where
all the languages and pleasures of the Mediterranean were known and
practised. Interpreters, ciceroni, and courtesans were as numerous as they
were in later days in Alexandria.
From the beginning of the Vlllth Cent. Greece was rising up to challenge
everywhere Phoenician supremacy, and by the end of that century Phoenician
activity in the Eastern Mediterranean had almost come to an end. The
Phoenicians were ousted, first by the Greek pirates and later by more
peacefully disposed Greek sailors and merchants from the ports of the
Delta which they had controlled from the Xlth Cent. But towards the end
of the Vlth Cent. Greek expansion and commerce received a serious check
- in the East by the Persian conquest of Asia Minor and Egypt, and in the
West by the combined forces of Etruscans and Carthaginians. The
Phoenicians were having their revenge, but not for long. Greek perseverance
managed to preserve much of what their ancestors had acquired. Naucratis
continued to exist, though shorn of much of its splendour. Even under the
Persians the Greeks spread themselves to Memphis and Abydos57, and
survived the hardships of Persian rule to welcome their countryman Alexander

520ne of the reasons why Athens supported the Egyptians in their struggle
against Persia was the need to get corn from Egypt. Thucydides, VIII, 35,
says that the convoys of corn sailing from Egypt used to be attacked by
the Spartans in the waters of Cyprus.
53" Saw the merry Grecian coaster come
Freighted with amber grapes and Chian wine
Green bursting figs, and tunnies steeped in brine."
54It was transcribed by Aristotle, but has been lost.
55Maspero, " Passing of the Empires." p. 647.
56Her. II. 178.
^Aristágoras of Miletus. F.H.G. Vol. II. p. 98.

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EGYPTIAN ART 57
to Egypt. One of the decrees58 of Nekhtanebo II, the last native Pharaoh
of Egypt, who was driven out by the Persians and fled to Ethiopia, runs
as follows:
"The tithe of the gold and the silver, and of all things which are
produced in Pi-em-roye, called Naucratis, on the banks of the Anu,
and which are reckoned to the King's doman, to be a temple
endowment of my mother Neith59 for all time."

58Gunn. " Journal of Egyptian Archaeology," XXIX. 1943. p. 38.

59Neith, "the mother of the sun," was specially woi shipped at Sais and her
worship was widespread throughout Egypt under the XXVIth Dynasty.
The Greeks identified the Egyptian gods of human shape with their own
deities. They transferred the names of their own islands to the islands
of the Nile. The goddess Neith, with her bow and her weaving, became
the Athene of the Greeks. (How and Wells. Op. C. Vpl. I. p. 196,
Mallet, "Le cylte de Neit à Sais.")

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