Book Description

Excerpt from Legends of Our Lady Mary the Perpetual Virgin and Her Mother Hanna Vllis the only copy of the Life of Hanna In Ethiopic known to me. Two of the manuscripts were large handsome volumes about 16 inches square, and each contained a good selection of the Miracles of the Virgin mary, illustrated with many full-page pictures painted in bright colours which were intended to illustrate the texts of the Miracles. The older of these mss. Was written in the xvith century and the other about a century later; each had been made for the use of a royal personage. Another manuscript contained the Life of Mab a'a seyon, a comparatively modern Ethio pian saint, and the Life of Gabra krestos, a prince who abandoned his royal state and home and parents, and became a mendicant monk. These Lives were illus trated by a large series of coloured pictures, which are of Special interest as they portray events in the daily life of the modern Abyssinians: I sent to Lady Meux a description of these mss. Pointing out their interest and importance, and their great value from an artistic point of view. I also told the Keeper of Oriental Manu scripts in the British Museum of them, and urged him to attempt to acquire them for the National Collection. But his official financial position was such that it was impossible for him to make an offer for them which Mr. Quaritch would accept, and so the whole group of mss., together with a few smaller works, became the property of Lady Meux, who added them to her Col lection of Egyptian and Sudani antiquities preserved in the museum at Theobalds Park. The nucleus of this Collection was made by Sir Henry and Lady Meux when they visited Egypt In 1878 and 1882. In the former year Lady Meux with a small party succeeded In getting as far south as Sarras, and they visited Semnah and Kummah, and some of the forts In the Second Cataract between Sarras and Wadi Halfah. On their way down the Nile from Aswan Lady Meux picked up several objects of Interest among thembeing the important figures of Nebseni and his wife, who flourished about b.c. I 550. A substantial part of the Collection as it was in 1897 was made by myself in Egypt under permission from the Trustees of the British Museum, and the total number of Egyptian objects in the Theobalds Park Museum was one thou sand four hundred. In 1886 Mr. Walter Ingram pre sented to Lady Meux the now notorious mummy and coffin of nes-amsu (nes-menu), a prophet of the god Menu at Panopolis about b.c. 350. Many absurd stories have been published about this mummy, which it has been alleged caused the death of Mr. Ingram, and it will be well to state the facts concerning its acqui sition, which I had direct from him and from the natives at Luxor who were present when he purchased it. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.