Of the class of domestic objects is the primitive but doubtless quite effective corn-grinder shown in the illustration.  This was found in an undisturbed tomb in the Osiris temenos, where also was a strangely shaped three-sided pottery bowl, similar in shape to a stone bowl of the same period, but otherwise unknown in antiquity.  This three-sided bowl may be regarded as a freak of the workman rather than as having any particular value along the line of evolution of pottery forms; and it is interesting to note that bowls of this form have been quite recently made by the modern English potters in South Devonshire, as the result of the inventive fancy of a village workman.

During the course of the excavations at Abydos many thousands of fragments of pottery were collected.

[Illustration:  402a.jpg IVORY COMB, B. C. 4800]

Those that appeared to be of historic value were sorted and classified, and, as a result of minute and extended labours, it is now possible for the reader to see at a glance the principal types of Egyptian pottery from prehistoric times, and to view their relationship as a whole.  The diagram exhibits an unbroken series of pottery forms from s.d. 76 to B.C. 4400.

[Illustration:  402b.jpg CORN-GRINDER AND THREE-SIDED BOWL]

The forms in the first column are those classified according to the chronological notation devised by Professor Petrie, enabling a “sequence date” (s. d.) to be assigned to an object which cannot otherwise be dated.  In the second column are forms found in the town of Abydos, and in the last column are those unearthed in the tombs.  Most of the large jars bear marks, which were scratched in the moist clay before being baked; some few were marked after the baking.

[Illustration:  403.jpg TYPES OF PREHISTORIC AND FIRST DYNASTY POTTERY]

Some of the marks are unquestionably hieroglyphs; others are probably connected with the signs used by the earlier prehistoric people; and many can scarcely be determined.

[Illustration:  404a.jpg POTTERY MARKS]

A typical instance of these pottery marks is shown in the illustration.  These signs appear to be distinctly of the time of Mer-sekha, and the fortified enclosure around the name may refer to the tomb as the eternal fortress of the king.  These marks can be roughly classified into types according to the skill with which they were drawn.  The first example illustrates the more careful workmanship, and the others show more degraded forms, in which the outline of the hawk and the signs in the cartouche become gradually more debased.  It is tolerably certain that what are known as the Mediterranean alphabets were derived from a selection of the signs used in these pottery marks.

[Illustration:  404b.jpg POTTERY FORMS FROM ABYDOS]