Plague Doctor

"Mr. Edwin, you can watch it as long as you want. This is just the appetizer. We have better things, if you are interested."

In the bright office, George Edwin, who was sitting behind his desk, felt his heart skip a beat when he saw this fragment of pottery.

There are many differences between fakes and authentic ones. For someone like him, who has been engaged in trading Egyptian antiquities for more than 30 years, many details can be seen at a glance.

Experience now told him that this was a genuine item.

However, Edwin remained calm on the surface, taking the palm-sized fragment from the dealer with his gloved hands, and one could see the excitement of the three dealers.

The other party was three local men who found him through the intermediary Paul Smith, who was now watching. Both of them knew that most of these dealers were newbies who had gotten some treasures from nowhere and were eager to sell them for cash. This usually resulted in a good price for both parties.

"Let me take a look." Edwin carefully held the fragment in one hand, picked up the magnifying glass in the other hand, and began to identify it.

They don't ask where things come from, that's none of their business, they only care about the authenticity of things.

As long as they are genuine and bought at a good price, these things can naturally appear in auction houses in the UK and Citigroup, and then sell for high prices.

Confirming the authenticity of the cultural relics in his hands is the only thing Edwin cares about.

As soon as he took the fragment, before Edwin could take a closer look, he could already see a line of ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs on the fragment, which was in hieroglyphic script.

【???????】

Edwin's forehead wrinkled, and he felt a little strange...

"How is it?" Baisher, the cultural relics dealer, asked nervously.

Paul Smith was watching from the side, and he also had some knowledge of the hieroglyphics, "King, Sun God, the inscriptions are well preserved, but I don't know whether they are true or false."

"Of course it's true." Besh said immediately, and Ella said anxiously: "Let me tell you, we only have a few fragments like this." Eldin noticed the expression on Edwin's old face. He pondered and asked, "What does the picture above mean?"

"Literally means king + rebel wearing a crown and holding a staff, sun god + rebel."

Edwin looked at the four words carefully with a magnifying glass, "The rebels are at the back, and there is no name or king's name circle, so the meaning should be that these were the rebels at that time, anti-king, anti-Sun God. This fragment is very Probably unearthed in a rebel's tomb."

Baishir, Ella, and Eldin immediately looked at each other, and they were no longer royal relatives.

If this is the case, it seems to explain why there is no mausoleum, not even a coffin...

But Bashir sounded like he was trying to lower the price, and said loudly: "Mr. Edwin, I don't care if he is a rebel or not, this is an Egyptian cultural relic."

"I didn't say it wasn't." Edwin said softly, and he was gradually fascinated by the sight. The quality of this pottery fragment was very high, the texture was clear, and the hieroglyphic script was the earliest font used in ancient Egypt. If it was Focusing on hieroglyphics, this fragment can even be traced back to 3000 BC.

Hidden script later evolved to retain only its phonetic function, a bit like the English alphabet.

The earliest hieroglyphics focused on form and meaning, and were very pictorial. You can understand the meaning it expresses by looking at the pictures.

But with just such a fragment and four characters, Edwin couldn't tell which period of hieroglyphics it was from or what it meant...

And the meaning is quite important. Only when more and more complete texts are put together can we determine whether it is a scripture, an inscription or something else, whether it is a record, blessing or incantation, and what nature this fragment comes from.

"Have you brought any other fragments?" Edwin raised his head and asked, "I need to find out the types of these fragments before I can give an estimate."

Beshir and others hesitated, and Paul Smith also said: "Take them all out, different things have different values."

"Mr. Edwin, you'd better explain your opinion to us." Bashir said, waving his hand for Ella to take something out of her backpack. Ella stared at Edwin's old face while taking it out. The remaining three fragments were placed on the table.

"Be gentle!" Seeing the other party's rough movements, Edwin couldn't help shouting, already leaning toward the fact that these were genuine items, and cultural relics that had existed for thousands of years were very fragile.

"Mr. Edwin, it seems that you are quite satisfied with our goods." Eldin saw the other party's concern.

Ella and Bashir immediately laughed knowingly after hearing this. Edwin did not respond and had already begun to try to piece together the four fragments.

These are indeed fragments of the same pottery. The broken shapes can be pieced together, like a bowl-shaped container. The words are engraved on the middle bowl surface of the container. They are all very clear, and time cannot erode their lines.

Edwin frowned and looked at the hieroglyphic text on the four fragments. He didn't know why, but the more he looked at it, the more he felt an indescribable surging feeling in his heart...

The ancient Egyptian language had no punctuation marks, but sometimes different expressions were written in separate lines, and there were other means of varying sizes.

Four fragments spelled out four sentences.

From left to right, the first sentence [?????????]

The second sentence【????】

The third sentence【??????????】

The fourth sentence【?????????】

"First sentence, rebel of kings, rebel of sun god."

Edwin thought about it and asked others

Explaining softly, "The second sentence, stone + pustule - that is, disease... stone disease, pustule caused by stone, disease caused by stone, this may be the cause of death of the deceased... The third sentence, birdcatcher + dissected pustule ——Represents medicine + birds + a flock of birds + death, a trap for birds? Use medicine to kill the birds... The fourth sentence, the ram-headed god + new world + rebirth + power..."

It’s a stone disease, and it’s a bird killer. Bashir scratched his head when he heard it, “What does that mean?”

Not to mention these three dealers, Paul Smith also couldn't figure it out. In fact, modern people have limited understanding of the ancient Egyptian language. Not only do they still not understand the meaning of many words, but many of the words they are connected to express are Relying on guesswork.

"Stone disease..." Edwin looked at these fragments, unsure whether this was the cause of death of the rebel? Or the rebel way of rebellion?

Who carved this inscription? By the king's men? Or someone from the rebel side?

This directly determines the meaning of the words, especially the third and fourth sentences...

"It seems that at that time," Edwin said, feeling increasingly confused, "there was a rebellion against the Kingdom of the Sun God, related to a disease... Mr. Bashir, I want these fragments, What other treasures do you have?”

"Haha, that's a lot, but it's much more expensive than these fragments." Bashir said happily, and Ella also said happily: "You may not be able to buy it."

While Edwin was speaking, he was still looking thoughtfully at the ancient text on the four fragments:

【??????????????????????????????】

Love the Plague Doctor.