They are foredoomed to destruction by the mere value of the materials in which they are made.

What civil war and foreign invasion had spared, and what had chanced to escape the rapacity of Roman princes and governors, fell a prey to Christian iconoclasm.

A few tiny statuettes buried as amulets upon the bodies of mummies, a few domestic divinities buried in the ruins of private houses, a few ex-votos forgotten, perchance, in some dark corner of a fallen sanctuary, have escaped till the present day.

The Ptah and Amen of Queen Aahhotep, another golden Amen also at Gizeh, and the silver vulture found in 1885 at Medinet Habu, are the only pieces of this kind which can be attributed with certainty to the great period of Egyptian art.

The remainder are of Saite or Ptolemaic work, and are remarkable only for the perfection with which they are wrought.