Note 50 — PREFACE.

Professor Petrie, speaking of his discovery that it was the Egyptian custom to place masonic deposits of miniature model tools, etc., underneath the foundations of temples, and giving an account of the foundation deposits which he found beneath the pyramid temple of Ûsertesen II., at Illahûn, says: “The reason for burying such objects is yet unexplained; but it seems not unlikely that they were intended for the use of the Kas of the builders, like the models placed in tombs for the Kas of the deceased. Whether each building had a Ka, which needed ghostly repair by the builders’ Kas, is also to be considered” (Kahun, Gurob, and Hawara, p. 22). We know that each building had its guardian spirit in the form of a serpent (cf. the representation of one dating from the time of Amenophis III, in Ghizeh, No. 217, published by Mariette, Mon. Div., pl. 63 b).