“In spite of the fact that the Ancient Egyptians enjoy rather more popularity than their contemporaries, it is evident that the books which they wrote are closed books to those who have not the glamour of vanished peoples, and the fascination of mighty cities now made desolate, strong upon them. Yet in the heterogeneous and pitiful flotsam that reluctant seas have washed to us piecemeal from a remote past, there are, as will be shown later, many things which, although proceeding from a culture and modes of thought as far removed from our own as they may well be, are worth the reading.”

Battiscombe G Gunn, Introduction to The Instruction Of Ptah-Hotep And The Instruction Of Ke’gemni (1906)