Since then Prof. Petrie and his co-workers have
revisited the same district, and Gurob has been re-examined (in 1904)
by Messrs. Loat and Ayrton, who discovered there a shrine devoted to
the worship of fish. This work was carried on at the same time as Prof.
Petrie's main excavation for the Egypt Exploration Fund at Annas, or
Ahnas-yet el-Medina, the site of the ancient Henensu, the Herakleopolis
of the Greeks. Prof. Naville had excavated there for the Egypt
Exploration Fund in 1892, but had not completely cleared the temple.
This work was now taken up by Prof. Petrie, who laid the whole building
bare. It is dedicated to Hershefi, the local deity of Herakleopolis.
This god, who was called Ar-saphes by the Greeks, and identified with
Herakles, was in fact a form of Horus with the head of a ram; his name
means "Terrible-Face." The greater part of the temple dates to the time
of the XIXth Dynasty, and nothing of the early period is left. We know,
however, that the Middle Kingdom was the flourishing period of the
city of Hershefi. For a comparatively brief period, between the age of
Memphite hegemony and that of Theban dominion, Herakleopolis was the
capital city of Egypt. The kings of the IXth and Xth Dynasties were
Herakleopolites, though we know little of them. One, Kheti, is said to
have been a great tyrant.
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