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HISTORY OF EGYPT CHALDEA, SYRIA, BABYLONIA, AND ASSYRIA

By G. MASPERO, Honorable Doctor of Civil Laws, and Fellow of Queen'sCollege, Oxford; Member of the Institute and Professor at the College ofFrance

Edited by A. H. SAYCE, Professor of Assyriology, Oxford

Translated by M. L. McCLURE, Member of the Committee of the EgyptExploration Fund

CONTAINING OVER TWELVE HUNDRED COLORED PLATES AND ILLUSTRATIONS

Volume I. , Part A. 

LONDON

THE GROLIER SOCIETY

PUBLISHERS

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EDITOR'S PREFACE

Professor Maspero does not need to be introduced to us. His name iswell known in England and America as that of one of the chief masters ofEgyptian science as well as of ancient Oriental history and archaeology. Alike as a philologist, a historian, and an archaeologist, he occupiesa foremost place in the annals of modern knowledge and research. Hepossesses that quick apprehension and fertility of resource withoutwhich the decipherment of ancient texts is impossible, and he alsopossesses a sympathy with the past and a power of realizing it which areindispensable if we would picture it aright. His intimate acquaintancewith Egypt and its literature, and the opportunities of discoveryafforded him by his position for several years as director of the BulaqMuseum, give him an unique claim to speak with authority on the historyof the valley of the Nile. In the present work he has been prodigal ofhis abundant stores of learning and knowledge, and it may therefore beregarded as the most complete account of ancient Egypt that has ever yetbeen published. 

In the case of Babylonia and Assyria he no longer, it is true, speaksat first hand. But he has thoroughly studied the latest and bestauthorities on the subject, and has weighed their statements with thejudgment which comes from an exhaustive acquaintance with a similardepartment of knowledge. 

Naturally, in progressive studies like those of Egyptology andAssyriology, a good many theories and conclusions must be tentative andprovisional only. Discovery crowds so quickly on discovery, that thetruth of to-day is often apt to be modified or amplified by the truthof to-morrow. A single fresh fact may throw a wholly new and unexpectedlight upon the results we have already gained, and cause them to assumea somewhat changed aspect. But this is what must happen in all sciencesin which there is a healthy growth, and archaeological science is noexception to the rule. 

The spelling of ancient Egyptian proper names adopted by ProfessorMaspero will perhaps seem strange to many. But it must be rememberedthat all our attempts to represent the pronunciation of ancient Egyptianwords can be approximate only; we can never ascertain with certainty howthey were actually sounded. All that can be done is to determine whatpronunciation was assigned to them in the Greek period, and to workbackwards from this, so far as it is possible, to more remote ages. This is what Professor Maspero has done, and it must be no slightsatisfaction to him to find that on the whole his system oftransliteration is confirmed by the cuneiform tablets of Tel el-Amarna. 

The difficulties attaching to the spelling of Assyrian names aredifferent from those which beset our attempts to reproduce, evenapproximately, the names of ancient Egypt. The cuneiform system ofwriting was syllabic, each character denoting a syllable, so that weknow what were the vowels in a proper name as well as the consonants. Moreover, the pronunciation of the consonants resembled that of theHebrew consonants, the transliteration of which has long since becomeconventional. When, therefore, an Assyrian or Babylonian name is writtenphonetically, its correct transliteration is not often a matterof question. But, unfortunately, the names are not always writtenphonetically. The cuneiform script was an inheritance from thenon-Semitic predecessors of the Semites in Babylonia, and in this scriptthe characters represented words as well as sounds. Not unfrequentlythe Semitic Assyrians continued to write a name in the old Sumerian wayinstead of spelling it phonetically, the result being that we do notknow how it was pronounced in their own language. The name of theChaldæan Noab, for instance, is written with two characters whichideographically signify "the sun" or "day of life, " and of the first ofwhich the Sumerian values were _ut, babar, khis, tarn, _ and _par_, while the second had the value of _zi_. Were it not that the Chaldæanhistorian Bêrôssos writes the name Xisuthros, we should have no clue toits Semitic pronunciation. 

Professor Maspero's learning and indefatigable industry are well knownto me, but I confess I was not prepared for the exhaustive acquaintancehe shows with Assyriological literature. Nothing seems to have escapedhis notice. Papers and books just published, and half forgotten articlesin obscure periodicals which appeared years ago, have all alike beenused and quoted by him. Naturally, however, there are some points onwhich I should be inclined to differ from the conclusions he draws, or to which he has been led by other Assyriologists. Without being anAssyriologist himself, it was impossible for him to be acquainted withthat portion of the evidence on certain disputed questions which is onlyto be found in still unpublished or untranslated inscriptions. 

There are two points which seem to me of sufficient importanceto justify my expression of dissent from his views. These are thegeographical situation of the land of Magan, and the historicalcharacter of the annals of Sargon of Accad. The evidence about Magan isvery clear. Magan is usually associated with the country of Melukhkha, "the salt" desert, and in _every_ text in which its geographicalposition is indicated it is placed in the immediate vicinity of Egypt. Thus Assur-bani-pal, after stating that he had "gone to the lands ofMagan and Melukhkha, " goes on to say that he "directed his road toEgypt and Kush, " and then describes the first of his Egyptian campaigns. Similar testimony is borne by Esar-haddon. The latter king tells us thatafter quitting Egypt he directed his road to the land of Melukhkha, adesert region in which there were no rivers, and which extended "to thecity of Rapikh" (the modern Raphia) "at the edge of the wadi of Egypt"(the present Wadi El-Arîsh). After this he received camels from the kingof the Arabs, and made his way to the land and city of Magan. The Telel-Amarna tablets enable us to carry the record back to the fifteenthcentury b. C. In certain of the tablets now as Berlin (Winckler and Abel, 42 and 45) the Phoenician governor of the Pharaoh asks that help shouldbe sent him from Melukhkha and Egypt: "The king should hear the words ofhis servant, and send ten men of the country of Melukhkha and twenty menof the country of Egypt to defend the city [of Gebal] for the king. " Andagain, "I have sent [to] Pharaoh" (literally, "the great house") "for agarrison of men from the country of Melukhkha, and... The king hasjust despatched a garrison [from] the country of Melukhkha. " At a stillearlier date we have indications that Melukhkha and Magan denoted thesame region of the world. In an old Babylonian geographical list whichbelongs to the early days of Chaldsean history, Magan is described as"the country of bronze, " and Melukhkha as "the country of the _samdu_, "or "malachite. " It was this list which originally led Oppert, Lenormant, and myself independently to the conviction that Magan was to be lookedfor in the Sinaitic Peninsula. Magan included, however, the Midian ofScripture, and the city of Magan, called Makkan in Semitic Assyrian, isprobably the Makna of classical geography, now represented by the ruinsof Mukna. 

As I have always maintained the historical character of the annals ofSargon of Accad, long before recent discoveries led Professor Hilprechtand others to adopt the same view, it is as well to state why Iconsider them worthy of credit. In themselves the annals containnothing improbable; indeed, what might seem the most unlikely portionof them--that which describes the extension of Sargon's empire to theshores of the Mediterranean--has been confirmed by the progress ofresearch. Ammi-satana, a king of the first dynasty of Babylon (about2200 B. C. ), calls himself "king of the country of the Amorites, " andthe Tel el-Amarna tablets have revealed to us how deep and long-lastingBabylonian influence must have been throughout Western Asia. Moreover, the vase described by Professor Maspero in the present work proves thatthe expedition of Naram-Sin against Magan was an historical reality, andsuch an expedition was only possible if "the land of the Amorites, " theSyria and Palestine of later days, had been secured in the rear. But what chiefly led me to the belief that the annals are a documentcontemporaneous with the events narrated in them, are two facts whichdo not seem to have been sufficiently considered. On the one side, whilethe annals of Sargon are given in full, those of his son Naram-Sin breakoff abruptly in the early part of his reign. I see no explanation ofthis, except that they were composed while Naram-Sin was still on thethrone. On the other side, the campaigns of the two monarchs are coupledwith the astrological phenomena on which the success of the campaignswas supposed to depend. We know that the Babylonians were given to thepractice and study of astrology from the earliest days of their history;we know also that even in the time of the later Assyrian monarchy it wasstill customary for the general in the field to be accompanied bythe _asipu_, or "prophet, " the ashshâph of Dan. Ii. 10, on whoseinterpretation of the signs of heaven the movements of the armydepended; and in the infancy of Chaldæn history we should accordinglyexpect to find the astrological sign recorded along with the event withwhich it was bound up. At a subsequent period the sign and the eventwere separated from one another in literature, and had the annals ofSargon been a later compilation, in their case also the separation wouldassuredly have been made. That, on the contrary, the annals have theform which they could have assumed and ought to have assumed only atthe beginning of contemporaneous Babylonian history, is to me a strongtestimony in favour of their genuineness. 

It may be added that Babylonian seal-cylinders have been found inCyprus, one of which is of the age of Sargon of Accad, its style andworkmanship being the same as that of the cylinder figured in vol. Iii. P. 96, while the other, though of later date, belonged to a personwho describes himself as "the servant of the deified Naram-Sin. " Suchcylinders may, of course, have been brought to the island in latertimes; but when we remember that a characteristic object of prehistoricCypriote art is an imitation of the seal-cylinder of Chaldsea, theirdiscovery cannot be wholly an accident. 

Professor Maspero has brought his facts up to so recent a date thatthere is very little to add to what he has written. Since hismanuscript was in type, however, a few additions have been made to ourAssyriological knowledge. A fresh examination of the Babylonian dynastictablet has led Professor Delitzsch to make some alterations in thepublished account of what Professor Maspero calls the ninth dynasty. According to Professor Delitzsch, the number of kings composing thedynasty is stated on the tablet to be twenty-one, and not thirty-one aswas formerly read, and the number of lost lines exactly corresponds withthis figure. The first of the kings reigned thirty-six years, and hehad a predecessor belonging to the previous dynasty whose name has beenlost. There would consequently have been two Elamite usurpers instead ofone. 

I would further draw attention to an interesting text, published byMr. Strong in the _Babylonian and Oriental Record_, which I believe tocontain the name of a king who belonged to the legendary dynasties ofChaldæa. This is Samas-natsir, who is coupled with Sargon of Accad andother early monarchs in one of the lists. The legend, if I interpret itrightly, states that "Elam shall be altogether given to Samas-natsir;"and the same prince is further described as building Nippur and Dur-ilu, as King of Babylon and as conqueror both of a certain Baldakha and ofKhumba-sitir, "the king of the cedar-forest. " It will be remembered thatin the Epic of Gil-games, Khumbaba also is stated to have been the lordof the "cedar-forest. "

But of new discoveries and facts there is a constant supply, and itis impossible for the historian to keep pace with them. Even while thesheets of his work are passing through the press, the excavator, theexplorer, and the decipherer are adding to our previous stores ofknowledge. In Egypt, Mr. De Morgan's unwearied energy has raised as itwere out of the ground, at Kom Ombo, a vast and splendidly preservedtemple, of whose existence we had hardly dreamed; has discoveredtwelfth-dynasty jewellery at Dahshur of the most exquisite workmanship, and at Meir and Assiut has found in tombs of the sixth dynasty paintedmodels of the trades and professions of the day, as well as fightingbattalions of soldiers, which, for freshness and lifelike reality, contrast favourably with the models which come from India to-day. InBabylonia, the American Expedition, under Mr. Haines, has at Nifferunearthed monuments of older date than those of Sargon of Accad. Normust I forget to mention the lotiform column found by Mr. De Morgan ina tomb of the Old Empire at Abusir, or the interesting discovery made byMr. Arthur Evans of seals and other objects from the prehistoric sitesof Krete and other parts of the AEgean, inscribed with hieroglyphiccharacters which reveal a new system of writing that must at one timehave existed by the side of the Hittite hieroglyphs, and may have hadits origin in the influence exercised by Egypt on the peoples of theMediterranean in the age of the twelfth dynasty. 

In volumes IV. , V. , and VI. We find ourselves in the full light of anadvanced culture. The nations of the ancient East are no longer eachpursuing an isolated existence, and separately developing the seeds ofcivilization and culture on the banks of the Euphrates and the Nile. Asia and Africa have met in mortal combat. Babylonia has carried itsempire to the frontiers of Egypt, and Egypt itself has been held inbondage by the Hyksôs strangers from Asia. In return, Egypt has drivenback the wave of invasion to the borders of Mesopotamia, has substitutedan empire of its own in Syria for that of the Babylonians, and hasforced the Babylonian king to treat with its Pharaoh on equal terms. In the track of war and diplomacy have come trade and commerce; WesternAsia is covered with roads, along which the merchant and the couriertravel incessantly, and the whole civilised world of the Orient is knittogether in a common literary culture and common commercial interests. 

The age of isolation has thus been succeeded by an age of intercourse, partly military and antagonistic, partly literary and peaceful. Professor Maspero paints for us this age of intercourse, describesits rise and character, its decline and fall. For the unity of Easterncivilization was again shattered. The Hittites descended from the rangesof the Taurus upon the Egyptian province of Northern Syria, and cut offthe Semites of the west from those of the east. The Israelites pouredover the Jordan out of Edom and Moab, and took possession of Canaan, while Babylonia itself, for so many centuries the ruling power of theOriental world, had to make way for its upstart rival Assyria. The oldimperial powers were exhausted and played out, and it needed time beforethe new forces which were to take their place could acquire sufficientstrength for their work. 

As usual, Professor Maspero has been careful to embody in his historythe very latest discoveries and information. Notice, it will be found, has been taken even of the _stela_ of Meneptah, recently disinterred byProfessor Pétrie, on which the name of the Israelites is engraved. At Elephantine, I found, a short time since, on a granite boulder, aninscription of Khufuânkh--whose sarcophagus of red granite is one ofthe most beautiful objects in the Gizeh Museum--which carries back thehistory of the island to the age of the pyramid-builders of the fourthdynasty. The boulder was subsequently concealed under the southern sideof the city-wall, and as fragments of inscribed papyrus coeval with thesixth dynasty have been discovered in the immediate neighbourhood, onone of which mention is made of "this domain" of Pepi II. , it would seemthat the town of Elephantine must have been founded between the periodof the fourth dynasty and that of the sixth. Manetho is thereforejustified in making the fifth and sixth dynasties of Elephantine origin. 

It is in Babylonia, however, that the most startling discoveries havebeen made. At Tello, M. De Sarzec has found a library of more thanthirty thousand tablets, all neatly arranged, piled in order one on theother, and belonging to the age of Gudea (b. C. 2700). Many more tabletsof an early date have been unearthed at Abu-Habba (Sippara) and Jokha(Isin) by Dr. Scheil, working for the Turkish government. But the mostimportant finds have been at Niffer, the ancient Nippur, in NorthernBabylonia, where the American expedition has brought to a close its longwork of systematic excavation. Here Mr. Haynes has dug down to the veryfoundations of the great temple of El-lil, and the chief historicalresults of his labours have been published by Professor Hilprecht (in_The Babylonian Expedition of the University of Pennsylvania_, vol. I. Pl. 2, 1896). 

About midway between the summit and the bottom of the mound, Mr. Hayneslaid bare a pavement constructed of huge bricks stamped with the namesof Sargon of Akkad and his son Naram-Sin. He found also the ancient wallof the city, which had been built by Naram-Sin, 13. 7 metres wide. The_débris_ of ruined buildings which lies below the pavement of Sargonis as much as 9. 25 metres in depth, while that above it, the topmoststratum of which brings us down to the Christian era, is only 11 metresin height. We may form some idea from this of the enormous age to whichthe history of Babylonian culture and writing reaches back. In fact, Professor Hilprecht quotes with approval Mr. Haynes's words: "We mustcease to apply the adjective 'earliest' to the time of Sargon, or to anyage or epoch within a thousand years of his advanced civilization. " "Thegolden age of Babylonian history seems to include the reign of Sargonand of Ur-Gur. "

Many of the inscriptions which belong to this remote age of humanculture have been published by Professor Hilprecht. Among them is a longinscription, in 132 lines, engraved on multitudes of large stonevases presented to the temple of El-lil by a certain Lugal-zaggisi. Lugal-zaggisi was the son of Ukus, the _patesi_ or high priest of the"Land of the Bow, " as Mesopotamia, with its Bedawin inhabitants, wascalled. He not only conquered Babylonia, then known as Kengi, "the landof canals and reeds, " but founded an empire which extended from thePersian Gulf to the Mediterranean. This was centuries before Sargonof Akkad followed in his footsteps. Erech became the capital ofLugal-zaggisi's empire, and doubtless received at this time its Sumeriantitle of "the city" _par excellence_. 

For a long while previously there had been war between Babylonia and the"Land of the Bow, " whose rulers seem to have established themselvesin the city of Kis. At one time we find the Babylonian princeEn-sag(sag)-ana capturing Kis and its king; at another time it is a kingof Kis who makes offerings to the god of Nippur, in gratitude for hisvictories. To this period belongs the famous "Stela of the Vultures"found at Tello, on which is depicted the victory of E-dingir-ana-gin, the King of Lagas (Tello), over the Semitic hordes of the Land of theBow. It may be noted that the recent discoveries have shown how correctProfessor Maspero has been in assigning the kings of Lagas to a periodearlier than that of Sargon of Akkad. 

Professor Hilprecht would place E-dingir-ana-gin after Lugal-zaggisi, and see in the Stela of the Vultures a monument of the revenge takenby the Sumerian rulers of Lagas for the conquest of the country by theinhabitants of the north. But it is equally possible that it marksthe successful reaction of Chaldsea against the power established byLugal-zaggisi. However this may be, the dynasty of Lagas (to whichProfessor Hilprecht has added a new king, En-Khegal) reigned in peacefor some time, and belonged to the same age as the first dynasty of Ur. This was founded by a certain Lugal-kigubnidudu, whose inscriptions havebeen found at Niffer. The dynasty which arose at Ur in later days (cir. B. C. 2700), under Ur-Gur and Bungi, which has hitherto been known as"the first dynasty of Ur, " is thus dethroned from its position, andbecomes the second. The succeeding dynasty, which also made Ur itscapital, and whose kings, Ine-Sin, Pur-Sin IL, and Gimil-Sin, werethe immediate predecessors of the first dynasty of Babylon (to whichKharnmurabi belonged), must henceforth be termed the third. 

Among the latest acquisitions from Tello are the seals of the _patesi_, Lugal-usumgal, which finally remove all doubt as to the identity of"Sargani, king of the city, " with the famous Sargon of Akkad. Thehistorical accuracy of Sargon's annals, moreover, have been fullyvindicated. Not only have the American excavators found the contemporarymonuments of him and his son Naram-Sin, but also tablets dated in theyears of his campaigns against "the land of the Amorites. " In short, Sargon of Akkad, so lately spoken of as "a half-mythical" personage, hasnow emerged into the full glare of authentic history. 

That the native chronologists had sufficient material for reconstructingthe past history of their country, is also now clear. The earlyBabylonian contract-tablets are dated by events which officiallydistinguished the several years of a king's reign, and tablets have beendiscovered compiled at the close of a reign which give year by year theevents which thus characterised them. One of these tablets, for example, from the excavations at Niffer, begins with the words: (1) "The yearwhen Par-Sin (II. ) becomes king. (2) The year when Pur-Sin the kingconquers Urbillum, " and ends with "the year when Gimil-Sin becomes Kingof Ur, and conquers the land of Zabsali" in the Lebanon. 

Of special interest to the biblical student are the discoveries madeby Mr. Pinches among some of the Babylonian tablets which have recentlybeen acquired by the British Museum. Four of them relate to no less apersonage than Kudur-Laghghamar or Chedor-laomer, "King of Elam, " aswell as to Eri-Aku or Arioch, King of Larsa, and his son Dur-makh-ilani;to Tudghula or Tidal, the son of Gazza[ni], and to their war againstBabylon in the time of Khamrnu[rabi]. In one of the texts the questionis asked, "Who is the son of a king's daughter who has sat on the throneof royalty? Dur-makh-ilani, the son of Eri-Âku, the son of the ladyKur... Has sat on the throne of royalty, " from which it may perhaps beinferred that Eri-Âku was the son of Kudur-Laghghamar's daughter; and inanother we read, "Who is Kudur-Laghghamar, the doer of mischief? Hehas gathered together the Umman Manda, has devastated the land of Bel(Babylonia), and [has marched] at their side. " The Umman Manda were the"Barbarian Hordes" of the Kurdish mountains, on the northern frontier ofElam, and the name corresponds with that of the Goyyim or "nations" inthe fourteenth chapter of Genesis. We here see Kudur-Laghghamar actingas their suzerain lord. Unfortunately, all four tablets are in ashockingly broken condition, and it is therefore difficult to discoverin them a continuous sense, or to determine their precise nature. 

They have, however, been supplemented by further discoveries made byDr. Scheil at Constantinople. Among the tablets preserved there, he hasfound letters from Kharnmurabi to his vassal Sin-idinnam of Larsa, from which we learn that Sin-idinnam had been dethroned by the ElamitesKudur-Mabug and Eri-Âku, and had fled for refuge to the court ofKharnmurabi at Babylon. In the war which subsequently broke out betweenKharnmurabi and Kudur-Laghghamar, the King of Elam (who, it would seem, exercised suzerainty over Babylonia for seven years), Sin-idinnamgave material assistance to the Babylonian monarch, and Khammurabiaccordingly bestowed presents upon him as a "recompense for his valouron the day of the overthrow of Kudur-Laghghamar. "

I must also refer to a fine scarab--found in the rubbish-mounds of theancient city of Kom Ombos, in Upper Egypt--which bears upon it thename of Sutkhu-Apopi. It shows us that the author of the story of theExpulsion of the Hyksôs, in calling the king Ra-Apopi, merely, like anorthodox Egyptian, substituted the name of the god of Heliopolis forthat of the foreign deity. Equally interesting are the scarabs broughtto light by Professor Flinders Pétrie, on which a hitherto unknownYa'aqob-hal or Jacob-el receives the titles of a Pharaoh. 

In volumes VII. , VIII. , and IX. , Professor Maspero concludes hismonumental work on the history of the ancient East. The overthrow of thePersian empire by the Greek soldiers of Alexander marks the beginning ofa new era. Europe at last enters upon the stage of history, and becomesthe heir of the culture and civilisation of the Orient. The culturewhich had grown up and developed on the banks of the Euphrates and Nilepasses to the West, and there assumes new features and is inspired witha new spirit. The East perishes of age and decrepitude; its strength isoutworn, its power to initiate is past. The long ages through which ithad toiled to build up the fabric of civilisation are at an end; freshraces are needed to carry on the work which it had achieved. Greeceappears upon the scene, and behind Greece looms the colossal figure ofthe Roman Empire. 

During the past decade, excavation has gone on apace in Egypt andBabylonia, and discoveries of a startling and unexpected nature havefollowed in the wake of excavation. Ages that seemed prehistoric stepsuddenly forth into the daydawn of history; personages whom a scepticalcriticism had consigned to the land of myth or fable are clothed oncemore with flesh and blood, and events which had been long forgottendemand to be recorded and described. In Babylonia, for example, theexcavations at Niffer and Tello have shown that Sargon of Akkad, so farfrom being a creature of romance, was as much a historical monarch asNebuchadrezzar himself; monuments of his reign have been discovered, andwe learn from them that the empire he is said to have founded had a veryreal existence. Contracts have been found dated in the years when he wasoccupied in conquering Syria and Palestine, and a cadastral survey thatwas made for the purposes of taxation mentions a Canaanite who had beenappointed "governor of the land of the Amorites. " Even a postal servicehad already been established along the high-roads which knit the severalparts of the empire together, and some of the clay seals which frankedthe letters are now in the Museum of the Louvre. 

At Susa, M. De Morgan, the late director of the Service of Antiquitiesin Egypt, has been excavating below the remains of the Achremenianperiod, among the ruins of the ancient Elamite capital. Here hehas found numberless historical inscriptions, besides a text inhieroglyphics which may cast light on the origin of the cuneiformcharacters. But the most interesting of his discoveries are twoBabylonian monuments that were carried off by Elamite conquerors fromthe cities of Babylonia. One of them is a long inscription of about 1200lines belonging to Manistusu, one of the early Babylonian kings, whosename has been met with at Niffer; the other is a monument of Naram-Sin, the Son of Sargon of Akkad, which it seems was brought as booty to Susaby Simti-silkhak, the grandfather, perhaps, of Eriaku or Arioch. 

In Armenia, also, equally important inscriptions have been found byBelck and Lehmann. More than two hundred new ones have been added to thelist of Vannic texts. It has been discovered from them that the kingdomof Biainas or Van was founded by Ispuinis and Menuas, who rebuiltYan itself and the other cities which they had previously sacked anddestroyed. The older name of the country was Kumussu, and it may be thatthe language spoken in it was allied to that of the Hittites, since atablet in hieroglyphics of the Hittite type has been unearthed at ToprakKaleh. One of the newly-found inscriptions of Sarduris III. Shows thatthe name of the Assyrian god, hitherto read Ramman or Rimmon, wasreally pronounced Hadad. It describes a war of the Vannic king againstAssur-nirari, son of Hadad-nirari (_A-da-di-ni-ra-ri_) of Assyria, thusrevealing not only the true form of the Assyrian name, but also theparentage of the last king of the older Assyrian dynasty. From anotherinscription, belonging to Rusas II. , the son of Argistis, we learn thatcampaigns were carried on against the Hittites and the Moschi in thelatter years of Sennacherib's reign, and therefore only just before theirruption of the Kimmerians into the northern regions of Western Asia. 

The two German explorers have also discovered the site and even theruins of Muzazir, called Ardinis by the people of Van. They lie on thehill of Shkenna, near Topsanâ, on the road between Kelishin and Sidek. In the immediate neighbourhood the travellers succeeded in decipheringa monument of Rusas I. , partly in Vannic, partly in Assyrian, from whichit appears that the Vannic king did not, after all, commit suicide whenthe news of the fall of Muzazir was brought to him, as is stated bySargon, but that, on the contrary, he "marched against the mountainsof Assyria" and restored the fallen city itself. Urzana, the King ofMuzazir, had fled to him for shelter, and after the departure of theAssyrian army he was sent back by Rusas to his ancestral domains. Thewhole of the district in which Muzazir was situated was termed Lulu, andwas regarded as the southern province of Ararat. In it was Mount Nizir, on whose summit the ark of the Chaldsean Noah rested, and which istherefore rightly described in the Book of Genesis as one of "themountains of Ararat. " It was probably the Rowandiz of to-day. 

The discoveries made by Drs. Belck and Lehmann, however, have not beenconfined to Vannic texts. At the sources of the Tigris Dr. Lehmann hasfound two Assyrian inscriptions of the Assyrian king, Shalmaneser IL, one dated in his fifteenth and the other in his thirty-first year, andrelating to his campaigns against Aram of Ararat. He has further foundthat the two inscriptions previously known to exist at the same spot, and believed to belong to Tiglath-Ninip and Assur-nazir-pal, are reallythose of Shalmaneser II. , and refer to the war of his seventh year. 

But it is from Egypt that the most revolutionary revelations havecome. At Abydos and Kom el-Ahmar, opposite El-Kab, monuments have beendisinterred of the kings of the first and second dynasties, if not ofeven earlier princes; while at Negada, north of Thebes, M. De Morgan hasfound a tomb which seems to have been that of Menés himself. A new worldof art has been opened out before us; even the hieroglyphic system ofwriting is as yet immature and strange. But the art is already advancedin many respects; hard stone was cut into vases and bowls, and eveninto statuary of considerable artistic excellence; glazed porcelain wasalready made, and bronze, or rather copper, was fashioned into weaponsand tools. The writing material, as in Babylonia, was often clay, over which seal-cylinders of a Babylonian pattern were rolled. EquallyBabylonian are the strange and composite animals engraved on some of theobjects of this early age, as well as the structure of the tombs, whichwere built, not of stone, but of crude brick, with their externalwalls panelled and pilastered. Professor Hommel's theory, which bringsEgyptian civilisation from Babylonia along with the ancestors of thehistorical Egyptians, has thus been largely verified. 

But the historical Egyptians were not the first inhabitants of thevalley of the Nile. Not only have palaeolithic implements been found onthe plateau of the desert; the relics of neolithic man have turned upin extraordinary abundance. When the historical Egyptians arrived withtheir copper weapons and their system of writing, the land was alreadyoccupied by a pastoral people, who had attained a high level ofneolithic culture. Their implements of flint are the most beautiful anddelicately finished that have ever been discovered; they were able tocarve vases of great artistic excellence out of the hardest of stone, and their pottery was of no mean quality. Long after the country hadcome into the possession of the historical dynasties, and had even beenunited into a single monarchy, their settlements continued to existon the outskirts of the desert, and the neolithic culture thatdistinguished them passed only gradually away. By degrees, however, they intermingled with their conquerors from Asia, and thus formed theEgyptian race of a later day. But they had already made Egypt what ithas been throughout the historical period. Under the direction of theAsiatic immigrants and of the eugineering science whose first home hadbeen in the alluvial plain of Babylonia, they accomplished those greatworks of irrigation which confined the Nile to its present channel, which cleared away the jungle and the swamp that had formerly borderedthe desert, and turned them into fertile fields. Theirs were the handswhich carried out the plans of their more intelligent masters, andcultivated the valley when once it had been reclaimed. The Egyptof history was the creation of a twofold race: the Egyptians of themonuments supplied the controlling and directing power; the Egyptians ofthe neolithic graves bestowed upon it their labour and their skill. 

The period treated of by Professor Maspero in these volumes is one forwhich there is an abundance of materials sucli as do not exist forthe earlier portions of his history. The evidence of the monuments issupplemented by that of the Hebrew and classical writers. But on thisvery account it is in some respects more difficult to deal with, and theconclusions arrived at by the historian are more open to question anddispute. In some cases conflicting accounts are given of an event whichseem to rest on equally good authority; in other cases, there is asudden failure of materials just where the thread of the story becomesmost complicated. Of this the decline and fall of the Assyrian empireis a prominent example; for our knowledge of it, we have still to dependchiefly on the untrustworthy legends of the Greeks. Our views must becoloured more or less by our estimate of Herodotos; those who, likemyself, place little or no confidence in what he tells us about Orientalaffairs will naturally form a very different idea of the death-struggle, of Assyria from that formed by writers who still see in him the Fatherof Oriental History. 

Even where the native monuments have come to our aid, they have notunfrequently introduced difficulties and doubts where none seemed toexist before, and have made the task of the critical historian harderthan ever. Cyrus and his forefathers, for instance, turn out to havebeen kings of Anzan, and not of Persia, thus explaining why it is thatthe Neo-Susian language appears by the side of the Persian and theBabylonian as one of the three official languages of the Persian empire;but we still have to learn what was the relation of Anzan to Persia onthe one hand, and to Susa on the other, and when it was that Cyrus ofAnzan became also King of Persia. In the Annalistic Tablet, he is called"King of Persia" for the first time in the ninth year of Nabonidos. 

Similar questions arise as to the position and nationality of Astyages. He is called in the inscriptions, not a Mede, but a Manda--a name which, as I showed many years ago, meant for the Babylonian a "barbarian" ofKurdistan. I have myself little doubt that the Manda over whom Astyagesruled were the Scythians of classical tradition, who, as may be gatheredfrom a text published by Mr. Strong, had occupied the ancient kingdom ofEllipi. It is even possible that in the Madyes of Herodotos, we have areminiscence of the Manda of the cuneiform inscriptions. That the Greekwriters should have confounded the Madâ or Medes with the Manda orBarbarians is not surprising; we find even Berossos describing one ofthe early dynasties of Babylonia as "Median" where Manda, and notMadâ, must plainly be meant. 

These and similar problems, however, will doubtless be cleared up by theprogress of excavation and research. Perhaps M. De Morgan's excavationsat Susa may throw some light on them, but it is to the work of theGerman expedition, which has recently begun the systematic explorationof the site of Babylon, that we must chiefly look for help. The Babylonof Nabopolassar and Nebuchadrezzar rose on the ruins of Nineveh, andthe story of downfall of the Assyrian empire must still be lying buriedunder its mounds. 

A. H. SAYCE. 

TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE

In completing the translation of this great work, I have to thankProfessor Maspero for kindly permitting me to appeal to him on variousquestions which arose while preparing the translation. His patience andcourtesy have alike been unfailing in every matter submitted for hisdecision. 

I am indebted to Miss Bradbury for kindly supplying, in the midst ofmuch other literary work for the Egypt Exploration Fund, the translationof the chapter on the gods, and also of the earlier parts of some of thefirst chapters. She has, moreover, helped me in my own share of the workwith many suggestions and hints, which her intimate connection with thelate Miss Amelia B. Edwards fully qualified her to give. 

As in the original there is a lack of uniformity in the transcriptionand accentuation of Arabic names, I have ventured to alter them inseveral cases to the form most familiar to English readers. 

The spelling of the ancient Egyptian words has, at Professor Maspero'srequest, been retained throughout, with the exception that the French_ou_ has been invariably represented by û, e. G. Khnoumou by Khnûmû. 

By an act of international courtesy, the director of the _ImprimerieNationale_ has allowed the beautifully cut hieroglyphic and cuneiformtype used in the original to be employed in the English edition, andI take advantage of this opportunity to express to him our thanks andappreciation of his graceful act. 

M. L. McClure. 

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I. --THE NILE AND EGYPT The River and its Influence upon theFormation of the Country--The Oldest Inhabitants of the Valley and itsFirst Political Organization

CHAPTER II. --THE GODS OF EGYPT Their Number and their Nature--The FeudalGods, Living and Dead--The Triads--Temples and Priests--The Cosmogoniesof the Delta--The Enneads of Heliopolis and of Hermopolis

CHAPTER III. --THE LEGENDARY HISTORY OF EGYPT The Divine Dynasties:Râ, Shû, Osiris, Sit, Horus-Thot, and the Invention of Sciences andWriting-Menes, and the Three First Human Dynasties

[Illustration: 001. Jpg PAGE ONE]

[Illustration: 002. Jpg PAGE TWO]

CHAPTER I. --THE NILE AND EGYPT

_THE RIVER AND ITS INFLUENCE UPON THE FORMATION AND CHARACTER OFTHE COUNTRY--THE OLDEST INHABITANTS OF THE LAND--THE FIRST POLITICALORGANIZATION OF THE VALLEY. _

_The Delta: its gradual formation, its structure, its canals--The valleyof Egypt--The two arms of the river--The Eastern Nile--The appearanceof its hanks--The hills--The gorge of Gehel Silsileh--The cataracts: thefalls of Aswan--Nubia--The rapids of Wady Halfah--The Takazze--The BlueNile and the White Nile. 

The sources of the Nile--The Egyptian cosmography--The four pillarsand the four upholding mountains--The celestial Nile the source of theterrestial Nile--the Southern Sea and the islands of Spirits--The tearsof Isis--The rise of the Nile--The Green Nile and the Bed Nile--Theopening of the dykes---The fall of the Nile--The river at its lowestebb. 

The alluvial deposits and the effects of the inundation upon the soil ofEgypt--Paucity of the flora: aquatic plants, the papyrus and the lotus;the sycamore and the date-palm, the acacias, the dôm-palms--The fauna:the domestic and wild animals; serpents, the urstus; the hippopotamusand the crocodile; birds; fish, the fahaka. 

The Nile god: his form and its varieties--The goddess Mirit--Thesupposed sources of the Nile at Elephantine--The festivals of GebelSilsileh-Hymn to the Nile from papyri m the British Museum. 

The names of the Nile and Egypt: Bomitu and Qimit--Antiquity of theEgyptianpeople--Their first horizon--The hypothesis of their Asiaticorigin--The probability of their African origin--The language and itsSemitic affinities--The race and its principal types. 

The primitive civilization of Egypt--Its survival into historictimes--The women of Amon--Marriage--Rights of women andchildren--Houses--Furniture--Dress--Jewels--Wooden and metalarms--Primitive life-Fishing and hunting--The lasso and "bolas"--Thedomestication of animals--Plants used for food--The lotus--Cereals--Thehoe and the plough. 

The conquest of the valley--Dykes--Basins--Irrigation--The princes--Thenomes--The first local principalities--Late organization of theDelta--Character of its inhabitants--Gradual division of theprincipalities and changes of then areas--The god of the city. _

[Illustration: 003. Jpg CHAPTER ONE]

THE NILE AND EGYPT

_The river and its influence upon the formation of the country--Theoldest inhabitants of the valley and its first political organization. _

 * The same expression has been attributed to Hecatseus of Miletus. It has often been observed that this phrase seems Egyptian on the face of it, and it certainly recalls such forms of expression as the following, taken from a formula frequently found on funerary "All things created by heaven, given by earth, _brought by the Nile--from its mysterious sources. _" Nevertheless, up to the present time, the hieroglyphic texts have yielded nothing altogether corresponding to the exact terms of the Greek historians-- _gift_ of the Nile, or its natural _product_. 

A long low, level shore, scarcely rising above the sea, a chain ofvaguely defined and ever-shifting lakes and marshes, then the triangularplain beyond, whose apex is thrust thirty leagues into the land--this, the Delta of Egypt, has gradually been acquired from the sea, and isas it were the gift of the Nile. The Mediterranean once reached to thefoot of the sandy plateau on which stand the Pyramids, and formed awide gulf where now stretches plain beyond plain of the Delta. Thelast undulations of the Arabian hills, from Gebel Mokattam to GebelGeneffeh, were its boundaries on the east, while a sinuous and shallowchannel running between Africa and Asia united the Mediterranean tothe Red Sea. Westward, the littoral followed closely the contour of theLibyan plateau; but a long limestone spur broke away from it at about31° N. , and terminated in Cape Abûkîr. The alluvial deposits firsttilled up the depths of the bay, and then, under the influence of thecurrents which swept along its eastern coasts, accumulated behind thatrampart of sand-hills whose remains are still to be seen near Benha. Thus was formed a miniature Delta, whose structure pretty accuratelycorresponded with that of the great Delta of to-day. Here the Niledivided into three divergent streams, roughly coinciding with thesouthern courses of the Rosetta and Damietta branches, and with themodern canal of Abu Meneggeh. The ceaseless accumulation of mud broughtdown by the river soon overpassed the first limits, and steadilyencroached upon the sea until it was carried beyond the shelterfurnished by Cape Abûkîr. Thence it was gathered into the great littoralcurrent flowing from Africa to Asia, and formed an incurvated coast-lineending in the headland of Casios, on the Syrian frontier. From that timeEgypt made no further increase towards the north, and her coast remainspractically such as it was thousands of years ago:[*] the interioralone has suffered change, having been dried up, hardened, and graduallyraised. Its inhabitants thought they could measure the exact length oftime in which this work of creation had been accomplished. Accordingto the Egyptians, Menés, the first of their mortal kings, had found, sothey said, the valley under water. The sea came in almost as far as theFayûm, and, excepting the province of Thebes, the whole country wasa pestilential swamp. Hence, the necessary period for the physicalformation of Egypt would cover some centuries after Menés. This isno longer considered a sufficient length of time, and some moderngeologists declare that the Nile must have worked at the formation ofits own estuary for at least seventy-four thousand years. [**]

 * Élie de Beaumont, "The great distinction of the Nile Delta lies in the almost uniform persistence of its coast-line.... The present sea-coast of Egypt is little altered from that of three thousand years ago. " The latest observations prove it to be sinking and shrinking near Alexandria to rise in the neighbourhood of Port Said. 

 ** Others, as for example Schweinfurth, are more moderate in their views, and think "that it must have taken about twenty thousand years for that alluvial deposit which now forms the arable soil of Egypt to have attained to its present depth and fertility. "

This figure is certainly exaggerated, for the alluvium would gain onthe shallows of the ancient gulf far more rapidly than it gains upon thedepths of the Mediterranean. But even though we reduce the period, wemust still admit that the Egyptians little suspected the true age oftheir country. Not only did the Delta long precede the coming of Menés, but its plan was entirely completed before the first arrival of theEgyptians. The Greeks, full of the mysterious virtues which theyattributed to numbers, discovered that there were seven principalbranches, and seven mouths of the Nile, and that, as compared withthese, the rest were but false mouths. 

[Illustration: 006. Jpg THE MOUTH OF THE NILE PREVIOUS TO THE FORMATIONOF THE DELTA. ]

As a matter of fact, there were only three chief outlets. The Canopicbranch flowed westward, and fell into the Mediterranean near CapeAbûkîr, at the western extremity of the arc described by the coast-line. The Pelusiac branch followed the length of the Arabian chain, and flowedforth at the other extremity; and the Sebennytic stream almost bisectedthe triangle contained between the Canopic and Pelusiac channels. Twothousand years ago, these branches separated from the main river at thecity of Cerkasoros, nearly four miles north of the site where Cairo nowstands. But after the Pelusiac branch had ceased to exist, the fork ofthe river gradually wore away the land from age to age, and is now somenine miles lower down. [*] These three great waterways are united by anetwork of artificial rivers and canals, and by ditches--some natural, others dug by the hand of man, but all ceaselessly shifting. They siltup, close, open again, replace each other, and ramify in innumerablebranches over the surface of the soil, spreading life and fertility onall sides. As the land rises towards the south, this web contracts andis less confused, while black mould and cultivation alike dwindle, andthe fawn-coloured line of the desert comes into sight. The Libyan andArabian hills appear above the plain, draw nearer to each other, andgradually shut in the horizon until it seems as though they would unite. And there the Delta ends, and Egypt proper has begun. 

It is only a strip of vegetable mould stretching north and south betweenregions of drought and desolation, a prolonged oasis on the banks of theriver, made by the Nile, and sustained by the Nile. The whole length ofthe land is shut in between two ranges of hills, roughly parallel at amean distance of about twelve miles. [**]

 * By the end of the Byzantine period, the fork of the river lay at some distance south of Shetnûfi, the present Shatanûf, which is the spot where it now is. The Arab geographers call the head of the Delta Batn-el-Bagaraji, the Cow's Belly. Ampère, in his Voyage en Egypte et en Nubie, p. 120, says, --"May it not be that this name, denoting the place where the most fertile part of Egypt begins, is a reminiscence of the Cow Goddess, of Isis, the symbol of fecundity, and the personification of Egypt?"

 **De Rozière estimated the mean breadth as being only a little over nine miles. 

During the earlier ages, the river filled all this intermediate space, and the sides of the hills, polished, worn, blackened to their verysummits, still bear unmistakable traces of its action. Wasted, andshrunken within the deeps of its ancient bed, the stream now makes a waythrough its own thick deposits of mud. The bulk of its waters keepsto the east, and constitutes the true Nile, the "Great River" of thehieroglyphic inscriptions. A second arm flows close to the Libyandesert, here and there formed into canals, elsewhere left to followits own course. From the head of the Delta to the village of Demt itis called the Bahr-Yûsuf; beyond Derût--up to Gebel Silsileh--it is theIbrâhimîyeh, the Sohâgîyeh, the Raiân. But the ancient names are unknownto us. This Western Nile dries up in winter throughout all its uppercourses: where it continues to flow, it is by scanty accessions fromthe main Nile. It also divides north of Henassieh, and by the gorge ofIllahûn sends out a branch which passes beyond the hills into the basinof the Fayûrn. The true Nile, the Eastern Nile, is less a river thana sinuous lake encumbered with islets and sandbanks, and its navigablechannel winds capriciously between them, flowing with a strong andsteady current below the steep, black banks cut sheer through thealluvial earth. 

[Illustration: 009. Jpg A LINE OF LADEN CAMELS EMERGES FROM A HOLLOW OFTHE UNDULATING ROAD. 1]

 1 From a drawing by Boudier, after a photograph by Insinger, taken in 1884. 

There are light groves of the date-palm, groups of acacia trees andsycamores, square patches of barley or of wheat, fields of beans or ofbersîm, [*] and here and there a long bank of sand which the least breezeraises into whirling clouds. And over all there broods a great silence, scarcely broken by the cry of birds, or the song of rowers in a passingboat. 

 * Bersîm is a kind of trefoil, the _Trifolium Alexandrinum_ of LINNÆUS. It is very common in Egypt, and the only plant of the kind generally cultivated for fodder. 

Something of human life may stir on the banks, but it is softened intopoetry by distance. A half-veiled woman, bearing a bundle of herbs uponher head, is driving her goats before her. An irregular line of asses orof laden camels emerges from one hollow of the undulating road only todisappear within another. A group of peasants, crouched upon the shore, in the ancient posture of knees to chin, patiently awaits the return ofthe ferry-boat. 

[Illustration: 010. Jpg]

 1 From a drawing by Boudier, after a photograph by Insinger, taken in 1886. 

A dainty village looks forth smiling from beneath its palm trees. Nearat hand it is all naked filth and ugliness: a cluster of low grey hutsbuilt of mud and laths; two or three taller houses, whitewashed;an enclosed square shaded by sycamores; a few old men, each seatedpeacefully at his own door; a confusion of fowls, children, goats, andsheep; half a dozen boats made fast ashore. But, as we pass on, thewretchedness all fades away; meanness of detail is lost in light, andlong before it disappears at a bend of the river, the village is againclothed with gaiety and serene beauty. Day by day, the landscape repeatsitself. The same groups of trees alternate with the same fields, growinggreen or dusty in the sunlight according to the season of the year. Withthe same measured flow, the Nile winds beneath its steep banks and aboutits scattered islands. 

[Illustration: 011. Jpg PART OF GEBEL SHÊKH HERÎDI. 1]

 1 From a drawing by Boudier, after a photograph by Insinger, taken in 1882. 

One village succeeds another, each alike smiling and sordid under itscrown of foliage. The terraces of the Libyan hills, away beyond theWestern Nile, scarcely rise above the horizon, and lie like a whiteedging between the green of the plain and the blue of the sky. TheArabian hills do not form one unbroken line, but a series of mountainmasses with their spurs, now approaching the river, and now withdrawingto the desert at almost regular intervals. At the entrance to thevalley, rise Gebel Mokattam and Gebel el-Ahmar. Gebel Hemûr-Shemûl andGebel Shêkh Embârak next stretch in echelon from north to south, and aresucceeded by Gebel et-Ter, where, according to an old legend, all thebirds of the world are annually assembled. [*]

 * In Makrizi's _Description of Egypt_ we read: "Every year, upon a certain day, all the herons (Boukîr, _Ardea bubulcus_ of Cuvier) assemble at this mountain. One after another, each puts his beak into a cleft of the hill until the cleft closes upon one of them. And then forthwith all the others fly away But the bird which has been caught struggles until he dies, and there his body remains until it has fallen into dust. " The same tale is told by other Arab writers, of which a list may be seen in Etienne Quatremère, _Mémoires historiques et géographiques sur l'Egypte et quelques contrées voisines_, vol. I. Pp. 31-33. It faintly recalls that ancient tradition of the Cleft at Abydos, whereby souls must pass, as human-headed birds, in order to reach the other world. 

[Illustration: 12. Jpg THE HILL OF KASR ES-SAYYAD. 2]

 2 From a drawing by Boudier, after a photograph by insinger, taken in 1882. 

Then follows Gebel Abûfêda, dreaded by the sailors for its sudden gusts. Limestone predominates throughout, white or yellowish, broken by veinsof alabaster, or of red and grey sandstones. Its horizontal strata areso symmetrically laid one above another as to seem more like the wallsof a town than the side of a mountain. But time has often dismantledtheir summits and loosened their foundations. Man has broken into theirfaçades to cut his quarries and his tombs; while the current is secretlyundermining the base, wherein it has made many a breach. As soon as anymargin of mud has collected between cliffs and river, halfah and wildplants take hold upon it, and date-palms grow there--whence their seed, no one knows. Presently a hamlet rises at the mouth of the ravine, among clusters of trees and fields in miniature. Beyond Siût, the lightbecomes more glowing, the air drier and more vibrating, and the green ofcultivation loses its brightness. The angular outline of the dom-palnimingles more and more with that of the common palm and of the heavysycamore, and the castor-oil plant increasingly abounds. But all thesechanges come about so gradually that they are effected before we noticethem. The plain continues to contract. At Thebes it is still ten mileswide; at the gorge of Gebelên it has almost disappeared, and at GebelSilsileh it has completely vanished. There, it was crossed by a naturaldyke of sandstone, through which the waters have with difficulty scoopedfor themselves a passage. From this point, Egypt is nothing but the bedof the Nile lying between two escarpments of naked rock. 

Further on the cultivable land reappears, but narrowed, and changedalmost beyond recognition. Hills, hewn out of solid sandstone, succeedeach other at distances of about two miles, low, crushed, sombre, andformless. Presently a forest of palm trees, the last on that side, announces Aswan and Nubia. Five banks of granite, ranged in linesbetween latitude 24° and 18° N. , cross Nubia from east to west, and fromnorth-east to south-west, like so many ramparts thrown up between theMediterranean and the heart of Africa. The Nile has attacked them frombehind, and made its way over them one after another in rapids whichhave been glorified by the name of cataracts. 

[Illustration: 014. Jpg ENTRANCE TO THE FIRST CATARACT. 1]

 1 View taken from the hills opposite Elephantine, by Insinger, in 1884. 

Classic writers were pleased to describe the river as hurled into thegulfs of Syne with so great a roar that the people of the neighbourhoodwere deafened by it. Even a colony of Persians, sent thither byCambyses, could not bear the noise of the falls, and went forth to seeka quieter situation. The first cataract is a kind of sloping and sinuouspassage six and a quarter miles in length, descending from the islandof Philae to the port of Aswan, the aspect of its approach relieved andbrightened by the ever green groves of Elephantine. Beyond Elephantineare cliffs and sandy beaches, chains of blackened "roches moutonnées"marking out the beds of the currents, and fantastic reefs, sometimesbare and sometimes veiled by long grasses and climbing plants, inwhich thousands of birds have made their nests. There are isletstoo, occasionally large enough to have once supported something of apopulation, such as Amerade, Salûg, Sehêl. The granite threshold ofNubia, is broken beyond Sehêl, but its débris, massed m disorder againstthe right bank, still seem to dispute the passage of the waters, dashingturbulently and roaring as they flow along through tortuous channels, where every streamlet is broken up into small cascades, ihe channelrunning by the left bank is always navigable. 

[Illustration: 015. Jpg ENTRANCE TO NUBIA. ]

During the inundation, the rocks and sandbanks of the right side arecompletely under water, and their presence is only betrayed by eddies. But on the river's reaching its lowest point a fall of some six feet isestablished, and there big boats, hugging the shore, are hauled up bymeans of ropes, or easily drift down with the current. 

[Illustration: 016. Jpg LEAGUE BEYOND LEAGUE, THE HILLS STKETCH ON IN LOWIGNOBLE OUTLINE. 1]

 1 From a drawing by Boudier, after a photograph by Insinger, taken in 1881. 

All kinds of granite are found together in this corner of Africa. Thereare the pink and red Syenites, porphyritic granite, yellow granite, greygranite, both black granite and white, and granites veined with blackand veined with white. As soon as these disappear behind us, varioussandstones begin to crop up, allied to the coarsest _calcaire grossier_. The hill bristle with small split blocks, with peaks half overturned, with rough and denuded mounds. League beyond league, they stretch in lowignoble outline. Here and there a valley opens sharply into the desert, revealing an infinite perspective of summits and escarpments in echelonone behind another to the furthest plane of the horizon, like motionlesscaravans. The now confined river rushes on with a low, deep murmur, accompanied night and day by the croaking of frogs and the rhythmiccreak of the sâkîeh. [*]

 * The sâkîeh is made of a notch-wheel fixed vertically on a horizontal axle, and is actuated by various cog-wheels set in continuous motion by oxen or asses. A long chain of earthenware vessels brings up the water either from the river itself, or from some little branch canal, and empties it into a system of troughs and reservoirs. Thence, it flows forth to be distributed over all the neighbouring land. 

Jetties of rough stone-work, made in unknown times by an unknown people, run out like breakwaters into midstream. 

[Illustration: 018. Jpg THE ENTRANCE TO THE FIRST CATARACT]

From time to time waves of sand are borne over, and drown the narrowfields of durra and of barley. Scraps of close, aromatic pasturage, acacias, date-palms, and dôm-palms, together with a few shrivelledsycamores, are scattered along both banks. The ruins of a crumblingpylon mark the site of some ancient city, and, overhanging the water, is a vertical wall of rock honeycombed with tombs. Amid these relics ofanother age, miserable huts, scattered hamlets, a town or two surroundedwith little gardens are the only evidence that there is yet life inNubia. South of Wâdy Halfah, the second granite bank is broken through, and the second cataract spreads its rapids over a length of fourleagues: the archipelago numbers more than 350 islets, of which somesixty have houses upon them and yield harvests to their inhabitants. Themain characteristics of the first two cataracts are repeated with slightvariations in the cases of the three which follow, --at Hannek, atGuerendid, and El-Hu-mar. It is Egypt still, but a joyless Egypt bereftof its brightness: impoverished, disfigured, and almost desolate. 

[Illustration: 020. Jpg ENTRANCE TO THE SECOND CATAKACT. 1]

 1 View taken from the top of the rocks of Abusîr, after a photograph by Insinger, in 1881. 

There is the same double wall of hills, now closely confining thevalley, and again withdrawing from each other as though to flee intothe desert. Everywhere are moving sheets of sand, steep black banks withtheir narrow strips of cultivation, villages which are scarcely visibleon account of the lowness of their huts sycamore ceases at Gebel-Barkal, date-palms become fewer and finally disappear. The Nile alone has notchanged. And it was at Philse, so it is at Berber. Here, however, onthe right bank, 600 leagues from the sea, is its first affluent, theTakazze, which intermittently brings to it the waters of NorthernEthiopia. At Khartum, the single channel in which the river floweddivides; and two other streams are opened up in a southerly direction, each of them apparently equal in volume to the main stream. Which isthe true Nile? Is it the Blue Nile, which seems to come down from thedistant mountains? Or is it the White Nile, which has traversed theimmense plains of equatorial Africa. The old Egyptians never knew. The river kept the secret of its source from them as obstinately as itwithheld it from us until a few years ago. Vainly did their victoriousarmies follow the Nile for months together as they pursued thetribes who dwelt upon its banks, only to find it as wide, as full, asirresistible in its progress as ever. It was a fresh-water sea, andsea--_iaûmâ, iôma_--was the name by which they called it. 

The Egyptians therefore never sought its source. They imagined the wholeuniverse to be a large box, nearly rectangular in form, whose greatestdiameter was from south to north, and its least from east to west. Theearth, with its alternate continents and seas, formed the bottom of thebox; it was a narrow, oblong, and slightly concave floor, with Egyptin its centre. The sky stretched over it like an iron ceiling, flataccording to some, vaulted according to others. Its earthward face wascapriciously sprinkled with lamps hung from strong cables, and which, extinguished or unperceived by day, were lighted, or became visible toour eyes, at night. 

[Illustration: 022. Jpg AN ATTEMPT TO REPRESENT THE EGYPTIAN UNIVERSE. 2]

 2 Section taken at Hermopolis. To the left, is the bark of the sun on the celestial river. 

Since this ceiling could not remain in mid-air without support, fourcolumns, or rather four forked trunks of trees, similar to those whichmaintained the primitive house, were supposed to uphold it. But it wasdoubtless feared lest some tempest should overturn them, for they weresuperseded by four lofty peaks, rising at the four cardinal points, andconnected by a continuous chain of mountains. The Egyptians knew littleof the northern peak: the Mediterranean, the "Very Green, " interposedbetween it and Egypt, and prevented their coming near enough to see it. The southern peak was named Apit the Horn of the Earth; that on the eastwas called Bâkhû, the Mountain of Birth; and the western peak was knownas Manu, sometimes as Onkhit, the Region of Life. 

[Illustration: 023. Jpg FOOTNOTES WITH GRAPHICS]

Bâkhû was not a fictitious mountain, but the highest of those distantsummits seen from the Nile in looking towards the red Sea. In the sameway, Manu answered to some hill of the Libyan desert, whose summitclosed the horizon. When it was discovered that neither Bâkhû nor Manuwere the limits of the world, the notion of upholding the celestial roofwas not on that account given up. It was only necessary to withdraw thepillars from sight, and imagine fabulous peaks, invested with familiarnames. These were not supposed to form the actual boundary ofthe universe; a great river--analogous to the Ocean-stream of theGreeks--lay between them and its utmost limits. This river circulatedupon a kind of ledge projecting along the sides of the box a littlebelow the continuous mountain chain upon which the starry heavens weresustained. On the north of the ellipse, the river was bordered by asteep and abrupt bank, which took its rise at the peak of Manu on thewest, and soon rose high enough to form a screen between the river andthe earth. The narrow valley which it hid from view was known asDa'it from remotest times. Eternal night enfolded that valley in thickdarkness, and filled it with dense air such as no living thing couldbreathe. Towards the east the steep bank rapidly declined, and ceasedaltogether a little beyond Bâkhû, while the river flowed on between lowand almost level shores from east to south, and then from south to west. The sun was a disc of fire placed upon a boat. At the same equable rate, the river carried it round the ramparts of the world. Erom evening untilmorning it disappeared within the gorges of Daït; its light did not thenreach us, and it was night. From morning until evening its rays, beingno longer intercepted by any obstacle, were freely shed abroad from oneend of the box to the other, and it was day. The Nile branched off fromthe celestial river at its southern bend;[*] hence the south wasthe chief cardinal point to the Egyptians, and by that they orientedthemselves, placing sunrise to their left, and sunset to their right. 

 * The classic writers themselves knew that, according to Egyptian belief, the Nile flowed down from heaven. The legend of the Nile having its source in the ocean stream was but a Greek transposition of the Egyptian doctrine, which represented it as an arm of the celestial river whereon the sun sailed round the earth. 

Before they passed beyond the defiles of Gebel Silsileh, they thoughtthat the spot whence the celestial waters left the sky was situatebetween Elephantine and Philae, and that they descended in an immensewaterfall whose last leaps were at Syene. It may be that the tales aboutthe first cataract told by classic writers are but a far-off echo ofthis tradition of a barbarous age. Conquests carried into the heart ofAfrica forced the Egyptians to recognize their error, but did not weakentheir faith in the supernatural origin of the river. They only placedits source further south, and surrounded it with greater marvels. They told how, by going up the stream, sailors at length reached anundetermined country, a kind of borderland between this world and thenext, a "Land of Shades, " whose inhabitants were dwarfs, monsters, or spirits. Thence they passed into a sea sprinkled with mysteriousislands, like those enchanted archipelagoes which Portuguese and Bretonmariners were wont to see at times when on their voyages, and whichvanished at their approach. These islands were inhabited by serpentswith human voices, sometimes friendly and sometimes cruel to theshipwrecked. He who went forth from the islands could never morere-enter them: they were resolved into the waters and lost within thebosom of the waves. A modern geographer can hardly comprehend suchfancies; those of Greek and Roman times were perfectly familiar withthem. They believed that the Nile communicated with the Red Sea nearSuakin, by means of the Astaboras, and this was certainly the routewhich the Egyptians of old had imagined for their navigators. Thesupposed communication was gradually transferred farther and farthersouth; and we have only to glance over certain maps of the sixteenthand seventeenth centuries, to see clearly drawn what the Egyptians hadimagined--the centre of Africa as a great lake, whence issued the Congo, the Zambesi, and the Nile. Arab merchants of the Middle Ages believedthat a resolute man could pass from Alexandria or Cairo to the land ofthe Zindjes and the Indian Ocean by rising from river to river. [*]

 * Joinville has given a special chapter to the description of the sources and wonders of the Nile, in which he believed as firmly as in an article of his creed. As late as the beginning of the seventeenth century, Wendelinus devoted part of his _Admiranda Nili_ to proving that the river did not rise in the earthly Paradise. At Gûrnah, forty years ago, Rhind picked up a legend which stated that the Nile flows down from the sky. 

[Illustration: 027. Jpg SOUTH AFRICA AND THE SOURCES OF THE NILE, BYODOAKDO LOPEZ. 1]

 1 Facsimile of the map published by Kircher in _OEdipus Ægyptiacus_, vol. I. (_Iconismus II_), p. 53. 

Many of the legends relating to this subject are lost, while othershave been collected and embellished with fresh features by Jewish andChristian theologians. The Nile was said to have its source in Paradise, to traverse burning regions inaccessible to man, and afterwards to fallinto a sea whence it made its way to Egypt. Sometimes it carried downfrom its celestial sources branches and fruits unlike any to be foundon earth. The sea mentioned in all these tales is perhaps a lessextravagant invention than we are at first inclined to think. A lake, nearly as large as the Victoria Nyanza, once covered the marshy plainwhere the Bahr el-Abiad unites with the Sobat, and with the Bahrel-Ghazal. Alluvial deposits have filled up all but its deepestdepression, which is known as Birket Nû; but, in ages preceding our era, it must still have been vast enough to suggest to Egyptian soldiers andboatmen the idea of an actual sea, opening into the Indian Ocean. The mountains, whose outline was vaguely seen far to southward on thefurther shores, doubtless contained within them its mysterious source. There the inundation was made ready, and there it began upon a fixedday. The celestial Nile had its periodic rise and fall, on which thoseof the earthly Nile depended. Every year, towards the middle of June, Isis, mourning for Osiris, let fall into it one of the tears which sheshed over her brother, and thereupon the river swelled and descendedupon earth. Isis has had no devotees for centuries, and her very name isunknown to the descendants of her worshippers; but the tradition of herfertilizing tears has survived her memory. Even to this day, every onein Egypt, Mussulman or Christian, knows that a divine drop falls fromheaven during the night between the 17th and 18th of June, and forthwithbrings about the rise of the Nile. Swollen by the rains which fallin February over the region of the Great Lakes, the White Nile rushesnorthward, sweeping before it the stagnant sheets of water left by theinundation of the previous year. On the left, the Bahr el-Ghazâl bringsit the overflow of the ill-defined basin stretching between Darfûr andthe Congo; and the Sobat pours in on the right a tribute from the riverswhich furrow the southern slopes of the Abyssinian mountains. The firstswell passes Khartum by the end of April, and raises the water-levelthere by about a foot, then it slowly makes its way through Nubia, anddies away in Egypt at the beginning of June. Its waters, infectedby half-putrid organic matter from the equatorial swamps, are notcompletely freed from it even in the course of this long journey, butkeep a greenish tint as far as the Delta. They are said to be poisonous, and to give severe pains in the bladder to any who may drink them. I ambound to say that every June, for five years, I drank this green waterfrom the Nile itself, without taking any other precaution than the usualone of filtering it through a porous jar. Neither I, nor the many peopleliving with me, ever felt the slightest inconvenience from it. Happily, this _Green Nile_ does not last long, but generally flows away in threeor four days, and is only the forerunner of the real flood. The meltingof the snows and the excessive spring rains having suddenly swollen thetorrents which rise in the central plateau of Abyssinia, the Blue Nile, into which they flow, rolls so impetuously towards the plain that, whenits waters reach Khartum in the middle of May, they refuse to minglewith those of the White Nile, and do not lose their peculiar colourbefore reaching the neighbourhood of Abu Hamed, three hundred milesbelow. From that time the height of the Nile increases rapidly dayby day. The river, constantly reinforced by floods following one uponanother from the Great Lakes and from Abyssinia, rises in furiousbounds, and would become a devastating torrent were its rage not checkedby the Nubian cataracts. Here six basins, one above another, in whichthe water collects, check its course, and permit it to flow thence onlyas a partially filtered and moderated stream. It is signalled at Syenetowards the 8th of June, at Cairo by the 17th to the 20th, and there itsbirth is officially celebrated during the "Night of the Drop. " Twodays later it reaches the Delta, just in time to save the country fromdrought and sterility. Egypt, burnt up by the Khamsin, a west windblowing continuously for fifty days, seems nothing more than anextension of the desert. The trees are covered and choked by a layer ofgrey dust. About the villages, meagre and laboriously watered patchesof vegetables struggle for life, while some show of green stilllingers along the canals and in hollows whence all moisture has notyet evaporated. The plain lies panting in the sun--naked, dusty, andashen--scored with intersecting cracks as far as eye can see. The Nileis only half its usual width, and holds not more than a twentieth ofthe volume of water which is borne down in October. It has at first hardwork to recover its former bed, and attains it by such subtle gradationsthat the rise is scarcely noted. It is, however, continually gainingground; here a sandbank is covered, there an empty channel is filled, islets are outlined where there was a continuous beach, a new streamdetaches itself and gains the old shore. The first contact is disastrousto the banks; their steep sides, disintegrated and cracked by the heat, no longer offer any resistance to the current, and fall with a crash, inlengths of a hundred yards and more. 

[Illustration: 31. Jpg DURING THE INUNDATION]

As the successive floods grow stronger and are more heavily charged withmud, the whole mass of water becomes turbid and changes colour. In eightor ten days it has turned from greyish blue to dark red, occasionally ofso intense a colour as to look like newly shed blood. The "Red Nile" isnot unwholesome like the "Green Nile, " and the suspended mud to whichit owes its suspicious appearance deprives the water of none of itsfreshness and lightness. It reaches its full height towards the 15thof July; but the dykes which confine it, and the barriers constructedacross the mouths of canals, still prevent it from overflowing. The Nilemust be considered high enough to submerge the land adequately beforeit is set free. The ancient Egyptians measured its height by cubits oftwenty-one and a quarter inches. At fourteen cubits, they pronounced itan excellent Nile; below thirteen, or above fifteen, it was accountedinsufficient or excessive, and in either case meant famine, and perhapspestilence at hand. To this day the natives watch its advance with thesame anxious eagerness; and from the 3rd of July, public criers, walkingthe streets of Cairo, announce each morning what progress it has madesince evening. More or less authentic traditions assert that the preludeto the opening of the canals, in the time of the Pharaohs, wasthe solemn casting to the waters of a young girl decked as for herbridal--the "Bride of the Nile. " Even after the Arab conquest, theirruption of the river into the bosom of the land was still consideredas an actual marriage; the contract was drawn up by a cadi, andwitnesses confirmed its consummation with the most fantastic formalitiesof Oriental ceremonial. It is generally between the 1st and 16th of Julythat it is decided to break through the dykes. When that proceeding hasbeen solemnly accomplished in state, the flood still takes several daysto fill the canals, and afterwards spreads over the low lands, advancinglittle by little to the very edge of the desert. Egypt is then one sheetof turbid water spreading between two lines of rock and sand, fleckedwith green and black spots where there are towns or where the groundrises, and divided into irregular compartments by raised roadsconnecting the villages. In Nubia the river attains its greatest heighttowards the end of August; at Cairo and in the Delta not until threeweeks or a month later. For about eight days it remains stationary, andthen begins to fall imperceptibly. Sometimes there is a new freshetin October, and the river again increases in height. But the rise isunsustained; once more it falls as rapidly as it rose, and by Decemberthe river has completely retired to the limits of its bed. One afteranother, the streams which fed it fail or dwindle. The Tacazze islost among the sands before rejoining it, and the Blue Nile, well-nighdeprived of tributaries, is but scantily maintained by Abyssiniansnows. The White Nile is indebted to the Great Lakes for the greaterpersistence of its waters, which feed the river as far as theMediterranean, and save the valley from utter drought in winter. But, even with this resource, the level of the water falls daily, and itsvolume is diminished. Long-hidden sandbanks reappear, and are againlinked into continuous line. Islands expand by the rise of shinglybeaches, which gradually reconnect them with each other and with theshore. Smaller branches of the river cease to flow, and form a merenetwork of stagnant pools and muddy ponds, which fast dry up. The mainchannel itself is only intermittently navigable; after March boats runaground in it, and are forced to await the return of the inundation fortheir release. From the middle of April to the middle of June, Egypt isonly half alive, awaiting the new Nile. 

[Illustration: 034. Jpg ASSIOUT]

Those ruddy and heavily charged waters, rising and retiring with almostmathematical regularity, bring and leave the spoils of the countriesthey have traversed: sand from Nubia, whitish clay from the regionsof the Lakes, ferruginous mud, and the various rock-formations ofAbyssinia. These materials are not uniformly disseminated in thedeposits; their precipitation being regulated both by their specificgravity and the velocity of the current. Flattened stones and roundedpebbles are left behind at the cataract between Syene and Keneh, whilecoarser particles of sand are suspended in the undercurrents and serveto raise the bed of the river, or are carried out to sea and form thesandbanks which are slowly rising at the Damietta and Rosetta mouths ofthe Nile. The mud and finer particles rise towards the surface, and aredeposited upon the land after the opening of the dykes. Soil which isentirely dependent on the deposit of a river, and periodically invadedby it, necessarily maintains but a scanty flora; and though it is wellknown that, as a general rule, a flora is rich in proportion to itsdistance from the poles and its approach to the equator, it is alsoadmitted that Egypt offers an exception to this rule. At the most, shehas not more than a thousand species, while, with equal area, England, for instance, possesses more than fifteen hundred; and of this thousand, the greater number are not indigenous. Many of them have been broughtFrom Central Africa by the river: birds and winds have continuedthe work, and man himself has contributed his part in making it morecomplete. From Asia he has at different times brought wheat barleythe olive, the apple, the white or pink almond, and some twentyother species now acclimatized on the banks of the Nile. Marsh plantspredominate in the Delta; but the papyrus, and the three varieties ofblue, white, and pink lotus which once flourished there, being no longercultivated, have now almost entirely disappeared, and reverted to theiroriginal habitats. 

[Illustration: 036. Jpg ENTRANCE OF THE MUDÎRIYEH OF ASYÛT. ]

The sycamore and the date-palm, both importations from Central Africa, have better adapted themselves to their exile, and are now fullynaturalized on Egyptian soil. 

[Illustration: 037. Jpg FOREST OF DATE PALMS]

The sycamore grows in sand on the edge of the desert as vigorously asin the midst of a well-watered country. Its roots go deep in search ofwater, which infiltrates as far as the gorges of the hills, and theyabsorb it freely, even where drought seems to reign supreme. The heavy, squat, gnarled trunk occasionally attains to colossal dimensions, without ever growing very high. Its rounded masses of compact foliageare so wide-spreading that a single tree in the distance may give theimpression of several grouped together; and its shade is dense, and impenetrable to the sun. A striking contrast to the sycamoreis presented by the date-palm. Its round and slender stem risesuninterruptedly to a height of thirteen to sixteen yards; its headis crowned with a cluster of flexible leaves arranged in two or threetiers, but so scanty, so pitilessly slit, that they fail to keep off thelight, and cast but a slight and unrefreshing shadow. Few trees have soelegant an appearance, yet few are so monotonously elegant. There arepalm trees to be seen on every hand; isolated, clustered by twos andthrees at the mouths of ravines and about the villages, plantedin regular file along the banks of the river like rows of columns, symmetrically arranged in plantations, --these are the invariablebackground against which other trees are grouped, diversifying thelandscape. The feathery tamarisk[*] and the nabk, the moringa, thecarob, or locust tree several varieties of acacia and mimosa-the sont, the mimosa habbas, the white acacia, the Acacia Parnesxana--andthe pomegranate tree, increase in number with the distance from theMediterranean. 

 * The Egyptian name for the tamarisk, _asari, asri_, is identical with that given to it in Semitic languages, both ancient and modern. This would suggest the question whether the tamarisk did not originally come from Asia. In that case it must have been brought to Egypt from remote antiquity, for it figures in the Pyramid texts. Bricks of Nile mud, and Memphite and Theban tombs have yielded us leaves, twigs, and even whole branches of the tamarisk. 

[Illustration: 40. Jpg ACACIAS AT THE ENTRANCE TO A GARDEN OUTSIDEEKHMÎM. 1]

 1 From a drawing by Boudier, from a photograph by Insinger, taken in 1884. 

The dry air of the valley is marvellously suited to them, but makes thetissue of their foliage hard and fibrous, imparting an aerial aspect, and such faded tints as are unknown to their growth in other climates. The greater number of these trees do not reproduce themselvesspontaneously, and tend to disappear when neglected. The Acacia Seyal, formerly abundant by the banks of the river, is now almost entirelyconfined to certain valleys of the Theban desert, along with a varietyof the kernelled dôm-palm, of which a poetical description has comedown to us from the Ancient Egyptians. The common dôm-palm bifurcates ateight or ten yards from the ground; these branches are subdivided, andterminate in bunches of twenty to thirty palmate and fibrous leaves, sixto eight feet long. At the beginning of this century the tree wascommon in Upper Egypt, but it is now becoming scarce, and we are withinmeasurable distance of the time when its presence will be an exceptionnorth of the first cataract. Willows are decreasing in number, and thepersea, one of the sacred trees of Ancient Egypt, is now only to befound in gardens. None of the remaining tree species are common enoughto grow in large clusters; and Egypt, reduced to her lofty groves ofdate-palms, presents the singular spectacle of a country where there isno lack of trees, but an almost entire absence of shade. 

[Illustration: 41. Jpg SHE-ASS AND HER FOAL. ]

If Egypt is a land of imported flora, it is also a land of importedfauna, and all its animal species have been brought from neighbouringcountries. Some of these--as, for example, the horse and the camel--wereonly introduced at a comparatively recent period, two thousand toeighteen hundred years before our era; the camel still later. Theanimals--such as the long and short-horned oxen, together with varietiesof goats and dogs--are, like the plants, generally of African origin, and the ass of Egypt preserves an original purity of form and a vigourto which the European donkey has long been a stranger. The pig andthe wild boar, the long-eared hare, the hedgehog, the ichneumon, themoufflon, or maned sheep, innumerable gazelles, including the Egyptiangazelles, and antelopes with lyre-shaped horns, are as much West Asianas African, like the carnivors of all sizes, whose prey they are--thewild cat, the wolf, the jackal, the striped and spotted hyenas, theleopard, the panther, the hunting leopard, and the lion. 

[Illustration: 042. Jpg THE URÆUS OF EGYPT. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin from pl. Iii. Of the Reptiles- Supplement to the _Description de Ægypte_. 

On the other hand, most of the serpents, large and small, areindigenous. Some are harmless, like the colubers; others are venomous, such as the soy tale, the cerastes, the haje viper, and the asp. The aspwas worshipped by the Egyptians under the name of uræus. It occasionallyattains to a length of six and a half feet, and when approached willerect its head and inflate its throat in readiness for darting forward. The bite is fatal, like that of the cerastes; birds are literally struckdown by the strength of the poison, while the great mammals, and manhimself, almost invariably succumb to it after a longer or shorterdeath-struggle. The uræus is rarely found except in the desert or in thefields; the scorpion crawls everywhere, in desert and city alike, and ifits sting is not always followed by death, it invariably causes terriblepain. Probably there were once several kinds of gigantic serpent inEgypt, analogous to the pythons of equatorial Africa. They are still tobe seen in representations of funerary scenes, but not elsewhere; for, like the elephant, the giraffe, and other animals which now only thrivefar south, they had disappeared at the beginning of historic times. The hippopotamus long maintained its ground before returning to thoseequatorial regions whence it had been brought by the Nile. Common underthe first dynasties, but afterwards withdrawing to the marshes of theDelta, it there continued to flourish up to the thirteenth century ofour era. The crocodile, which came with it, has, like it also, beencompelled to beat a retreat. Lord of the river throughout all ancienttimes, worshipped and protected in some provinces, execrated andproscribed in others, it might still be seen in the neighbourhood ofCairo towards the beginning of our century. In 1840, it no longer passedbeyond the neighbourhood of Gebel et-Têr, nor beyond that of Manfalûtin Thirty years later, Mariette asserted that it was steadily retreatingbefore the guns of tourists, and the disturbance which the regularpassing of steamboats produced in the deep waters. To-day, no one knowsof a single crocodile existing below Aswan, but it continues to infestNubia, and the rocks of the first cataract: one of them is occasionallycarried down by the current into Egypt where it is speedily despatchedby the fellâhin, or by some traveller in quest of adventure. Thefertility of the soil, and the vastness of the lakes and marshes, attract many migratory birds; passerinæ and palmipedes flock thitherfrom all parts of the Mediterranean. Our European swallows, ourquails, our geese and wild ducks, our herons--to mention only themost familiar--come here to winter, sheltered from cold and inclementweather. 

[Illustration: 044. Jpg THE IBIS OF EGYPT. ]

Even the non-migratory birds are really, for the most part, strangersacclimatized by long sojourn. Some of them--the turtledove, the magpie, the kingfisher, the partridge, and the sparrow-may be classed with ourEuropean species, while others betray their equatorial origin in thebrightness of their colours. White and black ibises, red flamingoes, pelicans, and cormorants enliven the waters of the river, and animatethe reedy swamps of the Delta in infinite variety. They are to be seenranged in long files upon the sand-banks, fishing and basking in thesun; suddenly the flock is seized with panic, rises heavily, and settlesaway further off. In hollows of the hills, eagle and falcon, the merlin, the bald-headed vulture, the kestrel, the golden sparrow-hawk, findinaccessible retreats, whence they descend upon the plains like so manypillaging and well-armed barons. A thousand little chattering birds comeat eventide to perch in flocks upon the frail boughs of tamarisk andacacia. 

[Illustration: 045. Jpg THE MORMYRUS OXYRHYNCHUS. ]

Many sea-fish make their way upstream to swim in fresh waters-shad, mullet, perch, and labrus--and carry their excursions far into the Saïd. Those species which are not Mediterranean came originally, still comeannually, from the heart of Ethiopia with the of the Nile, including twokinds of Alestes, the elled turtle, the Bagrus docmac, and the mormyrus. Some attain to a gigantic size, the Bagrus bayad and the turtle to aboutone yard, the latus to three and a half yards in length, while others, such as the sihlrus (catfish), are noted for their electric properties. Nature seems to have made the fahâka (the globe-fish) in a fit ofplayfulness. It is a long fish from beyond the cataracts, and it iscarried by the Nile the more easily on account of the faculty it has offilling itself with air, and inflating its body at will. 

[Illustration: 046. Jpg AHAKA]

When swelled out immoderately, the fahâka overbalances, and drifts alongupside down, its belly to the wind, covered with spikes so that it lookslike a hedgehog. During the inundation, it floats with the current fromone canal to another, and is cast by the retreating waters upon themuddy fields, where it becomes the prey of birds or of jackals, orserves as a plaything for children. 

[Illustration: 47. Jpg TWO FISHERMEN CARRYING A LATUS. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a Medûm painting. Pétrie, _Medûm_, pl. Xii. 

Everything is dependent upon the river:--the soil, the produce of thesoil, the species of animals it bears, the birds which it feeds: andhence it was the Egyptians placed the river among their gods. Theypersonified it as a man with regular features, and a vigorous andportly body, such as befits the rich of high lineage. His breasts, fullydeveloped like those of a woman, though less firm, hang heavily upon awide bosom where the fat lies in folds. A narrow girdle, whose ends fallfree about the thighs, supports his spacious abdomen, and his attireis completed by sandals, and a close-fitting head-dress, generallysurmounted with a crown of water-plants. Sometimes water springs fromhis breast; sometimes he presents a frog, or libation vases; or holds abundle of the cruces ansato, as symbols of life; or bears a flat tray, full of offerings--bunches of flowers, ears of corn, heaps of fish, and geese tied together by the feet. The inscriptions call him, "Hâpi, father of the gods, lord of sustenance, who maketh food to be, andcovereth the two lands of Egypt with his products; who giveth life, banisheth want, and filleth the granaries to overflowing. " He is evolvedinto two personages, one being sometimes coloured red, and the otherblue. The former, who wears a cluster of lotus-flowers upon his head, presides over the Egypt of the south; the latter has a bunch of papyrusfor his head-dress, and watches over the Delta. [**]

 [**] Wilkinson was the first who suggested that this god, when painted red was the Red (that is High) Nile and when painted blue, was to be identified with the Low Nile. This opinion has since been generally adopted; but to me it does not appear so incontrovertible as it has been considered. Here, as in other cases, the difference in colour is only a means of making the distinction between two personages obvious to sight. 

Two goddesses, corresponding to the two Hâpis--Mirit Qimâit for Upper, and Mirit Mîhit for Lower Egypt--personified the banks of the river. They are often represented as standing with outstretched arms, as thoughbegging for the water which should make them fertile. The Nile-god hadhis chapel in every province, and priests whose right it was to bury allbodies of men or beasts cast up by the river; for the god had claimedthem, and to his servants they belonged. 

[Illustration: 048. Jpg THE NILE GOD. 1]

 1 THE NILE GOD: Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, after a statue in the British Museum. The dedication of this statue took place about 880 B. C. The giver was Sheshonqu, high-priest of Amon in Thebes, afterwards King of Egypt under the name of Sheshhonqû II. , and he is represented as standing behind the leg of the god. 

[Illustration: 049. Jpg THE Shrine Of The Nile At Biggeh. 1]

 1 Reproduced from a bas-relief in the small temple of Philae, built by Rajan and his successors. The window or door of this temple opened upon gen, and by comparing the drawing of the Egyptian artist with the view i the end of the chamber, it is easy to recognize the original of this cliff bouette in the piled-up rocks of the island. By a mistake of the modern copyist's, his drawing faces the wrong way. 

Several towns were dedicated to him: Hâthâpi, Nûit-Hâpi, Nilo-polis. It was told in the Thebaïd how the god dwelt within a grotto, or shrine(tophit), in the island of Biggeh, whence he issued at the inundation. This tradition dates from a time when the cataract was believed to be atthe end of the world, and to bring down the heavenly river upon earth. Two yawning gulfs (_qorîti_), at the foot of the two granite cliffs(_monîti_) between which it ran, gave access to this mysterious retreat. A bas-relief from Philae represents blocks of stone piled one aboveanother, the vulture of the south and the hawk of the north, eachperched on a summit, wearing a panther skin, with both arms upheld inadoration. The statue is mutilated: the end of the nose, the beard, andpart of the tray have disappeared, but are restored in the illustration. The two little birds hanging alongside the geese, together with a bunchof ears of corn, are fat quails, and the circular chamber wherein Hâpicrouches concealed, clasping a libation vase in either hand. A singlecoil of a serpent outlines the contour of this chamber, and leaves anarrow passage between its overlapping head and tail through which therising waters may overflow at the time appointed, bringing to Egypt "allthings good, and sweet, and pure, " whereby gods and men are fed. Towardsthe summer solstice, at the very moment when the sacred water from thegulfs of Syene reached Silsileh, the priests of the place, sometimes thereigning sovereign, or one of his sons, sacrificed a bull and geese, andthen cast into the waters a sealed roll of papyrus. This was a writtenorder to do all that might insure to Egypt the benefits of a normalinundation. When Pharaoh himself deigned to officiate, the memory ofthe event was preserved by a stela engraved upon the rocks. Even in hisabsence, the festivals of the Nile were among the most solemn and joyousof the land. According to a tradition transmitted from age to age, theprosperity or adversity of the year was dependent upon the splendourand fervour with which they were celebrated. Had the faithful shown theslightest lukewarmness, the Nile might have refused to obey the commandand failed to spread freely over the surface of the country. Peasantsfrom a distance, each bringing his own provisions, ate their mealstogether for days, and lived in a state of brutal intoxication as longas this kind of fair lasted. On the great day itself, the priests cameforth in procession from the sanctuary, bearing the statue of the godalong the banks, to the sound of instruments and the chanting of hymns. 

[Illustration: 051. Jpg NILE GODS FROM THE TEMPLE OF SETI I. AT ABYDOSBRINGING FOOD TO EVERY NOME OF EGYPT. 1]

 1 From a drawing by Faucher-Gudin, after a photograph by Béato. 

"I. --Hail to thee, Hâpi!--who appearest in the land and comest--to givelife to Egypt;--thou who dost hide thy coming in darkness--in this veryday whereon thy coming is sung, --wave, which spreadest over the orchardscreated by Ra--to give life to all them that are athirst--who refusestto give drink unto the desert--of the overflow of the waters of heaven;as soon as thou descendest, --Sibû, the earth-god, is enamoured ofbread, --Napri, the god of grain, presents his offering, --Phtah makethevery workshop to prosper. 

"II. --Lord of the fish! as soon as he passeth the cataract--thebirds no longer descend upon the fields;--creator of corn, maker ofbarley, --he prolongeth the existence of temples. --Do his fingers ceasefrom their labours, or doth he suffer?--then are all the millions ofbeings in misery;--doth he wane in heaven? then the gods--themselves, and all men perish. 

"III. --The cattle are driven mad, and all the world--both great andsmall, are in torment!--But if, on the contrary, the prayers of men areheard at his rising--and (for them) he maketh himself Khnûmû, --whenhe ariseth, then the earth shouts for joy, --then are all belliesjoyful, --each back is shaken with laughter, --and every tooth grindeth. 

"IV. --Bringing food, rich in sustenance, --creator of all goodthings, --lord of all seeds of life, pleasant unto his elect, --if hisfriendship is secured--he produceth fodder for the cattle, --and heprovideth for the sacrifices of all the gods, --finer than any otheris the incense which cometh from him;--he taketh possession of thetwo lands--and the granaries are filled, the storehouses areprosperous, --and the goods of the poor are multiplied. 

"V. --He is at the service of all prayers to answer them, --withholdingnothing. To make boats to be that is his strength. --Stones are notsculptured for him--nor statues whereon the double crown is placed;--heis unseen;--no tribute is paid unto him and no offerings are broughtunto him, --he is not charmed by words of mystery;--the place of hisdwelling is unknown, nor can his shrine be found by virtue of magicwritings. 

"VI. --There is no house large enough for thee, --nor any who maypenetrate within thy heart!--Nevertheless, the generations of thychildren rejoice in thee--for thou dost rule as a king--whose decreesare established for the whole earth, --who is manifest in presence of thepeople of the South and of the North, --by whom the tears are washed fromevery eye, --and who is lavish of his bounties. 

"VII. --Where sorrow was, there doth break forth joy--and everyheart rejoiceth. Sovkû, the crocodile, the child of Nit, leaps forgladness;[*]--for the Nine gods who accompany thee have ordered allthings, --the overflow giveth drink unto the fields--and maketh all menvaliant; one man taketh to drink of the labour of another, --withoutcharge being brought against him. [**]

 * The goddess Nît, the heifer born from the midst of the primordial waters, had two crocodiles as her children, which are sometimes represented on the monuments as hanging from her bosom. Both the part played by these animals, and the reason for connecting them with the goddess, are still imperfectly understood. 

 ** This is an allusion to the quarrels and lawsuits resulting from the distribution of the water in years when the Nile was poor or bad. If the inundation is abundant, disputes are at an end. 

"IX. --If thou dost enter in the midst of songs to go forth in the midstof gladness, --if they dance with joy when thou comest forth out of theunknown, --it is that thy heaviness is death and corruption. --And whenthou art implored to give the water of the year, --the people of theThebai'd and of the North are seen side by side, --each man with thetools of his trade, --none tarrieth behind his neighbour;--of allthose who clothed themselves, no man clotheth himself (with festivegarments)--the children of Thot, the god of riches, no longer adornthemselves with jewels, --nor the Nine gods, but they are in thenight!--As soon as thou hast answered by the rising, --each one anointethhimself with perfumes. 

"X. --Establisher of true riches, desire of men, --here are seductivewords in order that thou mayest reply;--if thou dost answer mankindby waves of the heavenly Ocean, --Napri, the grain-god, presents hisoffering, --all the gods adore (thee), --the birds no longer descend uponthe hills;--though that which thy hand formeth were of gold--or in theshape of a brick of silver, --it is not lapis-lazuli that we eat, --butwheat is of more worth than precious stones. 

"XI. --They have begun to sing unto thee upon the harp, --they singunto thee keeping time with their hands, --and the generations of thychildren rejoice in thee, and they have filled thee with salutations ofpraise;--for it is the god of Riches who adorneth the earth, --who makethbarks to prosper in the sight of man--who rejoiceth the heart of womenwith child--who loveth the increase of the flocks. 

"XII. --When thou art risen in the city of the Prince, --then is the richman filled--the small man (the poor) disdaineth the lotus, --all is solidand of good quality, --all herbage is for his children. --Doth he forgetto give food?--prosperity forsaketh the dwellings, --and earth fallethinto a wasting sickness. "

[Illustration: 055. Jpg Libyan Mountains]

The word Nile is of uncertain origin. We have it from the Greeks, and they took it from a people foreign to Egypt, either from thePhoenicians, the Khîti, the Libyans, or from people of Asia Minor. Whenthe Egyptians themselves did not care to treat their river as the godHâpi, they called it the sea, or the great river. They had twenty termsor more by which to designate the different phases which it assumedaccording to the seasons, but they would not have understood what wasmeant had one spoken to them of the Nile. The name Egypt also is partof the Hellenic tradition; perhaps it was taken from the temple-name ofMemphis, Hâikûphtah, which barbarian coast tribes of the Mediterraneanmust long have had ringing in their ears as that of the most importantand wealthiest town to be found upon the shores of their sea. TheEgyptians called themselves Bomitû, Botû, and their country Qîmit, theblack land. Whence came they? How far off in time are we to carry backthe date of their arrival? The oldest monuments hitherto known scarcelytransport us further than six thousand years, yet they are of an art sofine, so well determined in its main outlines, and reveal so ingeniouslycombined a system of administration, government, and religion, that weinfer a long past of accumulated centuries behind them. It must alwaysbe difficult to estimate exactly the length of time needful for a raceas gifted as were the Ancient Egyptians to rise from barbarism into ahigh degree of culture. Nevertheless, I do not think that we shall bemisled in granting them forty or fifty centuries wherein to bring socomplicated an achievement to a successful issue, and in placing theirfirst appearance at eight or ten thousand years before our era. Their earliest horizon was a very limited one. Their gaze might wanderwestward over the ravine-furrowed plains of the Libyan desert withoutreaching that fabled land of Manu where the sun set every evening; butlooking eastward from the valley, they could see the peak of Bâkhû, which marked the limit of regions accessible to man. 

Beyond these regions lay the beginnings of To-nûtri, the land of thegods, and the breezes passing over it were laden with its perfumes, andsometimes wafted them to mortals lost in the desert. [*]

 * The perfumes and the odoriferous woods of the Divine Land were celebrated in Egypt. A traveller or hunter, crossing the desert, "could not but be vividly impressed by suddenly becoming aware, in the very midst of the desert, of the penetrating scent of the _robul (Puliciaria undulata_, Schwbine. ), which once followed us throughout a day and two nights, in some places without our being able to distinguish whence it came; as, for instance, when we were crossing tracts of country without any traces of vegetation whatever. " (Golenischeff). 

Northward, the world came to an end towards the lagoons of the Delta, whose inaccessible islands were believed to be the sojourning-placeof souls after death. As regards the south, precise knowledge of itscarcely went beyond the defiles of Gebel Sil-sileh, where the lastremains of the granite threshold had perhaps not altogether disappeared. The district beyond Gebel Silsileh, the province of Konûsit, was stilla foreign and almost mythic country, directly connected with heaven bymeans of the cataract. Long after the Egyptians had broken through thisrestricted circle, the names of those places which had as it were markedout their frontiers, continued to be associated in their minds with theidea of the four cardinal points. Bâkhû and Manu were still the mostfrequent expressions for the extreme East and West. Nekhabit and Bûto, the most populous towns in the neighbourhoods of Gebel Silsileh and theponds of the Delta, were set over against each other to designate Southand North. It was within these narrow limits that Egyptian civilizationstruck root and ripened, as in a closed vessel. What were the people bywhom it was developed, the country whence they came, the races towhich they belonged, is to-day unknown. The majority would place theircradle-land in Asia, [*] but cannot agree in determining the route whichwas followed in the emigration to Africa. 

 * The greater number of contemporary Egyptologists, Brugsch, Ebers, --Lauth, Lieblein, have rallied to this opinion, in the train of E. De Rougé; but the most extreme position has been taken up by Hommel, the Assyriologist, who is inclined to derive Egyptian civilization entirely from the Babylonian. After having summarily announced this thesis in his _Geschichte Babyloniens und Assyriens_, p. 12, et seq. , he has set it forth at length in a special treatise, _Der Babylonische Ursprung der àgyptischen Kultur_, 1892, wherein he endeavours to prove that the Heliopolitan myths, and hence the whole Egyptian religion, are derived from the cults of Eridû, and would make the name of the Egyptian city Onû, or Anû, identical with that of _Nûn-H, Nûn_, which is borne by the Chaldean. 

Some think that the people took the shortest road across the Isthmusof Suez, others give them longer peregrinations and a more complicateditinerary. They would have them cross the Straits of Bab el-Mandeb, and then the Abyssinian mountains, and, spreading northward and keepingalong the Nile, finally settle in the Egypt of to-day. A more minuteexamination compels us to recognize that the hypothesis of an Asiaticorigin, however attractive it may seem, is somewhat difficultto maintain. The bulk of the Egyptian population presents thecharacteristics of those white races which have been found establishedfrom all antiquity on the Mediterranean slope of the Libyan continent;this population is of African origin, and came to Egypt from the Westor South-West. In the valley, perhaps, it may have met with a black racewhich it drove back or destroyed; and there, perhaps, too, it afterwardsreceived an accretion of Asiatic elements, introduced by way of theisthmus and the marshes of the Delta. But whatever may be the originof the ancestors of the Egyptians, they were scarcely settled upon thebanks of the Nile before the country conquered, and assimilated them toitself, as it has never ceased to do in the case of strangers who haveoccupied it. At the time when their history begins for us, all theinhabitants had long formed but one people, with but one language. 

This language seems to be connected with the Semitic tongues by manyof its roots. It forms its personal pronouns, whether isolated orsuffixed, in a similar way. One of the tenses of the conjugation, andthat the simplest and most archaic, is formed with identical affixes. Without insisting upon resemblances which are open to doubt, it may bealmost affirmed that most of the grammatical processes used in Semiticlanguages are to be found in a rudimentary condition in Egyptian. Onewould say that the language of the people of Egypt and the languages ofthe Semitic races, having once belonged to the same group, had separatedvery early, at a time when the vocabulary and the grammatical systemof the group had not as yet taken definite shape. Subject to differentinfluences, the two families would treat in diverse fashion the elementscommon to both. The Semitic dialects continued to develop for centuries, while the Egyptian language, although earlier cultivated, stopped shortin its growth. "If it is obvious that there was an original connexionbetween the language of Egypt and that of Asia, this connexion isnevertheless sufficiently remote to leave to the Egyptian race adistinct physiognomy. " We recognize it in sculptured and paintedportraits, as well as in thousands of mummied bodies out of subterraneantombs. The highest type of Egyptian was tall and slender, with a proudand imperious air in the carriage of his head and in his whole bearing. He had wide and full shoulders, well-marked and vigorous pectoralmuscles, muscular arms, a long, fine hand, slightly developed hips, andsinewy legs. The detail of the knee-joint and the muscles of the calfare strongly marked beneath the skin; the long, thin, and low-archedfeet are flattened out at the extremities owing to the custom of goingbarefoot. The head is rather short, the face oval, the forehead somewhatretreating. The eyes are wide and fully opened, the cheekbones not toomarked, the nose fairly prominent, and either straight or aquiline. Themouth is long, the lips full, and lightly ridged along their outline;the teeth small, even, well-set, and remarkably sound; the ears are sethigh on the head. At birth the skin is white, but darkens in proportionto its exposure to the sun. Men are generally painted red in thepictures, though, as a matter of fact, there must already have beenall the shades which we see among the present population^ from a mostdelicate, rose-tinted complexion to that of a smoke-coloured bronze. Women, who were less exposed to the sun, are generally painted yellow, the tint paler in proportion as they rise in the social scale. The hairwas inclined to be wavy, and even to curl into little ringlets, butwithout ever turning into the wool of the negro. 

[Illustration: 059. Jpg THE NOBLE TYPE OF EGYPTIAN. 1]

 1 Statue of Rânofir in the Gîzeh Museum (Vth dynasty), after a photograph by Émil Brugsch-Bey. 

[Illustration: 060. Jpg HEAD OF A TILEBAN MUMMY. ]

The beard was scanty, thick only upon the chin. Such was the highesttype; the commoner was squat, dumpy, and heavy. Chest and shoulders seemto be enlarged at the expense of the pelvis and the hips, to such anextent as to make the want of proportion between the upper and lowerparts of the body startling and ungraceful. The skull is long, somewhatretreating, and slightly flattened on the top; the features are coarse, and as though carved in flesh by great strokes of the blocking-outchisel. Small frseuated eyes, a short nose, flanked by widely distendednostrils, round cheeks, a square chin, thick, but not curling lips--thisunattractive and ludicrous physiognomy, sometimes animated by anexpression of cunning which recalls the shrewd face of an old Frenchpeasant, is often lighted up by gleams of gentleness and of melancholygood-nature. The external characteristics of these two principal typesin the ancient monuments, in all varieties of modifications, may stillbe seen among the living. The profile copied from a Theban mummy takenat hazard from a necropolis of the XVIIIth dynasty, and compared withthe likeness of a modern Luxor peasant, would almost pass for a familyportrait. Wandering Bisharîn have inherited the type of face of a greatnoble, the contemporary of Kheops; and any peasant woman of the Deltamay bear upon her shoulders che head of a twelfth-dynasty king. Acitizen of Cairo, gazing with wonder at the statues of Khafra or of SetiI. In the Gîzeh Museum, is himself, feature for feature, the very imageof those ancient Pharaohs, though removed from them by fifty centuries. 

[Illustration: 062. Jpg A FELLAH WOMAN WITH THE FEATURES OF AN ANCIENTKING. 1]

 1 The face of the woman here given was taken separately, and was subsequently attached to the figure of an Egyptian woman whom Naville had photographed sitting beside a colossal head. The nose of the statue has been restored. 

Until quite recently nothing, or all but nothing, had been discoveredwhich could be attributed to the primitive races of Egypt: even theflint weapons and implements which had been found in various placescould not be ascribed to them with any degree of certainty, for theEgyptians continued to use stone long after metal was known to them. They made stone arrowheads, hammers, and knives, not only in the time ofthe Pharaohs, but under the Romans, and during the whole period ofthe Middle Ages, and the manufacture of them has not yet entirely diedout. [**]

 ** An entire collection of flint tools--axes, adzes, knives, and sickles--mostly with wooden handles, were found by Prof. Pétrie in the ruins of Kahun, at the entrance to the Fayûm: these go back to the time of the twelfth dynasty, more than three thousand years before our era. Mariette had previously pointed out to the learned world the fact that a Coptic _Reis_, Salîb of Abydos, in charge of the excavations, shaved his head with a flint knife, according to the custom of his youth (1820-35). I knew the man, who died at over eighty years of age in 1887; he was still faithful to his flint implement, while his sons and the whole population of El Kharbeh were using nothing but steel razors. As his scalp was scraped nearly raw by the operation, he used to cover his head with fresh leaves to cool the inflamed skin. 

These objects, and the workshops where they were made, might thereforebe less ancient than the greater part of the inscribed monuments. But ifso far we had found no examples of any work belonging to the first ages, we met in historic times with certain customs which were out of harmonywith the general civilization of the period. A comparison of thesecustoms with analogous practices of barbarous nations threw light uponthe former, completed their meaning, and showed us at the same time thesuccessive stages through which the Egyptian people had to pass beforereaching their highest civilization. We knew, for example, that evenas late as the Cæsars, girls belonging to noble families at Thebes wereconsecrated to the service of Amon, and were thus licensed to a lifeof immorality, which, however, did not prevent them from making richmarriages when age obliged them to retire from office. Theban women werenot the only people in the world to whom such licence was granted orimposed upon them by law; wherever in a civilized country we see asimilar practice, we may recognize in it an ancient custom which in thecourse of centuries has degenerated into a religious observance. Theinstitution of the women of Amon is a legacy from a time when thepractice of polyandry obtained, and marriage did not yet exist. Age andmaternity relieved them from this obligation, and preserved them fromthose incestuous connections of which we find examples in other races. A union of father and daughter, however, was perhaps not whollyforbidden, [*] and that of brother and sister seems to have been regardedas perfectly right and natural; the words brother and sister possessingin Egyptian love-songs the same significance as lover and mistress withus. 

 * E. De Rouge held that Rameses II. Married at least two of his daughters, Bint Anati and Honittui; Wiedemann admits that Psammetichus I. Had in the same way taken to wife Nitocris, who had been born to him by the Theban princess Shapenuapit. The Achæmenidan kings did the same: Artaxerxes married two of his own daughters. 

Paternity was necessarily doubtful in a community of this kind, andhence the tie between fathers and children was slight; there beingno family, in the sense in which we understand the word, except as itcentred around the mother. 

Maternal descent was, therefore, the only one openly acknowledged, andthe affiliation of the child was indicated by the name of the motheralone. When the woman ceased to belong to all, and confined herself toone husband, the man reserved to himself the privilege of taking as manywives as he wished, or as he was able to keep, beginning with his ownsisters. All wives did not enjoy identical rights: those born of thesame parents as the man, or those of equal rank with himself, preservedtheir independence. If the law pronounced him the master, _nibû_, towhom they owed obedience and fidelity, they were mistresses of thehouse, _nîbît pirû_, as well as wives, _himitû_, and the two words ofthe title express their condition. Each of them occupied, in fact, herown house, _pirû_, which she had from her parents or her husband, and ofwhich she was absolute mistress, _nîbît_. She lived in it and performedin it without constraint all a woman's duties; feeding the fire, grinding the corn, occupying herself in cooking and weaving, makingclothing and perfumes, nursing and teaching her children. When herhusband visited her, he was a guest whom she received on an equalfooting. It appears that at the outset these various wives were placedunder the authority of an older woman, whom they looked on as theirmother, and who defended their rights and interests against the master;but this custom gradually disappeared, and in historic times we readof it as existing only in the families of the gods. The female singersconsecrated to Amon and other deities, owed obedience to severalsuperiors, of whom the principal (generally the widow of a king or highpriest) was called _chief-superior of the ladies of the harem of Amon_. Besides these wives, there were concubines, slaves purchased or born inthe house, prisoners of war, Egyptians of inferior class, who were thechattels of the man and of whom he could dispose as he wished. All thechildren of one father were legitimate, whether their mother were a wifeor merely a concubine, but they did not all enjoy the same advantages;those among them who were born of a brother or sister united inlegitimate marriage, took precedence of those whose mother was a wife ofinferior rank or a slave. In the family thus constituted, the woman, to all appearances, played the principal part. Children recognized theparental relationship in the mother alone. The husband appears to haveentered the house of his wives, rather than the wives to have enteredhis, and this appearance of inferiority was so marked that the Greekswere deceived by it. They affirmed that the woman was supreme in Egypt;the man at the time of marriage promised obedience to her and enteredinto a contract not to raise any objection to her commands. 

We had, therefore, good grounds for supposing that the first Egyptianswere semi-savages, like those still living in Africa and America, havingan analogous organization, and similar weapons and tools. A few livedin the desert, in the oasis of Libya, or in the deep valleys of the RedLand--Doshirit, To Doshiru--between the Nile and the sea; the povertyof the country fostering their native savagery. Others, settled onthe Black Land, gradually became civilized, and we have found of lateconsiderable remains of those of their generations who, if not anteriorto the times of written records, were at least contemporary with theearliest kings of the first historical dynasty. 

[Illustration: 066. Jpg NEGRO PRISONERS WEARING THE PANTHER'S SKIST AS ALOIN-CLOTH. ]

Their houses were like those of the fellahs of to-day, low huts ofwattle daubed with puddled clay, or of bricks dried in the sun. Theycontained one room, either oblong or square, the door being the onlyaperture. Those of the richer class only were large enough to make itneedful to support the roof by means of one or more trunks of trees, which did duty for columns. Earthen pots, turned by hand, flint knivesand other implements, mats of reeds or plaited straw, two flat stonesfor grinding corn, a few pieces of wooden furniture, stools, andhead-rests for use at night, comprised all the contents. Their ordinarypottery is heavy and almost devoid of ornament, but some of the finerkinds have been moulded and baked in wickerwork baskets, which have lefta quaint trellis-like impression on the surface of the clay. In manycases the vases are bicolour, the body being of a fine smooth red, polished with a stone, while the neck and base are of an intense black, the surface of which is even more shining than that of the red part. Sometimes they are ornamented with patterns in white of flowers, palms, ostriches, gazelles, boats with undulated or broken lines, orgeometrical figures of a very simple nature. More often the ground iscoloured a fine yellow, and the decoration has been traced in red lines. Jars, saucers, double vases, flat plates, large cups, supports foramphorae, trays raised on a foot--in short, every kind of form is foundin use at that remote period. The men went about nearly naked, exceptthe nobles, who wore a panther's skin, sometimes thrown over theshoulders, sometimes drawn round the waist, and covering the lower partof the body, the animal's tail touching the heels behind, as we seelater in several representations of the negroes of the Upper Nile. Theysmeared their limbs with grease or oil, and they tattooed their facesand bodies, at least in part; but in later times this practice wasretained by the lower classes only. On the other hand, the custom ofpainting the face was never given up. To complete their toilet, it wasnecessary to accentuate the arch of the eyebrow with a line of kohl(antimony powder). A similar black line surrounded and prolonged theoval of the eye to the middle of the temple, a layer of green colouredthe under lid, and ochre and carmine enlivened the tints of the cheeksand lips. The hair, plaited, curled, oiled, and plastered with grease, formed an erection which was as complicated in the case of the man as inthat of the woman. 

[Illustration: 068. Jpg NOTABLE WEARING THE LARGE CLOAK OVER THE LEFTSHOULDER. 1; AND PRIEST WEARING THE PANTHER'S SKIN ACROSS THE BREAST. 2]

 1 Wooden statue in the Gîzeh Museum (IVth dynasty), drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Béchard. 

 2 Statue of the second prophet of Amon, Aa-nen, in the Turin Museum (XVIIIth dynasty). 

Should the hair be too short, a black or blue wig, dressed with muchskill, was substituted for it; ostrich feathers waved on the headsof warriors, and a large lock, flattened behind the right ear, distinguished the military or religious chiefs from their subordinates. When the art of weaving became common, a belt and loin-cloth of whitelinen replaced the leathern garment. Fastened round the waist, but solow as to leave the navel uncovered, the loin-cloth frequently reachedto the knee; the hinder part was frequently drawn between the legs andattached in front to the belt, thus forming a kind of drawers. Tailsof animals and wild beast's skin were henceforth only the insignia ofauthority with which priests and princes adorned themselves on greatdays and at religious ceremonies. The skin was sometimes carelesslythrown over the left shoulder and swayed with the movement of the body;sometimes it was carefully adjusted over one shoulder and under theother, so as to bring the curve of the chest into prominence. The headof the animal, skilfully prepared and enlivened by large eyes of enamel, rested on the shoulder or fell just below the waist of the wearer; thepaws, with the claws attached, hung down over the thighs; the spots ofthe skin were manipulated so as to form five-pointed stars. On goingout-of-doors, a large wrap was thrown over all; this covering was eithersmooth or hairy, similar to that in which the Nubians and Abyssinians ofthe present day envelop themselves. It could be draped in variousways; transversely over the left shoulder like the fringed shawl of theChaldeans, or hanging straight from both shoulders like a mantle. [**]

 ** This costume, to which Egyptologists have not given sufficient attention, is frequently represented on the monuments. Besides the two statues reproduced above, I may cite those of Uahibri and of Thoth-nofir in the Louvre, and the Lady Nofrit in the Gîzeh Museum. Thothotpû in his tomb wears this mantle. Khnumhotpû and several of his workmen are represented in it at Beni-Hasan, as also one of the princes of Elephantine in the recently discovered tombs, besides many Egyptians of all classes in the tombs of Thebes (a good example is in the tomb of Harmhabi). The reason why it does not figure more often is, in the first place, that the Egyptian artists experienced actual difficulty in representing the folds of its drapery, although these were simple compared with the complicated arrangement of the Roman toga; finally, the wall-paintings mostly portray either interior scenes, or agricultural labour, or the work of various trades, or episodes of war, or religious ceremonies, in all of which the mantle plays no part. Every Egyptian peasant, however, possessed his own, and it was in constant use in his daily life. 

In fact, it did duty as a cloak, sheltering the wearer from the sunor from the rain, from the heat or from the cold. They never sought totransform it into a luxurious garment of state, as was the case in latertimes with the Roman toga, whose amplitude secured a certain dignity ofcarriage, and whose folds, carefully adjusted beforehand, fell aroundthe body with studied grace. The Egyptian mantle when not required wasthrown aside and folded up. The material being fine and soft it occupiedbut a small space and was reduced to a long thin roll; the ends beingthen fastened together, it was slung over the shoulder and round thebody like a cavalry cloak. [*]

 * Many draughtsmen, ignorant of what they had to represent, have made incorrect copies of the manner in which this cloak was worn; but examples of it are numerous, although until now attention has not been called to them. The following are a few instances taken at random of the way in which it was used: Pepi I. , fighting against the nomads of Sinai, has the cloak, but with the two ends passed through the belt of his loin-cloth; at Zawyet el-Maiyitîn, Khunas, killing birds with the boomerang from his boat, wears it, but simply thrown over the left shoulder, with the two extremities hanging free. Khnumhotpû at Beni-Hasan, the Khrihdbi, the overseers, or the peasants, all have it rolled and slung round them; the Prince of el-Bersheh wears it like a mantle in folds over the two shoulders. If it is objected that the material could not be reduced to such small dimensions as those represented in these drawings of what I believe to be the Egyptian cloak, I way cite our cavalry capes, when rolled and slung, as an instance of what good packing will do in reducing volume. 

[Illustration: 070. Jpg a dignitary wrapped in his large cloak. 1]

 1 Statue of Khiti in the Gîzeh Museum (XIIth and XIIIth dynasties), drawn by Faucher-Gudin. 

Travellers, shepherds, all those whose occupations called them to thefields, carried it as a bundle at the ends of their sticks; once arrivedat the scene of their work, they deposited it in a corner with theirprovisions until they required it. The women were at first contentedwith a loin-cloth like that of the men; it was enlarged and lengthenedtill it reached the ankle below and the bosom above, and became atightly fitting garment, with two bands over the shoulders, like braces, to keep it in place. The feet were not always covered; on certainoccasions, however, sandals of coarse leather, plaited straw, splitreed, or even painted wood, adorned those shapely Egyptian feet, which, to suit our taste, should be a little shorter. 

[Illustration: 072. Jpg COSTUME OF EGYPTIAN WOMAN, SPINNING. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from one of the spinning-women at the Paris Exhibition of 1889. It was restored from the paintings in the tomb of Khnumhotpû at Beni-Hasan. 

Both men and women loved ornaments, and covered their necks, breasts, arms, wrists, and ankles with many rows of necklaces and bracelets. Thebracelets were made of elephant ivory, mother-of-pearl, or even flint, very cleverly perforated. The necklaces were composed of strings ofpierced shells, [**] interspersed with seeds and little pebbles, either sparkling or of unusual shapes. [***] Subsequently imitationsin terra-cotta replaced the natural shells, and precious stones weresubstituted for pebbles, as were also beads of enamel, either round, pear-shaped, or cylindrical: the necklaces were terminated and a uniformdistance maintained between the rows of beads, by several slips of wood, bone, ivory, porcelain, or terra-cotta, pierced with holes, throughwhich ran the threads. 

 ** The burying-places of Abydos, especially the most ancient, have furnished us with millions of shells, pierced and threaded as necklaces; they all belong to the species of cowries used as money in Africa at the present day. 

 *** Necklaces of seeds have been found in the tombs of Abydos, Thebes, and Gebelên. Of these Schweinfurth has identified, among others, the _Cassia absus_, "a weed of the Soudan whose seeds are sold in the drug bazaar at Cairo and Alexandria under the name of _shishn_, as a remedy, which is in great request among the natives, for ophthalmia. " For the necklaces of pebbles, cf. Maspeeo, Guide du visiteur, pp. 270, 271, No. 4129. A considerable number of these pebbles, particularly those of strange shape, or presenting a curious combination of colours, must have been regarded as amulets or fetishes by their Egyptian owners; analogous cases, among other peoples, have been pointed out by E. B. Tylor, Primitive Culture, vol. Ii. P. 189. 

[Illustration: 073. Jpg MAN WEARING WIG AND NECKLACES. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a portrait of Pharaoh Seti I. Of the XIXth dynasty: the lower part of the necklace has been completed. 

Weapons, at least among the nobility, were an indispensable part ofcostume. Most of them were for hand-to-hand fighting: sticks, clubs, lances furnished with a sharpened bone or stone point, axes and daggersof flint, [*] sabres and clubs of bone or wood variously shaped, pointedor rounded at the end, with blunt or sharp blades, --inoffensive enoughto look at, but, wielded by a vigorous hand, sufficient to break an arm, crush in the ribs, or smash a skull with all desirable precision. [**]The plain or triple curved bow was the favourite weapon for attack ata distance, [***] but in addition to this there were the sling, thejavelin, and a missile almost forgotten nowadays, the boomerang, we haveno proof however, that the Egyptians handled the boomerang[****] withthe skill of the Australians, or that they knew how to throw it so as tobring it back to its point of departure. [v]

 * In several museums, notably at Leyden, we find Egyptian axes of stone, particularly of serpentine, both rough and polished. 

 ** In primitive times the bone of an animal served as a club. This is proved by the shape of the object held in the hand in the sign and the hieroglyph which is the determinative in writing for all ideas of violence or brute force, comes down to us from a time when the principal weapon was the club, or a bone serving as a club. 

 *** For the two principal shapes of the bow, see Lepsius, Der Bogen in der Hieroglypliik (Zeitschrift, 1872, pp. 79- 88). From the earliest times the sign m£ portrays the soldier equipped with the bow and bundle of arrows; the quiver was of Asiatic origin, and was not adopted until much later. In the contemporary texts of the first dynasties, the idea of weapons is conveyed by the bow, arrow, and club or axe. 

 **** The boomerang is still used by certain tribes of the Nile valley. It is portrayed in the most ancient tombs, and every museum possesses examples, varying in shape. Besides the ordinary boomerang, the Egyptians used one which ended in a knob, and another of semicircular shape: this latter, reproduced in miniature in cornelian or in red jasper, served as an amulet, and was placed on the mummy to furnish the deceased in the other world with a fighting or hunting weapon. 

 v The Australian boomerang is much larger than the Egyptian one; it is about a yard in length, two inches in width, and three sixteenths of an inch in thickness. For the manner of handling it, and what can be done with it, see Lubbock, Prehistoric Man, pp. 402, 403. 

[Illustration: 074. Jpg the boomerang and FIGHTING bow. 2 ]

 2 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a painting in the tomb of Khnumhotpû at Beni-Hasan. 

[Illustration: 075. Jpg VOTIVE AXE. 3]

 3 The blade is of bronze, and is attached to the wooden handle by interlacing thongs of leather (Gizeh Museum). Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Emil Brugsch- Bey. 

Such was approximately the most ancient equipment as far as we canascertain; but at a very early date copper and iron were known inEgypt. [**] Long before historic times, the majority of the weapons inwood were replaced by those of metal, --daggers, sabres, hatchets, whichpreserved, however, the shape of the old wooden instruments. 

 ** Metals were introduced into Egypt in very ancient times, since the class of blacksmiths is associated with the worship of Horus of Edfû, and appears in the account of the mythical wars of that God. The earliest tools we possess, in copper or bronze, date from the IVth dynasty: pieces of iron have been found from time to time in the masonry of the Great Pyramid. Mons Montélius has again and again contested the authenticity of these discoveries, and he thinks that iron was not known in Egypt till a much later period. 

Those wooden weapons which were retained, were used for hunting, or wereonly brought out on solemn occasions when tradition had to be respected. The war-baton became the commander's wand of authority, and at lastdegenerated into the walking-stick of the rich or noble. 

[Illustration: 076. Jpg KING HOLDING THE BATON. 3]

 3 Bas-relief in the temple of Luxor, from a photograph taken by Insinger in 1886. 

The club at length represented merely the rank of a chieftain, [*] whilethe crook and the wooden-handled mace, with its head of ivory, diorite, granite, or white stone, the favourite weapons of princes, continued tothe last the most revered insignia of royalty. [**]

Life was passed in comparative ease and pleasure. Of the ponds left inthe open country by the river at its fall, some dried up more or lessquickly during the winter, leaving on the soil an immense quantityof fish, the possession of which birds and wild beasts disputed withman. [***]

 * The wooden club most commonly represented is the usual insignia of a nobleman. Several kinds of clubs, somewhat difficult for us moderns to distinguish, yet bearing different names, formed a part of funereal furniture. 

 ** The crook is the sceptre of a prince, a Pharaoh, or a god; the white mace has still the value apparently of a weapon in the hands of the king who brandishes it over a group of prisoners or over an ox which he is sacrificing to a divinity. Most museums possess specimens of the stone heads of these maces, but until lately their use was not known. I had several placed in the Boulak Museum. It already possessed a model of one entirely of wood. 

 *** Cf. The description of these pools given by Geoffroy- Saint-Hilaire in speaking of the fahaka. Even at the present day the jackals come down from the mountains in the night, and regale themselves with the fish left on the ground by the gradual drying up of these ponds. 

[Illustration: 077. Jpg FISHING IN THE MARSHES]

Other pools, however, remained till the returning inundation, as so many_vivaria_ in which the fish were preserved for dwellers on the banks. Fishing with the harpoon, made either of stone or of metal, with theline, with a net or with traps, were all methods of fishing known andused by the Egyptians from early times. Where the ponds failed, theneighbouring Nile furnished them with inexhaustible supplies. Standingin light canoes, or rather supported by a plank on bundles of reedsbound together, they ventured into mid-stream, in spite of the dangerarising from the ever-present hippopotamus; or they penetrated upthe canals amid a thicket of aquatic plants, to bring down with theboomerang the birds which found covert there. 

[Illustration: 078. Jpg HUNTING IN THE MARSHES: ENCOUNTERING AND SPEARINGA HIPPOPOTAMUS. 1]

 1 Tomb of Ti. Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from Dûmichen, Besultate, vol. Ii. Pl. X. 

The fowl and fish which could not be eaten fresh, were dried, salted, or smoked, and kept for a rainy day. Like the river, the desert had itsperils and its resources. Only too frequently, the lion, the leopard, the panther, and other large felidse were met with there. 

[Illustration: 079. Jpg HUNTING IN THE DESERT: BULL, LION, AND ORYXPIERCED WITH ARROWS. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a painting by Beni-Hasan, Lepsius, Denhm. , ii. 136. 

 2 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a bas-relief of Ptahhotpû. The dogs on the upper level are of hyenoid type, those on the lower are Abyssinian greyhounds. 

The nobles, like the Pharaohs of later times, deemed it as theirprivilege or duty to stalk and destroy these animals, pursuing them evento their dens. The common people preferred attacking the gazelle, theoryx, the mouflon sheep, the ibex, the wild ox, and the ostrich, but didnot disdain more humble game, such as the porcupine and long-eared hare:nondescript packs, in which the jackal and the hyena ran side by sidewith the wolf-dog and the lithe Abyssinian greyhound, scented andretrieved for their master the prey which he had pierced with hisarrows. At times a hunter, returning with the dead body of the mother, would be followed by one of her young; or a gazelle, but slightlywounded, would be taken to the village and healed of its hurt. 

[Illustration: 080. Jpg CATCHING ANIMALS WITH THE BOLA. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a bas-relief of Ptahhotpû. Above are seen two porcupines, the foremost of which, emerging from his hole, has seized a grasshopper. 

Such animals by daily contact with man, were gradually tamed, andformed about his dwelling a motley flock, kept partly for his pleasureand mostly for his profit, and becoming in case of necessity a readystock of provisions. [**]

 ** In the same way, before the advent of Europeans, the half-civilized tribes of North America used to keep about their huts whole flocks of different animals, which were tame, but not domesticated. 

Efforts were therefore made to enlarge this flock, and the wish toprocure animals without seriously injuring them, caused the Egyptiansto use the net for birds and the lasso and the _bola_ forquadrupeds, [*]--weapons less brutal than the arrow and the javelin. The_bola_ was made by them of a single rounded stone, attached to a strapabout five yards in length. The stone once thrown, the cord twistedround the legs, muzzle, or neck of the animal pursued, and by theattachment thus made the pursuer, using all his strength, was enabled tobring the beast down half strangled. The lasso has no stone attachedto it, but a noose prepared beforehand, and the skill of the hunterconsists in throwing it round the neck of his victim while running. They caught indifferently, without distinction of size or kind, allthat chance brought within their reach. The daily chase kept up thesehalf-tamed flocks of gazelles, wild goats, water-bucks, stocks, andostriches, and their numbers are reckoned by hundreds on the monumentsof the ancient empire. [**]

 * Hunting with the bola is constantly represented in the paintings both of the Memphite and Theban periods. Wilkinson has confounded it with lasso-hunting, and his mistake has been reproduced by other Egyptologists. Lasso-hunting is seen in Lepsius, Denhn. , ii. 96, in Dùmichen, _resultate_, vol. I. Pl. Viii. , and particularly in the numerous sacrificial scenes where the king is supposed to be capturing the bull of the north or south, previous to offering it to the god. 

 ** As the tombs of the ancient empire show us numerous flocks of gazelles, antelopes, and storks, feeding under the care of shepherds, Fr. Lenormant concluded that the Egyptians of early times had succeeded in domesticating some species, nowadays rebels to restraint. It is my belief that the animals represented were tamed, but not domesticated, and were the result of great hunting expeditions in the desert. The facts which Lenormant brought forward to support his theory may be used against him. For instance, the fawn of the gazelle nourished by its mother does not prove that it was bred in captivity; the gazelle may have been caught before calving, or just after the birth of its young. The fashion of keeping flocks of animals taken from the desert died out between the XIIth and XVIIIth dynasties. At the time of the new empire, they had only one or two solitary animals as pets for women or children, the mummies of which were sometimes buried by the side of their mistresses. 

Experience alone taught the hunter to distinguish between those speciesfrom which he could draw profit, and others whose wildness made themimpossible to domesticate. The subjection of the most useful kinds hadnot been finished when the historic period opened. 

[Illustration: 082. Jpg A SWINEHERD AND HIS PIGS. 2]

 2 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a painting in a Theban tomb of the XVIIIth dynasty. 

The ass, the sheep, and the goat were already domesticated, but the pigwas still out in the marshes in a semi-wild state, under the care ofspecial herdsmen, [*] and the religious rites preserved the remembranceof the times in which the ox was so little tamed, that in order tocapture while grazing the animals needed for sacrifice or for slaughter, it was necessary to use the lasso. [***]

 * The hatred of the Egyptians for the pig (Herodotus, ii. 47) is attributed to mythological motives. Lippert thinks this antipathy did not exist in Egypt in primitive times. At the outset the pig would have been the principal food of the people; then, like the dog in other regions, it must have been replaced at the table by animals of a higher order-- gazelles, sheep, goats, oxen--and would have thus fallen into contempt. To the excellent reasons given by Lippert could be added others drawn from the study of the Egyptian myths, to prove that the pig has often been highly esteemed. Thus, Isis is represented, down to late times, under the form of a sow, and a sow, whether followed or not by her young is one of the amulets placed in the tomb with the deceased, to secure for him the protection of the goddess. 

 *** Mariette, Abydos (vol. I. Pl. 48 b, 53). To prevent the animal from evading the lasso and escaping during the sacrifice, its right hind foot was fastened to its left horn. 

Europeans are astonished to meet nowadays whole peoples who make useof herbs and plants whose flavour and properties are nauseating tous: these are mostly so many legacies from a remote past; for example, castor-oil, with which the Berbers rub their limbs, and with which thefellahîn of the Saïd flavour their bread and vegetables, was preferredbefore all others by the Egyptians of the Pharaonic age foranointing the body and for culinary use. [*] They had begun by eatingindiscriminately every kind of fruit which the country produced. Manyof these, when their therapeutic virtues had been learned by experience, were gradually banished as articles of food, and their use restricted tomedicine; others fell into disuse, and only reappeared at sacrifices, orat funeral feasts; several varieties continue to be eaten to thepresent time--the acid fruits of the nabeca and of the carob tree, the astringent figs of the sycamore, the insipid pulp of the dam-palm, besides those which are pleasant to our Western palates, such as thecommon fig and the date. The vine flourished, at least in Middle andLower Egypt; from time immemorial the art of making wine from it wasknown, and even the most ancient monuments enumerate half a dozen famousbrands, red or white. [**]

 * I have often been obliged, from politeness, when dining with the native agents appointed by the European powers at Port Saïd, to eat salads and mayonnaise sauces flavoured with castor-oil; the taste was not so disagreeable as might be at first imagined. 

 ** The four kinds of canonical wine, brought respectively from the north, south, east, and west of the country, formed part of the official repast and of the wine-cellar of the deceased from remote antiquity. 

Vetches, lupins, beans, chick-peas, lentils, onions, fenugreek, [*] thebamiâ, [**] the meloukhia, [***] the arum colocasia, all grew wild in thefields, and the river itself supplied its quota of nourishing plants. 

 * All these species have been found in the tombs and identified by savants in archaeological botany--Kunth, Unger, Schweinfurth (Loret, _La Flore Pharaonique_, pp. 17, 40, 42, 43, Nos. 33, 97, 102, 104, 105, 106). 

 ** The bamiâ, _Hibiscus esculentus_, L. , is a plant of the family of the Malvaceae, having a fruit of five divisions, covered with prickly hairs, and pontaining round, white, soft seeds, slightly sweet, but astringent in taste, and very mucilaginous. It figures on the monuments of Pharaonic times. 

 *** The meloukhia, _Corchorus Olitorius_, L. , is a plant belonging to the Tilliacese, which is chopped up and cooked much the same as endive is with us, but which few Europeans can eat with pleasure, owing to the mucilage it contains. Theophrastus says it was celebrated for its bitterness; it was used as food, however, in the Greek town of Alexandria. 

[Illustration: 084. Jpg THE EGYPTIAN LOTUS. 4]

 4 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin from the _Description de l'Egypte_, Histoire Naturelle, pl. 61. 

Two of the species of lotus which grew in the Nile, the white and theblue, have seed-vessels similar to those of the poppy: the capsulescontain small grains of the size of millet-seed. The fruit of the pinklotus "grows on a different stalk from that of the flower, and springsdirectly from the root; it resembles a honeycomb in form, " or, to takea more prosaic simile, the rose of a watering-pot. The upper part hastwenty or thirty cavities, "each containing a seed as big as an olivestone, and pleasant to eat either fresh or dried. " This is what theancients called the bean of Egypt. "The yearly shoots of the papyrus arealso gathered. After pulling them up in the marshes, the points are cutoff and rejected, the part remaining being about a cubit in length. Itis eaten as a delicacy and is sold in the markets, but those who arefastidious partake of it only after baking. " Twenty different kinds ofgrain and fruits, prepared by crushing between two stones, are kneadedand baked to furnish cakes or bread; these are often mentioned in thetexts as cakes of nabeca, date cakes, and cakes of figs. Lily loaves, made from the roots and seeds of the lotus, were the delight of thegourmand, and appear on the tables of the kings of the XIXth dynasty. [*]

 * _Tiû_, which is the most ancient word for bread, appears in early times to have been used for every kind of paste, whether made with fruits or grain; the more modern word âqû applies specially to bread made from cereals. The lily loaves are mentioned in the Papyrus Anastasi, No. 4, p. 14. 1. 1. 

Bread and cakes made of cereals formed the habitual food of the people. Durrah is of African origin; it is the "grain of the South" of theinscriptions. On the other hand, it is supposed that wheat and six-rowedbarley came from the region of the Euphrates. Egypt was among the firstto procure and cultivate them. [*] The soil there is so kind to man, thatin many places no agricultural toil is required. 

 * The position which wheat and barley occupy in the lists of offerings, proves the antiquity of their existence in Egypt. Mariette found specimens of barley in the tombs of the Ancient Empire at Saqqarah. 

[Illustration: 086. Jpg THE EGYPTIAN HOE. 2]

 2 Bas-relief from the tomb of Ti; drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Emil Brugsch-Bey. 

As soon as the water of the Nile retires, the ground is sown withoutprevious preparation, and the grain, falling straight into the mud, grows as vigorously as in the best-ploughed furrows. Where the earth ishard it is necessary to break it up, but the extreme simplicity of theinstruments with which this was done shows what a feeble resistance itoffered. For a long time the hoe sufficed. It was composed either of alarge stone tied to a wooden handle, or was made of two pieces of woodof unequal length, united at one of their extremities, and held togethertowards the middle by a slack cord: the plough, when first invented wasbut a slightly enlarged hoe, drawn by oxen. The cultivation of cereals, once established on the banks of the Nile, developed, from earliesttimes, to such a degree as to supplant all else: hunting, fishing, the rearing of cattle, occupied but a secondary place compared withagriculture, and Egypt became, that which she still remains, a vastgranary of wheat. The part of the valley first cultivated was from GebelSilsileh to the apex of the Delta. [*]

 * This was the tradition of all the ancients. Herodotus related that, according to the Egyptians, the whole of Egypt, with the exception of the Theban nome, was a vast swamp previous to the time of Menés. Aristotle adds that the Red Sea, the Mediterranean, and the area now occupied by the Delta, formed one sea. Cf. Pp. 3-5 of this volume, on the formation of the Delta. 

[Illustration: 087. Jpg PLOUGHING. 2]

 2 Bas-relief from the tomb of Ti; drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Emil Brugsch-Bey. 

Between the Libyan and Arabian ranges it presents a slightly convexsurface, furrowed lengthways by a depression, in the bottom of whichthe Nile is gathered and enclosed when the inundation is over. In thesummer, as soon as the river had risen higher than the top of itsbanks, the water rushed by the force of gravity towards the lower lands, hollowing in its course long channels, some of which never completelydried up, even when the Nile reached its lowest level. [*] Cultivationwas easy in the neighbourhood of these natural reservoirs, buteverywhere else the movements of the river were rather injurious thanadvantageous to man. The inundation scarcely ever covered the higherground in the valley, which therefore remained unproductive; it flowedrapidly over the lands of medium elevation, and moved so sluggishly inthe hollows that they became weedy and stagnant pools. [**]

 * The whole description of the damage which can be done by the Nile in places where the inundation is not regulated, is borrowed from Linant de Bellefonds, _Mémoire sur les principaux travaux d'utilité publique_, p. 3. 

 ** This physical configuration of the country explains the existence at a very early date of those gigantic serpents which I have already mentioned. 

[Illustration: 089. Jpg AN EGYPTIAN SAKIÂ (WELL) SHOWING METHOD OFPROCURING WATER FOR IRRIGATION. ]

In any year the portion not watered by the river was invaded by thesand: from the lush vegetation of a hot country, there was but onestep to absolute aridity. At the present day an ingeniously establishedsystem of irrigation allows the agriculturist to direct and distributethe overflow according to his needs. From Gebel Ain to the sea, the Nileand its principal branches are bordered by long dykes, which closelyfollow the windings of the river and furnish sufficiently stableembankments. Numerous canals lead off to right and left, directed moreor less obliquely towards the confines of the valley; they are dividedat intervals by fresh dykes, starting at the one side from the river, and ending on the other either at the Bahr Yusuf or at the rising ofthe desert. Some of these dykes protect one district only, and consistmerely of a bank of earth; others command a large extent of territory, and a breach in them would entail the ruin of an entire province. Theselatter are sometimes like real ramparts, made of crude brick carefullycemented; a few, as at Qosheish, have a core of hewn stones, which latergenerations have covered with masses of brickwork, and strengthened withconstantly renewed buttresses of earth. They wind across the plain withmany unexpected and apparently aimless turns; on closer examination, however, it may be seen that this irregularity is not to be attributedto ignorance or caprice. Experience had taught the Egyptians the artof picking out, upon the almost imperceptible relief of the soil, theeasiest lines to use against the inundation: of these they have followedcarefully the sinuosities, and if the course of the dykes appearssingular, it is to be ascribed to the natural configuration of theground. Subsidiary embankments thrown up between the principal ones, and parallel to the Nile, separate the higher ground bordering the riverfrom the low lands on the confines of the valley; they divide the largerbasins into smaller divisions of varying area, in which the irrigationis regulated by means of special trenches. As long as the Nileis falling, the dwellers on its banks leave their canals in freecommunication with it; but they dam them up towards the end of thewinter, just before the return of the inundation, and do not reopen themtill early in August, when the new flood is at its height. The watersthen flowing in by the trenches are arrested by the nearest transversedyke and spread over the fields. When they have stood there long enoughto saturate the ground, the dyke is pierced, and they pour into the nextbasin until they are stopped by a second dyke, which in its turn forcesthem again to spread out on either side. This operation is renewed fromdyke to dyke, till the valley soon becomes a series of artificial ponds, ranged one above another, and flowing one into another from GrebelSilsileh to the apex of the Delta. In autumn, the mouth of each ditch isdammed up anew, in order to prevent the mass of water from flowing backinto the stream. The transverse dykes, which have been cut in variousplaces, are also repaired, and the basins become completely landlocked, separated by narrow causeways. In some places, the water thus imprisonedis so shallow that it is soon absorbed by the soil; in others, it is sodeep, that after it has been kept in for several weeks, it is necessaryto let it run off into a neighbouring depression, or straight into theriver itself. 

[Illustration: 091. Jpg BOATMEN FIGHTING ON A CANAL COMMUNICATING WITHTHE NILE. 1]

 1 Bas-relief from the tomb of Ti; drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by E. Brugsch-Bey. 

History has left us no account of the vicissitudes of the struggle inwhich the Egyptians were engaged with the Nile, nor of the time expendedin bringing it to a successful issue. Legend attributes the idea of thesystem and its partial working out to the god Osiris: then Menés, thefirst mortal king, is said to have made the dyke of Qosheish, on whichdepends the prosperity of the Delta and Middle Egypt, and the fabulousMceris is supposed to have extended the blessings of the irrigation tothe Fayûm. In reality, the regulation of the inundation and the makingof cultivable land are the work of unrecorded generations who peopledthe valley. The kings of the historic period had only to maintain anddevelop certain points of what had already been done, and Upper Egyptis to this day chequered by the network of waterways with which itsearliest inhabitants covered it. The work must have begun simultaneouslyat several points, without previous agreement, and, as it were, instinctively. A dyke protecting a village, a canal draining or wateringsome small province, demanded the efforts of but few individuals; thenthe dykes would join one another, the canals would be prolonged tillthey met others, and the work undertaken by chance would be improved, and would spread with the concurrence of an ever-increasing population. What happened at the end of last century, shows us that the system grewand was developed at the expense of considerable quarrels and bloodshed. The inhabitants of each district carried out the part of the work mostconducive to their own interest, seizing the supply of water, keepingit and discharging it at pleasure, without considering whether theywere injuring their neighbours by depriving them of their supply orby flooding them; hence arose perpetual strife and fighting. It becameimperative that the rights of the weaker should be respected, and thatthe system of distribution should be co-ordinated, for the country toaccept a beginning at least of social organization analogous to thatwhich it acquired later: the Nile thus determined the political as wellas the physical constitution of Egypt. 

[Illustration: 092. Jpg A GREAT EGYPTIAN LORD, TI, AND HIS WIFE. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Dûmichen, _Resultate_, vol. Ii. Pl. Vit

The country was divided among communities, whose members were supposedto be descended from the same seed (_paît_) and to belong to thesame family (_pâîtû_): the chiefs of them were called _ropâîtû_, theguardians, or pastors of the family, and in later times their namebecame a title applicable to the nobility in general. Families combinedand formed groups of various importance under the authority of a headchief--_ropâîtû-hâ_. They were, in fact, hereditary lords, dispensingjustice, levying taxes in kind on their subordinates, reserving tothemselves the redistribution of land, leading their men to, battle, andsacrificing to the gods. [*] The territories over which they exercisedauthority formed small states, whose boundaries even now, in someplaces, can be pointed out with certainty. The principality of theTerebinth[**] occupied the very heart of Egypt, where the valley iswidest, and the course of the Nile most advantageously disposedby nature--a country well suited to be the cradle of an infantcivilization. Siaût (Siût), the capital, is built almost at the footof the Libyan range, on a strip of land barely a mile in width, whichseparates the river from the hills. A canal surrounds it on three sides, and makes, as it were, a natural ditch about its walls; duringthe inundation it is connected with the mainland only by narrowcauseways--shaded with mimosas--and looking like a raft of verdureaground in the current. [***]

 * These prerogatives were still exercised by the princes of the nomes under the Middle and New Empires; they only enjoyed them then by the good will of the reigning sovereign. 

 ** The Egyptian word for the tree which gives its name to this principality is _atf, iatf, iôtf_: it is only by a process of elimination that I have come to identify it with the _Pistacia Terebinthus_, L. , which furnished the Egyptians with the scented resin _snûtir_. 

 *** Boudier's drawing, reproduced on p. 31, and taken from a photograph by Beato, gives most faithfully the aspect presented by the plain and the modern town of Siout during the inundation. 

[Illustration: 094. Jpg NOMES OF MIDDLE EGYPT]

The site is as happy as it is picturesque; not only does the towncommand the two arms of the river, opening or closing the waterway atwill, but from time immemorial the most frequented of the routes intoCentral Africa has terminated at its gates, bringing to it the commerceof the Soudan. It held sway, at the outset, over both banks, from rangeto range, northward as far as Deyrût, where the true Bahr Yusuf leavesthe Nile, and southward to the neighbourhood of Gebel Sheikh Haridi. Theextent and original number of the other principalities is not so easilydetermined. 

The most important, to the north of Siût, were those of the Hare and theOleander. The principality of the Hare never reached the dimensionsof that of its neighbour the Terebinth, but its chief town was Khmûnû, whose antiquity was so remote, that a universally accepted traditionmade it the scene of the most important acts of creation. [*] That of theOleander, on the contrary, was even larger than that of the Terebinth, and from Hininsû, its chief governor ruled alike over the marshes of theFayûm and the plains of Beni-Suef. [**] To the south, Apû on the rightbank governed a district so closely shut in between a bend of the Nileand two spurs of the range, that its limits have never varied much sinceancient times. Its inhabitants were divided in their employment betweenweaving and the culture of cereals. From early times they possessed theprivilege of furnishing clothing to a large part of Egypt, and theirlooms, at the present day, still make those checked or striped"melayahs" which the fellah women wear over their long blue tunics. [***]

 * Khmûnû, the present Ashmûneîn, is the Hermopolis of the Greeks, the town of the god Thot. 

 ** Hininsû is the _Heraecleopolis Magna_ of the Greeks, the present Henassieh, called also Ahnas-el-Medineh. The Egyptian word for the tree which gives its name to this principality, is Nârît. Loret has shown that this tree, _Nârît_, is the oleander. 

 *** Apû was the Panopolis or Chemmis of the Greeks, the town of the god Mîn or ithyphallic Khimû. Its manufactures of linen are mentioned by Strabo; the majority of the beautiful Coptic woven fabrics and embroideries which have been brought to Europe lately, come from the necropolis of the Arab period at Apû. 

Beyond Apû, Thinis, the Girgeh of the Arabs, situate on both banks ofthe river, rivalled Khmûnû in antiquity and Siût in wealth: its plainsstill produce the richest harvests and feed the most numerous herds ofsheep and oxen in the Said. 

[Illustration: 096. Jpg NOMES OF UPPER EGYPT]

As we approach the cataract, information becomes scarcer. Qûbti and Aûnûof the South, the Coptos and Hermonthis of the Greeks, shared peaceablythe plain occupied later on by Thebes and its temples, and Nekhabît andZobû watched over the safety of Egypt. Nekhabît soon lost its positionas a frontier town, and that portion of Nubia lying between GebelSilsileh and the rapids of Syene formed a kind of border province, ofwhich Nubît-Ombos was the principal sanctuary and Abu-Elephantinethe fortress: beyond this were the barbarians, and those inaccessibleregions whence the Nile descended upon our earth. 

The organization of the Delta, it would appear, was more slowly broughtabout. It must have greatly resembled that of the lowlands of EquatorialAfrica, towards the confluence of the Bahr el Abiad and the Bahr elGhazâl. Great tracts of mud, difficult to describe as either solid orliquid, marshes dotted here and there with sandy islets, bristling withpapyrus reeds, water-lilies, and enormous plants through which the armsof the Nile sluggishly pushed their ever-shifting course, low-lyingwastes intersected with streams and pools, unfit for cultivationand scarcely available for pasturing cattle. The population of suchdistricts, engaged in a ceaseless struggle with nature, always preservedrelatively ruder manners, and a more rugged and savage character, impatient of all authority. The conquest of this region began from theouter edge only. A few principalities were established at the apex ofthe Delta in localities where the soil had earliest been won from theriver. It appears that one of these divisions embraced the countrysouth of and between the bifurcation of the Nile: Aûnû of the North, the Heliopolis of the Greeks, was its capital. In very early times theprincipality was divided, and formed three new states, independent ofeach other. Those of Aûnû and the Haunch were opposite to each other, the first on the Arabian, the latter on the Libyan bank of the Nile. Thedistrict of the White Wall marched with that of the Haunch on the north, and on the south touched the territory of the Oleander. Further down theriver, between the more important branches, the governors of Sai's andof Bubastis, of Athribis and of Busiris, shared among themselves theprimitive Delta. Two frontier provinces of unequal size, the Arabian onthe east in the Wady Tumilat, and the Libyan on the west to the south ofLake Mareotis, defended the approaches of the country from the attacksof Asiatic Bedâwins and of African nomads. The marshes of the interiorand the dunes of the littoral, were not conducive to the development ofany great industry or civilization. They only comprised tracts of thinlypopulated country, like the principalities of the Harpoon and of theCow, and others whose limits varied from century to century withthe changing course of the river. The work of rendering the marshessalubrious and of digging canals, which had been so successful in theNile Valley, was less efficacious in the Delta, and proceeded moreslowly. Here the embankments were not supported by a mountain chain:they were continued at random across the marshes, cut at every turn toadmit the waters of a canal or of an arm of the river. The waters lefttheir usual bed at the least disturbing influence, and made a freshcourse for themselves across country. If the inundation were delayed, the soft and badly drained soil again became a slough: should it lastbut a few weeks longer than usual, the work of several generations wasfor a long time undone. The Delta of one epoch rarely presented the sameaspect as that of previous periods, and Northern Egypt never became asfully mistress of her soil as the Egypt of the south. 

[Illustration: 099. Jpg NOMES OF LOWER EGYPT]

These first principalities, however small they appear to us, were yettoo large to remain undivided. In those times of slow communication, thestrong attraction which a capital exercised over the provinces under itsauthority did not extend over a wide radius. That part of the populationof the Terebinth, living sufficiently near to Siût to come into the townfor a few hours in the morning, returning in the evening to the villageswhen business was done, would not feel any desire to withdraw from therule of the prince who governed there. On the other hand, those wholived outside that restricted circle were forced to seek elsewhere someplaces of assembly to attend the administration of justice, to sacrificein common to the national gods, and to exchange the produce of thefields and of local manufactures. Those towns which had the good fortuneto become such rallying-points naturally played the part of rivals tothe capital, and their chiefs, with the district whose population, soto speak, gravitated around them, tended to become independent of theprince. When they succeeded in doing this, they often preserved for thenew state thus created, the old name, slightly modified by the additionof an epithet. The primitive territory of Siût was in this way dividedinto three distinct communities; two, which remained faithful to the oldemblem of the tree--the Upper Terebinth, with Siût itself in the centre, and the Lower Terebinth, with Kûsit to the north; the third, in thesouth and east, took as their totem the immortal serpent which dwelt intheir mountains, and called themselves the Serpent Mountain, whosechief town was that of the Sparrow Hawk. The territory of the Oleanderproduced by its dismemberment the principality of the Upper Oleander, that of the Lower Oleander, and that of the Knife. The territory ofthe Harpoon in the Delta divided itself into the Western and EasternHarpoon. The fission in most cases could not have been accomplishedwithout struggles; but it did take place, and all the principalitieshaving a domain of any considerable extent had to submit to it, howeverthey may have striven to avoid it. This parcelling out was continued ascircumstances afforded opportunity, until the whole of Egypt, except thehalf desert districts about the cataract, became but an agglomeration ofpetty states nearly equal in power and population. [*]

 * Examples of the subdivision of ancient nomes and the creation of fresh nomes are met with long after primitive times. We find, for example, the nome of the Western Harpoon divided under the Greeks and Romans into two districts--that of the Harpoon proper, of which the chief town was Sonti- nofir; and that of Ranûnr, with the Onûphis of classical geographers for its capital. 

The Greeks called them nomes, and we have borrowed the word from them;the natives named them in several ways, the most ancient termbeing "nûît, " which may be translated _domain_, and the most commonappellation in recent times being "hospû, " which signifies _district_. The number of the nomes varied considerably in the course of centuries:the hieroglyphic monuments and classical authors fixed them sometimes atthirty-six, sometimes at forty, sometimes at forty-four, or even fifty. The little that we know of their history, up to the present time, explains the reason of this variation. Ceaselessly quarrelled over bythe princely families who possessed them, the nomes were alternatelyhumbled and exalted by civil wars, marriages, and conquest, which causedthem continually to pass into fresh hands, either entire or divided. TheEgyptians, whom we are accustomed to consider as a people respectingthe established order of things, and conservative of ancient tradition, showed themselves as restless and as prone to modify or destroy the workof the past, as the most inconstant of our modern nations. The distanceof time which separates them from us, and the almost complete absenceof documents, gives them an appearance of immobility, by which we areliable to be unconsciously deceived; when the monuments still existingshall have been unearthed, their history will present the samecomplexity of incidents, the same agitations, the same instability, which we suspect or know to have been characteristic of most otherOriental nations. One thing alone remained stable among them in themidst of so many revolutions, and which prevented them from losing theirindividuality and from coalescing in a common unity. This was the beliefin and the worship of one particular deity. If the little capitalsof the petty states whose origin is lost in a remote past--Edfû andDenderah, Nekhabît and Bûto, Siûfc, Thinis, Khmûnû, Sais, Bubastis, Athribis--had only possessed that importance which resulted from thepresence of an ambitious petty prince, or from the wealth of theirinhabitants, they would never have passed safe and sound through thelong centuries of existence which they enjoyed from the opening to theclose of Egyptian history. Fortune raised their chiefs, some even to therank of rulers of the world, and in turn abased them: side by side withthe earthly ruler, whose glory was but too often eclipsed, there wasenthroned in each nome a divine ruler, a deity, a god of the domain, "nûtir nûiti, " whose greatness never perished. The princely familiesmight be exiled or become extinct, the extent of the territory mightdiminish or increase, the town might be doubled in size and populationor fall in ruins: the god lived on through all these vicissitudes, andhis presence alone preserved intact the rights of the state over whichhe reigned as sovereign. If any disaster befell his worshippers, histemple was the spot where the survivors of the catastrophe ralliedaround him, their religion preventing them from mixing with theinhabitants of neighbouring towns and from becoming lost among them. The survivors multiplied with that extraordinary rapidity which is thecharacteristic of the Egyptian fellah, and a few years of peace sufficedto repair losses which apparently were irreparable. Local religionwas the tie which bound together those divers elements of which eachprincipality was composed, and as long as it remained, the nomesremained; when it vanished, they disappeared with it. 

[Illustration: 105. Jpg PAGE IMAGE]

[Illustration: 106. Jpg PAGE IMAGE]

CHAPTER II. --THE GODS OF EGYPT

_THEIR NUMBER AND NATURE--THE FEUDAL GODS, LIVING AND DEAD--TRIADS----THE TEMPLES AND PRIESTHOOD--THE COSMOGONIES OF THE DELTA----THE ENNEADSOF HELIOPOLIS AND HERMOPOLIS. _

_Multiplicity of the Egyptian gods: the commonalty of the gods, itsvarieties, human, animal, and intermediate between man and beast; godsof foreign origin, indigenous gods, and the contradictory forms withwhich they were invested in accordance with various conceptions of theirnature. 

The Star-gods--The Sun-god as the Eye of the Shy; as a bird, as a calf, and as a man; its barks, voyages round the world, and encounters withthe serpent Apopi--The Moon-god and its enemies--The Star-gods: theHaunch of the Ox, the Hippopotamus, the Lion, the five Horus-planets;Sothis Sirius, and Sahû Orion. 

The feudal gods and their classes: the Nile-gods, the earth-gods, thesky-gods and the sun-god, the Horus-gods--The equality of feudalgods and goddesses; their persons, alliances, and marriages: theirchildren--The triads and their various developments. 

The nature of the gods: the double, the soul, the body, death of men andgods, and their fate after death--The necessity for preserving the body, mummification--Dead gods the gods of the dead--The living gods, theirtemples and images--The gods of the people, trees, serpents, familyfetiches--The theory of prayer and sacrifice: the servants of thetemples, the property of the gods, the sacerdotal colleges. 

The cosmogonies of the Delta: Sibu and Naît, Osiris and Isis, SU andNephthys--Heliopolis and its theological schools: Ra, his identificationwith Horus, his dual nature, and the conception of Atûmû--TheHeliopolitan Enneads: formation of the Great Ennead--Thot andthe Hermopolitan Ennead: creation by articulate words and by voicealone--Diffusion of the Enneads: their connection with the local triads, the god One and the god Eight--The one and only gods. _

[Illustration: 107. Jpg PAGE IMAGE]

THE GODS OF EGYPT

The incredible number of religious scenes to be found among therepresentations on the ancient monuments of Egypt is at first glancevery striking. Nearly every illustration in the works of Egyptologistsbrings before us the figure of some deity receiving with an impassivecountenance the prayers and offerings of a worshipper. One would thinkthat the country had been inhabited for the most part by gods, andcontained just sufficient men and animals to satisfy the requirements oftheir worship. 

[Illustration: 108. Jpg THE GODDESS NAPKÎT, STAPÎT. 1]

 1 The goddess Naprît, Napît; bas-relief from the first chamber of Osiris, on the east side of the great temple of Denderah. Drawn by Faucher-Gudin. 

On penetrating into this mysterious world, we are confronted by anactual rabble of gods, each one of whom has always possessed but alimited and almost unconscious existence. They severally represented afunction, a moment in the life of man or of the universe; thus Naprîtwas identified with the ripe ear, or the grain of wheat;[**]

 ** The word _naprît_ means _grain_, the grain of wheat. The grain-god is represented in the tomb of Seti I. As a man wearing two full ears of wheat or barley upon his head. He is mentioned in the _Hymn to the Nile_ about the same date, and in two or three other texts of different periods. The goddess _Naprît_, or _Napît_, to whom reference is here made, was his duplicate; her head-dress is a sheaf of corn, as in the illustration. 

 *** This goddess, whose name expresses and whose form personifies the brick or stone couch, the child-bed or -chair, upon which women in labour bowed themselves, is sometimes subdivided into two or four secondary divinities. She is mentioned along with Shaît, _destiny_, and Raninît, _suckling_. Her part of fairy godmother at the cradle of the new-born child is indicated in the passage of the Westcar Papyrus giving a detailed account of the births of three kings of the fifth dynasty. She is represented in human form, and often wears upon her head two long palm-shoots, curling over at their ends. 

Maskhonît appeared by the child's cradle at the very moment of itsbirth;[*] and Raninît presided over the naming and the nurture of thenewly born. [*] Neither Raninît, the fairy godmother, nor Maskhonîtexercised over nature as a whole that sovereign authority which we areaccustomed to consider the primary attribute of deity. Every dayof every year was passed by the one in easing the pangs of women intravail; by the other, in choosing for each baby a name of an auspicioussound, and one which would afterwards serve to exorcise the influencesof evil fortune. No sooner were their tasks accomplished in one placethan they hastened to another, where approaching birth demanded theirpresence and their care. From child-bed to child-bed they passed, and ifthey fulfilled the single offices in which they were accounted adepts, the pious asked nothing more of them. Bands of mysterious cynocephalihaunting the Eastern and the Western mountains concentrated the wholeof their activity on one passing moment of the day. They danced andchattered in the East for half an hour, to salute the sun at his rising, even as others in the West hailed him on his entrance into night. [**]

 * Raninît presides over the child's suckling, but she also gives him his name, and hence, his fortune. She is on the whole the nursing goddess. Sometimes she is represented as a human-headed woman, or as lioness-headed, most frequently with the head of a serpent; she is also the urseus, clothed, and wearing two long plumes on her head, and a simple urous, as represented in the illustration on p. 169. 

 ** This is the subject of a vignette in the _Book of the Dead_, ch. Xvi. , where the cynocephali are placed in echelon upon the slopes of the hill on the horizon, right and left of the radiant solar disk, to which they offer worship by gesticulations. 

It was the duty of certain genii to open gates in Hades, or to keep thepaths daily traversed by the sun. [*] These genii were always at theirposts, never free to leave them, and possessed no other faculty thanthat of punctually fulfilling their appointed offices. Their existence, generally unperceived, was suddenly revealed at the very moment when thespecific acts of their lives were on the point of accomplishment. Thesebeing completed, the divinities fell back into their state of inertia, and were, so to speak, reabsorbed by their functions until the nextoccasion. [***]

 * Maspero, _Études de Mythologie et d'Archéologie Égyptiennes_, vol. Ii. Pp. 34, 35. 

 *** The Egyptians employed a still more forcible expression than our word "absorption" to express this idea. It was said of objects wherein these genii concealed themselves, and whence they issued in order to re-enter them immediately, that these forms _ate_ them, or that they _ate_ their own forms. 

[Illustration: 110. Jpg SOME FABULOUS BEASTS OF THE EGYPTIAN DESERT. 2]

 2 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin from Champollion's copies, made from the tombs of Beni-Hassan. To the right is the _sha_, one of the animals of Sit, and an exact image of the god with his stiff and arrow-like tail. Next comes the _safir_, the griffin; and, lastly, we have the serpent-headed _saza_. 

Scarcely visible even by glimpses, they were not easily depicted; theirreal forms being often unknown, these were approximately conjecturedfrom their occupations. The character and costume of an archer, or of aspear-man, were ascribed to such as roamed through Hades, to pierce thedead with arrows or with javelins. Those who prowled around souls to cuttheir throats and hack them to pieces were represented as women armedwith knives, carvers--_donît_--or else as lacerators--_nokit_. Someappeared in human form; others as animals--bulls or lions, rams ormonkeys, serpents, fish, ibises, hawks; others dwelt in inanimatethings, such as trees, [*] sistrums, stakes stuck in the ground;[**] andlastly, many betrayed a mixed origin in their combinations of human andanimal forms. These latter would be regarded by us as monsters; to theEgyptians, they were beings, rarer perhaps than the rest, but not theless real, and their like might be encountered in the neighbourhood ofEgypt. [***]

 * Thus, the sycamores planted on the edge of the desert were supposed to be inhabited by Hâthor, Nûît, Selkît, Nît, or some other goddess. In vignettes representing the deceased as stopping before one of these trees and receiving water and loaves of bread, the bust of the goddess generally appears from amid her sheltering foliage. But occasionally, as on the sarcophagus of Petosiris, the transformation is complete, and the trunk from which the branches spread is the actual body of the god or goddess. Finally, the whole body is often hidden, and only the arm of the goddess to be seen emerging from the midst of the tree, with an overflowing libation vase in her hand. 

 ** The trunk of a tree, disbranched, and then set up in the ground, seems to me the origin of the Osirian emblem called _tat_ or _didu_. The symbol was afterwards so conventionalized as to represent four columns seen in perspective, one capital overtopping another; it thus became the image of the four pillars which uphold the world. 

 *** The belief in the real existence of fantastic animals was first noted by Maspero, _Études de Mythologie et d'Archéologie Égyptiennes_, vol. I. Pp. 117, 118, 132, and vol. Ii. P. 213. Until then, scholars only recognized the sphinx, and other Egyptian monsters, as allegorical combinations by which the priesthood claimed to give visible expression in one and the same being to physical or moral qualities belonging to several different beings. The later theory has now been adopted by Wiedemann, and by most contemporary Egyptologists. 

How could men who believed themselves surrounded by sphinxes andgriffins of flesh and blood doubt that there were bull-headed andhawk-headed divinities with human busts? The existence of suchparadoxical creatures was proved by much authentic testimony; morethan one hunter had distinctly seen them as they ran along the furthestplanes of the horizon, beyond the herds of gazelles of which he wasin chase; and shepherds dreaded them for their flocks as truly as theydreaded the lions, or the great felidse of the desert. [*]

 * At Beni-Hassan and in Thebes many of the fantastic animals mentioned in the text, griffins, hierosphinxes, serpent- headed lions, are placed along with animals which might be encountered by local princes hunting in the desert. 

This nation of gods, like nations of men, contained foreign elements, the origin of which was known to the Egyptians themselves. They knewthat Hâthor, the milch cow, had taken up her abode in their land fromvery ancient times, and they called her the Lady of Pûanît, after thename of her native country. Bîsû had followed her in course of time, and claimed his share of honours and worship along with her. He firstappeared as a leopard; then he became a man clothed in a leopard's skin, but of strange countenance and alarming character, a big-headed dwarfwith high cheek-bones, and a wide and open mouth, whence hung anenormous tongue; he was at once jovial and martial, the friend of thedance and of battle. [*]

 * The hawk-headed monster with flower-tipped tail was called the saga. 

In historic times all nations subjugated by the Pharaohs transferredsome of their principal divinities to their conquerors, and the LibyanShehadidi was enthroned in the valley of the Nile, in the same way asthe Semitic Baâlû and his retinue of Astartes, Anitis, Eeshephs, andKadshûs. These divine colonists fared like all foreigners whohave sought to settle on the banks of the Nile: they were promptlyassimilated, wrought, moulded, and made into Egyptian deities scarcelydistinguishable from those of the old race. This mixed pantheon hadits grades of nobles, princes, kings, and each of its members wasrepresentative of one of the elements constituting the world, or of oneof the forces which regulated its government. 

[Illustration: 113. Jpb SOME FABULOUS BEASTS OF THE EGYPTIAN DESERT 1]

 1 Bîsû, pp. 111-184. The tail-piece to the summary of this chapter is a figure of Bîsû, drawn by Faucher-Gudin from an amulet in blue enamelled pottery. 

The sky, the earth, the stars, the sun, the Nile, were so many breathingand thinking beings whose lives were daily manifest in the life of theuniverse. 

They were worshipped from one end of the valley to the other, and thewhole nation agreed in proclaiming their sovereign power. But when thepeople began to name them, to define their powers and attributes, toparticularize their forms, or the relationships that subsisted amongthem, this unanimity was at an end. Each principality, each nome, eachcity, almost every village, conceived and represented them differently. Some said that the sky was the Great Horus, Haroêris, the sparrow-hawkof mottled plumage which hovers in highest air, and whose gaze embracesthe whole field of creation. Owing to a punning assonance between hisname and the word _horû_, which designates the human countenance, thetwo senses were combined, and to the idea of the sparrow-hawk there wasadded that of a divine face, whose two eyes opened in turn, the righteye being the sun, to give light by day, and the left eye the moon, toillumine the night. The face shone also with a light of its own, thezodiacal light, which appeared unexpectedly, morning or evening, alittle before sunrise, and a little after sunset. These luminous beams, radiating from a common centre, hidden in the heights of the firmament, spread into a wide pyramidal sheet of liquid blue, whose base restedupon the earth, but whose apex was slightly inclined towards the zenith. The divine face was symmetrically framed, and attached to earth by fourthick locks of hair; these were the pillars which upbore the firmamentand prevented its falling into ruin. A no less ancient traditiondisregarded as fabulous all tales told of the sparrow-hawk, or of theface, and taught that heaven and earth are wedded gods, Sibû, and Nûît, from whose marriage came forth all that has been, all that is, and allthat shall be. 

[Illustration: 115. Jpg NÛÎT THE STARRY ONE. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a painted coffin of the XXIth dynasty in Leyden. 

Most people invested them with human form, and represented the earth-godSibû as extended beneath Nûît the Starry One; the goddess stretched outher arms, stretched out her slender legs, stretched out her body abovethe clouds, and her dishevelled head drooped westward. But there werealso many who believed that Sibû was concealed under the form of acolossal gander, whose mate once laid the Sun Egg, and perhaps stilllaid it daily. From the piercing cries wherewith he congratulated her, and announced the good news to all who cared to hear it--after themanner of his kind--he had received the flattering epithet of _Ngaguoîrû_, the Great Cack-ler. Other versions repudiated the goose in favourof a vigorous bull, the father of gods and men, whose companion was acow, a large-eyed Hâthor, of beautiful countenance. The head of thegood beast rises into the heavens, the mysterious waters which coverthe world flow along her spine; the star-covered underside of her body, which we call the firmament, is visible to the inhabitants of earth, andher four legs are the four pillars standing at the four cardinal pointsof the world. 

[Illustration: 116. Jpg THE GOOSE-GOD FACING THE CAT-GODDESS, THE LADY OFHEAVEN. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a stella in the museum of Gîzeh. This is not the goose of Sibû, but the goose of Amon, which was nurtured in the temple of Karnak, and was called Smonû. Pacing it is the cat of Maût, the wife of Amon. Amon, originally an earth-god, was, as we see, confounded with Sibû, and thus naturally appropriated that deity's form of a goose. 

The planets, and especially the sun, varied in form and nature accordingto the prevailing conception of the heavens. The fiery disk _Atonû_, bywhich the sun revealed himself to men, was a living god, called Râ, aswas also the planet itself. [*] Where the sky was regarded as Horus, Râformed the right eye of the divine face: when Horus opened his eyelidsin the morning, he made the dawn and day; when he closed them in theevening, the dusk and night were at hand. 

 * The name of Râ has been variously explained. The commonest etymology is that deriving the name from a verb râ, _to give, to make to be_ a person or a thing, so that Râ would thus be the great organizer, the author of all things. Lauth goes so far as to say that "notwithstanding its brevity, Râ is a composite word (r-a, _maker--to be_)" As a matter of fact, the word is simply the name of the planet applied to the god. It means the _sun_, and nothing more. 

[Illustration: 117. Jpg THE COW HÂTHOR, THE LADY OP HEAVEN. 3]

 3 Drawn by Boudier, from a XXXth dynasty statue of green basalt in the Gîzeh Museum (Maspero, _Guide du Visiteur_, p. 345, No. 5243). The statue was also published by Mariette, _Monuments divers_, pl. 96 A-B, and in the _Album photographique du Musée de Boulaq_, pl. X. 

Where the sky was looked upon as the incarnation of a goddess, Râ wasconsidered as her son, [**] his father being the earth-god, and he wasborn again with every new dawn, wearing a sidelock, and with his fingerto his lips as human children were conventionally represented. 

 ** Several passages from the Pyramid texts prove that the _two eyes_ were very anciently considered as belonging to the face of Nûît, and this conception persisted to the last days of Egyptian paganism. Hence, we must not be surprised if the inscriptions generally represent the god Râ as coming forth from Nûît under the form of a disc, or a scarabaeus, and born of her even as human children are born. 

He was also that luminous egg, laid and hatched in the East by thecelestial goose, from which the sun breaks forth to fill the world withits rays. [**]

 ** These are the very expressions used in the seventeenth chapter of the _Book of the Dead_ (Naville's edition, vol. I. Pl. Xxv. Lines 58-61; Lepsius, _Todtenbuch_, pl. Ix. 11. 50, 51). 

[Illustration: 118. Jpg THE TWELVE STAGES IN THE LIFE OF THE SUN AND ITSTWELVE FORMS THROUGHOUT THE DAY. 1]

 1 The twelve forms of the sun during the twelve hours of the day, from the ceiling of the Hall of the New Year at Edfu. Drawing by Faucher-Gudin. 

Nevertheless, by an anomaly not uncommon in religions, the egg did notalways contain the same kind of bird; a lapwing, or a heron, mightcome out of it, [*] or perhaps, in memory of Horus, one of the beautifulgolden sparrow-hawks of Southern Egypt. A Sun-Hawk, hovering in highheaven on outspread wings, at least presented a bold and poetic image;but what can be said for a Sun-Calf? Yet it is under the innocentaspect of a spotted calf, a "sucking calf of pure mouth, "[**] that theEgyptians were pleased to describe the Sun-God when Sibu, the father, was a bull, and Hâthor a heifer. 

 * The lapwing or the heron, the Egyptian _bonû_, is generally the Osirian bird. The persistence with which it is associated with Heliopolis and the gods of that city shows that in this also we have a secondary form of Râ. 

 ** The calf is represented in ch. Cix. Of the _Book of the Dead_ (Naville's edition, pl. Cxx. ), where the text says (lines 10, 11), "I know that this calf is Harmakhis the Sun, and that it is no other than the Morning Star, daily saluting Râ. " The expression "_sucking calf of pure mouth_" is taken word for word from a formula preserved in the Pyramid texts (Ûnas, 1. 20). 

But the prevalent conception was that in which the life of the sun waslikened to the life of man. The two deities presiding over the Eastreceived the orb upon their hands at its birth, just as midwives receivea new-born child, and cared for it during the first hour of the day andof its life. It soon left them, and proceeded "under the belly of Nûît, "growing and strengthening from minute to minute, until at noon it hadbecome a triumphant hero whose splendour is shed abroad over all. But asnight comes on his strength forsakes him and his glory is obscured; heis bent and broken down, and heavily drags himself along like an oldman leaning upon his stick. At length he passes away beyond the horizon, plunging westward into the mouth of Nûît, and traversing her body bynight to be born anew the next morning, again to follow the paths alongwhich he had travelled on the preceding day. 

A first bark, the _saktit_, awaited him at his birth, and carried himfrom the Eastern to the Southern extremity of the world. _Mâzît_, thesecond bark, received him at noon, and bore him into the land of Manu, which is at the entrance into Hades; other barks, with which we are lessfamiliar, conveyed him by night, from his setting until his rising atmorn. [*] Sometimes he was supposed to enter the barks alone, and thenthey were magic and self-directed, having neither oars, nor sails, norhelm. [**]

 * In the formulæ of the _Book of Knowing that which is in Hades_, the dead sun remains in the bark Saktit during part of the night, and it is only to traverse the fourth and fifth hours that he changes into another. 

 ** Such is the bark of the sun in the other world. Although carrying a complete crew of gods, yet for the most part it progresses at its own will, and without their help. The bark containing the sun alone is represented in many vignettes of the _Book of the Dead_, and at the head of many stelæ. 

Sometimes they were equipped with a full crew, like that of an Egyptianboat--a pilot at the prow to take soundings in the channel and forecastthe wind, a pilot astern to steer, a quartermaster in the midst totransmit the orders of the pilot at the prow to the pilot at the stern, and half a dozen sailors to handle poles or oars. Peacefully the barkglided along the celestial river amid the acclamations of the gods whodwelt upon its shores. But, occasionally, Apôpi, a gigantic serpent, like that which hides within the earthly Nile and devours its banks, came forth from the depth of the waters and arose in the path of thegod. [*] As soon as they caught sight of it in the distance, the crewflew to arms, and entered upon the struggle against him with prayersand spear-thrusts. Men in their cities saw the sun faint and fail, and sought to succour him in his distress; they cried aloud, they werebeside themselves with excitement, beating their breasts, sounding theirinstruments of music, and striking with all their strength upon everymetal vase or utensil in their possession, that their clamour might riseto heaven and terrify the monster. After a time of anguish, Râ emergedfrom the darkness and again went on his way, while Apôpi sank back intothe abyss, [**] paralysed by the magic of the gods, and pierced with manya wound. 

 * In Upper Egypt there is a widespread belief in the existence of a monstrous serpent, who dwells at the bottom of the river, and is the genius of the Nile. It is he who brings about those falls of earth (_batabît_) at the decline of the inundation which often destroy the banks and eat whole fields. At such times, offerings of durrah, fowls, and dates are made to him, that his hunger may be appeased, and it is not only the natives who give themselves up to these superstitious practices. Part of the grounds belonging to the Karnak hotel at Luxor having been carried away during the autumn of 1884, the manager, a Greek, made the customary offerings to the serpent of the Nile. 

 ** The character of Apôpi and of his struggle with the sun was, from the first, excellently defined by Champollion as representing the conflict of darkness with light. Occasionally, but very rarely, Apôpi seems to win, and his triumph over Râ furnishes one explanation of a solar eclipse. A similar explanation is common to many races. In one very ancient form of the Egyptian legend, the sun is represented by a wild ass running round the world along the sides of the mountains that uphold the sky, and the serpent which attacks it is called _Haiû_. 

Apart from these temporary eclipses, which no one could foretell, theSun-King steadily followed his course round the world, according to lawswhich even his will could not change. Day after day he made his obliqueascent from east to south, thence to descend obliquely towards the west. During the summer months the obliquity of his course diminished, andhe came closer to Egypt; during the winter it increased, and he wentfarther away. This double movement recurred with such regularity fromequinox to solstice, and from solstice to equinox, that the day ofthe god's departure and the day of his return could be confidentlypredicted. The Egyptians explained this phenomenon according to theirconceptions of the nature of the world. The solar bark always kept closeto that bank of the celestial river which was nearest to men; and whenthe river overflowed at the annual inundation, the sun was carried alongwith it outside the regular bed of the stream, and brought yet closerto Egypt. As the inundation abated, the bark descended and receded, itsgreatest distance from earth corresponding with the lowest level of thewaters. It was again brought back to us by the rising strength of thenext flood; and, as this phenomenon was yearly repeated, the periodicityof the sun's oblique movements was regarded as the necessary consequenceof the periodic movements of the celestial Nile. 

The same stream also carried a whole crowd of gods, whose existence wasrevealed at night only to the inhabitants of earth. At an interval oftwelve hours, and in its own bark, the pale disk of the moon--_YâûhûAûhû_--followed the disk of the sun along the ramparts of the world. The moon, also, appeared in many various forms--here, as a man born ofNûît;[*] there, as a cynocephalus or an ibis;[**] elsewhere, it was theleft eye of Horus, [***] guarded by the ibis or cynocephalus. Like Râ, it had its enemies incessantly upon the watch for it: the crocodile, thehippopotamus, and the sow. But it was when at the full, about the 15thof each month, that the lunar eye was in greatest peril. 

 * He may be seen as a child, or man, bearing the lunar disk upon his head, and pressing the lunar eye to his breast. Passages from the Pyramid text of Unas indicate the relationship subsisting between Thot, Sibû, and Nûît, making Thot the brother of Isis, Sit, and Nephthys. In later times he was considered a son of Râ. 

 ** Even as late as the Græco-Roman period, the temple of Thot at Khmûnû contained a sacred ibis, which was the incarnation of the god, and said to be immortal by the local priesthood. The temple sacristans showed it to Apion the grammarian, who reports the fact, but is very sceptical in the matter. 

 *** The texts quoted by Chabas and Lepsius to show that the sun is the right eye of Horus also prove that his left eye is the moon. 

[Illustration: 123. Jpg EGYPTIAN CONCEPTION OF THE PRINCIPALCONSTELLATIONS OF THE NORTHERN SKY. 4]

 4 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the ceiling of the Ramesseum. On the right, the _female hippopotamus_ bearing the _crocodile_, and leaning on the _Monâît_; in the middle, the _Haunch_, here represented by the whole bull; to the left, _Selkit_ and the _Sparrow-hawk_, with the _Lion_, and the _Giant fighting the Crocodile_. 

The sow fell upon it, tore it out of the face of heaven, and cast it, streaming with blood and tears, into the celestial Nile, where it wasgradually extinguished, and lost for days; but its twin, the sun, orits guardian, the cyno-cephalus, immediately set forth to find it andto restore it to Horus. No sooner was it replaced, than it slowlyrecovered, and renewed its radiance; when it was well--_ûzaît_--the sowagain attacked and mutilated it, and the gods rescued and again revivedit. 

[Illustration: 124. Jpg THE LUNAR BARK, SELF-PROPELLED, UNDER THEPROTECTION OF THE TWO EYES. ]

Each month there was a fortnight of youth and of growing splendour, followed by a fortnight's agony and ever-increasing pallor. It was bornto die, and died to be born again twelve times in the year, and eachof these cycles measured a month for the inhabitants of the world. One invariable accident from time to time disturbed the routine ofits existence. Profiting by some distraction of the guardians, the sowgreedily swallowed it, and then its light went out suddenly, instead offading gradually. These eclipses, which alarmed mankind at least as muchas did those of the sun, were scarcely more than momentary, the godscompelling the monster to cast up the eye before it had been destroyed. 

[Illustration: 125. Jpg THE HAUNCH, AND THE FEMALE HIPPOPOTAMUS. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the rectangular zodiac carved upon the ceiling of the great temple of Denderah (Dùmichen, _Resultate_, vol. Ii. Pl. Xxxix. ). 

Every evening the lunar bark issued out of Hades by the door which Râhad passed through in the morning, and as it rose on the horizon, thestar-lamps scattered over the firmament appeared one by one, givinglight here and there like the camp-fires of a distant army. Howevermany of them there might be, there were as many Indestructibles--_AkhîmûSokû_--or Unchanging Ones--_Akhîmû Ûrdû_--whose charge it was to attendupon them and watch over their maintenance. [**]

 ** The _Akhîmû Sokû_ and the _Akhîmû Ûrdû_ have been very variously defined by different Egyptologists who have studied them. Chabas considered them to be gods or genii of the constellations of the ecliptic, which mark the apparent course of the sun through the sky. Following the indications given by Dévéria, he also thought them to be the sailors of the solar bark, and perhaps the gods of the twelve hours, divided into two classes: the _Akhîmû Sokû_ being those who are rowing, and the _Akhîmû Ûrdû_ those who are resting. But texts found and cited by Brugsch show that the _Akhîmû Sokû_ are the planets accompanying Râ in the northern sky, while the _Akhîmû Ûrdû_ are his escort in the south. The nomenclature of the stars included in these two classes is furnished by monuments of widely different epochs. The two names should be translated according to the meaning of their component words: _Akhîmû Sokû_, those who know not destruction, the Indestructibles; and _Akhîmû Ûrdû_ ( _Urzii_), those who know not the immobility of death, the _Imperishables_. 

They were not scattered at random by the hand which had suspended them, but their distribution had been ordered in accordance with a certainplan, and they were arranged in fixed groups like so many starrepublics, each being independent of its neighbours. They representedthe outlines of bodies of men and animals dimly traced out uponthe depths of night, but shining with greater brilliancy in certainimportant places. The seven stars which we liken to a chariot (Charles'sWain) suggested to the Egyptians the haunch of an ox placed on thenorthern edge of the horizon. [*]

 * The forms of the constellations, and the number of stars composing them in the astronomy of different periods, are known from the astronomical scenes of tombs and temples. The identity of the _Haunch_ with the _Chariot_, or _Great Bear_ of modern astronomy, was discovered by Lepsius and confirmed by Biot. Mariette pointed out that the Pyramid Arabs applied the name of the _Haunch (er-Rigl)_ to the same group of stars as that thus designated by the ancient Egyptians. Champollion had noted the position of the _Haunch_ in the northern sky, but had not suggested any identification. The _Haunch_ appertained to Sît-Typhon. 

Two lesser stars connected the haunch--_Maskhaît_--withthirteen others, which recalled the silhouette of a femalehippopotamus--_Rirît_--erect upon her hind legs, [*] and jauntilycarrying upon her shoulders a monstrous crocodile whose jaws openedthreateningly above her head. Eighteen luminaries of varying size andsplendour, forming a group hard by the hippopotamus, indicated theoutline of a gigantic lion couchant, with stiffened tail, its headturned to the right, and facing the Haunch. [***]

 * The connection of _Birît_, the female hippopotamus, with the Haunch is made quite clear in scenes from Philae and Edfû, representing Isis holding back Typhon by a chain, that he might do no hurt to Sâhii-Osiris. Jollois and Devilliers thought that the hippopotamus was the _Great Bear_. Biot contested their conclusions, and while holding that the hippopotamus might at least in part present our constellation of the Dragon, thought that it was probably included in the scene only as an ornament, or as an emblem. The present tendency is to identify the hippopotamus with the Dragon and with certain stars not included in the constellations surrounding it. 

 *** The Lion, with its eighteen stars, is represented on the tomb of Seti I. ; on the ceiling of the Ramesseum; and on the sarcophagus of Htari. 

[Illustration: 127. Jpg OKION, SOTHIS, AND TWO HOKUS-PLANETS STANDING INTHEIR BAKKS. 2]

 2 From the astronomic ceiling in the tomb of Seti I. (Lefébure, 4th part, pl. Xxxvi. ). 

The Lion is sometimes shown as having a crocodile's tail. Accordingto Biot the Egyptian Lion has nothing in common with the Greekconstellation of that name, nor yet with our own, but was composed ofsmaller stars, belonging to the Greek constellation of the Cup or tothe continuation of the Hydra, so that its head, its body, and itstail would follow the [ ] of the Hydra, between the [ ] and [ ] of thatconstellation, or the [ ] of the Virgin. 

Most of the constellations never left the sky: night after night theywere to be found almost in the same places, and always shining with thesame even light. 

[Illustration: 128. Jpg SAHU-ORION. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a small bronze in the Gîzeh Museum, published by Mariette, in the _Album photographique du Musée de Boulaq_, pl. 9. The legs are a modern restoration. 

Others borne by a slow movement passed annually beyond the limits ofsight for months at a time. Five at least of our planets were knownfrom all antiquity, and their characteristic colours and appearancescarefully noted. Sometimes each was thought to be a hawk-headed Horus. Ùapshetatûi, our Jupiter, Kahiri-(Saturn), Sobkû-(Mercury), steeredtheir barks straight ahead like Iâûhû and Râ; but Mars-Doshiri, thered, sailed backwards. As a star Bonu, the bird (Yenus) had a dualpersonality; in the evening it was Uati, the lonely star which isthe first to rise, often before nightfall; in the morning it becameTiûnûtiri, the god who hails the sun before his rising and proclaims thedawn of day. 

Sahû and Sopdît, Orion and Sirius, were the rulers of this mysteriousworld. Sahû consisted of fifteen stars, seven large and eight small, so arranged as to represent a runner darting through space, while thefairest of them shone above his head, and marked him out from afar tothe admiration of mortals. 

[Illustration: 129. Jpg ORION AND THE COW SOTHIS SEPARATED BY THESPARROW-HAWK. 1]

 1 Scene from the rectangular zodiac of Denderah, drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph taken with magnesium light by Dûmichen. 

With his right hand he flourished the _crux ansata_, and turning hishead towards Sothis as he beckoned her on with his left, seemed asthough inviting her to follow him. The goddess, standing sceptre inhand, and crowned with a diadem of tall feathers surmounted by her mostradiant star, answered the call of Sahû with a gesture, and quietlyembarked in pursuit as though in no anxiety to overtake him. Sometimesshe is represented as a cow lying down in her bark, with tree starsalong her back, and Sirius flaming from between her horns. [*]

 * The identity of the cow with Sothis was discovered by Jollois and Devilliers. It is under this animal form that Sothis is represented in most of the Græco-Roman temples, at Denderah, Edfû, Esneh, Dêr el-Medîneh. 

Not content to shine by night only, her bluish rays, suddenly dartedforth in full daylight and without any warning, often described upon thesky the mystic lines of the triangle which stood for her name. It wasthen that she produced those curious phenomena of the zodiacal lightwhich other legends attributed to Horus himself. One, and perhapsthe most ancient of the innumerable accounts of this god and goddess, represented Sahû as a wild hunter. A world as vast as ours rested uponthe other side of the iron firmament; like ours, it was distributed intoseas, and continents divided by rivers and canals, but peopled by racesunknown to men. Sahû traversed it during the day, surrounded by geniiwho presided over the lamps forming his constellation. At his appearing"the stars prepared themselves for battle, the heavenly archers rushedforward, the bones of the gods upon the horizon trembled at the sightof him, " for it was no common game that he hunted, but the very godsthemselves. One attendant secured the prey with a lasso, as bulls arecaught in the pastures, while another examined each capture to decide ifit were pure and good for food. This being determined, others bound thedivine victim, cut its throat, disembowelled it, cut up its carcass, cast the joints into a pot, and superintended their cooking. Sahû didnot devour indifferently all that the fortune of the chase might bringhim, but classified his game in accordance with his wants. He ate thegreat gods at his breakfast in the morning, the lesser gods at hisdinner towards noon, and the small ones at his supper; the old wererendered more tender by roasting. 

[Illustration: 131. Jpg AMON-RÂ, AS MÎNÛ OF COPTOS, AND INVESTED WITH HISEMBLEMS. 1]

 1 Scene on the north wall of the Hypostyle Hall at Karnak; drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by Insinger, taken in 1882. The king, Seti I. , is presenting bouquets of leaves to Amon-Mînû. Behind the god stands Isis (of Coptos), sceptre and _crux ansata_ in hand. 

As each god was assimilated by him, its most precious virtues weretransfused into himself; by the wisdom of the old was his wisdomstrengthened, the youth of the young repaired the daily waste of hisown youth, and all their fires, as they penetrated his being, served tomaintain the perpetual splendour of his light. 

The nome gods who presided over the destinies of Egyptian cities, andformed a true feudal system of divinities, belonged to one or other ofthese natural categories. In vain do they present themselves underthe most shifting aspects and the most deceptive attributes; in vaindisguise themselves with the utmost care; a closer examination generallydiscloses the principal features of their original physiognomies. Osirisof the Delta, Khuûmû of the Cataract, Harshâfitû of Heracleopolis, wereeach of them, incarnations of the fertilizing and life-sustaining Nile. Wherever there is some important change in the river, there they aremore especially installed and worshipped: Khnûmû at the place of itsentering into Egypt, and again at the town of Hâûrît, near the pointwhere a great arm branches off from the Eastern stream to flow towardsthe Libyan hills and form the Bahr-Yûsuf: Harshâfitû at the gorges ofthe Fayûm, where the Bahr-Yûsuf leaves the valley; and, finally, Osirisat Mendes and at Busiris, towards the mouth of the middle branch, whichwas held to be the true Nile by the people of the land. Isis of Bûtodenoted the black vegetable mould of the valley, the distinctive soil ofEgypt annually covered and fertilized by the inundation. [*]

 * In the case of Isis, as in that of Osiris, we must mark the original character; and note her characteristics as goddess of the Delta before she had become a multiple and contradictory personality through being confounded with other divinities. 

But the earth in general, as distinguished from the sky--the earth withits continents, its seas, its alternation of barren deserts and fertilelands--was represented as a man: Phtah at Memphis, Amon at Thebes, Mînûat Coptos and at Panopolis. Amon seems rather to have symbolized theproductive soil, while Mînû reigned over the desert. But these were finedistinctions, not invariably insisted upon, and his worshippers ofteninvested Amon with the most significant attributes of Mînû. 

[Illustration: 133. Jpg ANHÛRI. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a bronze of the Saïte period, in my own possession. 

The Sky-gods, like the Earth-gods, were separated into two groups, theone consisting of women: Hâthor of Denderah, or Nît of Sais; the othercomposed of men identical with Horus, or derived from him: Anhûri-Shû ofSebennytos and Thinis; Harmerati, Horus of the two eyes, at Pharbaethos;Har-Sapdi, Horus the source of the zodiacal light, in the Wâdy Tumilât;and finally Harhûdîti at Edfû. Râ, the solar disk, was enthroned atHeliopolis, and sun-gods were numerous among the nome deities, but theywere sun-gods closely connected with gods representing the sky, andresembled Horus quite as much as Râ. Whether under the name of Horusor of Anhûri, the sky was early identified with its most brilliantluminary, its solar eye, and its divinity was as it were fused into thatof the Sun. Horus the Sun, and Râ, the Sun-Cod of Heliopolis, had sopermeated each other that none could say where the one began and theother ended. One by one all the functions of Râ had been usurped byHorus, and all the designations of Horus had been appropriated by Râ. The sun was styled Harmakhûîti, the Horus of the two mountains--that is, the Horus who comes forth from the mountain of the east in the morning, and retires at evening into the mountain of the west;[*] or Hartimâ, Horus the Pikeman, that Horus whose lance spears the hippopotamus or theserpent of the celestial river; or Harnûbi, the Golden Horus, the greatgolden sparrow-hawk with mottled plumage, who puts all other birdsto flight; and these titles were indifferently applied to each of thefeudal gods who represented the sun. 

 * From the time of Champollion, Harmakhûîti has been identified with the Harmachis of the Greeks, the great Sphinx. 

[Illustration: 134. Jpg THE HAWK-HEADED HOKUS. 2]

 2 A bronze of the Saïte period, from the Posno collection, and now in the Louvre; drawn by Faucher-Gudin. The god is represented as upholding a libation vase with both hands, and pouring the life-giving water upon the king, standing, or prostrate, before him. In performing this ceremony, he was always assisted by another god, generally by Sit, sometimes by Thot or Anubis. 

The latter were numerous. Sometimes, as in the case of Harkhobi, Horusof Khobiû, [*] a geographical qualification was appended to the genericterm of Horus, while specific names, almost invariably derived fromthe parts which they were supposed to play, were borne by others. Thesky-god worshipped at Thinis in Upper Egypt, at Zarît and at Sebennytosin Lower Egypt, was called Anhuri. When he assumed the attributes ofRâ, and took upon himself the solar nature, his name was interpreted asdenoting the conqueror of the sky. He was essentially combative. Crownedwith a group of upright plumes, his spear raised and ever ready tostrike the foe, he advanced along the firmament and triumphantlytraversed it day by day. [**] The sun-god who at Medamôfc Taûd and Ermenthad preceded Amon as ruler of the Theban plain, was also a warrior, and his name of Montû had reference to his method of fighting. He wasdepicted as brandishing a curved sword and cutting off the heads of hisadversaries. [***]

 * _Harkhobi, Harâmkhobiû_ is the Horus of the marshes (_khobiû_) of the Delta, the lesser Horus the son of Isis, who was also made into the son of Osiris. 

 ** The right reading of the name was given as far back as Lepsius. The part played by the god, and the nature of the link connecting him with Shû, have been explained by Maspero. The Greeks transcribed his name Onouris, and identified him with Ares. 

 *** Montû preceded Amon as god of the land between Kûs and Gebelên, and he recovered his old position in the Græco- Roman period after the destruction of Thebes. Most Egyptologists, and finally Brugsch, made him into a secondary form of Amon, which is contrary to what we know of the history of the province. Just as Onû of the south (Erment) preceded Thebes as the most important town in that district, so Montû had been its most honoured god. Heer Wiedemann thinks the name related to that of Amon and derived from it, with the addition of the final _tû_. 

Each of the feudal gods naturally cherished pretensions to universaldominion, and proclaimed himself the suzerain, the father of all thegods, as the local prince was the suzerain, the father of all men; butthe effective suzerainty of god or prince really ended where that of hispeers ruling over the adjacent nomes began. 

[Illustration: 136. Jpg THE HOEUS OF HIBONÛ, ON THE BACK OF THE GAZELLE. ]

The goddesses shared in the exercise of supreme power, and had the sameright of inheritance and possession as regards sovereignty that womenhad in human law. [*] Isis was entitled lady and mistress at Bûto, asHâthor was at Denderah, and as Nit at Sais, "the firstborn, when as yetthere had been no birth. " They enjoyed in their cities the same honoursas the male gods in theirs; as the latter were kings, so were theyqueens, and all bowed down before them. The animal gods, whetherentirely in the form of beasts, or having human bodies attached toanimal heads, shared omnipotence with those in human form. Horus ofHibonû swooped down upon the back of a gazelle like a hunting hawk, Hâthor of Denderah was a cow, Bastit of Bubastis was a cat or a tigress, while Nekhabit of El Kab was a great bald-headed vulture. [**] Hermopolisworshipped the ibis and cynocephalus of Thot; Oxyrrhynchus the_mor-myrus_ fish;[***] and Ombos and the Fayûm a crocodile, under thename of Sobkû, [****] sometimes with the epithet of Azaï, the brigand. [v]

 * In attempts at reconstituting Egyptian religions, no adequate weight has hitherto been given to the equality of gods and goddesses, a fact to which attention was first called by Maspeeo (_Études de Mythologie et d'Archéologie Égyptiennes_, vol. Ii. P. 253, et seq. ). 

 ** Nekhabît, the goddess of the south, is the vulture, so often represented in scenes of war or sacrifice, who hovers over the head of the Pharaohs. She is also shown as a vulture-headed woman. 

 *** We have this on the testimony of classic writers, Steabo, book xvii. P. 812, _De Iside et Csiride_, § vii. , 1872, Paethey's edition, pp. 9, 30, 128. ^Elianus, Hist, anim. , book x. § 46. 

 **** Sobhû, Sovkû is the animal's name, and the exact translation of Sovû would be crocodile-god. Its Greek transcription is [ ]. On account of the assonance of the names he was sometimes confounded with _Sivû, Sibû_ by the Egyptians themselves, and thus obtained the titles of that god. This was especially the case at the time when Sit having been proscribed, Sovkû the crocodile, who was connected with Sit, shared his evil reputation, and endeavoured to disguise his name or true character as much as possible. 

 v Azaï is generally considered to be the Osiris of the Fayûm, but he was only transformed into Osiris, and that by the most daring process of assimilation. His full name defines him as _Osiri Azaï hi halt To-sit (Osiris the Brigand, who is in the Fayûm)_, that is to say, as Sovkû identified with Osiris. 

[Illustration: 138. Jpg THE CAT-HEADED BAST. 4]

 4 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a green enamelled figure in my possession (Saïte period). 

We cannot always understand what led the inhabitants of each nome toaffect one animal rather than another. Why, towards Græco-Roman times, should they have worshipped the jackal, or even the dog, at Siût?[**]How came Sit to be incarnate in a fennec, or in an imaginaryquadruped?[***] Occasionally, however, we can follow the train ofthought that determined their choice. 

 ** Uapuaîtû, the _guide of the celestial ways_, who must not be confounded with Anubis of the Cynopolite nome of Upper Egypt, was originally the feudal god of Siût. He guided human souls to the paradise of the Oasis, and the sun upon its southern path by day, and its northern path by night. 

 *** Champollion, Rosellini, Lepsius, have held that the Typhonian animal was a purely imaginary one, and Wilkinson says that the Egyptians themselves admitted its unreality by representing it along with other fantastic beasts. This would rather tend to show that they believed in its actual existence (cf. P. 112 of this History). Plbyte thinks that it may be a degenerated form of the figure of the ass or oryx. 

The habit of certain monkeys in assembling as it were in full court, and chattering noisily a little before sunrise and sunset, would almostjustify the as yet uncivilized Egyptians in entrusting cynocephali withthe charge of hailing the god morning and evening as he appeared in theeast, or passed away in the west. 

[Illustration: 139. Jpg TWO IMAGES]

If Râ was held to be a grasshopper under the Old Empire, it was becausehe flew far up in the sky like the clouds of locusts driven from CentralAfrica which suddenly fall upon the fields and ravage them. Most of theNile-gods, Khnûmû, Osiris, Harshafitû, were incarnate in the form of aram or of a buck. Does not the masculine vigour and procreative rageof these animals naturally point them out as fitting images of thelife-giving Nile and the overflowing of its waters? It is easy tounderstand how the neighbourhood of a marsh or of a rock-encumberedrapid should have suggested the crocodile as supreme deity to theinhabitants of the Fayûm or of Ombos. The crocodiles there multiplied sorapidly as to constitute a serious danger; there they had the mastery, and could be appeased only by means of prayers and sacrifices. When instinctive terror had been superseded by reflection, and someexplanation was offered of the origin of the various cults, the verynature of the animal seemed to justify the veneration with which it wasregarded. The crocodile is amphibious; and Sobkû was supposed to bea crocodile, because before the creation the sovereign god plungedrecklessly into the dark waters and came forth to form the world, as thecrocodile emerges from the river to lay its eggs upon the bank. 

Most of the feudal divinities began their lives in solitary grandeur, apart from, and often hostile to, their neighbours. Families wereassigned to them later. [*]

 * The existence of the Egyptian triads was discovered and defined by Champollion. These triads have long served as the basis upon which modern writers have sought to establish their systems of the Egyptian religion. Brugsch was the first who rightly attempted to replace the triad by the Ennead, in his book Religion und Mythologie der alten Ægypter. The process of forming local triads, as here set forth, was first pointed out by Maspero (_Études de Mythologie et d'Archéologie Égyptiennes_, vol. Ii. P. 269, et seq. ). 

Each appropriated two companions and formed a trinity, or as it isgenerally called, a triad. But there were several kinds of triads. Innomes subject to a god, the local deity was frequently content with onewife and one son; but often he was united to two goddesses, who were atonce his sisters and his wives according to the national custom. 

[Illustration: 141. Jpg NIT OF SAÏS. ]

Thus, Thot of Hermopolis possessed himself of a harem consisting ofSeshaît-Safk-hîtâbûi and Hahmâûît. Tûmû divided the homage of theinhabitants of Helio-polis with Nebthôtpît and with Iûsasît. Khnûmûseduced and married the two fairies of the neighbouring cataract--Anûkîtthe constrainer, who compresses the Nile between its rocks at Philse andat Syene, and Satît the archeress, who shoots forth the current straightand swift as an arrow. [*] Where a goddess reigned over a nome, the triadwas completed by two male deities, a divine consort and a divine son. Nît of Sai's had taken for her husband Osiris of Mendes, and borne him alion's whelp, Ari-hos-nofir. [**]

 * Maspero, _Études de Mythologie et d'Archéologie Égyptiennes_, vol. Ii. P. 273, et seq. 

 ** _Arihosnofir_ means _the lion whose gaze has a beneficent fascination_. He also goes under the name of _Tutu_, which seems as though it should be translated "_the bounding_, "--a mere epithet characterizing one gait of the lion-god's. 

Hâthor of Denderah had completed her household with Haroêris and ayounger Horus, with the epithet of Ahi--he who strikes the sistrum. [*]

 * Brugsch explains the name of Ahi as meaning _he who causes his waters to rise_, and recognizes this personage as being, among other things, a form of the Nile. The interpretation offered by myself is borne out by the many scenes representing the child of Hâthor playing upon the sistrum and the _monâît_. Moreover, _ahi, ahît_ is an invariable title of the priests and priestesses whose office it is, during religious ceremonies, to strike the sistrum, and that other mystic musical instrument, the sounding whip called _monâît_. 

[Illustration: 142. Jpg IMHOTPÛ. 2]

 2 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a bronze statuette encrusted with gold, in the Gîzeh Museum. The seat is alabaster, and of modern manufacture. 

A triad containing two goddesses produced no legitimate offspring, andwas unsatisfactory to a people who regarded the lack of progeny as acurse from heaven; one in which the presence of a son promised toensure the perpetuity of the race was more in keeping with the idea of ablessed and prosperous family, as that of gods should be. Triads ofthe former kind were therefore almost everywhere broken up into two newtriads, each containing a divine father, a divine mother, and a divineson. Two fruitful households arose from the barren union of Thotwith Safkhîtâbûi and Nahmâûît: one composed of Thot, Safkhîtâbûi, andHarnûbi, the golden sparrow-hawk;[***] into the other Nahmâûît and hernursling Nofirhorû entered. 

 *** This somewhat rare triad, noted by Wilkinson, is sculptured on the wall of a chamber in the Tûrah quarries. 

[Illustration: 143. Jpg NOFIRTÛMÛ. 3]

 3 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a bronze statuette incrusted with gold, in the Gîzeh Museum. 

The persons united with the old feudal divinities in order to formtriads were not all of the same class. Goddesses, especially, were madeto order, and might often be described as grammatical, so obvious is thelinguistic device to which they owe their being. From Râ, Amon, Horus, Sobkû, female Ras, Anions, Horuses, and Sobkûs were derived, by theaddition of the regular feminine affix to the primitive masculinenames--Râît, Amonît, Horît, Sobkît. [*] In the same way, detachedcognomens of divine fathers were embodied in divine sons. Imhotpû, "hewho comes in peace, " was merely one of the epithets of Phtah before hebecame incarnate as the third member of the Memphite triad. [**] In othercases, alliances were contracted between divinities of ancient stock, but natives of different nomes, as in the case of Isis of Bûto and theMendesian Osiris; of Haroêris of Edfu and Hâthor of Denderah. 

 * Maspero, _Études de Mythologie et d'Archéologie Égyptiennes_, vol. Ii. Pp. 7, 8, 256. 

 ** Imhotpû, the Imouthes of the Greeks, and by them identified with Æsculapius, was discovered by Salt, and his name was first translated as _he who comes with offering_. The translation, _he who comes in peace_, proposed by E. De Rougé, is now universally adopted. Imhotpû did not take form until the time of the New Empire; his great popularity at Memphis and throughout Egypt dates from the Saïte and Greek periods. 

In the same manner Sokhît of Letopolis and Bastît of Bubastis wereappropriated as wives to Phtah of Memphis, Nofirtûmû being representedas his son by both unions. [*] These improvised connections weregenerally determined by considerations of vicinity; the gods ofconterminous principalities were married as the children of kings of twoadjoining kingdoms are married, to form or to consolidate relations, and to establish bonds of kinship between rival powers whose unremittinghostility would mean the swift ruin of entire peoples. 

The system of triads, begun in primitive times and con-, tinnedunbrokenly up to the last days of Egyptian polytheism, far from in anyway lowering the prestige of the feudal gods, was rather the meansof enhancing it in the eyes of the multitude. Powerful lords as thenew-comers might be at home, it was only in the strength of an auxiliarytitle that they could enter a strange city, and then only on conditionof submitting to its religious law. Hâthor, supreme at Denderah, shrankinto insignificance before Haroêris at Edfû, and there retained only thesomewhat subordinate part of a wife in the house of her husband. [**]

 * Originally, Nofirtûmû appears to have been the son of cat or lioness-headed goddesses, Bastît and Sokhît, and from them he may have inherited the lion's head with which he is often represented. His name shows him to have been in the first place an incarnation of Atûmû, but he was affiliated to the god Phtah of Memphis when that god became the husband of his mothers, and preceded Imhotpû as the third personage in the oldest Memphite triad. 

 ** Each year, and at a certain time, the goddess came in high state to spend a few days in the great temple of Edfû, with her husband Haroêris. 

On the other hand, Haroêris when at Denderah descended from the supremerank, and was nothing more than the almost useless consort of the ladyHâthor. His name came first in invocations of the triad because of hisposition therein as husband and father; but this was simply a concessionto the propriety of etiquette, and even though named in second place, Hâthor was none the less the real chief of Denderah and of its divinefamily. [*] Thus, the principal personage in any triad was always theone who had been patron of the nome previous to the introduction of thetriad: in some places the father-god, and in others the mother-goddess. 

 * The part played by Haroêris at Denderah was so inconsiderable that the triad containing him is not to be found in the temple. "In all our four volumes of plates, the triad is not once represented, and this is the more remarkable since at Thebes, at Memphis, at Philse, at the cataracts, at Elephantine, at Edfû, among all the data which one looks to find in temples, the triad is most readily distinguished by the visitor. But we must not therefore conclude that there was no triad in this case. The triad of Edfû consists of Hor-Hut, Hâthor, and Hor-Sam-ta-ui. The triad of Denderah contains Hâthor, Hor-Hut, and Hor-Sam-ta- ui. The difference is obvious. At Edfû, the male principle, as represented by Hor-Hut, takes the first place, whereas the first person at Denderah is Hâthor, who represents the female principle" (Mariette, _Dendérah_, Texte, pp. 80, 81). 

[Illustration: 145. Jpg HORUS]

 2 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin from a statuette in the Gîzeh Museum (Mariette, _Album du Musée de Boulaq_, pl. 4). 

The son in a divine triad had of himself but limited authority. WhenIsis and Osiris were his parents, he was generally an infant Horus, naked, or simply adorned with necklaces and bracelets; a thick lock ofhair depended from his temple, and his mother squatting on her heels, or else sitting, nursed him upon her knees, offering him her breast. [*]Even in triads where the son was supposed to have attained to man'sestate, he held the lowest place, and there was enjoined upon him thesame respectful attitude towards his parents as is observed by childrenof human race in the presence of theirs. He took the lowest place at allsolemn receptions, spoke only with his parents' permission, acted onlyby their command and as the agent of their will. Occasionally he wasvouchsafed a character of his own, and filled a definite position, as atMemphis, where Imhotpû was the patron of science. [**]

 * For representations of Harpocrates, the child Horus, see Lanzone, _Dizionario di Mitologia Egizia_, pis. Ccxxvii. , ccxxviii. , and particularly pl. Cccx. 2, where there is a scene in which the young god, represented as a sparrow-hawk, is nevertheless sucking the breast of his mother Isis with his beak. 

 ** Hence he is generally represented as seated, or squatting, and attentively reading a papyrus roll, which lies open upon his knees; cf. The illustration on p. 142. 

But, generally, he was not considered as having either office or markedindividuality; his being was but a feeble reflection of his father's, and possessed neither life nor power except as derived from him. Twosuch contiguous personalities must needs have been confused, and, asa matter of fact, were so confused as to become at length nothing morethan two aspects of the same god, who united in his own person degreesof relationship mutually exclusive of each other in a human family. Father, inasmuch as he was the first member of the triad; son, by virtueof being its third member; identical with himself in both capacities, hewas at once his own father, his own son, and the husband of his mother. 

Gods, like men, might be resolved into at least two elements, soul andbody;[*] but in Egypt, the conception of the soul varied in differenttimes and in different schools. It might be an insect--butterfly, bee, or praying mantis;[**] or a bird--the ordinary sparrow-hawk, thehuman-headed sparrow-hawk, a heron or a crane--bi, haï--whosewings enabled it to pass rapidly through space;[***] or the blackshadow--khaîbît--that is attached to every body, but which death setsfree, and which thenceforward leads an independent existence, so that itcan move about at will, and go out into the open sunlight. 

 * In one of the Pyramid texts, Sâhû-Orion, the wild hunter, captures the gods, slaughters and disembowels them, cooks their joints, their haunches, their legs, in his burning cauldrons, and feeds on their souls as well as on their bodies. A god was not limited to a single body and a single soul; we know from several texts that Râ had _seven souls and fourteen doubles_. 

 ** Mr. Lepage-Renouf supposes that the soul may have been considered as being a butterfly at times, as in Greece. M. Lefébure thinks that it must sometimes have been incarnate as a wasp--I should rather say a bee or a praying mantis. 

 *** The simple sparrow-hawk is chiefly used to denote the soul of a god; the human-headed sparrow-hawk, the heron, or the crane is used indifferently for human or divine souls. It is from Horapollo that we learn this symbolic significance of the sparrow-hawk and the pronunciation of the name of the soul as _bai_. 

[Illustration: 147. Jp THE BLACK SHADOW COMING OUT INTO THE SUNLIGHT. 4]

 4 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from Naville's _Das Thebanische Todtenbuch, vol. I. Pl. Civ. _

Finally, it might be a kind of light shadow, like a reflection fromthe surface of calm water, or from a polished mirror, the living andcoloured projection of the human figure, a double--_ka_--reproducing inminutest detail the complete image of the object or the person to whomit belonged. [*]

 * The nature of the double has long been misapprehended by Egyptologists, who had even made its name into a kind of pronominal form. That nature was publicly and almost simultaneously announced in 1878, first by Maspero, and directly afterwards by Lepage-Renouf. 

[Illustration: 148. Jpg THE AUGUST SOULS OF OSIRIS AnD HORUS IN ADORATIONBEFORE THE SOLAR DISK. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Dûmichen, of a scene on the cornice of the front room of Osiris on the terrace of the great temple of Denderah. The soul on the left belongs to Horus, that on the right to Osiris, lord of Amentît. Each bears upon its head the group of tall feathers which is characteristic of figures of Anhûri (cf. P. 103). 

The soul, the shadow, the double of a god, was in no way essentiallydifferent from the soul, shadow, or double of a man; his body, indeed, was moulded out of a more rarefied substance, and generally invisible, but endowed with the same qualities, and subject to the sameimperfections as ours. The gods, therefore, on the whole, were moreethereal, stronger, more powerful, better fitted to command, to enjoy, and to suffer than ordinary men, but they were still men. They hadbones, [**] muscles, flesh, blood; they were hungry and ate, they werethirsty and drank; our passions, griefs, joys, infirmities, were alsotheirs. The _sa_, a mysterious fluid, circulated throughout theirmembers, and carried with it health, vigour, and life. 

 ** For example, the text of the _Destruction of Men_, and other documents, teach us that the flesh of the aged sun had become gold, and his bones silver. The blood of Râ is mentioned in the _Book of the Dead_, as well as the blood of Isis and of other divinities. 

They were not all equally charged with it; some had more, others less, their energy being in proportion to the amount which they contained. Thebetter supplied willingly gave of their superfluity to those who lackedit, and all could readily transmit it to mankind, this transfusion beingeasily accomplished in the temples. The king, or any ordinary man whowished to be thus impregnated, presented himself before the statue ofthe god, and squatted at its feet with his back towards it. The statuethen placed its right hand upon the nape of his neck, and by makingpasses, caused the fluid to flow from it, and to accumulate in him asin a receiver. This rite was of temporary efficacy only, and requiredfrequent renewal in order that its benefit might be maintained. 

[Illustration: 150. Jpg THE KING AFTER HIS CORONATION RECEIVING THEIMPOSITION OF THE SA. 1]

 1 Drawn by Boudier from a photograph by M. Gay et, taken in 1889, of a scene in the hypostyle hall at Lûxor. This illustration shows the relative positions of prince and god. Anion, after having placed the pschent upon the head of the Pharaoh Amenôthes III. , who kneels before him, proceeds to _impose the sa_. 

By using or transmitting it the gods themselves exhausted their _sa_ oflife; and the less vigorous replenished themselves from the stronger, while the latter went to draw fresh fulness from a mysterious pondin the northern sky, called the "pond of the Sa. "[*] Divine bodies, continually recruited by the influx of this magic fluid, preserved theirvigour far beyond the term allotted to the bodies of men and beasts. Age, instead of quickly destroying them, hardened and transformed theminto precious metals. Their bones were changed to silver, their flesh togold; their hair, piled up and painted blue, after the manner of greatchiefs, was turned into lapis-lazuli. [**]

 * It is thus that in the _Tale of the Daughter of the Prince of Bakhtan_ we find that one of the statues of the Theban Konsû supplies itself with _sa_ from another statue representing one of the most powerful forms of the god. The _pond of Sa_, whither the gods go to draw the magic fluid, is mentioned in the Pyramid texts. 

 ** Cf. The text of the _Destruction of Men_ (Il. 1, 2) referred to above, where age produces these transformations in the body of the sun. This changing of the bodies of the gods into gold, silver, and precious stones, explains why the alchemists, who were disciples of the Egyptians, often compared the transmutation of metals to the metamorphosis of a genius or of a divinity: they thought by their art to hasten at will that which was the slow work of nature. 

This transformation of each into an animated statue did not altogetherdo away with the ravages of time. Decrepitude was no less irremediablewith them than with men, although it came to them more slowly; when thesun had grown old "his mouth trembled, his drivelling ran down to earth, his spittle dropped upon the ground. "

None of the feudal gods had escaped this destiny; for them as formankind the day came when they must leave the city and go forth to thetomb. [*]

 * The idea of the inevitable death of the gods is expressed in other places as well as in a passage of the eighth chapter of the Booh of the Dead (Naville's edition), which has not to my knowledge hitherto been noticed: "I am that Osiris in the West, and Osiris knoweth his day in which he shall be no more;" that is to say, the day of his death when he will cease to exist. All the gods, Atûmû, Horus, Râ, Thot, Phtah, Khnûmû, are represented under the forms of mummies, and this implies that they are dead. Moreover, their tombs were pointed out in several places in Egypt. 

The ancients long refused to believe that death was naturaland inevitable. They thought that life, once began, might go onindefinitely: if no accident stopped it short, why should it cease ofitself? And so men did not die in Egypt; they were assassinated. Themurderer often belonged to this world, and was easily recognized asanother man, an animal, some inanimate object such as a stone loosenedfrom the hillside, a tree which fell upon the passer-by and crushed him. But often too the murderer was of the unseen world, and so was hidden, his presence being betrayed in his malignant attacks only. He was a god, an evil spirit, a disembodied soul who slily insinuated itself into theliving man, or fell upon him with irresistible violence--illness being astruggle between the one possessed and the power which possessed him. As soon as the former succumbed he was carried away from his own people, and his place knew him no more. But had all ended for him with themoment in which he had ceased to breathe? As to the body, no one wasignorant of its natural fate. It quickly fell to decay, and a few yearssufficed to reduce it to a skeleton. And as for the skeleton, in thelapse of centuries that too was disintegrated and became a mere train ofdust, to be blown away by the first breath of wind. The soul mighthave a longer career and fuller fortunes, but these were believed tobe dependent upon those of the body, and commensurate with them. Everyadvance made in the process of decomposition robbed the soul of somepart of itself; its consciousness gradually faded until nothing was leftbut a vague and hollow form that vanished altogether when the corpse hadentirely disappeared. Erom an early date the Egyptians had endeavouredto arrest this gradual destruction of the human organism, and theirfirst effort to this end naturally was directed towards the preservationof the body, since without it the existence of the soul could not beensured. It was imperative that during that last sleep, which forthem was fraught with such terrors, the flesh should neither becomedecomposed nor turn to dust, that it should be free from offensive odourand secure from predatory worms. 

They set to work, therefore, to discover how to preserve it. The oldestburials which have as yet been found prove that these early inhabitantswere successful in securing the permanence of the body for a few decadesonly. When one of them died, his son, or his nearest relative, carefullywashed the corpse in water impregnated with an astringent or aromaticsubstance, such as natron or some solution of fragrant gums, and thenfumigated it with burning herbs and perfumes which were destined tooverpower, at least temporarily, the odour of death. [*]

 * This is to be gathered from the various Pyramid texts relating to the purification by water and to fumigation: the pains taken to secure material cleanliness, described in these formulas, were primarily directed towards the preservation of the bodies subjected to these processes, and further to the perfecting of the souls to which these bodies had been united. 

Having taken these precautions, they placed the body in the grave, sometimes entirely naked, sometimes partially covered with its ordinarygarments, or sewn up in a closely fitting gazelle skin. The dead manwas placed on his left side, lying north and south with his face to theeast, in some cases on the bare ground, in others on a mat, a strip ofleather or a fleece, in the position of a child in the foetal state. Theknees were sharply bent at an angle of 45° with the thighs, while thelatter were either at right angles with the body, or drawn up so asalmost to touch the elbows. The hands are sometimes extended in frontof the face, sometimes the arms are folded and the hands joined on thebreast or neck. In some instances the legs are bent upward in such afashion that they almost lie parallel with the trunk. The deceased couldonly be made to assume this position by a violent effort, and inmany cases the tendons and the flesh had to be cut to facilitate theoperation. The dryness of the ground selected for these burial-placesretarded the corruption of the flesh for a long time, it is true, butonly retarded it, and so did not prevent the soul from being finallydestroyed. Seeing decay could not be prevented, it was determinedto accelerate the process, by taking the flesh from the bones beforeinterment. The bodies thus treated are often incomplete; the head ismissing, or is detached from the neck and laid in another part of thepit, or, on the other hand, the body is not there, and the head only isfound in the grave, generally placed apart on a brick, a heap of stones, or a layer of cut flints. The forearms and the hands were subjected tothe same treatment as the head. In many cases no trace of them appears, in others they are deposited by the side of the skull or scatteredabout haphazard. Other mutilations are frequently met with; the ribs aredivided and piled up behind the body, the limbs are disjointed or thebody is entirely dismembered, and the fragments arranged upon the groundor enclosed together in an earthenware chest. 

These precautions were satisfactory in so far as they ensured thebetter preservation of the more solid parts of the human frame, but theEgyptians felt this result was obtained at too great a sacrifice. Thehuman organism thus deprived of all flesh was not only reduced tohalf its bulk, but what remained had neither unity, consistency, norcontinuity. It was not even a perfect skeleton with its constituentparts in their relative places, but a mere mass of bones with noconnecting links. This drawback, it is true, was remedied by theartificial reconstruction in the tomb of the individual thus completelydismembered in the course of the funeral ceremonies. The bones were laidin their natural order; those of the feet at the bottom, then thoseof the leg, trunk, and arms, and finally the skull itself. But thesuperstitious fear inspired by the dead man, particularly of one thusharshly handled, and particularly the apprehension that he might revengehimself on his relatives for the treatment to which they had subjectedhim, often induced them to make this restoration intentionallyincomplete. When they had reconstructed the entire skeleton, theyrefrained from placing the head in position, or else they suppressedone or all of the vertebras of the spine, so that the deceased should beunable to rise and go forth to bite and harass the living. Having takenthis precaution, they nevertheless felt a doubt whether the soul couldreally enjoy life so long as one half only of the body remained, and theother was lost for ever: they therefore sought to discover the meansof preserving the fleshy parts in addition to the bony framework of thebody. It had been observed that when a corpse had been buried in thedesert, its skin, speedily desiccated and hardened, changed into a caseof blackish parchment beneath which the flesh slowly wasted away, [*] andthe whole frame thus remained intact, at least in appearance, while itsintegrity ensured that of the soul. 

 * Such was the appearance of the bodies of Coptic monks of the sixth, eighth, and ninth centuries, which I found in the convent cemeteries of Contra-Syene, Taûd, and Akhmîm, right in the midst of the desert. 

An attempt was made by artificial means to reproduce the conservativeaction of the sand, and, without mutilating the body, to secure at willthat incorruptibility without which the persistence of the soul was buta useless prolongation of the death-agony. It was the god Anubis--thejackal lord of sepulture--who was supposed to have made this discovery. He cleansed the body of the viscera, those parts which most rapidlydecay, saturated it with salts and aromatic substances, protected itfirst of all with the hide of a beast, and over this laid thick layersof linen. The victory the god had thus gained over corruption was, however, far from being a complete one. The bath in which the dead manwas immersed could not entirely preserve the softer parts of the body:the chief portion of them was dissolved, and what remained after theperiod of saturation was so desiccated that its bulk was seriouslydiminished. 

When any human being had been submitted to this process, he emerged fromit a mere skeleton, over which the skin remained tightly drawn: theseshrivelled limbs, sunken chest, grinning features, yellow and blackenedskin spotted by the efflorescence of the embalmer's salts, were notthe man himself, but rather a caricature of what he had been. Asnevertheless he was secure against immediate destruction, the Egyptiansdescribed him as furnished with his shape; henceforth he had been purgedof all that was evil in him, and he could face with tolerable securitywhatever awaited him in the future. The art of Anubis, transmitted tothe embalmers and employed by them from generation to generation, had, by almost eliminating the corruptible part of the body withoutdestroying its outward appearance, arrested decay, if not for ever, at least for an unlimited period of time. If there were hills at hand, thither the mummied dead were still borne, partly from custom, partlybecause the dryness of the air and of the soil offered them a furtherchance of preservation. In districts of the Delta where the hills wereso distant as to make it very costly to reach them, advantage wastaken of the smallest sandy islet rising above the marshes, and therea cemetery was founded. Where this resource failed, the mummy wasfearlessly entrusted to the soil itself, but only after being placedwithin a sarcophagus of hard stone, whose lid and trough, hermeticallyfastened together with cement, prevented the penetration of anymoisture. Reassured on this point, the soul followed the body to thetomb, and there dwelt with it as in its eternal house, upon the confinesof the visible and invisible worlds. 

Here the soul kept the distinctive character and appearance whichpertained to it "upon the earth:" as it had been a "double" beforedeath, so it remained a double after it, able to perform all functionsof animal life after its own fashion. It moved, went, came, spoke, breathed, accepted pious homage, but without pleasure, and as it weremechanically, rather from an instinctive horror of annihilation thanfrom any rational desire for immortality. Unceasing regret for thebright world which it had left disturbed its mournful and inertexistence. "O my brother, withhold not thyself from drinking and fromeating, from drunkenness, from love, from all enjoyment, from followingthy desire by night and by day; put not sorrow within thy heart, forwhat are the years of a man upon earth? The West is a land of sleep andof heavy shadows, a place wherein its inhabitants, when once installed, slumber on in their mummy-forms, never more waking to see theirbrethren; never more to recognize their fathers or their mothers, withhearts forgetful of their wives and children. The living water, whichearth giveth to all who dwell upon it, is for me but stagnant and dead;that water floweth to all who are on earth, while for me it is butliquid putrefaction, this water that is mine. Since I came into thisfunereal valley I know not where nor what I am. Give me to drink ofrunning water!... Let me be placed by the edge of the water with my faceto the North, that the breeze may caress me and my heart be refreshedfrom its sorrow. " By day the double remained concealed within the tomb. If it went forth by night, it was from no capricious or sentimentaldesire to revisit the spots where it had led a happier life. Its organsneeded nourishment as formerly did those of its body, and of itself itpossessed nothing "but hunger for food, thirst for drink. "[*] Want andmisery drove it from its retreat, and flung it back among the living. It prowled like a marauder about fields and villages, picking up andgreedily devouring whatever it might find on the ground--broken meatswhich had been left or forgotten, house and stable refuse--and, should these meagre resources fail, even the most revolting dung andexcrement. [**]

 * _Teti_, 11. 74, 75. "Hateful unto Teti is hunger, and he eateth it not; hateful unto Teti is thirst, nor hath he drunk it. " We see that the Egyptians made hunger and thirst into two substances or beings, to be swallowed as food is swallowed, but whose effects were poisonous unless counteracted by the immediate absorption of more satisfying sustenance. 

 ** King Teti, when distinguishing his fate from that of the common dead, stated that he had abundance of food, and hence was not reduced to so pitiful an extremity. "Abhorrent unto Teti is excrement, Teti rejecteth urine, and Teti abhorreth that which is abominable in him; abhorrent unto him is faecal matter and he eateth it not, hateful unto Teti is liquid filth. " (_Teti_, 11. 68, 69_). The same doctrine is found in several places in the Book of the Dead_. 

This ravenous sceptre had not the dim and misty form, the long shroudof floating draperies of our modern phantoms, but a precise and definiteshape, naked, or clothed in the garments which it had worn while yetupon earth, and emitting a pale light, to which it owed the name ofLuminous--_Khû, Khûû_. [*] The double did not allow its family toforget it, but used all the means at its disposal to remind them ofits existence. It entered their houses and their bodies, terrified themwaking and sleeping by its sudden apparitions, struck them down withdisease or madness, [**] and would even suck their blood like the modernvampire. 

 * The name of luminous was at first so explained as to make the light wherewith souls were clothed, into a portion of the divine light. In my opinion the idea is a less abstract one, and shows that, as among many other nations, so with the Egyptians the soul was supposed to appear as a kind of pale flame, or as emitting a glow analogous to the phosphorescent halo which is seen by night about a piece of rotten wood, or putrefying fish. This primitive conception may have subsequently faded, and _khû the glorious one_, one of the _mânes_, may have become one of those flattering names by which it was thought necessary to propitiate the dead; it then came to have that significance of _resplendent with light_ which is ordinarily attributed to it. 

 ** The incantations of which the Leyden Papyrus published by Pleyte is full are directed against _dead men or dead women_ who entered into one of the living to give him the _migraine_, and violent headaches. Another Leyden Papyrus, briefly analyzed by Ohabas, and translated by Maspero, contains the complaint, or rather the formal act of requisition of a husband whom the _luminous_ of his wife returned to torment in his home, without any just cause for such conduct. 

One effectual means there was, and one only, of escaping or preventingthese visitations, and this lay in taking to the tomb all the variousprovisions of which the double stood in need, and for which it visitedtheir dwellings. Funerary sacrifices and the regular cultus of thedead originated in the need experienced for making provision for thesustenance of the manes after having secured their lasting existence bythe mummification of their bodies. [*]

 * Several chapters of the _Book of the Dead_ consist of directions for giving food to that part of man which survives his death, e. G. Chap, cv. , "_Chapter for providing food for the double_" (Naville's edition, pl. Cxvii. ), and chap, cvi. , "_Chapter for giving daily abundance unto the deceased, in Memphis_" (Naville's edition, pl. Cxviii. ). 

[Illustration: 161. Jpg SACRIFICING TO THE DEAD IN THE TOMB CHAPEL. 2]

 2 Stela of Antûf I. , Prince of Thebes, drawn by Faucher- Gudin from a photograph taken by Emil Brugsch-Bey. Below, servants and relations are bringing the victims and cutting up the ox at the door of the tomb. In the middle is the dead man, seated under his pavilion and receiving the sacrifice: an attendant offers him drink, another brings him the haunch of an ox a third a basket and two jars; provisions fill the whole chamber. Behind Antûf stand two servants, the one fanning his master, and the second offering him his staff and sandals. The position of the door, which is in the lowest row of the scenes, indicates that what is represented above it takes place within the tomb. 

Gazelles and oxen were brought and sacrificed at the door of the tombchapel; the haunches, heart, and breast of each victim being presentedand heaped together upon the ground, that there the dead might find themwhen they began to be hungry. Vessels of beer or wine, great jars offresh water, purified with natron, or perfumed, were brought to themthat they might drink their fill at pleasure, and by such voluntarytribute men bought their good will, as in daily life they bought that ofsome neighbour too powerful to be opposed. 

The gods were spared none of the anguish and none of the perils whichdeath so plentifully bestows upon men. Their bodies suffered change andgradually perished until nothing was left of them. Their souls, like human souls, were only the representatives of their bodies, andgradually became extinct if means of arresting the natural tendency todecay were not found in time. Thus, the same necessity that forced mento seek the kind of sepulture which gave the longest term of existenceto their souls, compelled the gods to the same course. At first, theywere buried in the hills, and one of their oldest titles describes themas those "who are upon the sand, "[*] safe from putrefaction; afterwards, when the art of embalming had been discovered, the gods received thebenefit of the new invention and were mummified. 

 * In the _Book of Knowing that which is in Hades_, for the fourth and fifth hours of the night, we have the description of the sandy realm of Sokaris and of the gods _Hiriû Shâîtû- senû_, who are on their sand. Elsewhere in the same book we have a cynocephalus _upon its sand_, and the gods of the eighth hour are also mysterious gods who are on their sand. Wherever these personages are represented in the vignettes, the Egyptian artist has carefully drawn the ellipse painted in yellow and sprinkled with red, which is the conventional rendering of sand, and sandy districts. 

Each nome possessed the mummy and the tomb of its dead god: at Thinisthere was the mummy and the tomb of Anhuri, the mummy of Osiris atMendes, the mummy of Tûmû at Heliopolis. [*] In some of the nomes thegods did not change their names in altering the mode of their existence:the deceased Osiris remained Osiris; Nit and Hâthor when dead were stillNît and Hâthor, at Saïs and at Denderah. But Phtah of Memphis becameSokaris by dying; Uapûaîtû, the jackal of Siût, was changed intoAnubis;[**] and when his disk had disappeared at evening, Anhûri, thesunlit sky of Thinis, was Khontamentît, Lord of the West, until thefollowing day. 

 * The sepulchres of Tûmû, Khopri, Râ, Osiris, and in each of them the heap of sand hiding the body, are represented in the tomb of Seti I. , as also the four rams in which the souls of the god are incarnate. The tombs of the gods were known even in Roman times. 

 ** To my mind, at least, this is an obvious conclusion from the monuments of Siût, in which the jackal god is called Uapûaîtû, as the living god, lord of the city, and Anûpû, master of embalming or of the Oasis, lord of Ra-qrirît, inasmuch as he is god of the dead. Ra-qrirît, _the door of the stone_, was the name which the people of Siût gave to their necropolis and to the infernal domain of their god. 

That bliss which we dream of enjoying in the world to come was notgranted to the gods any more than to men. Their bodies were nothingbut inert larvae, "with unmoving heart, "[*] weak and shrivelled limbs, unable to stand upright were it not that the bandages in which they wereswathed stiffened them into one rigid block. Their hands and heads alonewere free, and were of the green or black shades of putrid flesh. 

 * This is the characteristic epithet for the dead Osiris, Urdu Mt, he whose heart is unmoving, he whose heart no longer beats, and who has therefore ceased to live. 

[Illustration: 164. Jpg PHTAH AS A MUMMY. 2]

 2 Drawing by Faucher-Gudin of a bronze statuette of the Saïte period, found in the department of Hérault, at the end of a gallery in an ancient mine. 

Their doubles, like those of men, both dreaded and regretted the light. All sentiment was extinguished by the hunger from which they suffered, and gods who were noted for their compassionate kindness when alive, became pitiless and ferocious tyrants in the tomb. When once men werebidden to the presence of Sokaris, Khontamentîfc, or even of Osiris, "mortals come terrifying their hearts with fear of the god, and nonedareth to look him in the face either among gods or men; for him thegreat are as the small. He spareth not those who love him; he bearethaway the child from its mother, and the old man who walketh on his way;full of fear, all creatures make supplication before him, but he turnethnot his face towards them. " Only by the unfailing payment of tribute, and by feeding him as though he were a simple human double, could livingor dead escape the consequences of his furious temper. The living paidhim his dues in pomps and solemn sacrifices, repeated from year to yearat regular intervals; but the dead bought more dearly the protectionwhich he deigned to extend to them. He did not allow them to receivedirectly the prayers, sepulchral meals, or offerings of kindred onfeast-days; all that was addressed to them must first pass through hishands. When their friends wished to send them wine, water, bread, meat, vegetables, and fruits, he insisted that these should first be offeredand formally presented to himself; then he was humbly prayed to transmitthem to such or such a double, whose name and parentage were pointed outto him. He took possession of them, kept part for his own use, and ofhis bounty gave the remainder to its destined recipient. Thus deathmade no change in the relative positions of the feudal god and hisworshippers. The worshipper who called himself the _amakhû_ of the godduring life was the subject and vassal of his mummied god even in thetomb;[*] and the god who, while living, reigned over the living, afterhis death continued to reign over the dead. 

 * The word _amakhû_ is applied to an individual who has freely entered the service of king or baron, and taken him for his lord: _amakhû khir nibuf_ means _vassal of his lord_. In the same way, each chose for himself a god who became his patron, and to whom he owed _fealty_, i. E. To whom he was _amakhû_--vassal. To the god he owed the service of a good vassal--tribute, sacrifices, offerings; and to his vassal the god owed in return the service of a suzerain-- protection, food, reception into his dominions and access to his person. A man might be absolutely _nib amahkît_, master of fealty, or, relatively to a god, _amakhû khir Osiri_, the vassal of Osiris, _amakhû khir Phtah-Sokari_, the vassal of Phtah-Sokaris. 

He dwelt in the city near the prince and in the midst of his subjects:Râ living in Heliopolis along with the prince of Heliopolis; Haroêrisin Edfû together with the prince of Edfû; Nît in Saïs with the prince ofSais. Although none of the primitive temples have come down to us, the name given to them in the language of the time, shows whatthey originally were. A temple was considered as the feudalmansion--hâît, --the house--_pirû, pi_, --of the god, better cared for, and more respected than the houses of men, but not otherwise differingfrom them. It was built on a site slightly raised above the level ofthe plain, so as to be safe from the inundation, and where there was nonatural mound, the want was supplied by raising a rectangular platformof earth. A layer of sand spread uniformly on the sub-soil providedagainst settlements or infiltration, and formed a bed for thefoundations of the building. [*]

 * This custom lasted into Græco-Roman times, and was part of the ritual for laying the foundations of a temple. After the king had dug out the soil on the ground where the temple was to stand, he spread over the spot sand mixed with pebbles and precious stones, and upon this he laid the first course of stone. 

This was first of all a single room, circumscribed, gloomy, covered inby a slightly vaulted roof, and having no opening but the doorway, whichwas framed by two tall masts, whence floated streamers to attract fromafar the notice of worshippers; in front of its façade [*] was a court, fenced in with palisading. 

 * No Egyptian temples of the first period have come down to our time, but Herr Erman has very justly remarked that we have pictures of them in several of the signs denoting the word _temple_ in texts of the Memphite period. 

[Illustration: 167. Jpg THE SACRED BULL. 2]

 2 A sculptor's model from Tanis, now in the Gîzeh Museum, drawn by Faucher-Gudin from a photograph by Emil Brugsch- Bey. The sacred marks, as given in the illustration, are copied from those of similar figures on stelæ of the Serapeum. 

Within the temple were pieces of matting, low tables of stone, wood, or metal, a few utensils for cooking the offerings, a few vessels forcontaining the blood, oil, wine, and water with which the god wasevery day regaled. As provisions for sacrifice increased, the number ofchambers increased with them, and rooms for flowers, perfumes, stuffs, precious vessels, and food were grouped around the primitive abode;until that which had once constituted the whole temple became no morethan its sanctuary. There the god dwelt, not only in spirit but inbody, [*] and the fact that it was incumbent upon him to live in severalcities did not prevent his being present in all of them at once. Hecould divide his double, imparting it to as many separate bodies as hepleased, and these bodies might be human or animal, natural objectsor things manufactured--such as statues of stone, metal, or wood. [**]Several of the gods were incarnate in rams: Osiris at Mendes, Harshafitûat Heracleopolis, Khnûmû at Elephantine. Living rams were kept in theirtemples, and allowed to gratify any fancy that came into theiranimal brains. Other gods entered into bulls: Râ at Heliopolis, and, subsequently, Phtah at Memphis, Minû at Thebes, and Montû at Hermonthis. They indicated beforehand by certain marks such beasts as they intendedto animate by. Their doubles, and he who had learnt to recognize thesesigns was at no loss to find a living god when the time came forseeking one and presenting it to the adoration of worshippers in thetemple. [***]

 * Thus at Denderah, it is said that the soul of Hâthor likes to leave heaven "in the form of a human-headed sparrow-hawk of lapis-lazuli, accompanied by her divine cycle, to come and unite herself to the statue. " "Other instances, " adds Mariette, "would seem to justify us in thinking that the Egyptians accorded a certain kind of life to the statues and images which they made, and believed (especially in connection with tombs) that the spirit haunted images of itself. "

 ** Maspero, _Études de Mythologie et l'Archéologie Égyptiennes_, vol. I. P. 77, et seq. ; _Archéologie Égyptienne_, pp. 106, 107; English edition, pp. 105, 106. This notion of actuated statues seemed so strange and so unworthy of the wisdom of the Egyptians that Egyptologists of the rank of M. De Rougé have taken in an abstract and metaphorical sense expressions referring to the automatic movements of divine images. 

 *** The bulls of Râ and of Phtah, the Mnevis and the Hapis, are known to us from classic writers. The bull of Minû at Thebes may be seen in the procession of the god as represented on monuments of Ramses II. And Ramses III. Bâkhû (called Bakis by the Greeks), the bull of Hermonthis, is somewhat rare, and mainly represented upon a few later stelæ in the Gîzeh Museum; it is chiefly known from the texts. The particular signs distinguishing each of these sacred animals have been determined both on the authority of ancient writers, and from examination of the figured monuments; the arrangement and outlines of some of the black markings of the Hapis are clearly shown in the illustration on p. 167. 

And if the statues had not the same outward appearance of actual life asthe animals, they none the less concealed beneath their rigid exteriorsan intense energy of life which betrayed itself on occasion by gesturesor by words. They thus indicated, in language which their servants couldunderstand, the will of the gods, or their opinion on the events of theday; they answered questions put to them in accordance with prescribedforms, and sometimes they even foretold the future. 

[Illustration: 169. Jpg OPEN-AIR OFFERINGS TO THE SERPENT. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph taken in the tomb of Khopirkerîsonbû. The inscription behind the urseus states that it represents _Banûît the August, lady of the double granary_. 

Each temple held a fairly large number of statues representing so manyembodiments of the local divinity and of the members of his triad. Theselatter shared, albeit in a lesser degree, all the honours and all theprerogatives of the master; they accepted sacrifices, answered prayers, and, if needful, they prophesied. They occupied either the sanctuaryitself, or one of the halls built about the principal sanctuary, orone of the isolated chapels which belonged to them, subject to thesuzerainty of the feudal god. The god has his divine court to help himin the administration of his dominions, just as a prince is aided by hisministers in the government of his realm. 

This State religion, so complex both in principle and in its outwardmanifestations, was nevertheless inadequate to express the exuberantpiety of the populace. There were casual divinities in every nomewhom the people did not love any the less because of their inofficialcharacter; such as an exceptionally high palm tree in the midst of thedesert, a rock of curious outline, a spring trickling drop by drop fromthe mountain to which hunters came to slake their thirst in the hottesthours of the day, or a great serpent believed to be immortal, whichhaunted a field, a grove of trees, a grotto, or a mountain ravine. [*]

 * It was a serpent of this kind which gave its name to the hill of Shêikh Harîdî, and the adjacent nome of the Serpent Mountain; and though the serpent has now turned Mussulman, he still haunts the mountain and preserves his faculty of coming to life again every time that he is killed. 

The peasants of the district brought it bread, cakes, fruits, andthought that they could call down the blessing of heaven upon theirfields by gorging the snake with offerings. Everywhere on the confinesof cultivated ground, and even at some distance from the valley, arefine single sycamores, flourishing as though by miracle amid the sand. 

[Illustration: 171. Jpg THE PEASANT'S OFFERING TO THE SYCAMORE. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin from a scene in the tomb of Khopirkerîsonbû. The sacred sycamore here stands at the end of a field of corn, and would seem to extend its protection to the harvest. 

Their fresh greenness is in sharp contrast with the surroundingfawn-coloured landscape, and their thick foliage defies the midday suneven in summer. But, on examining the ground in which they grow, we soonfind that they drink from water which has infiltrated from the Nile, andwhose existence is in nowise betrayed upon the surface of the soil. Theystand as it were with their feet in the river, though no one about themsuspects it. Egyptians of all ranks counted them divine and habituallyworshipped them, [**] making them offerings of figs, grapes, cucumbers, vegetables, and water in porous jars daily replenished by good andcharitable people. 

 ** Maspero, _Études de Mythologie et d'Archéologie Égyptiennes_, vol. Ii. Pp. 224--227. They were represented as animated by spirits concealed within them, but which could manifest themselves on occasion. At such times the head or whole body of the spirit of a tree would emerge from its trunk, and when it returned to its hiding-place the trunk reabsorbed it, or _ate_ it again, according to the Egyptian expression, which I have already had occasion to quote above; see p. 110, note 3. 

Passers-by drank of the water, and requited the unexpected benefit witha short prayer. There were several such trees in the Memphite nome, andin the Letopolite nome from Dashûr to Gîzeh, inhabited, as every oneknew, by detached doubles of Nûît and Hâthor. These combined districtswere known as the "Land of the Sycamore, " a name afterwards extendedto the city of Memphis; and their sacred trees are worshipped at thepresent day both by Mussulman and Christian fellahîn. [*]

 * The tree at Matarîeh, commonly called the _Tree of the Virgin_, seems to me to be the successor of a sacred tree of Heliopolis in which a goddess, perhaps Hâthor, was worshipped. 

The most famous among them all, the Sycamore of the South--_nûhîtrîsit_--was regarded as the living body of Hâthor on earth. Side by sidewith its human gods and prophetic statues, each nome proudly advancedone or more sacred animals, one or more magic trees. Each family, andalmost every individual, also possessed gods and fetishes, which hadbeen pointed out for their worship by some fortuitous meeting with ananimal or an object; by a dream, or by sudden intuition. They had aplace in some corner of the house, or a niche in its walls; lamps werecontinually kept burning before them, and small daily offeringswere made to them, over and above what fell to their share on solemnfeast-days. In return, they became the protectors of the household, itsguardians and its counsellors. Appeal was made to them in every exigencyof daily life, and their decisions were no less scrupulously carried outby their little circle of worshippers, than was the will of the feudalgod by the inhabitants of his principality. 

[Illustration: 173. Jpg THE SACRIFICE OF THE BULL. --THE OFFICIATINGPRIEST LASSOING THE VICTIM. 1]

 1 Bas-relief from the temple of Seti I. At Abydos; drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by M. Daniel Héron. Seti I. , second king of the XIXth dynasty, is throwing the lasso; his son, Ramses II. , who is still the crown prince, holds the bull by the tail to prevent its escaping from the slipknot. 

The prince was the great high priest. The whole religion of the nomerested upon him, and originally he himself performed its ceremonies. Ofthese, the chief was sacrifice, --that is to say, a banquet which it washis duty to prepare and lay before the god with his own hands. He wentout into the fields to lasso the half-wild bull; bound it, cut itsthroat, skinned it, burnt part of the carcase in front of his idoland distributed the rest among his assistants, together with plenty ofcakes, fruits, vegetables, and wine. [*] On the occasion, the god waspresent both in body and double, suffering himself to be clothed andperfumed, eating and drinking of the best that was set on the tablebefore him, and putting aside some of the provisions for future use. This was the time to prefer requests to him, while he was gladdened anddisposed to benevolence by good cheer. He was not without suspicion asto the reason why he was so feasted, but he had laid down his conditionsbeforehand, and if they were faithfully observed he willingly yieldedto the means of seduction brought to bear upon him. Moreover, he himselfhad arranged the ceremonial in a kind of contract formerly made with hisworshippers and gradually perfected from age to age by the piety of newgenerations. [**] Above all things, he insisted on physical cleanliness. The officiating priest must carefully wash--_ûâbû_--his face, mouth, hands, and body; and so necessary was this preliminary purificationconsidered, that from it the professional priest derived his name of_ûîbû_, the washed, the clean. [***]

 * This appears from the sacrificial ritual employed in the temples up to the last days of Egyptian paganism; cf. , for instance, the illustration on p. 173, where the king is represented as lassoing the bull. That which in historic times was but an image, had originally been a reality. 

 ** The most striking example of the divine institution of religious services is furnished by the inscription relating the history of the destruction of men in the reign of Râ, where the god, as he is about to make his final ascension into heaven, substitutes animal for human sacrifices. 

 *** The idea of physical cleanliness comes out in such variants as _ûîbû totûi_, "clean of both hands, " found on stelae instead of the simple title _ûîbû_. We also know, on the evidence of ancient writers, the scrupulous daily care which Egyptian priests took of their bodies. It was only as a secondary matter that the idea of moral purity entered into the conception of a priest. 

His costume was the archaic dress, modified according to circumstances. During certain services, or at certain points in the sacrifices, it wasincumbent upon him to wear sandals, the panther-skin over his shoulder, and the thick lock of hair falling over his right ear; at other times hemust gird himself with the loin-cloth having a jackal's tail, and takethe shoes from off his feet before proceeding with his office, or attacha false beard to his chin. The species, hair, and age of the victim, theway in which it was to be brought and bound, the manner and details ofits slaughter, the order to be followed in opening its body and cuttingit up, were all minutely and unchangeably decreed. And these were butthe least of the divine exactions, and those most easily satisfied. Theformulas accompanying each act of the sacrificial priest containeda certain number of words whose due sequence and harmonies might notsuffer the slightest modification whatever, even from the god himself, under penalty of losing their efficacy. [*]

 * The Purification Ritual for officiating priests is contained in a papyrus of the Berlin Museum, whose analysis and table of chapters has been published by Herr Oscar von Lemm, _Das Bitualbuch des Ammonsdienstes_, p. 4, et seq. 

They were always recited with the same rhythm, according to a system ofchaunting in which every tone had its virtue, combined with movementswhich confirmed the sense and worked with irresistible effect: onefalse note, a single discord between the succession of gestures and theutterance of the sacramental words, any hesitation, any awkwardness inthe accomplishment of a rite, and the sacrifice was vain. 

Worship as thus conceived became a legal transaction, in the course ofwhich the god gave up his liberty in exchange for certain compensationswhose kind and value were fixed by law. By a solemn deed of transfer theworshipper handed over to the legal representatives of the contractingdivinity such personal or real property as seemed to him fitting paymentfor the favour which he asked, or suitable atonement for the wrong whichhe had done. If man scrupulously observed the innumerable conditionswith which the transfer was surrounded, the god could not escape theobligation of fulfilling his petition;[*] but should he omit the leastof them, the offering remained with the temple and went to increasethe endowments in mortmain, while the god was pledged to nothing inexchange. 

 * This obligation is evident from texts where, as in the poem of Pentaûirît, a king who is in danger demands from his favourite god the equivalent in protection of the sacrifices which he has offered to that divinity, and the gifts wherewith he has enriched him. "Have I not made unto thee many offerings?" says Ramses II. To Amon. "I have filled thy temple with my prisoners, I have built thee a mansion for millions of years.... Ah if evil is the lot of them who insult thee, good are thy purposes towards those who honour thee, O Amon!"

Hence the officiating priest assumed a formidable responsibilityas regarded his fellows: a slip of memory, the slightest accidentalimpurity, made him a bad priest, injurious to himself and harmful tothose worshippers who had entrusted him with their interests before thegods. Since it was vain to expect ritualistic perfections from a princeconstantly troubled with affairs of state, the custom was establishedof associating professional priests with him, personages who devoted alltheir lives to the study and practice of the thousand formalities whosesum constituted the local religion. Each temple had its service ofpriests, independent of those belonging to neighbouring temples, whosemembers, bound to keep their hands always clean and their voices true, were ranked according to the degrees of a learned hierarchy. At theirhead was a sovereign pontiff to direct them in the exercise of theirfunctions. In some places he was called the first prophet, or rather thefirst servant of the god--_hon-nûtir topi_; at Thebes he was the firstprophet of Amon, at Thinis he was the first prophet of Anhûri. [*]

 * This title of _first prophet_ belongs to priests of the less important towns, and to secondary divinities. If we find it employed in connection with the Theban worship, it is because Amon was originally a provincial god, and only rose into the first rank with the rise of Thebes and the great conquests of the XVIIIth and XIXth dynasties. 

But generally he bore a title appropriate to the nature of the god whoseservant he was. The chief priest of Râ at Heliopolis, and in all thecities which adopted the Heliopolitan form of worship, was called _Oîrûmaû_, the master of visions, and he alone besides the sovereign ofthe nome, or of Egypt, enjoyed the privilege of penetrating into thesanctuary, of "entering into heaven and there beholding the god" faceto face. In the same way, the high priest of Anhûri at Sebennytos wasentitled the wise and pure warrior--_ahûîti saû uîbu_--because his godwent armed with a pike, and a soldier god required for his service apontiff who should be a soldier like himself. 

These great personages did not always strictly seclude themselveswithin the limits of the religious domain. The gods accepted, and evensometimes solicited, from their worshippers, houses, fields, vineyards, orchards, slaves, and fishponds, the produce of which assured theirlivelihood and the support of their temples. There was no Egyptian whodid not cherish the ambition of leaving some such legacy to the patrongod of his city, "for a monument to himself, " and as an endowmentfor the priests to institute prayers and perpetual sacrifices on hisbehalf. [*] In course of time these accumulated gifts at length formedreal sacred fiefs--_hotpû-nûtir_--analogous to the _wakfs_ of MussulmanEgypt. [**] They were administered by the high priest, who, if necessary, defended them by force against the greed of princes or kings. Two, three, or even four classes of prophets or _heiroduli_ under his ordersassisted him in performing the offices of worship, in giving religiousinstruction, and in the conduct of affairs. Women did not hold equalrank with men in the temples of male deities; they there formed a kindof harem whence the god took his mystic spouses, his concubines, hismaidservants, the female musicians and dancing women whose duty it wasto divert him and to enliven his feasts. But in temples of goddessesthey held the chief rank, and were called _hierodules_, or priestesses, _hierodules_ of Nit, _hierodules_ of Hâthor, _hierodules_ ofPakhît. [***]

 * As regards the Saïte period, we are beginning to accumulate many stelae recording gifts to a god of land or houses, made either by the king or by private individuals. 

 ** We know from the _Great Harris Papyrus_ to what the fortune of Amon amounted at the end of the reign of Ramses III. ; its details may be found in Brugsch, _Die Ægyptologie_, pp. 271-274. Cf. In Naville, _Bubastis, Eighth Memoir of the Egyptian Exploration Fund_, p. 61, a calculation as to the quantities of precious metals belonging to one of the least of the temples of Bubastis; its gold and silver were counted by thousands of pounds. 

 *** Mariette remarks that priests play but a subordinate part in the temple of Hâthor. This fact, which surprised him, is adequately explained by remembering that Hâthor being a goddess, women take precedence over men in a temple dedicated to her. At Sais, the chief priest was a man, the Tcharp-haîtû; but the persistence with which women of the highest rank, and even queens themselves, took the title of prophetess of Nit from the times of the Ancient Empire shows that in this city the priestess of the goddess was of equal, if not superior, rank to the priest. 

The lower offices in the households of the gods, as in princelyhouseholds, were held by a troop of servants and artisans: butchers tocut the throats of the victims, cooks and pastrycooks, confectioners, weavers, shoemakers, florists, cellarers, water-carriers andmilk-carriers. In fact, it was a state within a state, and the princetook care to keep its government in his own hands, either by investingone of his children with the titles and functions of chief pontiff', or by arrogating them to himself. In that case, he provided againstmistakes which would have annulled the sacrifice by associating withhimself several masters of the ceremonies, who directed him in theorthodox evolutions before the god and about the victim, indicated thedue order of gestures and the necessary changes of costume, and promptedhim with the words of each invocation from a book or tablet which theyheld in their hands. [*]

 * The title of such a personage was _khri-habi_, the man with the roll or tablet, because of the papyrus roll, or wooden tablet containing the ritual, which he held in his hand. 

In addition to its rites and special hierarchy, each of the sacerdotalcolleges thus constituted had a theology in accordance with the natureand attributes of its god. Its fundamental dogma affirmed the unity ofthe nome god, his greatness, his supremacy over all the gods of Egyptand of foreign lands[*]--whose existence was nevertheless admitted, andnone dreamed of denying their reality or contesting their power. 

 * In the inscriptions all local gods bear the titles of _Nûtir ûâ_, only god; Sûton nûtirû, Sûntirû, [ Greek word], king of the gods; of _Nûtir âa nib pit_, the great god, lord of heaven, which show their pretensions to the sovereignty and to the position of creator of the universe. 

The latter also boasted of their unity, their greatness, theirsupremacy; but whatever they were, the god of the nome was master ofthem all--their prince, their ruler, their king. It was he alone whogoverned the world, he alone kept it in good order, he alone had createdit. Not that he had evoked it out of nothing; there was as yet noconcept of nothingness, and even to the most subtle and refined ofprimitive theologians creation was only a bringing of pre-existentelements into play. 

[Illustration: 180. Jpg SHU UPLIFTING THE SKY. 2]

 2 Drawing by Faucher-Gudin of a green enamelled statuette in my possession. It was from Shu that the Greeks derived their representations, and perhaps their myth of Atlas. 

The latent germs of things had always existed, but they had slept forages and ages in the bosom of the Nû, of the dark waters. In fulness oftime the god of each nome drew them forth, classified them, marshalledthem according to the bent of his particular nature, and made hisuniverse out of them by methods peculiarly his own. Nît of Saïs, who wasa weaver, had made the world of warp and woof, as the mother of a familyweaves her children's linen. 

Khnûmû, the Nile-God of the cataracts, had gathered up the mud of hiswaters and therewith moulded his creatures upon a potter's table. In theeastern cities of the Delta these procedures were not so simple. Thereit was admitted that in the beginning earth and sky were two lovers lostin the Nû, fast locked in each other's embrace, the god lying beneaththe goddess. On the day of creation a new god, Shu, came forth from theprimaeval waters, slipped between the two, and seizing Nûît with bothhands, lifted her above his head with outstretched arms. [*]

 * This was what the Egyptians called _the upliftings of Shû_. The event first took place at Hermopolis, and certain legends added that in order to get high enough the god had been obliged to make use of a staircase or mound situate in this city, and which was famous throughout Egypt. 

Though the starry body of the goddess extended in space--her head beingto the west and her loins to the east--her feet and hands hung down tothe earth. These were the four pillars of the firmament under anotherform, and four gods of four adjacent principalities were in charge ofthem. Osiris, or Horus the sparrow-hawk, presided over the southern, andSit over the northern pillar; Thot over that of the west, and Sapdi, theauthor of the zodiacal light, over that of the east. They had dividedthe world among themselves into four regions, or rather into four"houses, " bounded by those mountains which surround it, and by thediameters intersecting between the pillars. Each of these housesbelonged to one, and to one only; none of the other three, nor eventhe sun himself, might enter it, dwell there, or even pass throughit without having obtained its master's permission. Sibu had not beensatisfied to meet the irruption of Shû by mere passive resistance. Hehad tried to struggle, and he is drawn in the posture of a man who hasjust awakened out of sleep, and is half turning on his couch beforegetting up. One of his legs is stretched out, the other is bent andpartly drawn up as in the act of rising. The lower part of the body isstill unmoved, but he is raising himself with difficulty on his leftelbow, while his head droops and his right arm is lifted towards thesky. His effort was suddenly arrested. Rendered powerless by a stroke ofthe creator, Sibû remained as if petrified in this position, the obviousirregularities of the earth's surface being due to the painful attitudein which he was stricken. His sides have since been clothed withverdure, generations of men and animals have succeeded each otherupon his back, but without bringing any relief to his pain; he suffersevermore from the violent separation of which he was the victim whenNûît was torn from him, and his complaint continues to rise to heavennight and day. 

[Illustration: 182. Jpg SHÛ FORCIBLY SEPARATING SIBÛ AND NÛÎT. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a painting on the mummy-case of Bûtehamon in the Turin Museum. "Shû, the great god, lord of heaven, " receives the adoration of two ram-headed souls placed upon his right and left. 

[Illustration: 183. Jpg THE DIDÛ OF OSIRIS. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin from a specimen in blue enamelled pottery, now in my possession. 

[Illustration: 183b. Jpg THE DIDÛ DRESSED. 2]

 2 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin from a figure frequently found in Theban mummy-cases of XXIst and XXIInd dynasties (Wilkinson, _Manners and Customs_. 2nd edit. , vol. Iii. Pl. Xxv. , No 5). 

The aspect of the inundated plains of the Delta, of the river by whichthey are furrowed and fertilized, and of the desert sands by which theyare threatened, had suggested to the theologians of Mendes and Bûto anexplanation of the mystery of creation, in which the feudal divinitiesof these cities and of several others in their neighbourhood, Osiris, Sit, and Isis, played the principal parts. Osiris first represented thewild and fickle Nile of primitive times; afterwards, as those who dweltupon his banks learned to regulate his course, they emphasizedthe kindlier side of his character and soon transformed him intoa benefactor of humanity, the supremely good being, Ûnnofriû, Onnophris. [*] He was lord of the principality of Didû, which lay alongthe Sebennytic branch of the river between the coast marshes and theentrance to the Wâdy Tûmilât, but his domain had been divided; and thetwo nomes thus formed, namely, the ninth and sixteenth nomes of theDelta in the Pharaonic lists, remained faithful to him, and herehe reigned without rival, at Busiris as at Mendes. His most famousidol-form was the Didû, whether naked or clothed, the fetish, formedof four superimposed columns, which had given its name to theprincipality. [**]

 * It has long been a dogma with Egyptologists that Osiris came from Abydos. Maspero has shown that from his very titles he is obviously a native of the Delta, and more especially of Busiris and Mendes. 

 ** The Didû has been very variously interpreted. It has been taken for a kind of nilometer, for a sculptor's or modeller's stand, or a painter's easel for an altar with four superimposed tables, or a sort of pedestal bearing four door-lintels, for a series of four columns placed one behind another, of which the capitals only are visible, one above the other, etc. The explanation given in the text is that of Reuvens, who recognized the Didû as a symbolic representation of the four regions of the world; and of Maspero, _Études de Mythologie et d'Archéologie Égyptiennes_, vol. Ii. P. 359, note 3. According to Egyptian theologians, it represented the spine of Osiris, preserved as a relic in the town bearing the name of _Didû, Bidît_. 

[Illustration: 185. Jpg OSIRIS-ONNOPHRIS, WHIP AND CROOK IN HAND. 1]

 1 Drawn by Boudier from a statue in green basalt found at Sakkarah, and now in the Gîzeh Museum. 

They ascribed life to this Didû, and represented it with a somewhatgrotesque face, big cheeks, thick lips, a necklace round its throat, along flowing dress which hid the base of the columns beneath its folds, and two arms bent across the breast, the hands grasping one a whip andthe other a crook, symbols of sovereign authority. This, perhaps, wasthe most ancient form of Osiris; but they also represented him as aman, and supposed him to assume the shapes of rams and bulls, [*] oreven those of water-birds, such as lapwings, herons, and cranes, whichdisported themselves about the lakes of that district. [**]

 * The ram of Mendes is sometimes Osiris, and sometimes the soul of Osiris. The ancients took it for a he-goat, and to them we are indebted for the record of its exploits. According to Manetho, the worship of the sacred ram is not older than the time of King Kaiekhos of the second dynasty. A Ptolemaic necropolis of sacred rams was discovered by Mariette at Tmai el-Amdid, in the ruins of Thmûis, and some of their sarcophagi are now in the Gîzeh Museum. 

 ** The Bonû, the chief among these birds, is not the phoenix, as has so often been asserted. It is a kind of heron, either the _Ardea cinerea_, which is common in Egypt, or else some similar species. 

The goddess whom we are accustomed to regard as inseparable from him, Isis the cow, or woman with cow's horns, had not always belonged to him. Originally she was an independent deity, dwelling at Bûto in themidst of the ponds of Adhû. She had neither husband nor lover, but hadspontaneously conceived and given birth to a son, whom she suckled amongthe reeds--a lesser Horus who was called Harsiîsît, Horus the son ofIsis, to distinguish him from Haroêris. At an early period she wasmarried to her neighbour Osiris, and no marriage could have been bettersuited to her nature. For she personified the earth--not the earth ingeneral, like Sibu, with its unequal distribution of seas and mountains, deserts and cultivated land; but the black and luxuriant plain of theDelta, where races of men, plants, and animals increase and multiplyin ever-succeeding generations. To whom did she owe this inexhaustibleproductive energy if not to her neighbour Osiris, to the Nile? The Nilerises, overflows, lingers upon the soil; every year it is wedded to theearth, and the earth comes forth green and fruitful from its embraces. 

[Illustration: 187. Jpg ISIS, WEARING THE COW-HORN HEAD-DRESS. 1]

 1 Drawn by Boudier from a green basalt statue in the Gîzeh Museum. Prom a photograph by Émil Brugsch-Bey. 

The marriage of the two elements suggested that of the two divinities;Osiris wedded Isis and adopted the young Horus. But this prolific andgentle pair were not representative of all the phenomena of nature. The eastern part of the Delta borders upon the solitudes of Arabia, andalthough it contains several rich and fertile provinces, yet most ofthese owe their existence to the arduous labour of the inhabitants, their fertility being dependent on the daily care of man, and on hisregular distribution of the water. The moment he suspends the straggleor relaxes his watchfulness, the desert reclaims them and overwhelmsthem with sterility. Sit was the spirit of the mountain, stone and sand, the red and arid ground as distinguished from the moist black soil ofthe valley. On the body of a lion or of a dog he bore a fantastic headwith a slender curved snout, upright and square-cut ears; his cloventail rose stiffly behind him, springing from his loins like a fork. Healso assumed a human form, or retained the animal head only upon a man'sshoulders. He was felt to be cruel and treacherous, always ready toshrivel up the harvest with his burning breath, and to smother Egyptbeneath a shroud of shifting sand. The contrast between this evil beingand the beneficent couple, Osiris and Isis, was striking. Nevertheless, the theologians of the Delta soon assigned a common origin to theserival divinities of Nile and desert, red land and black. Sibû hadbegotten them, Nûît had given birth to them one after another when thedemiurge had separated her from her husband; and the days of their birthwere the days of creation. [*]

 * According to one legend which is comparatively old in origin, the fous* children of Nûît, and Horus her grandson, were born one after another, each on one of the intercalary days of the year. This legend was still current in the Greek period. 

At first each of them had kept to his own half of the world. MoreoverSit, who had begun by living alone, had married, in order that he mightbe inferior to Osiris in nothing. 

[Illustration: 189. Jpg NEPHTHYS, AS A WAILING WOMAN. 1 and THE GOD SÎT, FIGHTING. 2]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin from a painted wooden statuette in my possession, from a funeral couch found at Akhmîm. On her head the goddess bears the hieroglyph for her name; she is kneeling at the foot of the funeral couch of Osiris and weeps for the dead god. 

 2 Bronze statuette of the XXth dynasty, encrusted with gold, from the Hoffmann collection: drawn by Faucher-Gudin from a photograph taken by Legrain in 1891. About the time when the worship of Sît was proscribed, one of the Egyptian owners of this little monument had endeavoured to alter its character, and to transform it into a statuette of the god Khnûmû. He took out the upright ears, replacing them with ram's horns, but made no other change. In the drawing I have had the later addition of the curved horns removed, and restored the upright ears, whose marks may still be seen upon the sides of the head-dress. 

As a matter of fact, his companion, Nephthys, did not manifest any greatactivity, and was scarcely more than an artificial counterpart of thewife of Osiris, a second Isis who bore no children to her husband;[*]for the sterile desert brought barrenness to her as to all that ittouched. 

 * The impersonal character of Nephthys, her artificial origin, and her derivation from Isis, have been pointed out by Maspero (_Études de Mythologie et d'Archéologie Égyptiennes_, vol. Ii. Pp. 362-364). The very name of the goddess, which means _the lady (nibît)_ of the_ mansion (haït)_, confirms this view. 

 [Illustration: 190. Jpg PLAN OF THE RUINS OF HELIOPOLIS. 2]

 2 Drawn by Thuillier, from the _Description de l'Egypte_ (Atlas, Ant. , vol. V. Pl. 26, 1). 

Yet she had lost neither the wish nor the power to bring forth, andsought fertilization from another source. Tradition had it that she hadmade Osiris drunken, drawn him to her arms without his knowledge, andborne him a son; the child of this furtive union was the jackal Anubis. Thus when a higher Nile overflows lands not usually covered by theinundation, and lying unproductive for lack of moisture, the soileagerly absorbs the water, and the germs which lay concealed in theground burst forth into life. The gradual invasion of the domain ofSît by Osiris marks the beginning of the strife. Sit rebels against thewrong of which he is the victim, involuntary though it was; he surprisesand treacherously slays his brother, drives Isis into temporarybanishment among her marshes, and reigns over the kingdom of Osirisas well as over his own. But his triumph is short-lived. Horus, havinggrown up, takes arms against him, defeats him in many encounters, andbanishes him in his turn. The creation of the world had brought thedestroying and the life-sustaining gods face to face: the history of theworld is but the story of their rivalries and warfare. 

None of these conceptions alone sufficed to explain the whole mechanismof creation, nor the part which the various gods took in it. The priestsof Heliopolis appropriated them all, modified some of their detailsand eliminated others, added several new personages, and thus finallyconstructed a complete cosmogony, the elements of which were learnedlycombined so as to correspond severally with the different operations bywhich the world had been evoked out of chaos and gradually brought toits present state. Heliopolis was never directly involved in the greatrevolutions of political history; but no city ever originated so manymystic ideas and consequently exercised so great an influence upon thedevelopment of civilization. [*]

 * By its inhabitants it was accounted older than any other city of Egypt. 

[Illustration: 192. Jpg HORUS, THE AVENGER OF HIS FATHER, AND ANUBISÛAPÔAÎTÛ. 2]

 2 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Béato of a bas-relief in the temple of Seti I. At Abydos. The two gods are conducting King Ramses II. , here identified with Osiris, towards the goddess Hâthor. 

It was a small town built on the plain not far from the Nile at the apexof the Delta, and surrounded by a high wall of mud bricks whose remainscould still be seen at the beginning of the century, but which have nowalmost completely disappeared. 

[Illustration: 191. Jpg THE SUN SPRINGING FROM AN OPENING LOTUS-FLOWER]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin. The open lotus-flower, with a bud on either side, stands upon the usual sign for any water- basin. Here the sign represents the Nû, that dark watery abyss from which the lotus sprang on the morning of creation, and whereon it is still supposed to bloom. 

One obelisk standing in the midst of the open plain, a few waste moundsof débris, scattered blocks, and two or three lengths of crumbling wall, alone mark the place where once the city stood. Ka was worshipped there, and the Greek name of Heliopolis is but the translation of that whichwas given to it by the priests--Pi-ra, City of the Sun. Its principaltemple, the "Mansion of the Prince, " rose from about the middle of theenclosure, and sheltered, together with the god himself, those animalsin which he became incarnate: the bull Mnevis, and sometimes the Phoenix. According to an old legend, this wondrous bird appeared in Egypt onlyonce in five hundred years. It is born and lives in the depths ofArabia, but when its father dies it covers the body with a layer ofmyrrh, and flies at utmost speed to the temple of Helio-polis, there tobury it. [*]

 * The Phoenix is not the _Bonû_ (cf. P. 186, note 2), but a fabulous bird derived from the golden sparrow-hawk, which was primarily a form of Haroêris, and of the sun-gods in second place only. On the authority of his Heliopolitan guides, Herodotus tells us (ii. 83) that in shape and size the phoenix resembled the eagle, and this statement alone should have sufficed to prevent any attempt at identifying it with the Bonû, which is either a heron or a lapwing. 

[Illustration: 194. Jpg THE PLAIN AND MOUNDS OF HELIOPOLIS FIFTY YEARSAGO. 2]

 2 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a water-colour published by Lepsius, _Denkm_. , i. 56. The view is taken from the midst of the ruins at the foot of the obelisk of Usirtasen. A little stream runs in the foreground, and passes through a muddy pool; to right and left are mounds of ruins, which were then considerable, but have since been partially razed. In the distance Cairo rises against the south-west. 

In the beginning, Râ was the sun itself, whose fires appear to belighted every morning in the east and to be extinguished at eveningin the west; and to the people such he always remained. Among thetheologians there was considerable difference of opinion on the point. Some held the disk of the sun to be the body which the god assumes whenpresenting himself for the adoration of his worshippers. Others affirmedthat it rather represented his active and radiant soul. Finally, therewere many who defined it as one of his forms of being--_khopriû_--one ofhis self-manifestations, without presuming to decide whether it was hisbody or his soul which he deigned to reveal to human eyes; but whethersoul or body, all agreed that the sun's disk had existed in the Nûbefore creation. But how could it have lain beneath the primordial oceanwithout either drying up the waters or being extinguished by them? Atthis stage the identification of Râ with Horus and his right eye servedthe purpose of the theologians admirably: the god needed only to haveclosed his eyelid in order to prevent his fires from coming in contactwith the water. [*]

 * This is clearly implied in the expression so often used by the sacred writers of Ancient Egypt in reference to the appearance of the sun and his first act at the time of creation: "_Thou openest the two eyes_, and earth is flooded with rays of light. "

He was also said to have shut up his disk within a lotus-bud, whosefolded petals had safely protected it. The flower had opened on themorning of the first day, and from it the god had sprung suddenly asa child wearing the solar disk upon his head. But all theories led thetheologians to distinguish two periods, and as it were two beings inthe existence of supreme deity: a pre-mundane sun lying inert within thebosom of the dark waters, and our living and life-giving sun. 

[Illustration: 196. Jpg HAKMAKHÛÎTI-HAKMAKHIS, THE GREAT GOD. 1]

 1 Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by Insinger of an outer wall of the Hypostyle Hall at Karnak. Harmakhis grants years and festivals to the Pharaoh Seti I. , who kneels before him, and is presented by the lioness-headed goddess Sokhît, here described as a magician--_Oîrît hilcaû_. 

One division of the Heliopolitan school retained the use of traditionalterms and images in reference to these Sun-gods. To the first it leftthe human form, and the title of Râ, with the abstract sense of creator, deriving the name from the verb _râ_, which means to give. Forthe second it kept the form of the sparrow-hawk and the name ofHarma-khûîti--Horus in the two horizons--which clearly denoted hisfunction;[*] and it summed up the idea of the sun as a whole in thesingle name of Râ-Harmakhûîti, and in a single image in which thehawk-head of Horus was grafted upon the human body of Râ. The otherdivisions of the school invented new names for new conceptions. The sunexisting before the world they called Creator--_Tûmû, Atûmû_ [**]--andour earthly sun they called _Khopri_--He who is. 

 * Harmakhûîti is Horus, the sky of the two horizons; _i. E. _ the sky of the daytime, and the night sky. When the celestial Horus was confounded with Râ, and became the sun (cf. P. 133), he naturally also became the sun of the two horizons, the sun by day, and the sun by night. 

 ** E. De Rouge, _Études sur le Rituel funéraire_, p. 76: "His name may be connected with two radicals. Tem is a negation; it may be taken to mean _the Inapproachable One, the Unknown_ (as in Thebes, where _Aman_ means mystery). Atûm is, in fact, described as 'existing alone in the abyss, ' before the appearance of light. It was in this time of darkness that Atûm performed the first act of creation, and this allows of our also connecting his name with the Coptic tamio, _creare_. Atûm was also the prototype of man (in Coptic tme, _homo_), and becomes a perfect 'tûm' after his resurrection. " Rugsch would rather explain _Tûmû_ as meaning _the Perfect One, the Complete_. E. De Rougé's philological derivations are no longer admissible; but his explanation of the name corresponds so well with the part played by the god that I fail to see how that can be challenged. 

Tûmû was a man crowned and clothed with the insignia of supreme power, atrue king of gods, majestic and impassive as the Pharaohs who succeededeach other upon the throne of Egypt. The conception of Khopri as a diskenclosing a scarabæus, or a man with a scarabous upon his head, or ascarabus-headed mummy, was suggested by the accidental alliteration ofhis name and that of Khopirrû, the scarabæus. The difference betweenthe possible forms of the god was so slight as to be eventuallylost altogether. His names were grouped by twos and threes in everyconceivable way, and the scarabæus of Khopri took its place upon thehead of Râ, while the hawk headpiece was transferred from the shouldersof Harmakhûîti to those of Tûmû. The complex beings resulting from thesecombinations, Râ-Tûmû, Atûmû-Râ, Râ-Tûmû-Khopri, Râ-Harmakhûîti-Tûmû, Tûm-Harmakhûîti-Khopri, never attained to any pronounced individuality. 

[Illustration: 198. Jpg KHOPRI, IN HIS BARK]

They were as a rule simple duplicates of the feudal god, names ratherthan persons, and though hardly taken for one another indiscriminately, the distinctions between them had reference to mere details of theirfunctions and attributes. Hence arose the idea of making these gods intoembodiments of the main phases in the life of the sun during the dayand throughout the year. Râ symbolized the sun of springtime and beforesunrise, Harmakhûîti the summer and the morning sun, Atûmû the sun ofautumn and of afternoon, Khopri that of winter and of night. The peopleof Heliopolis accepted the new names and the new forms presented fortheir worship, but always subordinated them to their beloved Râ. Forthem Râ never ceased to be the god of the nome; while Atûmû remained thegod of the theologians, and was invoked by them, the people preferredRâ. At Thinis and at Sebennytos Anhûri incurred the same fate as befellRâ at Heliopolis. After he had been identified with the sun, the similaridentification of Shû inevitably followed. Of old, Anhûri and Shû weretwin gods, incarnations of sky and earth. They were soon but one god intwo persons--the god Anhûri-Shû, of which the one half under the titleof Auhûri represented, like Atûmû, the primordial being; and Shû, theother half, became, as his name indicates, the creative sun-god whoupholds (_shû_) the sky. 

Tûrnû then, rather than Râ, was placed by the Heliopolitan priests atthe head of their cosmogony as supreme creator and governor. Severalversions were current as to how he had passed from inertia into action, from the personage of Tûmû into that of Râ. According to the versionmost widely received, he had suddenly cried across the waters, "Comeunto me!"[*] and immediately the mysterious lotus had unfolded itspetals, and Râ had appeared at the edge of its open cup as a disk, a newborn child, or a disk-crowned sparrow-hawk; this was probably arefined form of a ruder and earlier tradition, according to which itwas upon Râ himself that the office had devolved of separating Sibû fromNûît, for the purpose of constructing the heavens and the earth. 

 * It was on this account that the Egyptians named the first day of the year the _Day of Come-unto-me!_

But it was doubtless felt that so unseemly an act of intervention wasbeneath the dignity even of an inferior form of the suzerain god; Shûwas therefore borrowed for the purpose from the kindred cult of Anhûri, and at Heliopolis, as at Sebennytos, the office was entrusted to himof seizing the sky-goddess and raising her with outstretched arms. Theviolence suffered by Nûît at the hands of Shû led to a connexion of theOsirian dogma of Mendes with the solar dogma of Sebennytos, and thus thetradition describing the creation of the world was completed by another, explaining its division into deserts and fertile lands. Sîbû, hithertoconcealed beneath the body of his wife, was now exposed to the sun;Osiris and Sit, Isis and Nephthys, were born, and, falling from the sky, their mother, on to the earth, their father, they shared the surface ofthe latter among themselves. Thus the Heliopolitan doctrine recognizedthree principal events in the creation of the universe: the dualizationof the supreme god and the breaking forth of light, the raising of thesky and the laying bare of the earth, the birth of the Nile and theallotment of the soil of Egypt, all expressed as the manifestationsof successive deities. Of these deities, the latter ones alreadyconstituted a family of father, mother, and children, like humanfamilies. Learned theologians availed themselves of this example toeffect analogous relationships between the rest of the gods, combiningthem all into one line of descent. As Atûmû-Râ could have no fellow, hestood apart in the first rank, and it was decided that Shû should behis son, whom he had formed out of himself alone, on the first day ofcreation, by the simple intensity of his own virile energy. Shû, reducedto the position of divine son, had in his turn begotten Sibû and Nûît, the two deities which he separated. Until then he had not been supposedto have any wife, and he also might have himself brought his own progenyinto being; but lest a power of spontaneous generation equal to thatof the demiurge should be ascribed to him, he was married, and the wifefound for him was Tafnûît, his twin sister, born in the same way ashe was born. This goddess, invented for the occasion, was never fullyalive, and remained, like Nephthys, a theological entity rather than areal person. The texts describe her as the pale reflex of her husband. 

[Illustration: 201. Jpg THE TWIN LIONS, SHÛ AND TAFNÛÎT. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin from a vignette in the papyrus of Ani in the British Museum, published by Lepage-Renouf in the _Proceedings of the Society of Biblical Archæology_, vol. Xi. , 1889-90, pp. 26-28. The inscription above the lion on the right reads _safu_, "yesterday;" the other, _dûaû_, "this morning. "

Together with him she upholds the sky, and every morning receivesthe newborn sun as it emerges from the mountain of the east; she is alioness when Shû is a lion, a woman when he is a man, a lioness-headedwoman if he is a lion-headed man; she is angry when he is angry, appeased when he is appeased; she has no sanctuary wherein he is notworshipped. In short, the pair made one being in two bodies, or, to usethe Egyptian expression, "one soul in its two twin bodies. "

Hence we see that the Heliopolitans proclaimed the creation to be thework of the sun-god, Atûmû-Râ, and of the four pairs of deities who weredescended from him. It was really a learned variant of the old doctrinethat the universe was composed of a sky-god, Horus, supported by hisfour children and their four pillars: in fact, the four sons of theHeliopolitan cosmogony, Shû and Sibû, Osiris and Sit, were occasionallysubstituted for the four older gods of the "houses" of the world. Thisbeing premised, attention must be given to the important differencesbetween the two systems. At the outset, instead of appearingcontemporaneously upon the scene, like the four children of Horus, thefour Heliopolitan gods were deduced one from another, and succeeded eachother in the order of their birth. They had not that uniform attributeof supporter, associating them always with one definite function, buteach of them felt himself endowed with faculties and armed with specialpowers required by his condition. Ultimately they took to themselvesgoddesses, and thus the total number of beings working in different waysat the organization of the universe was brought up to nine. Hence theywere called by the collective name of the Ennead, the Nine gods--_paûitnûtîrû_, [*]--and the god at their head was entitled _Paûîti_, the god ofthe Ennead. 

 * The first Egyptologists confounded the sign used in writing _paûît_ with the sign _kh_, and the word _khet, other_. E. De Rougé was the first to determine its phonetic value: "it should be read Paû, and designates a body of gods. " Shortly afterwards Beugsch proved that "the group of gods invoked by E. De Rougé must have consisted of nine "-- of an Ennead. This explanation was not at first admitted either by Lepsius or by Mariette, who had proposed a mystic interpretation of the word in his _Mémoire sur la mère d'Apis_, or by E. De Rougé, or by Chabas. The interpretation a _Nine_, an _Ennead_, was not frankly adopted until later, and more especially after the discovery of the Pyramid texts; to-day, it is the only meaning admitted. Of course the Egyptian Ennead has no other connection than that of name with the Enneads of the Neo-Platonists. 

When creation was completed, its continued existence was ensured bycountless agencies with whose operation the persons of the Ennead werenot at leisure to concern themselves, but had ordained auxiliariesto preside over each of the functions essential to the regular andcontinued working of all things. The theologians of Heliopolis selectedeighteen from among the innumerable divinities of the feudal cults ofEgypt, and of these they formed two secondary Enneads, who were regardedas the offspring of the Ennead of the creation. The first of the twosecondary Enneads, generally known as the Minor Ennead, recognizedas chief Harsiesis, the son of Osiris. Harsiesis was originally anearth-god who had avenged the assassination of his father and thebanishment of his mother by Sit; that is, he had restored fulness to theNile and fertility to the Delta. When Harsiesis was incorporated intothe solar religions of Heliopolis, his filiation was left undisturbedas being a natural link between the two Enneads, but his personalitywas brought into conformity with the new surroundings into which he wastransplanted. He was identified with Râ through the intervention of theolder Horus, Haroêris-Harmakhis, and the Minor Ennead, like the GreatEnnead, began with a sun-god. This assimilation was not pushed so faras to invest the younger Horus with the same powers as his fictitiousancestor: he was the sun of earth, the everyday sun, while Atûmû-Râ wasstill the sun pre-mundane and eternal. Our knowledge of the eight otherdeities of the Minor Ennead is very imperfect. 

[Illustration: 204. Jpg THE FOUR FUNERARY GENII, KHABSONÛF, TIÛMAÛTF, HAPI, AND AMSÎT. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from Wilkinson's _Manners and Customs_, 2nd edit. , vol. Iii. P. 221, pl. Xlviii. 

We see only that these were the gods who chiefly protected the sun-godagainst its enemies and helped it to follow its regular course. ThusHarhûditi, the Horus of Edfû, spear in hand, pursues the hippopotamior serpents which haunt the celestial waters and menace the god. Theprogress of the Sun-bark is controlled by the incantations of Thot, while Uapûaîtû, the dual jackal-god of Siufc, guides, and occasionallytows it along the sky from south to north. The third Ennead would seemto have included among its members Anubis the jackal, and the fourfunerary genii, the children of Horus--Hapi, Amsît, Tiûmaûtf, Kabhsonûf;it further appears as though its office was the care and defence ofthe dead sun, the sun by night, as the second Ennead had charge ofthe living sun. Its functions were so obscure and apparently soinsignificant as compared with those exercised by the other Enneads, that the theologians did not take the trouble either to represent itor to enumerate its persons. They invoked it as a whole, after thetwo others, in those formulas in which they called into play all thecreative and preservative forces of the universe; but this was rather asa matter of conscience and from love of precision than out of any truedeference. At the initial impulse of the lord of Heliopolis, the threecombined Enneads started the world and kept it going, and gods whomthey had not incorporated were either enemies to be fought with, or mereattendants. 

The doctrine of the Heliopolitan Ennead acquired an immediate and alasting popularity. It presented such a clear scheme of creation, andone whose organization was so thoroughly in accordance with the spiritof tradition, that the various sacerdotal colleges adopted it one afteranother, accommodating it to the exigencies of local patriotism. Eachplaced its own nome-god at the head of the Ennead as "god of the Nine, ""god of the first time, " creator of heaven and earth, sovereign rulerof men, and lord of all action. As there was the Ennead of Atûmû atHeliopolis, so there was that of Anhûri at Thinis and at Sebennytos;that of Minû at Coptos and at Panopolis; that of Haroêris at Edfû; thatof Sobkhû at Ombos; and, later, that of Phtah at Memphis and of Amonat Thebes. Nomes which worshipped a goddess had no scruples whatever inascribing to her the part played by Atûmû, and in crediting her with thespontaneous maternity of Shû and Tafnûît. 

Illustration: 206. Jpg [PLAN OF THE RUINS OP HERMOPOLIS MAGNA. 1]

 1 Plan drawn by Thuillier, from the _Description de l' Egypte_, Ant. , vol. Iv. Pl. 50. 

Nît was the source and ruler of the Ennead of Saïs, Isis of that ofBûto, and Hâthor of that of Denderah. [**] Few of the sacerdotal collegeswent beyond the substitution of their own feudal gods for Atûmû. Provided that the god of each nome held the rank of supreme lord, therest mattered little, and the local theologians made no change in theorder of the other agents of creation, their vanity being unhurt even bythe lower offices assigned by the Heliopolitan tradition to such powersas Osiris, Sibû, and Sit, who were known and worshipped throughout thewhole country. 

 ** On the Ennead of Hâthor at Denderah, see Mariette, Denderah, p. 80. , et seq. , of the text. The fact that Nît, Isis, and, generally speaking, all the feudal goddesses, were the chiefs of their local Enneads, is proved by the epithets applied to them, which represent them as having independent creative power by virtue of their own unaided force and energy, like the god at the head of the Heliopolitan Ennead. 

The theologians of Hermopolis alone declined to borrow the new systemjust as it stood, and in all its parts. Hermopolis had always been oneof the ruling cities of Middle Egypt. Standing alone in the midst of theland lying between the Eastern and Western Mies, it had established uponeach of the two great arms of the river a port and a custom-house, whereall boats travelling either up or down stream paid toll on passing. Notonly the corn and natural products of the valley and of the Delta, butalso goods from distant parts of Africa brought to Siûfc by Soudanesecaravans, helped to fill the treasury of Hermopolis. Thot, the god ofthe city, represented as ibis or baboon, was essentially a moon-god, whomeasured time, counted the days, numbered the months, and recorded theyears. Lunar divinities, as we know, are everywhere supposed to exercisethe most varied powers: they command the mysterious forces of theuniverse; they know the sounds, words, and gestures by which thoseforces are put in motion, and not content with using them for their ownbenefit, they also teach to their worshippers the art of employing them. 

[Illustration: 208. Jpg THE IBIS THOT. 1; and THE CYNOCEPHALOUS THOT. 2]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin from an enamelled pottery figure from Coptos, now in my possession. Neck, feet, and tail are in blue enamel, the rest is in green. The little personage represented as squatting beneath the beak is Mâit, the goddess of truth, and the ally of Thot. The ibis was furnished with a ring for suspending it; this has been broken off, but traces of it may still be seen at the back of the head. 

 2 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin from a green enamelled pottery figure in my possession (Saïte period). 

Thot formed no exception to this rule. He was lord of the voice, masterof words and of books, possessor or inventor of those magic writingswhich nothing in heaven, on earth, or in Hades can withstand. [***]

 *** Cf. In the tale of Satni (Maspero, _Contes populaires de l'Ancienne Egypte_, 2nd edit. , p. 175) the description of the book which Thot has himself written with his own hand, and which makes its possessor the equal of the gods. "The two formulas which are written therein, if thou recitest the first thou shalt charm heaven, earth, Hades, the mountains, the waters; thou shalt know the birds of the sky and the reptiles, how many soever they be; thou shalt see the fish of the deep, for a divine power will cause them to rise to the surface of the water. If thou readest the second formula, even although thou shouldest be in the tomb, thou shalt again take the form which was thine upon earth; thou shalt even see the sun rising in heaven, and his cycle of gods, and the moon in the form wherein it appeareth. "

He had discovered the incantations which evoke and control the gods; hehad transcribed the texts and noted the melodies of these incantations;he recited them with that true intonation--_mâ khrôû_--which rendersthem all-powerful, and every one, whether god or man, to whom heimparted them, and whose voice he made true--_smâ khrôû_--became likehimself master of the universe. He had accomplished the creation notby muscular effort to which the rest of the cosmogonical gods primarilyowed their birth, but by means of formulas, or even of the voice alone, "the first time" when he awoke in the Nû. In fact, the articulate wordand the voice were believed to be the most potent of creative forces, not remaining immaterial on issuing from the lips, but condensing, soto speak, into tangible substances; into bodies which were themselvesanimated by creative life and energy; into gods and goddesses who livedor who created in their turn. By a very short phrase Tûmû had calledforth the gods who order all things; for his "Come unto me!" utteredwith a loud voice upon the day of creation, had evoked the sun fromwithin the lotus. Thot had opened his lips, and the voice whichproceeded from him had become an entity; sound had solidified intomatter, and by a simple emission of voice the four gods who preside overthe four houses of the world had come forth alive from his mouth withoutbodily effort on his part, and without spoken evocation. Creation by thevoice is almost as great a refinement of thought as the substitutionof creation by the word for creation by muscular effort. In fact, soundbears the same relation to words that the whistle of a quartermasterbears to orders for the navigation of a ship transmitted by a speakingtrumpet; it simplifies speech, reducing it as it were to a pureabstraction. At first it was believed that the creator had made theworld with a word, then that he had made it by sound; but the furtherconception of his having made it by thought does not seem to haveoccurred to the theologians. It was narrated at Hermopolis, and thelegend was ultimately universally accepted, even by the Heliopolitans, that the separation of Nûît and Sibû had taken place at a certain spoton the site of the city where Sibû had ascended the mound on whichthe feudal temple was afterwards built, in order that he might bettersustain the goddess and uphold the sky at the proper height. Theconception of a Creative Council of five gods had so far prevailed atHermopolis that from this fact the city had received in remote antiquitythe name of the "House of the Five;" its temple was called the "Abode ofthe Five" down to a late period in Egyptian history, and its prince, who was the hereditary high priest of Thot, reckoned as the first of hisofficial titles that of "Great One of the House of the Five. "

The four couples who had helped Atûmû were identified with the fourauxiliary gods of Thot, and changed the council of Five into a GreatHermopolitan Ennead, but at the cost of strange metamorphoses. Howeverartificially they had been grouped about Atûmû, they had all preservedsuch distinctive characteristics as prevented their being confounded onewith another. When the universe which they had helped to build upwas finally seen to be the result of various operations demanding aconsiderable manifestation of physical energy, each god was required topreserve the individuality necessary for the production of such effectsas were expected of him. They could not have existed and carried ontheir work without conforming to the ordinary conditions of humanity;being born one of another, they were bound to have paired with livinggoddesses as capable of bringing forth their children as they were ofbegetting them. On the other hand, the four auxiliary gods of Hermopolisexercised but one means of action--the voice. Having themselves comeforth from the master's mouth, it was by voice that they created andperpetuated the world. Apparently they could have done without goddesseshad marriage not been imposed upon them by their identification with thecorresponding gods of the Heliopolitan Ennead; at any rate, their wiveshad but a show of life, almost destitute of reality. As these four godsworked after the manner of their master, Thot, so they also bore hisform and reigned along with him as so many baboons. When associated withthe lord of Hermopolis, the eight divinities of Heliopolis assumed thecharacter and the appearance of the four Hermopolitan gods in whom theywere merged. They were often represented as eight baboons surroundingthe supreme baboon, or as four pairs of gods and goddesses withouteither characteristic attributes or features; or, finally, as four pairsof gods and goddesses, the gods being, as far as we are able to judge, the couple Nû-Nûît answers to Shû-Tafnûît; Hahû-Hehît to Sibû and Nûîfc;Kakû-Kakît to Osiris and Isis; Ninû-Ninît to Sit and Nephthys. Therewas seldom any occasion to invoke them separately; they were addressedcollectively as the Eight--_Khmûnû_--and it was on their account thatHermopolis was named _Khmûnû_, the City of the Eight. Ultimately theywere deprived of the little individual life still left to them, and werefused into a single being to whom the texts refer as Khomninû, the godEight. 

[Illustration: 212. Jpg THE HERMOPOLITAN OGDOAD. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin from a photograph by Béato. Cf. Lepsius, Denkm. , iv. Pl. 66 c. In this illustration I have combined! the two extremities of a great scene at Philæ, in which the _Eight_, divided into two groups of four, frog- headed men, and the goddesses serpent-headed women. Morning and evening do they sing; and the mysterious hymns wherewith they salute the rising and the setting sun ensure the continuity of his course. Their names did not survive their metamorphoses; each pair had no longer more than a single name, the termination of each name varying according as a god or a goddess was intended:--Nu and Nûît, Hehû and Hehît, Kakû and Kakît, Ninû and Ninît, the god One and the god Eight, the Monad and the Ogdoad. The latter had scarcely more than a theoretical existence, and was generally absorbed into the person of the former. Thus the theologians of Hermopolis gradually disengaged the unity of their feudal god from the multiplicity of the cosmogonie deities. 

[Illustration: 213. Jpg AMON. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin from a bronze statuette found at Thebes, and now in my possession. 

By degrees the Ennead of Thot was thus reduced to two terms: take partin the adoration of the king. According to a custom common towards theGræco-Roman period, the sculptor has made the feet of his gods likejackals' heads; it is a way of realizing the well-known metaphor whichcompares a rapid runner to the jackal roaming around Egypt. 

As the sacerdotal colleges had adopted the Heliopolitan doctrine, sothey now generally adopted that of Hermopolis: Amon, for instance, beingmade to preside indifferently over the eight baboons and over the fourindependent couples of the primitive Ennead. In both cases the processof adaptation was absolutely identical, and would have been attended byno difficulty whatever, had the divinities to whom it was applied onlybeen without family; in that case, the one needful change for each citywould have been that of a single name in the Heliopolitan list, thusleaving the number of the Ennead unaltered. But since these deities hadbeen turned into triads they could no longer be primarily regarded assimple units, to be combined with the elements of some one or other ofthe Enneads without preliminary arrangement. The two companions whomeach had chosen had to be adopted also, and the single Thot, or singleAtûmû, replaced by the three patrons of the nome, thus changing thetraditional nine into eleven. Happily, the constitution of the triadlent itself to all these adaptations. We have seen that the fatherand the son became one and the same personage, whenever it was thoughtdesirable. We also know that one of the two parents always so farpredominated as almost to efface the other. Sometimes it was the goddesswho disappeared behind her husband; sometimes it was the god whoseexistence merely served to account for the offspring of the goddess, andwhose only title to his position consisted in the fact that he was herhusband. Two personages thus closely connected were not long in blendinginto one, and were soon defined as being two faces, the masculine andfeminine aspects of a single being. On the one hand, the father was onewith the son, and on the other he was one with the mother. Hence themother was one with the son as with the father, and the three gods ofthe triad were resolved into one god in three persons. 

[Illustration: 215. Jpg THE THEBAN ENNEAD]

 1 This Ennead consists of fourteen members--Montû, duplicating Atûmû; the four usual couples; then Horus, the son of Isis and Osiris, together with his associate deities, Hâthor, Tanu, and Anît. 

Thanks to this subterfuge, to put a triad at the head of an Ennead wasnothing more than a roundabout way of placing a single god there: thethree persons only counted as one, and the eleven names only amountedto the nine canonical divinities. Thus, the Theban Ennead ofAmon-Maut-Khonsû, Shû, Tafnûît, Sibû, Nûît, Osiris, Isis, Sît, andNephthys, is, in spite of its apparent irregularity, as correct as thetypical Ennead itself. In such Enneads Isis is duplicated by goddessesof like nature, such as Hâthor, Selkît, Taninît, and yet remains butone, while Osiris brings in his son Horus, who gathers about himselfall such gods as play the part of divine son in other triads. Thetheologians had various methods of procedure for keeping the number ofpersons in an Ennead at nine, no matter how many they might choose toembrace in it. Supernumeraries were thrown in like the "shadows" atRoman suppers, whom guests would bring without warning to their host, and whose presence made not the slightest difference either in theprovision for the feast, or in the arrangements for those who had beenformally invited. 

Thus remodelled at all points, the Ennead of Heliopolis was readilyadjustable to sacerdotal caprices, and even profited by the facilitieswhich, the triad afforded for its natural expansion. In time theHeliopolitan version of the origin of Shû-Tafnûît must have appeared tooprimitively barbarous. Allowing for the licence of the Egyptians duringPharaonic times, the concept of the spontaneous emission whereby Atûrnûhad produced his twin children was characterized by a superfluity ofcoarseness which it was at least unnecessary to employ, since byplacing the god in a triad, this double birth could be duly explainedin conformity with the ordinary laws of life. The solitary Atûrnû of themore ancient dogma gave place to Atûrnû the husband and father. He had, indeed, two wives, Iûsâsît and Nebthotpît, but their individualitieswere so feebly marked that no one took the trouble to choose betweenthem; each passed as the mother of Shû and Tafnûîfc. This system ofcombination, so puerile in its ingenuity, was fraught with the gravestconsequences to the history of Egyptian religions. Shu having beentransformed into the divine son of the Heliopolitan triad, couldhenceforth be assimilated with the divine sons of all those triads whichtook the place of Tûmû at the heads of provincial Enneads. Thus we findthat Horus the son of Isis at Bûto, Arihosnofir the son of Nit at Sais, Khnûmû the son of Hâthor at Esneh, were each in turn identified withShû the son of Atûrnû, and lost their individualities in his. Sooneror later this was bound to result in bringing all the triads closertogether, and in their absorption into one another. Through constantreiteration of the statement that the divine sons of the triads wereidentical with Shû, as being in the second rank of the Ennead, the ideaarose that this was also the case in triads unconnected with Enneads; inother terms, that the third person in any family of gods was everywhereand always Shû under a different name. It having been finally admittedin the sacerdotal colleges that Tûmû and Shû, father and son, were one, all the divine sons were, therefore, identical with Tûmû, the fatherof Shû, and as each divine son was one with his parents, it inevitablyfollowed that these parents themselves were identical with Tûmû. Reasoning in this way, the Egyptians naturally tended towards thatconception of the divine oneness to which the theory of the HermopolitanOgdoad was already leading them. In fact, they reached it, and themonuments show us that in comparatively early times the theologians werebusy uniting in a single person the prerogatives which their ancestorshad ascribed to many different beings. But this conception of deitytowards which their ideas were converging has nothing in common with theconception of the God of our modern religions and philosophies. No godof the Egyptians was ever spoken of simply as God. Tûmû was the "oneand only god"--_nûtir ûâû ûâîti_--at Heliopolis; Anhûri-Shû was also the"one and only god" at Sebennytos and at Thinis. The unity of Atûmû didnot interfere with that of Anhûri-Shû, but each of these gods, althoughthe "sole" deity in his own domain, ceased to be so in the domain of theother. The feudal spirit, always alert and jealous, prevented the higherdogma which was dimly apprehended in the temples from triumphing overlocal religions and extending over the whole land. Egypt had as many"sole" deities as she had large cities, or even important temples; shenever accepted the idea of the sole God, "beside whom there is noneother. "

[Illustration: 218. Jpg TAILPIECE]

[Illustration: 219. Jpg PAGE IMAGE]

[Illustration: 220. Jpg PAGE IMAGE]

CHAPTER III. ---THE LEGENDARY HISTORY OF EGYPT

_THE DIVINE DYNASTIES: RÂ, SHÛ, OSIEIS, SÎT, HOEUS--THOT, AND THEINVENTION OF SCIENCES AND WRITING--MENES, AND THE THREE FIRST HUMANDYNASTIES. _

_The Egyptians claim to Be the most ancient of peoples: traditionsconcerning the creation of man and of animals--The Heliopolitan Enneadsthe framework of the divine dynasties--Râ, the first King of Egypt, andhis fabulous history: he allows himself to be duped and robbed by Isis, destroys rebellious men, and ascends into heaven. 

The legend of Shu and Sibil--The reign of Osiris Onnophris and of Isis:they civilize Egypt and the world--Osiris, slain by Sit, is entombed byIsis and avenged by Horus--The wars of Typhon and of Horus: peace, andthe division of Egypt between the two gods. 

The Osirian embalmment; the kingdom of Osiris opened to the followers ofHorus--The Book of the Dead--The journeying of the soul in search of thefields of Ialû--The judgment of the soul, the negative confession--Theprivileges and duties of Osirian souls--Confusion between Osirian andSolar ideas as to the state of the dead: the dead in the hark of theSun--The going forth by day--The campaigns of Harmakhis against Sit. 

Thot, the inventor: he reveals all sciences to men--Astronomy, stellartables; the year, its subdivisions, its defects, influence ofthe heavenly bodies and the days upon human destiny--Magic arts;incantations, amulets---Medicine: the vitalizing spirits, diagnosis, treatment--Writing: ideographic, syllabic, alphabetic. 

The history of Egypt as handed down by tradition: Manetho, the royallists, main divisions of Egyptian history--The beginnings of its earlyhistory vague and uncertain: Menés, and the legend of Memphis--The firstthree human dynasties, the two Thimie and the Memphite--Character and, origin of the legends concerning them--The famine stela--The earliestmonuments: the step pyramid of Saqgdrah. _

[Illustration: 221. Jpg PAGE IMAGE]

THE LEGENDARY HISTORY OF EGYPT

_The divine dynasties: Râ, Shû, Osiris, Sît, Horus--Thot, and theinvention of sciences and writing--Menés, and the three first humandynasties. _

The building up and diffusion of the doctrine of the Ennead, like theformation of the land of Egypt, demanded centuries of sustained effort, centuries of which the inhabitants themselves knew neither the numbernor the authentic history. When questioned as to the remote past oftheir race, they proclaimed themselves the most ancient of mankind, incomparison with whom all other races were but a mob of young children;and they looked upon nations which denied their pretensions with suchindulgence and pity as we feel for those who doubt a well-known truth. Their forefathers had appeared upon the banks of the Nile even beforethe creator had completed his work, so eager were the gods to beholdtheir birth. No Egyptian disputed the reality of this right of thefirstborn, which ennobled the whole race; but if they were asked thename of their divine father, then the harmony was broken, and eachadvanced the claims of a different personage. [*] Phtah had modelled manwith his own hands;[**] Khnûmû had formed him on a potter's table. [***]

 * We know the words which Plato puts into the mouth of an Egyptian priest: "O Solon, Solon, you Greeks are always children, and there is no old man who is a Greek! You are all young in mind; there is no opinion or tradition of knowledge among you which is white with age. " Other nations disputed their priority--the Phrygians, the Medes, or rather the tribe of the Magi among the Medes, the Ethiopians, the Scythians. A cycle of legends had gathered about this subject, giving an account of the experiments instituted, by Psamtik, or other sovereigns, to find out which were right, Egyptians or foreigners. 

 ** At Philæ and at Denderah, Phtah is represented as piling upon his potter's table the plastic clay from which he is about to make a human body, and which is somewhat wrongly called the egg of the world. It is really the lump of earth from which man came forth at his creation. 

 *** At Philas, Khnûmû calls himself "the potter who fashions men, the modeller of the gods. " He there moulds the members of Osiris, the husband of the local Isis, as at Erment he forms the body of Harsamtaûi, or rather that of Ptolemy Cæsarion, the son of Julius Cæsar and the celebrated Cleopatra, identified with Harsamtaûi. 

Râ at his first rising, seeing the earth desert and bare, had flooded itwith his rays as with a flood of tears; all living things, vegetable andanimal, and man himself, had sprung pell-mell from his eyes, and werescattered abroad with the light over the surface of the world. [*]Sometimes the facts were presented under a less poetic aspect. The mudof the Nile, heated to excess by the burning sun, fermented and broughtforth the various races of men and animals by spontaneous generation, having moulded itself into a thousand living forms. Then its procreativepower became weakened to the verge of exhaustion. Yet on the banks ofthe river, in the height of summer, smaller animals might still be foundwhose condition showed what had once taken place in the case of thelarger kinds. Some appeared as already fully formed, and strugglingto free themselves from the oppressive mud; others, as yet imperfect, feebly stirred their heads and fore feet, while their hind quarterswere completing their articulation and taking shape within the matrix ofearth. [**]

 * With reference to the substances which proceeded from the eye of Râ, see the remarks of Birch, _Sur un papyrus magique du Musée Britannique_. By his tears (_romîtû_) Horus, or his eye as identified with the sun, had given birth to all men, Egyptians (_romîtû, rotû_), Libyans, and Asiatics, excepting only the negroes. The latter were born from another part of his body by the same means as those employed by Atûmû in the creation of Shû and Tafnûît. 

 ** The same story is told, but with reference to rats only, by Pliny, by Diodorus, by Ælianus, by Macrobius, and by other Greek or Latin writers. Even in later times, and in Europe, this pretended phenomenon met with a certain degree of belief, as may be seen from the curious work of Marcus Fredericus Wendelinus, _Archipalatinus, Admiranda Nili_, Franco-furti, mdcxxiii. , cap. Xxi. Pp. 157-183. In Egypt all the fellahîn believe in the spontaneous generation of rats as in an article of their creed. They have spoken to me of it at Thebes, at Denderah, and on the plain of Abydos; and Major Brown has lately noted the same thing in the Fayûm. The variant which he heard from the lips of the notables is curious, for it professes to explain why the rats who infest the fields in countless bands during the dry season, suddenly disappear at the return of the inundation; born of the mud and putrid water of the preceding year, to mud they return, and as it were dissolve at the touch of the new waters. 

It was not Râ alone whose tears were endowed with vitalizing power. Alldivinities whether beneficent or malevolent, Sit as well as Osiris orIsis, could give life by weeping; and the work of their eyes, when onceit had fallen upon earth, flourished and multiplied as vigorously asthat which came from the eyes of Râ. 

[Illustration: 224. Jpg KHNÛMÛ MODELLING MAN UPON A POTTER'S TABLE. 1]

 1 Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by Gayet. The scene is taken from bas-reliefs in the temple of Luxor, where the god Khnûmû is seen completing his modelling of the future King Amenôthes III. And his double, represented as two children wearing the side-lock and large necklace. The first holds his finger to his lips, while the arms of the second swing at his sides. 

The individual character of the creator was not without bearing uponthe nature of his creatures; good was the necessary outcome of thegood gods, evil of the evil ones; and herein lay the explanation ofthe mingling of things excellent and things execrable, which is foundeverywhere throughout the world. Voluntarily or involuntarily, Sit andhis partisans were the cause and origin of all that is harmful. Dailytheir eyes shed upon the world those juices by which plants are madepoisonous, as well as malign influences, crime, and madness. Theirsaliva, the foam which fell from their mouths during their attacks ofrage, their sweat, their blood itself, were all no less to be feared. When any drop of it touched the earth, straightway it germinated, andproduced something strange and baleful--a serpent, a scorpion, a plantof deadly nightshade or of henbane. But, on the other hand, the sunwas all goodness, and persons or things which it cast forth into lifeinfallibly partook of its benignity. Wine that maketh man glad, the beewho works for him in the flowers secreting wax and honey, the meat andherbs which are his food, the stuffs that clothe him, all useful thingswhich he makes for himself, not only emanated from the Solar Eyeof Horus, but were indeed nothing more than the Eye of Horus underdifferent aspects, and in his name they were presented in sacrifice. Thedevout generally were of opinion that the first Egyptians, the sons andflock of Râ, came into the world happy and perfect;[*] by degrees theirdescendants had fallen from that native felicity into their presentstate. 

 * In the tomb of Seti I, the words _flock of the Sun, flock of Râ_, are those by which the god Horus refers to men. Certain expressions used by Egyptian writers are in themselves sufficient to show that the first generations of men were supposed to have lived in a state of happiness and perfection. To the Egyptians _the times of Râ, the times of the god_--that is to say, the centuries immediately following on the creation---were the ideal age, and no good thing had appeared upon earth since then. 

Some, on the contrary, affirmed that their ancestors were born as somany brutes, unprovided with the most essential arts of gentle life. They knew nothing of articulate speech, and expressed themselves bycries only, like other animals, until the day when Thot taught them bothspeech and writing. 

These tales sufficed for popular edification; they provided but meagrefare for the intelligence of the learned. The latter did not confinetheir ambition to the possession of a few incomplete and contradictorydetails concerning the beginnings of humanity. They wished to know thehistory of its consecutive development from the very first; what mannerof life had been led by their fathers; what chiefs they had obeyed andthe names or adventures of those chiefs; why part of the nations hadleft the blessed banks of the Nile and gone to settle in foreign lands;by what stages and in what length of time those who had not emigratedrose out of native barbarism into that degree of culture to which themost ancient monuments bore testimony. No efforts of imagination wereneedful for the satisfaction of their curiosity: the old substratum ofindigenous traditions was rich enough, did they but take the troubleto work it out systematically, and to eliminate its most incongruouselements. The priests of Heliopolis took this work in hand, as they hadalready taken in hand the same task with regard to the myths referringto the creation; and the Enneads provided them with a ready-madeframework. They changed the gods of the Ennead into so many kings, determined with minute accuracy the lengths of their reigns, andcompiled their biographies from popular tales. The duality of the feudalgod supplied an admirable expedient for connecting the history of theworld with that of chaos. Tûmû was identified with Nû, and relegated tothe primordial Ocean: Râ was retained, and proclaimed the first kingof the world. He had not established his rule without difficulty. The"Children of Defeat, " beings hostile to order and light, engaged him infierce battles; nor did he succeed in organizing his kingdom untilhe had conquered them in nocturnal combat at Hermopolis, and even atHeliopolis itself. [*]

 * The _Children of Defeat_, in Egyptian _Mosû batashû_, or _Mosû batashît_, are often confounded with the followers of Sit, the enemies of Osiris. From the first they were distinct, and represented beings and forces hostile to the sun, with the dragon Apôpi at their head. Their defeat at Hermopolis corresponded to the moment when Shu, raising the sky above the sacred mound in that city, substituted order and light for chaos and darkness. This defeat is mentioned in chap xvii. Of the _Book of the Dead_ (Naville's edition, vol. I. Pl. Xxiii. 1. 3, et seq. ), in which connexion E. De Rougé first explained its meaning. In the same chapter of the _Book of the Dead_ (Naville's edition, vol. I. Pis. Xxiv. , xxv. , 11. 54-58), reference is also made to the battle by night, in Heliopolis, at the close of which Râ appeared in the form of a cat or lion, and beheaded the great serpent. 

Pierced with wounds, Apôpi the serpent sank into the depths of Ocean atthe very moment when the new year began. The secondary members of theGreat Ennead, together with the Sun, formed the first dynasty, whichbegan with the dawn of the first day, and ended at the coming of Horus, the son of Isis. The local schools of theology welcomed this method ofwriting history as readily as they had welcomed the principle of theEnnead itself. Some of them retained the Heliopolitan demiurge, andhastened to associate him with their own; others completely eliminatedhim in favour of the feudal divinity, --Amon at Thebes, Thot atHermopolis, Phtah at Memphis, --keeping the rest of the dynastyabsolutely unchanged. [*] The gods in no way compromised their prestigeby becoming incarnate and descending to earth. Since they were men offiner nature, and their qualities, including that of miracle-working, were human qualities raised to the highest pitch of intensity, it wasnot considered derogatory to them personally to have watched overthe infancy and childhood of primeval man. The raillery in which theEgyptians occasionally indulged with regard to them, the good-humouredand even ridiculous _rôles_ ascribed to them in certain legends, do notprove that they were despised, or that zeal for them had cooled. Thegreater the respect of believers for the objects of their worship, the more easily do they tolerate the taking of such liberties, and thecondescension of the members of the Ennead, far from lowering themin the eyes of generations who came too late to live with them uponfamiliar terms, only enhanced the love and reverence in which they wereheld. Nothing shows this better than the history of Râ. His world wasours in the rough; for since Shu was yet nonexistent, and Nuit stillreposed in the arms of Sibû, earth and sky were but one. [**]

 * Thot is the chief of the Hermopolitan Ennead, and the titles ascribed to him by inscriptions maintaining his supremacy show that he also was considered to have been the first king. One of the Ptolemies said of himself that he came "as the Majesty of Thot, because he was the equal of Atûmû, hence the equal of Khopri, hence the equal of Râ. " Atûmû-Khopri-Râ being the first earthly king, it follows that the _Majesty of Thot_, with whom Ptolemy identifies himself, comparing himself to the three forms of the God Râ, is also the first earthly king. 

 ** This conception of the primitive Egyptian world is clearly implied in the very terms employed by the author of The Destruction of Men. Nuit does not rise to form the sky until such time as Râ thinks of bringing his reign to an end; that is to say, after Egypt had already been in existence for many centuries. In chap. Xvii. Of the Book of the Dead (Naville's edition, vol. I. Pl. Xxiii. 11. 3-5) it is stated that the reign of Râ began in the times when the upliftings had not yet taken place; that is to say, before Shu had separated Nûît from Sibû, and forcibly uplifted her above the body of her husband. 

Nevertheless in this first attempt at a world there was vegetable, animal, and human life. Egypt was there, all complete, with her twochains of mountains, her Nile, her cities, the people of her nomes, andthe nomes themselves. Then the soil was more generous; the harvests, without the labourer's toil, were higher and more abundant;[*] and whenthe Egyptians of Pharaonic times wished to mark their admiration of anyperson or thing, they said that the like had never been known since thetime of Râ. 

 * This is an ideal in accordance with the picture drawn of the fields of Ialû in chap. Ex. Of the _Book of the Dead_ (Naville's edition, vol. I. Pis. Cxxi. ~ cxxiii. ). As with the Paradise of most races, so the place of the Osirian dead still possessed privileges which the earth had enjoyed during the first years succeeding the creation; that is to say, under the direct rule of Râ. 

It is an illusion common to all peoples; as their insatiable thirstfor happiness is never assuaged by the present, they fall back upon theremotest past in search of an age when that supreme felicity which isonly known to them as an ideal was actually enjoyed by their ancestors. Râ dwelt in Heliopolis, and the most ancient portion of the temple ofthe city, that known as the "Mansion of the Prince"--Haït Sarû, --passedfor having been his palace. His court was mainly composed of gods andgoddesses, and they as well as he were visible to men. It containedalso men who filled minor offices about his person, prepared his food, received the offerings of his subjects, attended to his linen andhousehold affairs. It was said that the _oîrû maû_--the high priest ofRâ, the _hankistît_--his high priestess, and generally speaking all theservants of the temple of Heliopolis, were either directly descendedfrom members of this first household establishment of the god, or hadsucceeded to their offices in unbroken succession. 

[Illustration: 230. Jpg AT THE FIRST HOUR OF THE BAY THE SUN EMBARKS FOBHIS JOURNEY THROUGH EGYPT. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from one of the scenes represented upon the architraves of the pronaos at Edfû (Rosellini, _Monumenti del Culto_, pl. Xxxviii. No. 1). 

In the morning he went forth with his divine train, and, amid theacclamations of the crowd, entered the bark in which he made hisaccustomed circuit of the world, returning to his home at the end oftwelve hours after the accomplishment of his journey. He visited eachprovince in turn, and in each he tarried for an hour, to settle alldisputed matters, as the final judge of appeal. He gave audience to bothsmall and great, he decided their quarrels and adjudged their lawsuits, he granted investiture of fiefs from the royal domains to those whohad deserved them, and allotted or confirmed to every family the incomeneedful for their maintenance. He pitied the sufferings of his people, and did his utmost to alleviate them; he taught to all comers potentformulas against reptiles and beasts of prey, charms to cast out evilspirits, and the best recipes for preventing illness. His incessantbounties left him at length with only one of his talismans: the namegiven to him by his father and mother at his birth, which they hadrevealed to him alone, and which he kept concealed within his bosom lestsome sorcerer should get possession of it to use for the furtherance ofhis evil spells. 

But old age came on, and infirmities followed; the body of Râ grew bent, "his mouth trembled, his slaver trickled down to earth and hissaliva dropped upon the ground. " Isis, who had hitherto been a merewoman-servant in the household of the Pharaoh, conceived the project ofstealing his secret from him, "that she might possess the world and makeherself a goddess by the name of the august god. " Force would have beenunavailing; all enfeebled as he was by reason of his years, none wasstrong enough to contend successfully against him. But Isis "was a womanmore knowing in her malice than millions of men, clever among millionsof the gods, equal to millions of spirits, to whom as unto Râ nothingwas unknown either in heaven or upon earth. " She contrived a mostingenious stratagem. When man or god was struck down by illness, theonly chance of curing him lay in knowing his real name, and therebyadjuring the evil being that tormented him. Isis determined to cast aterrible malady upon Râ, concealing its cause from him; then to offerher services as his nurse, and by means of his sufferings to extractfrom him the mysterious word indispensable to the success of theexorcism. She gathered up mud impregnated with the divine saliva, andmoulded of it a sacred serpent which she hid in the dust of the road. Suddenly bitten as he was setting out upon his daily round, the godcried out aloud, "his voice ascended into heaven and his Nine called:'What is it? what is it?' and his gods: 'What is the matter? what is thematter?' but he could make them no answer so much did his lips tremble, his limbs shake, and the venom take hold upon his flesh as the Nileseizeth upon the land which it invadeth. " Presently he came to himself, and succeeded in describing his sensations. "Something painful hathstung me; my heart perceiveth it, yet my two eyes see it not; my handhath not wrought it, nothing that I have made knoweth it what it is, yethave I never tasted suffering like unto it, and there is no pain thatmay overpass it.... Fire it is not, water it is not, yet is my heart inflames, my flesh trembleth, all my members are full of shiverings bornof breaths of magic. Behold! let there be brought unto me children ofthe gods of beneficent words, who know the power of their mouths, andwhose science reacheth unto heaven. " They came, these children of thegods, all with their books of magic. There came Isis with her sorcery, her mouth full of life-giving breaths, her recipe for the destruction ofpain, her words which pour life into breathless throats, and she said:"What is it? what is it, O father of the gods? May it not be that aserpent hath wrought this suffering in thee; that one of thy childrenhath lifted up his head against thee? Surely he shall be overthrown bybeneficent incantations, and I will make him to retreat at the sightof thy rays. " On learning the cause of his torment, the Sun-god isterrified, and begins to lament anew: "I, then, as I went along theways, travelling through my double land of Egypt and over my mountains, that I might look upon that which I have made, I was bitten by a serpentthat I saw not. Fire it is not, water it is not, yet am I colder thanwater, I burn more than fire, all my members stream with sweat, Itremble, mine eye is not steady, no longer can I discern the sky, dropsroll from my face as in the season of summer. " Isis proposes her remedy, and cautiously asks him his ineffable name. But he divines her trick, and tries to evade it by an enumeration of his titles. He takes theuniverse to witness that he is called "Khopri in the morning, Râ atnoon, Tûmû in the evening. " The poison did not recede, but steadilyadvanced, and the great god was not eased. Then Isis said to Râ: "Thyname was not spoken in that which thou hast said. Tell it to me and thepoison will depart; for he liveth upon whom a charm is pronounced in hisown name. " The poison glowed like fire, it was strong as the burningof flame, and the Majesty of Râ said, "I grant thee leave that thoushouldest search within me, O mother Isis! and that my name pass from mybosom into thy bosom. " In truth, the all-powerful name was hidden withinthe body of the god, and could only be extracted thence by means ofa surgical operation similar to that practised upon a corpse whichis about to be mummified. Isis undertook it, carried it throughsuccessfully, drove out the poison, and made herself a goddess by virtueof the name. The cunning of a mere woman had deprived Râ of his lasttalisman. 

In course of time men perceived his decrepitude. They took counselagainst him: "Lo! his Majesty waxeth old, his bones are of silver, hisflesh is of gold, his hair of lapis-lazuli. " As soon as his Majestyperceived that which they were saying to each other, his Majesty said tothose who were of his train, "Call together for me my Divine Eye, Shû, Tafnûît, Sibû, and Nûît, the father and the mother gods who were withme when I was in the Nû, with the god Nû. Let each bring his cycle alongwith him; then, when thou shalt have brought them in secret, thou shalttake them to the great mansion that they may lend me their counsel andtheir consent, coming hither from the Nû into this place where I havemanifested myself. " So the family council comes together: the ancestorsof Râ, and his posterity still awaiting amid the primordial watersthe time of their manifestation--his children Shû and Tafnûît, hisgrandchildren Sibû and Nûît. They place themselves, according toetiquette, on either side his throne, prostrate, with their foreheads tothe ground, and thus their conference begins: "O Nû, thou the eldest ofthe gods, from whom I took my being, and ye the ancestor-gods, behold!men who are the emanation of mine eye have taken counsel togetheragainst me! Tell me what ye would do, for I have bidden you here beforeI slay them, that I may hear what ye would say thereto. " Nû, as theeldest, has the right to speak first, and demands that the guilty shallbe brought to judgment and formally condemned. "My son Râ, god greaterthan the god who made him, older than the gods who created him, sit thouupon thy throne, and great shall be the terror when thine eye shallrest upon those who plot together against thee!" But Râ not unreasonablyfears that when men see the solemn pomp of royal justice, they maysuspect the fate that awaits them, and "flee into the desert, theirhearts terrified at that which I have to say to them. " The desert waseven then hostile to the tutelary gods of Egypt, and offered an almostinviolable asylum to their enemies. The conclave admits that theapprehensions of Râ are well founded, and pronounces in favour ofsummary execution; the Divine Eye is to be the executioner. "Let it goforth that it may smite those who have devised evil against thee, forthere is no Eye more to be feared than thine when it attacketh in theform of Hâthor. " So the Eye takes the form of Hâthor, suddenly fallsupon men, and slays them right and left with great strokes of the knife. After some hours, Râ, who would chasten but not destroy his children, commands her to cease from her carnage; but the goddess has tastedblood, and refuses to obey him. "By thy life, " she replies, "when Islaughter men then is my heart right joyful!"

[Illustration: 236. Jpg SOKHÎT, THE LIONESS-HEADED. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin from a bronze statuette of the Saïte period in the Gizeh Museum (Mariette, _Album photographique du Musée de Boulaq_, pl. 6). 

That is why she was afterwards called Sokhît the slayer, and representedunder the form of a fierce lioness. Nightfall stayed her course in theneighbourhood of Heracleopolis; all the way from Heliopolis she hadtrampled through blood. As soon as she had fallen asleep, Râ hastilytook effectual measures to prevent her from beginning her work again onthe morrow. "He said: 'Call on my behalf messengers agile and swift, who go like the wind. ' When these messengers were straightway broughtto him, the Majesty of the god said: 'Let them run to Elephantine andbring me mandragora in plenty. '"[**]

** The mandragora of Elephantine was used in the manufacture of anintoxicating and narcotic drink employed either in medicine or in magic. In a special article, Brugsch has collected particulars preserved by thetexts as to the uses of this plant. It was not as yet credited withthe human form and the peculiar kind of life ascribed to it by westernsorcerers. 

When they had brought him the mandragora, the Majesty of this great godsummoned the miller which is in Heliopolis that he might bray it; andthe women-servants having crushed grain for the beer, the mandragora, and also human blood, were mingled with the liquor, and thereof was madein all seven thousand jars of beer. Râ himself examined this delectabledrink, and finding it to possess the wished-for properties: "'It iswell, ' said he; 'therewith shall I save men from the goddess;' then, addressing those of his train: 'Take these jars in your arms, and carrythem to the place where she has slaughtered men. ' Râ, the king, causeddawn to break at midnight, so that this philtre might be poured downupon the earth; and the fields were flooded with it to the depth of fourpalms, according as it pleased the souls of his Majesty. " In the morningthe goddess came, "that she might return to her carnage, but shefound that all was flooded, and her countenance softened; when she haddrunken, it was her heart that softened; she went away drunk, withoutfurther thought of men. " There was some fear lest her fury might returnwhen the fumes of drunkenness were past, and to obviate this dangerRâ instituted a rite, partly with the object of instructing futuregenerations as to the chastisement which he had inflicted upon theimpious, partly to console Sokhît for her discomfiture. He decreedthat "on New Year's Day there should be brewed for her as many jars ofphiltre as there were priestesses of the sun. That was the origin ofall those jars of philtre, in number equal to that of the priestesses, which, at the feast of Hâthor, all men make from that day forth. "

Peace was re-established, but could it last long? Would not men, assoon as they had recovered from their terror, betake themselves again toplotting against the god? Besides, Râ now felt nothing but disgust forour race. The ingratitude of his children had wounded him deeply; heforesaw ever-renewed rebellions as his feebleness became more marked, and he shrank from having to order new massacres in which mankind wouldperish altogether. "By my life, " says he to the gods who accompaniedhim, "my heart is too weary for me to remain with mankind, and slay themuntil they are no more: annihilation is not of the gifts that I loveto make. " And the gods exclaim in surprise: "Breathe not a word of thyweariness at a time when thou dost triumph at thy pleasure. " But Râ doesnot yield to their representations; he will leave a kingdom whereinthey murmur against him, and turning towards Nû he says: "My limbs aredecrepit for the first time; I will not go to any place where I canbe reached. " It was no easy matter to find him an inaccessible retreatowing to the imperfect state in which the universe had been left by thefirst effort of the demiurge. Nû saw no other way out of the difficultythan that of setting to work to complete the creation. Ancient traditionhad imagined the separation of earth and sky as an act of violenceexercised by Shu upon Sibû and Nûît. History presented facts after aless brutal fashion, and Shû became a virtuous son who devoted his timeand strength to upholding Nûît, that he might thereby do his father aservice. Nûît, for her part, showed herself to be a devoted daughterwhom there was no need to treat roughly in order to teach her her duty;of herself she consented to leave her husband, and place her belovedancestor beyond reach. "The Majesty of Nû said: 'Son Shu, do as thyfather Râ shall say; and thou, daughter Nûît, place him upon thy backand hold him suspended above the earth!' Nûît said: 'And how then, myfather Nû?' Thus spake Nûît, and she did that which Nû commanded her;she changed herself into a cow, and placed the Majesty of Râ upon herback. When those men who had not been slain came to give thanks to Râ, behold! they found him no longer in his palace; but a cow stood there, and they perceived him upon the back of the cow. " They found him soresolved to depart that they did not try to turn him from his purpose, but only desired to give him such a proof of their repentance as shouldassure them of the complete pardon of their crime. "They said unto him:'Wait until the morning, O Râ! our lord, and we will strike down thineenemies who have taken counsel against thee. ' So his Majesty returned tohis mansion, descended from the cow, went in along with them, and earthwas plunged into darkness. But when there was light upon earth the nextmorning, the men went forth with their bows and their arrows, and beganto shoot at the enemy. Whereupon the Majesty of this god said unto them:'Your sins are remitted unto you, for sacrifice precludes the executionof the guilty. ' And this was the origin upon earth of sacrifices inwhich blood was shed. "

Thus it was that when on the point of separating for ever, the godand men came to an understanding as to the terms of their futurerelationship. Men offered to the god the life of those who had offendedhim. Human sacrifice was in their eyes the obligatory sacrifice, theonly one which could completely atone for the wrongs committed againstthe godhead; man alone was worthy to wash away with his blood the sinsof men. [*] For this one time the god accepted the expiation just as itwas offered to him; then the repugnance which he felt to killing hischildren overcame him, he substituted beast for man, and decided thatoxen, gazelles, birds, should henceforth furnish the material forsacrifice. [**]

 * This legend, which seeks to explain the discontinuance of human sacrifices among the Egyptians, affords direct proof of their existence in primitive times. This is confirmed by many facts. We shall see that _ûashbîti_ laid in graves were in place of the male or female slaves who were originally slaughtered at the tombs of the rich and noble that they might go to serve their masters in the next world. Even in Thebes, under the XIXth dynasty, certain rock-cut tombs contain scenes which might lead us to believe that occasionally at least human victims were sent to doubles of distinction. During this same period, moreover, the most distinguished hostile chiefs taken in war were still put to death before the gods. In several towns, as at Eilithyia and at Heliopolis, or before certain gods, such as Osiris or Kronos-Sibû, human sacrifice lasted until near Roman times. But generally speaking it was very rare. Almost everywhere cakes of a particular shape, and called [Greek word], or else animals, had been substituted for man. 

 ** It was asserted that the partisans of Apôpi and of Sît, who were the enemies of Râ, Osiris, and the other gods, had taken refuge in the bodies of certain animals. Hence, it was really human or divine victims which were offered when beasts were slaughtered in sacrifice before the altars. 

This point settled, he again mounted the cow, who rose, supported on herfour legs as on so many pillars; and her belly, stretched out above theearth like a ceiling, formed the sky. He busied himself with organizingthe new world which he found on her back; he peopled it with manybeings, chose two districts in which to establish his abode, the Fieldof Reeds--_Sokhît Ialû_--and the Field of Rest--_Sokhît Hotpît_--andsuspended the stars which were to give light by night. All this isrelated with many plays upon words, intended, according to Orientalcustom, as explanations of the names which the legend assigned to thedifferent regions of heaven. At sight of a plain whose situation pleasedhim, he cried: "The Field rests in the distance!"--and that wasthe origin of the Field of Rest. He added: "There will I gatherplants!"--and from this the Field of Reeds took its name. While he gavehimself up to this philological pastime, Nûît, suddenly transported tounaccustomed heights, grew frightened, and cried for help: "For pity'ssake give me supports to sustain me!" This was the origin of thesupport-gods. They came and stationed themselves by each of her fourlegs, steadying these with their hands, and keeping constant watch overthem. As this was not enough to reassure the good beast, "Râ said, 'Myson Shû, place thyself beneath my daughter Nûît, and keep watch on bothsides over the supports, who live in the twilight; hold thou herup above thy head, and be her guardian!'" Shû obeyed; Nûît composedherself, and the world, now furnished with the sky which it had hithertolacked, assumed its present symmetrical form. 

Shû and Sibû succeeded Râ, but did not acquire so lasting a popularityas their great ancestor. Nevertheless they had their annals, fragmentsof which have come down to us. Their power also extended over the wholeuniverse: "The Majesty of Shû was the excellent king of the sky, of theearth, of Hades, of the water, of the winds, of the inundation, ofthe two chains of mountains, of the sea, governing with a true voiceaccording to the precepts of his father Râ-Harmakhis. "

[Illustration: 242. Jpg COW, SUSTAINED ABOVE THE EARTH BY SHÛ AND THESUPPORT]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin. 

Only "the children of the serpent Apôpi, the impious ones who hauntthe solitary places and the deserts, " disavowed his authority. Like theBedawîn of later times, they suddenly streamed in by the isthmus routes, went up into Egypt under cover of night, slew and pillaged, and thenhastily returned to their fastnesses with the booty which they hadcarried off. From sea to sea Ka had fortified the eastern frontieragainst them. He had surrounded the principal cities with walls, embellished them with temples, and placed within them those mysterioustalismans more powerful for defence than a garrison of men. ThusAît-nobsû, near the mouth of the Wady-Tûmilât, possessed one of therods of the Sun-god, also the living uraeus of his crown whose breathconsumes all that it touches, and, finally, a lock of his hair, which, being cast into the waters of a lake, was changed into a hawk-headedcrocodile to tear the invader in pieces. [*]

 * Egyptians of all periods never shrank from such marvels. One of the tales of the Theban empire tells us of a piece of wax which, on being thrown into the water, changed into a living crocodile capable of devouring a man. The talismans which protected Egypt against invasion are mentioned by the Pseudo-Callisthenes, who attributes their invention to Nectanebo. Arab historians often refer to them. 

The employment of these talismans was dangerous to those unaccustomedto use them, even to the gods themselves. Scarcely was Sibû enthroned asthe successor of Shu, who, tired of reigning, had reascended into heavenin a nine days' tempest, before he began his inspection of the easternmarches, and caused the box in which was kept the uræus of Râ to beopened. "As soon as the living viper had breathed its breath against theMajesty of Sibû there was a great disaster--great indeed, for thosewho were in the train of the god perished, and his Majesty himself wasburned in that day. When his Majesty had fled to the north of Aît-nobsû, pursued by the fire of this magic urasus, behold! when he came to thefields of henna, the pain of his burn was not yet assuaged, and the godswho were behind him said unto him: 'O Sire! let them take the lock of Râwhich is there, when thy Majesty shall go to see it and its mystery, andhis Majesty shall be healed as soon as it shall be placed upon thee. 'So the Majesty of Sibû caused the magic lock to be brought toPiarît, --the lock for which was made that great reliquary of hard stonewhich is hidden in the secret place of Piarît, in the district of thedivine lock of the Lord Râ, --and behold! this fire departed from themembers of the Majesty of Sibû. And many years afterwards, when thislock, which had thus belonged to Sibû, was brought back to Piarîtin Aît-nobsû, and cast into the great lake of Piarît whose name is_Aît-tostesû_, the dwelling of waves, that it might be purified, behold!this lock became a crocodile: it flew to the water and became Sobkû, the divine crocodile of Aît-nobsû. " In this way the gods of the solardynasty from generation to generation multiplied talismans and enrichedthe sanctuaries of Egypt with relics. 

[Illustration: 244. Jpg THREE OF THE DIVINE AMULETS PRESERVED IN THETEMPLE OF AÎT-NOBSÛ AT THE ROMAN PERIOD. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a sketch by Griffith. The three talismans here represented are two crowns, each in a naos, and the burning fiery uræus. 

Were there ever duller legends and a more senile phantasy! They did notspring spontaneously from the lips of the people, but were composed atleisure by priests desirous of enhancing the antiquity of their cult, and augmenting the veneration of its adherents in order to increaseits importance. Each city wished it to be understood that its feudalsanctuary was founded upon the very day of creation, that its privilegeshad been extended or confirmed during the course of the first divinedynasty, and that these pretensions were supported by the presenceof objects in its treasury which had belonged to the oldest of theking-gods. Such was the origin of tales in which the personage of thebeneficent Pharaoh is often depicted in ridiculous fashion. Did wepossess all the sacred archives, we should frequently find them quotingas authentic history more than one document as artificial as thechronicle of Aît-nobsû. When we come to the later members of the Ennead, there is a change in the character and in the form of these tales. Doubtless Osiris and Sît did not escape unscathed out of the hands ofthe theologians; but even if sacerdotal interference spoiled the legendconcerning them, it did not altogether disfigure it. Here and therein it is still noticeable a sincerity of feeling and liveliness ofimagination such as are never found in those of Shû and of Sibû. This arises from the fact that the functions of these gods left themstrangers, or all but strangers, to the current affairs of the world. Shû was the stay, Sibû the material foundation of the world; and so longas the one bore the weight of the firmament without bending, and theother continued to suffer the tread of human generations upon hisback, the devout took no more thought of them than they themselvestook thought of the devout. The life of Osiris, on the other hand, wasintimately mingled with that of the Egyptians, and his most trivialactions immediately reacted upon their fortunes. They followed themovements of his waters; they noted the turning-points in his strugglesagainst drought; they registered his yearly decline, yearly compensatedby his aggressive returns and his intermittent victories over Typhon;his proceedings and his character were the subject of their minutestudy. If his waters almost invariably rose upon the appointed day andextended over the black earth of the valley, this was no mechanicalfunction of a being to whom the consequences of his conduct areindifferent; he acted upon reflection, and in full consciousness of theservice that he rendered. He knew that by spreading the inundationhe prevented the triumph of the desert; he was life, he wasgoodness--_Onnofriû_--and Isis, as the partner of his labours, becamelike him the type of perfect goodness. But while Osiris developedfor the better, Sit was transformed for the worse, and increased inwickedness as his brother gained in purity and moral elevation. Inproportion as the person of Sît grew more defined, and stood out moreclearly, the evil within him contrasted more markedly with the innategoodness of Osiris, and what had been at first an instinctive strugglebetween two beings somewhat vaguely defined--the desert and the Nile, water and drought--was changed into conscious and deadly enmity. Nolonger the conflict of two elements, it was war between two gods; onelabouring to produce abundance, while the other strove to do away withit; one being all goodness and life, while the other was evil and deathincarnate. 

A very ancient legend narrates that the birth of Osiris and his brotherstook place during the five additional days at the end of the year; asubsequent legend explained how Nûît and Sibû had contracted marriageagainst the express wish of Râ, and without his knowledge. When hebecame aware of it he fell into a violent rage, and cast a spell overthe goddess to prevent her giving birth to her children in any month ofany year whatever. But Thot took pity upon her, and playing at draughtswith the moon won from it in several games one seventy-second part ofits fires, out of which he made five whole days; and as these were notincluded in the ordinary calendar, Nûît could then bring forth her fivechildren, one after another: Osiris, Haroêris, Sit, Isis, and Nephthys. Osiris was beautiful of face, but with a dull and black complexion; hisheight exceeded five and a half yards. [*]

 * As a matter of fact, Osiris is often represented with black or green hands and face, as is customary for gods of the dead; it was probably this peculiarity which suggested the popular idea of his black complexion. A magic papyrus of Ramesside times fixes the stature of the god at seven cubits, and a phrase in a Ptolemaic inscription places it at eight cubits, six palms, three fingers. 

He was born at Thebes, in the first of the additional days, and straightway a mysterious voice announced that the lord ofall--_nibû-r-zarû_--had appeared. The good news was hailed with shoutsof joy, followed by tears and lamentations when it became known withwhat evils he was menaced. [*] The echo reached Râ in his far-offdwelling, and his heart rejoiced, notwithstanding the curse which hehad laid upon Nûît. He commanded the presence of his great-grandchildin Xoïs, and unhesitatingly acknowledged him as the heir to his throne. Osiris had married his sister Isis, even, so it was said, while both ofthem were still within their mother's womb;[**] and when he became kinghe made her queen regent and the partner of all his undertakings. 

 * One variant of the legend told that a certain Pamylis of Thebes having gone to draw water had heard a voice proceeding from the temple of Zeus, which ordered him to proclaim aloud to the world the birth of the great king, the beneficent Osiris. He had received the child from the hands of Kronos, brought it up to youth, and to him the Egyptians had consecrated the feast of Pamylies, which resembled the Phallophoros festival of the Greeks. 

 ** _De Iside et Osiride_, Leemans' edition, § 12, pp. 20, 21. Haroêris, the Apollo of the Greeks, was supposed to be the issue of a marriage consummated before the birth of his parents while they were still within the womb of their mother Rhea-Nûît. This was a way of connecting the personage of Haroêris with the Osirian myths by confounding him with the homonymous Harsiêsis, the son of Isis, who became the son of Osiris through his mother's marriage with that god. 

The Egyptians were as yet but half civilized; they were cannibals, andthough occasionally they lived upon the fruits of the earth, they didnot know how to cultivate them. Osiris taught them the art of makingagricultural implements--the plough and the hoe, --field labour, therotation of crops, the harvesting of wheat and barley, [*] and vineculture. 

 * Diodoeus even ascribes to him the discovery of barley and of wheat; this is consequent upon the identification of Isis with Demeter by the Greeks. According to the historian, Leo of Pella, the goddess twined herself a crown of ripe ears and placed it upon her head one day when she was sacrificing to her parents. 

Isis weaned them from cannibalism, healed their diseases by means ofmedicine or of magic, united women to men in legitimate marriage, andshowed them how to grind grain between two flat stones and to preparebread for the household. She invented the loom with the help of hersister Nephthys, and was the first to weave and bleach linen. Therewas no worship of the gods before Osiris established it, appointed theofferings, regulated the order of ceremonies, and composed the texts andmelodies of the liturgies. He built cities, among them Thebes itself, according to some; though others declared that he was born there. As hehad been the model of a just and pacific king, so did he desire to bethat of a victorious conqueror of nations; and, placing the regency inthe hands of Isis, he went forth to war against Asia, accompanied byThot the ibis and the jackal Anubis. He made little or no use of forceand arms, but he attacked men by gentleness and persuasion, softenedthem with songs in which voices were accompanied by instruments, andtaught them also the arts which he had made known to the Egyptians. No country escaped his beneficent action, and he did not return to thebanks of the Nile until he had traversed and civilized the world fromone horizon to the other. 

Sît-Typhon was red-haired and white-skinned, of violent, gloomy, andjealous temper. [*] Secretly he aspired to the crown, and nothing but thevigilance of Isis had kept him from rebellion during the absence of hisbrother. The rejoicings which celebrated the king's return to Memphisprovided Sit with his opportunity for seizing the throne. 

 * The colour of his hair was compared with that of a red- haired ass, and on that account the ass was sacred to him. As to his violent and jealous disposition, see the opinion of Diodorus Siculus, book i. 21, and the picture drawn by Synesius in his pamphlet Ægyptius. It was told how he tore his mother's bowels at birth, and made his own way into the world through her side. 

[Illustration: 250. Jpg THE OSMIAN TRIAD HOKUS. OSIRIS, ISIS. 2]

 2 Drawing by Boudier of the gold group in the Louvre Museum. The drawing is made from a photograph which belonged to M. De Witte, before the monument was acquired by E. De Rougé in 1871. The little square pillar of lapis-lazuli, upon which Osiris squats, is wrongly set up, and the names and titles of King Osorkon, the dedicator of the triad, are placed upside down. 

He invited Osiris to a banquet along with seventy-two officers whosesupport he had ensured, made a wooden chest of cunning workmanship andordered that it should be brought in to him, in the midst of the feast. As all admired its beauty, he sportively promised to present it to anyone among the guests whom it should exactly fit. All of them tried it, one after another, and all unsuccessfully; but when Osiris lay downwithin it, immediately the conspirators shut to the lid, nailed itfirmly down, soldered it together with melted lead, and then threw itinto the Tanitic branch of the Nile, which carried it to the sea. Thenews of the crime spread terror on all sides. The gods friendly toOsiris feared the fate of their master, and hid themselves within thebodies of animals to escape the malignity of the new king. Isis cut offher hair, rent her garments, and set out in search of the chest. Shefound it aground near the mouth of the river[*] under the shadow ofa gigantic acacia, deposited it in a secluded place where no one evercame, and then took refuge in Bûto, her own domain and her nativecity, whose marshes protected her from the designs of Typhon even as inhistoric times they protected more than one Pharaoh from the attacks ofhis enemies. There she gave birth to the young Horus, nursed and rearedhim in secret among the reeds, far from the machinations of the wickedone. [**]

 * At this point the legend of the Saïte and Greek period interpolates a whole chapter, telling how the chest was carried out to sea and cast upon the Phoenician coast near to Byblos. The acacia, a kind of heather or broom in this case, grew up enclosing the chest within its trunk. This addition to the primitive legend must date from the XVIIIth to the XXth dynasties, when Egypt had extensive relations with the peoples of Asia. No trace of it whatever has hitherto been found upon Egyptian monuments strictly so called; not even on the latest. 

 ** The opening illustration of this chapter (p. 221) is taken from a monument at Phihe, and depicts Isis among the reeds. The representation of the goddess as squatting upon a mat probably gave rise to the legend of the floating isle of Khemmis, which HECATÆUS of Miletus had seen upon the lake of Bûto, but whose existence was denied by Herodotus notwithstanding the testimony of Hecatæus. 

But it happened that Sît, when hunting by moonlight, caught sight of thechest, opened it, and recognizing the corpse, cut it up into fourteenpieces, which he scattered abroad at random. Once more Isis set forth onher woeful pilgrimage. She recovered all the parts of the body exceptingone only, which the oxyrhynchus had greedily devoured;[*] and with thehelp of her sister Nephthys, her son Horus, Anubis, and Thot, she joinedtogether and embalmed them, and made of this collection of his remainsan imperishable mummy, capable of sustaining for ever the soul of a god. On his coming of age, Horus called together all that were left of theloyal Egyptians and formed them into an army. [**]

 * This part of the legend was so thoroughly well known, that by the time of the XIXth dynasty it suggested incidents in popular literature. When Bitiû, the hero of _The Tale of the Two Brothers_, mutilated himself to avoid the suspicion of adultery, he cast his bleeding member into the water, and _the Oxyrhynchus devoured it_. 

 ** Towards the Grecian period there was here interpolated an account of how Osiris had returned from the world of the dead to arm his son and train him to fight. According to this tale he had asked Horus which of all animals seemed to him most useful in time of war, and Horus chose the horse rather than the lion, because the lion avails for the weak or cowardly in need of help, whereas the horse is used for the pursuit and destruction of the enemy. Judging from this reply that Horus was ready to dare all, Osiris allowed him to enter upon the war. The mention of the horse affords sufficient proof that this episode is of comparatively late origin (cf. P. 41 for the date at which the horse was acclimatized in Egypt). 

His "Followers"--_Shosûû Horû_--defeated the "Accomplices ofSît"--_Samiu Sît_--who were now driven in their turn to transformthemselves into gazelles, crocodiles and serpents, --animals which werehenceforth regarded as unclean and Typhonian. For three days the twochiefs had fought together under the forms of men and of hippopotami, when Isis, apprehensive as to the issue of the duel, determined to bringit to an end. "Lo! she caused chains to descend upon them, and made themto drop upon Horus. Thereupon Horus prayed aloud, saying: 'I am thy sonHorus!' Then Isis spake unto the fetters, saying; 'Break, and unlooseyourselves from my son Horus!' She made other fetters to descend, andlet them fall upon her brother Sit. Forthwith he lifted up his voice andcried out in pain, and she spake unto the fetters and said unto them:'Break!' Yea, when Sît prayed unto her many times, saying: 'Wilt thounot have pity upon the brother of thy son's mother?' then her heart wasfilled with compassion, and she cried to the fetters: 'Break, for he ismy eldest brother!' and the fetters unloosed themselves from him, andthe two foes again stood face to face like two men who will not cometo terms. " Horus, furious at seeing his mother deprive him of his prey, turned upon her like a panther of the South. She fled before him on thatday when battle was waged with Sît the Violent, and he cut off her head. But Thot transformed her by his enchantments and made a cow's head forher, thereby identifying her with her companion, Hâthor. 

[Illustration: 253. Jpg ISIS-HATHOR, COW-HEADED. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a bronze statuette of Saïte period in the Gîzeh Museum (Mariette, _Album photographique du musée de Boulaq_, pl. 5, No. 167). 

The war went on, with all its fluctuating fortunes, till the gods atlength decided to summon both rivals before their tribunal. According toa very ancient tradition, the combatants chose the ruler of aneighbouring city, Thot, lord of Hermopolis Parva, as the arbitrator oftheir quarrel. Sît was the first to plead, and he maintained that Horuswas not the son of Osiris, but a bastard, whom Isis haô conceived afterthe death of her husband. Horua triumphantly vindicated the legitimacyof his birth; and Thot condemned Sît to restore, according to some, thewhole of the inheritance which he had wrongly retained, --according toothers, part of it only. The gods ratified the sentence, and awarded tothe arbitrator the title of _Ûapirahûhûi_: he who judges between twoparties. A legend of more recent origin, and circulated after theworship of Osiris had spread over all Egypt, affirmed that the case hadremained within the jurisdiction of Sibû, who was father to the one, andgrandfather to the other party. Sibû, however, had pronounced the samejudgment as Thot, and divided the kingdom into halves--_poshûi_; Sîtretained the valley from the neighbourhood of Memphis to the firstcataract, while Horus entered into possession of the Delta. Egypthenceforth consisted of two distinct kingdoms, of which one, that of theNorth, recognized Horus, the son of Isis, as its patron deity; and theother, that of the South, placed itself under the protection of SîtNûbîti, the god of Ombos. [*]

 * Another form of the legend gives the 27th Athyr as the date of the judgment, assigning Egypt to Horus, and to Sît Nubia, or _Doshirît_, the red land. It must have arisen towards the age of the XVIIIth dynasty, at a time when their piety no longer allowed the devout to admit that the murderer of Osiris could be the legitimate patron of half the country. So _the half_ belonging to Sît was then placed either in Nubia or in the western desert, which had, indeed, been reckoned as his domain from earliest times. 

The moiety of Horus, added to that of Sît, formed the kingdom which Sibûhad inherited; but his children failed to keep it together, though itwas afterwards reunited under Pharaohs of human race. 

The three gods who preceded Osiris upon the throne had ceased to reign, but not to live. Râ had taken refuge in heaven, disgusted with his owncreatures; Shû had disappeared in the midst of a tempest; and Sibû hadquietly retired within his palace when the time of his sojourning uponearth had been fulfilled. Not that there was no death, for death, too, together with all other things and beings, had come into existence inthe beginning, but while cruelly persecuting both man and beast, had fora while respected the gods. Osiris was the first among them to be struckdown, and hence to require funeral rites. He also was the first for whomfamily piety sought to provide a happy life beyond the tomb. Though hewas king of the living and the dead at Mendes by virtue of the rights ofall the feudal gods in their own principalities, his sovereignty afterdeath exempted him no more than the meanest of his subjects from thatpainful torpor into which all mortals fell on breathing their last. Butpopular imagination could not resign itself to his remaining in thatmiserable state for ever. What would it have profited him to haveIsis the great Sorceress for his wife, the wise Horus for his son, two master-magicians--Thot the Ibis and the jackal Anubis--for hisservants, if their skill had not availed to ensure him a less gloomyand less lamentable after-life than that of men. Anubis had long beforeinvented the art of mummifying, and his mysterious science had securedthe everlasting existence of the flesh; but at what a price!

[Illustration: 256. Jpg THE OSIRIAN MUMMY PREPARED AND LAID UPON THEFUNERARY COUCH BY THE JACKAL ANUBIS. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from Rosellint, _Monumenti Civili_, pl. Cxxxiv. 2. While Anubis is stretching out his hands to lay out the mummy on its couch, the soul is hovering above its breast, and holding to its nostrils the sceptre, and the wind-filled sail which is the emblem of breath and of the new life. 

For the breathing, warm, fresh-coloured body, spontaneous in movementand function, was substituted an immobile, cold and blackish mass, asufficient basis for the mechanical continuity of the double, but whichthat double could neither raise nor guide; whose weight paralysed andwhose inertness condemned it to vegetate in darkness, without pleasureand almost without consciousness of existence. Thot, Isis, and Horusapplied themselves in the case of Osiris to ameliorating the discomfortand constraint entailed by the more primitive embalmment. 

[Illustration: 257. Jpg THE RECEPTION OP THE MUMMY BY ANUBIS AT THE DOOROP THE TOMB, AND THE OPENING OF THE MOUTH. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a painting in the tomb of a king in the Theban necropolis. 

They did not dispense with the manipulations instituted by Anubis, but endued them with new power by means of magic. They inscribed theprincipal bandages with protective figures and formulas; they decoratedthe body with various amulets of specific efficacy for its differentparts; they drew numerous scenes of earthly existence and of the lifebeyond the tomb upon the boards of the coffin and upon the walls ofthe sepulchral chamber. When the body had been made imperishable, theysought to restore one by one all the faculties of which their previousoperations had deprived it. The mummy was set up at the entrance to thevault; the statue representing the living person was placed beside it, and semblance was made of opening the mouth, eyes, and ears, of loosingthe arms and legs, of restoring breath to the throat and movement to theheart. The incantations by which these acts were severally accompaniedwere so powerful that the god spoke and ate, lived and heard, and coulduse his limbs as freely as though he had never been steeped in the bathof the embalmer. He might have returned to his place among men, andvarious legends prove that he did occasionally appear to his faithfuladherents. But, as his ancestors before him, he preferred to leavetheir towns and withdraw into his own domain. The cemeteries of theinhabitants of Busiris and of Mendes were called _Sokhît Ialû_, theMeadow of Reeds, and _Sokhît Hotpû_, the Meadow of Best. They weresecluded amid the marshes, in small archipelagoes of sandy islets wherethe dead bodies, piled together, rested in safety from the inundations. This was the first kingdom of the dead Osiris, but it was soon placedelsewhere, as the nature of the surrounding districts and the geographyof the adjacent countries became better known; at first perhaps on thePhoenician shore beyond the sea, and then in the sky, in the Milky Way, between the North and the East, but nearer to the North than to theEast. This kingdom was not gloomy and mournful like that of the otherdead gods, Sokaris or Khontamentît, but was lighted by sun and moon;the heat of the day was tempered by the steady breath of the north wind, and its crops grew and throve abundantly. 

[Illustration: 259. Jpg OSIKIS IN HADES, ACCOMPANIED BY ISIS, AMENTÎT, AND NEPHTHYS, RECEIVES THE HOMAGE OF TRUTH. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Daniel Héron, taken in 1881 in the temple of Seti I. At Abydos. 

Thick walls served as fortifications against the attacks of Sit andevil genii; a palace like that of the Pharaohs stood in the midstof delightful gardens; and there, among his own people, Osiris led atranquil existence, enjoying in succession all the pleasures of earthlylife without any of its pains. 

The goodness which had gained him the title of Onnophris while hesojourned here below, inspired him with the desire and suggested themeans of opening the gates of his paradise to the souls of his formersubjects. Souls did not enter into it unexamined, nor without trial. Each of them had first to prove that during its earthly life it hadbelonged to a friend, or, as the Egyptian texts have it, to a vassal ofOsiris--_amakhû khir Osiri_--one of those who had served Horus in hisexile and had rallied to his banner from the very beginning of theTyphonian wars. 

[Illustration: 260. Jpg THE DECEASED CLIMBING THE SLOPE OF THE MOUNTAINOF THE WEST, 2]

 2 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from Naville Bas Ægyptische Todtenbuch, vol. I. Pl. Cxxviii. Ai. 

These were those followers of Horus--_Shosûû Horû_--so often referred toin the literature of historic times. [*]

 * Cf, p. 252. The _Followers of Horns_, i. E. Those who had followed Horus during the Typhonian wars, are mentioned in a Turin fragment of the Canon of the Kings, in which the author summarizes the chronology of the divine period. Like the reign of Râ, the time in which the followers of Horus were supposed to have lived was for the Egyptians of classic times the ultimate point beyond which history did not reach. 

Horus, their master, having loaded them with favours during life, decided to extend to them after death the same privileges which he hadconferred upon his father. He convoked around the corpse the gods whohad worked with him at the embalmment of Osiris: Anubis and Thot, Isis and Nephthys, and his four children--Hâpi, Qabhsonûf, Amsît, andTiûmaûtf--to whom he had entrusted the charge of the heart and viscera. They all performed their functions exactly as before, repeated the sameceremonies, and recited the same formulas at the same stages of theoperations, and so effectively that the dead man became a real Osirisunder their hands, having a true voice, and henceforth combining thename of the god with his own. 

[Illustration: 261. Jpg THE MUMMY OF SÛTIMOSÛ CLASPING HIS SOUL INTO HISARMS. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from Guieysse-Lefébure, _Le Papyrus de Soutimès_, pl. Viii. The outlines of the original have unfortunately been restored and enfeebled by the copyist. 

He had been Sakhomka or Menkaûrî; he became the Osiris Sakhomka, or theOsiris Menkaûrî, true of voice. Horus and his companions then celebratedthe rites consecrated to the "Opening of the Mouth and the Eyes:"animated the statue of the deceased, and placed the mummy in the tomb, where Anubis received it in his arms. Recalled to life and movement, thedouble reassumed, one by one, all the functions of being, came and wentand took part in the ceremonies of the worship which was rendered to himin his tomb. There he might be seen accepting the homage of hiskindred, and clasping to his breast his soul under the form of a greathuman-headed bird with features the counterpart of his own. After beingequipped with the formulas and amulets wherewith his prototype, Osiris, had been furnished, he set forth to seek the "Field of Reeds. " The waywas long and arduous, strewn with perils to which he must have succumbedat the very first stages had he not been carefully warned beforehand andarmed against them. 

[Illustration: 262. Jpg CYNOCEPHALI DRAWING THE NET IN WHICH SOULS ARECAUGHT. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a facsimile by Dévèria (E. De Rougé, _Études sur le Rituel Funéraire_, pl. Iv. No. 4). Ignorant souls fished for by the cynocephali are here represented as fish; but the soul of Nofirûbnû, instructed in the protective formulas, preserves its human form. 

A papyrus placed with the mummy in its coffin contained the needfultopo-graphical directions and passwords, in order that he mightneither stray nor perish by the way. The wiser Egyptians copied out theprincipal chapters for themselves, or learned them by heart while yetin life, in order to be prepared for the life beyond. Those who had nottaken this precaution studied after death the copy with which they wereprovided; and since few Egyptians could read, a priest, or relative ofthe deceased, preferably his son, recited the prayers in the mummy'sear, that he might learn them before he was carried away to thecemetery. If the double obeyed the prescriptions of the "Book of theDead" to the letter, he reached his goal without fail. [*] On leavingthe tomb he turned his back on the valley, and staff in hand climbedthe hills which bounded it on the west, plunging boldly into the desert, where some bird, or even a kindly insect such as a praying mantis, agrasshopper, or a butterfly, served as his guide. Soon he came to one ofthose sycamores which grow in the sand far away from the Nile, andare regarded as magic trees by the fellahîn. Out of the foliage agoddess--Nûît, ïïâthor, or Nît--half emerged, and offered him a dish offruit, loaves of bread, and a jar of water. 

 * Manuscripts of this work represent about nine-tenths of the papyri hitherto discovered. They are not all equally full; complete copies are still relatively scarce, and most of those found with mummies contain nothing but extracts of varying length. The book itself was studied by Champollion, who called it the _Funerary Ritual_; Lepsius afterwards gave it the less definite name of _Book of the Dead_, which seems likely to prevail. It has been chiefly known from the hieroglyphic copy at Turin, which Lepsius traced and had lithographed in 1841, under the title of _Das Todtenbuch der Ægypter_. In 1865, E. Du Rougé began to publish a hieratic copy in the Louvre, but since 1886 there has been a critical edition of manuscripts of the Theban period most carefully collated by E. Naville, _Das Mgyptische Todtenbuch der XVIII bis XX Dynastie_, Berlin, 1886, 2 vols, of plates in folio, and 1 vol. Of Introduction in 4to. On this edition see Maspero, _Études de Mythologie et d'Archéologie Égyptiennes_, vol. I. Pp. 325-387. 

By accepting these gifts he became the guest of the goddess, and couldnever more retrace his steps[*] without special permission. Beyondthe sycamore were lands of terror, infested by serpents and ferociousbeasts, furrowed by torrents of boiling water, intersected by ponds andmarshes where gigantic monkeys cast their nets. 

 * Maspero, _Études de Mythologie et d'Archéologie Égyptiennes_, vol. Ii. Pp. 224-227. It was not in Egypt alone that the fact of accepting food offered by a god of the dead constituted a recognition of suzerainty, and prevented the human soul from returning to the world of the living. Traces of this belief are found everywhere, in modern as in ancient times, and E. B. Tylob, has collected numerous examples of the same in Primitive Culture, 2nd edit. , vol. Ii. Pp. 47, 51, 52. 

[Illustration: 264. Jpg THE DECEASED AND HIS WIFE SEATED IN FRONT OF THESYCAMORE OF NÛÎT AND RECEIVING THE BREAD AND WATER OF THE NEXT WORLD. 2]

 2 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a coloured plate in Rosellini, _Monumenti civili. _, pl. Cxxxiv. 3. 

Ignorant souls, or those ill prepared for the struggle, had no easy workbefore them when they imprudently entered upon it. Those who were notovercome by hunger and thirst at the outset were bitten by a urasus, orhorned viper, hidden with evil intent below the sand, and perished inconvulsions from the poison; or crocodiles seized as many of them asthey could lay hold of at the fords of rivers; or cynocephali nettedand devoured them indiscriminately along with the fish into which thepartisans of Typhon were transformed. They came safe and sound out ofone peril only to fall into another, and infallibly succumbed beforethey were half through their journey. But, on the other hand, thedouble who was equipped and instructed, and armed with the true voice, confronted each foe with the phylactery and the incantation by which hisenemy was held in check. As soon as he caught sight of one of them herecited the appropriate chapter from his book, he loudly proclaimedhimself Râ, Tûmû, Horus, or Khopri--that god whose name and attributeswere best fitted to repel the immediate danger--and flames withdrew athis voice, monsters fled or sank paralysed, the most cruel of geniidrew in their claws and lowered their arms before him. He compelledcrocodiles to turn away their heads; he transfixed serpents with hislance; he supplied himself at pleasure with all the provisions that heneeded, and gradually ascended the mountains which surround the world, sometimes alone, and fighting his way step by step, sometimes escortedby beneficent divinities. Halfway up the slope was the good cow Hâfchor, the lady of the West, in meadows of tall plants where every eveningshe received the sun at his setting. If the dead man knew how to askit according to the prescribed rite, she would take him upon hershoulders[*] and carry him across the accursed countries at full speed. 

 * Coffins of the XXth and XXIst dynasties, with a yellow ground, often display this scene. Generally the scene is found beneath the feet of the dead, at the lower end of the cartonage, and the cow is represented as carrying off at a gallop the mummy who is lying on her back. 

[Illustration: 266. Jpg THE DECEASED PIERCING A SERPENT WITH HIS LANCE. 2]

 2 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a sketch by Naville (_Das Ægyptische Todtenbuch_, vol. I. Pl. Iii. P b). The commonest enemies of the dead were various kinds of serpents. 

Having reached the North, he paused at the edge of an immense lake, thelake of Kha, and saw in the far distance the outline of the Islands ofthe Blest. One tradition, so old as to have been almost forgotten inRames-side times, told how Thot the ibis there awaited him, and borehim away on his wings;[***] another, no less ancient but of more lastingpopularity, declared that a ferry-boat plied regularly between the solidearth and the shores of paradise. 

 *** It is often mentioned in the Pyramid texts, and inspired one of the most obscure chapters among them (_Teti_, 11. 185-200; cf. _Recueil de Travaux_, vol. V. Pp. 22, 23). It seems that the ibis had to fight with Sit for right of passage. 

The god who directed it questioned the dead, and the bark itselfproceeded to examine them before they were admitted on board; for itwas a magic bark. "Tell me my name, " cried the mast; and the travellersreplied: "He who guides the great goddess on her way is thy name. " "Tellme my name, " repeated the braces. "The Spine of the Jackal Ûapûaîtû isthy name. " "Tell me my name, " proceeded the mast-head. 

[Illustration: 267. Jpg THE GOOD COW HÂTHOR CARRYING THE DEAD MAN AND HISSOUL. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a coloured facsimile published by Leemans, _Monuments Égyptiens du Musée d' Antiquités des Pays-Bas à Leyden_, part iii. Pl. Xii. 

"The Neck of Amsît is thy name. " "Tell me my name, " asked the sail. "Nûît is thy name. " Each part of the hull and of the rigging spokein turn and questioned the applicant regarding its name, this beinggenerally a mystic phrase by which it was identified either with somedivinity as a whole, or else with some part of his body. 

When the double had established his right of passage by the correctnessof his answers, the bark consented to receive him and to carry him tothe further shore. There he was met by the gods and goddesses of thecourt of Osiris: by Anubis, by Hathor the lady of the cemetery, by Nît, by the two Màîts who preside over justice and truth, and by the fourchildren of Horus stiff-sheathed in their mummy wrappings. They formedas it were a guard of honour to introduce him and his winged guide intoan immense hall, the ceiling of which rested on light graceful columnsof painted wood. 

[Illustration: 268. Jpg ANUBIS AND THOT WEIGHING THE HEART OF THEDECEASED IN THE SCALES OF TRUTH. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from pl. Cxxxvi. Ag of Naville's _Das Thebanische Todtenbuch_. 

At the further end of the hall Osiris was seated in mysterious twilightwithin a shrine through whose open doors he might be seen wearing a rednecklace over his close-fitting case of white bandaging, his green facesurmounted by the tall white diadem flanked by two plumes, his slenderhands grasping flail and crook, the emblems of his power. 

[Illustration: 269. Jpg THE DECEASED IS BROUGHT BEFORE THE SHRINE OFOSIRIS THE JUDGE BY HORUS, THE SON OF ISIS. ]

Behind him stood Isis and Nephthys watching over him with upliftedhands, bare bosoms, and bodies straitly cased in linen. Forty-two jurorswho had died and been restored to life like their lord, and who hadbeen chosen, one from each of those cities of Egypt which recognizedhis authority, squatted right and left, and motionless, clothed in thewrappings of the dead, silently waited until they were addressed. The soul first advanced to the foot of the throne, carrying on itsoutstretched hands the image of its heart or of its eyes, agents andaccomplices of its sins and virtues. It humbly "smelt the earth, " thenarose, and with uplifted hands recited its profession of faith. "Hailunto you, ye lords of Truth! hail to thee, great god, lord of Truth andJustice! I have come before thee, my master; I have been brought to seethy beauties. For I know thee, I know thy name, I know the names of thyforty-two gods who are with thee in the Hall of the Two Truths, livingon the remains of sinners, gorging themselves with their blood, in thatday when account is rendered before Onnophris, the true of voice. Thyname which is thine is 'the god whose two twins are the ladies of thetwo Truths;' and I, I know you, ye lords of the two Truths, I bring untoyou Truth, I have destroyed sins for you. I have not committed iniquityagainst men! I have not oppressed the poor! I have not made defalcationsin the necropolis! I have not laid labour upon any free man beyond thatwhich he wrought for himself! I have not transgressed, I have notbeen weak, I have not defaulted, I have not committed that which is anabomination to the gods. I have not caused the slave to be ill-treatedof his master! I have not starved any man, I have not made any toweep, I have not assassinated any man, I have not caused any man to betreacherously assassinated, and I have not committed treason againstany! I have not in aught diminished the supplies of temples! I have notspoiled the shrewbread of the gods! I have not taken away the loaves andthe wrappings of the dead! I have done no carnal act within the sacredenclosure of the temple! I have not blasphemed! I have in noughtcurtailed the sacred revenues! I have not pulled down the scale of thebalance! I have not falsified the beam of the balance! I have not takenaway the milk from the mouths of sucklings! I have not lassoed cattle ontheir pastures! I have not taken with nets the birds of the gods! Ihave not fished in their ponds! I have not turned back the water in itsseason! I have not cut off a water-channel in its course! I have notput out the fire in its time! I have not defrauded the Nine Gods of thechoice part of victims! I have not ejected the oxen of the gods! I havenot turned back the god at his coming forth! I am pure! I am pure! I ampure! I am pure! Pure as this Great Bonû of Heracleopolis is pure!... There is no crime against me in this land of the Double Truth! Since Iknow the names of the gods who are with thee in the Hall of the DoubleTruth, save thou me from them!" He then turned towards the jury andpleaded his cause before them. They had been severally appointed forthe cognizance of particular sins, and the dead man took each of them byname to witness that he was innocent of the sin which that one recorded. His plea ended, he returned to the supreme judge, and repeated, underwhat is sometimes a highly mystic form, the ideas which he had alreadyadvanced in the first part of his address. "Hail unto you, ye gods whoare in the Great Hall of the Double Truth, who have no falsehood inyour bosoms, but who live on Truth in Aûnû, and feed your hearts upon itbefore the Lord God who dwelleth in his solar disc! Deliver me fromthe Typhon who feedeth on entrails, O chiefs! in this hour of supremejudgment;--grant that the deceased may come unto you, he who hath notsinned, who hath neither lied, nor done evil, nor committed any crime, who hath not borne false witness, who hath done nought against himself, but who liveth on truth, who feedeth on truth. He hath spread joy on allsides; men speak of that which he hath done, and the gods rejoice in it. He hath reconciled the god to him by his love; he hath given bread tothe hungry, water to the thirsty, clothing to the naked; he hath givena boat to the shipwrecked; he hath offered sacrifices to the gods, sepulchral meals unto the manes. Deliver him from himself, speak notagainst him before the Lord of the Dead, for his mouth is pure, and histwo hands are pure!" In the middle of the Hall, however, his acts werebeing weighed by the assessors. Like all objects belonging to the gods, the balance is magic, and the genius which animates it sometimes showsits fine and delicate little human head on the top of the uprightstand which forms its body. Everything about the balance recalls itssuperhuman origin: a cynocephalus, emblematic of Thot, sits perched onthe upright and watches the beam; the cords which suspend the scales aremade of alternate _cruces ansato and tats_. Truth squats upon one ofthe scales; Thot, ibis-headed, places the heart on the other, and alwaysmerciful, bears upon the side of Truth that judgment may be favourablyinclined. He affirms that the heart is light of offence, inscribesthe result of the proceeding upon a wooden tablet, and pronounces theverdict aloud. "Thus saith Thot, lord of divine discourse, scribe ofthe Great Ennead, to his father Osiris, lord of eternity, 'Behold thedeceased in this Hall of the Double Truth, his heart hath been weighedin the balance in the presence of the great genii, the lords of Hades, and been found true. No trace of earthly impurity hath been found inhis heart. Now that he leaveth the tribunal true of voice, his heartis restored to him, as well as his eyes and the material cover of hisheart, to be put back in their places each in its own time, his soul inheaven, his heart in the other world, as is the custom of the "Followersof Horus. " Henceforth let his body lie in the hands of Anubis, whopresideth over the tombs; let him receive offerings at the cemetery inthe presence of Onno-phris; let him be as one of those favourites whofollow thee; let his soul abide where it will in the necropolis ofhis city, he whose voice is true before the Great Ennead. '" In this"Negative Confession, " which the worshippers of Osiris taught to theirdead, all is not equally admirable. The material interests of the templewere too prominent, and the crime of killing a sacred goose or stealinga loaf from the bread offerings was considered as abominable as calumnyor murder. But although it contains traces of priestly cupidity, yethow many of its precepts are untarnished in their purity by any selfishulterior motive! In it is all our morality in germ, and with refinementsof delicacy often lacking among peoples of later and more advancedcivilizations. The god does not confine his favour to the prosperous andthe powerful of this world; he bestows it also upon the poor. His willis that they be fed and clothed, and exempted from tasks beyond theirstrength; that they be not oppressed, and that unnecessary tears bespared them. If this does not amount to the love of our neighbour as ourreligions preach it, at least it represents the careful solicitude duefrom a good lord to his vassals. His pity extends to slaves; not onlydoes he command that no one should ill-treat them himself, but heforbids that their masters should be led to ill-treat them. Thisprofession of faith, one of the noblest bequeathed us by the old world, is of very ancient origin. It may be read in scattered fragments uponthe monuments of the first dynasties, and the way in which its ideas aretreated by the compilers of these inscriptions proves that it was notthen regarded as new, but as a text so old and so well known that itsformulas were current in all mouths, and had their prescribed placesin epitaphs. [*] Was it composed in Mendes, the god's own home, or inHeliopolis, when the theologians of that city appropriated the god ofMendes and incorporated him in their Ennead? In conception it certainlybelongs to the Osirian priesthood, but it can only have been diffusedover the whole of Egypt after the general adoption of the HeliopolitanEnnead throughout the cities. 

As soon as he was judged, the dead man entered into the possession ofhis rights as a pure soul. On high he received from the UniversalLord all that kings and princes here below bestowed upon theirfollowers--rations of food, [**] and a house, gardens, and fields to beheld subject to the usual conditions of tenure in Egypt, i. E. Taxation, military service, and the corvée. 

 * For instance, one of the formulas found in Memphite tombs states that the deceased had been the friend of his father, the beloved of his mother, sweet to those who lived with him, gracious to his brethren, loved of his servants, and that he had never sought wrongful quarrel with any man; briefly, that he spoke and did that which is right here below. 

 ** The formula of the pyramid times is: "Thy thousand of oxen, thy thousand of geese, of roast and boiled joints from the larder of the gods, of bread, and plenty of the good things presented in the hall of Osiris. "

If the island was attacked by the partisans of Sit, the Osirian doubleshastened in a body to repulse them, and fought bravely in its defence. Of the revenues sent to him by his kindred on certain days and by meansof sacrifices, each gave tithes to the heavenly storehouses. Yet thiswas but the least part of the burdens laid upon him by the laws of thecountry, which did not suffer him to become enervated by idleness, butobliged him to labour as in the days when he still dwelt in Egypt. 

[Illustration: 275. Jpg THE MANES TILLING THE GROUND AND REAPING IN THEFIELDS OF IALÛ. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a vignette in the funerary papyrus of Nebhopît in Turin. 

He looked after the maintenance of canals and dykes, he tilled theground, he sowed, he reaped, he garnered the grain for his lord and forhimself. Yet to those upon whom they were incumbent, these posthumousobligations, the sequel and continuation of feudal service, at lengthseemed too heavy, and theologians exercised their ingenuity to findmeans of lightening the burden. They authorized the manes to look totheir servants for the discharge of all manual labour which they oughtto have performed themselves. Barely did a dead man, no matter howpoor, arrive unaccompanied at the eternal cities; he brought with him afollowing proportionate to his rank and fortune upon earth. 

[Illustration: 276. Jpg UASHBÎTI. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin from a painted limestone statuette from the tomb of _Sonnozmû_ at Thebes, dating from the end of the XXth dynasty. 

At first they were real doubles, those of slaves or vassals killed atthe tomb, and who had departed along with the double of the master toserve him beyond the grave as they had served him here. A number ofstatues and images, magically endued with activity and intelligence, was afterwards substituted for this retinue of victims. Originally ofso large a size that only the rich or noble could afford them, they werereduced little by little to the height of a few inches. Some were carvedout of alabaster, granite, diorite, fine limestone, or moulded outof fine clay and delicately modelled; others had scarcely any humanresemblance. They were endowed with life by means of a formula recitedover them at the time of their manufacture, and afterwards traced upontheir legs. All were possessed of the same faculties. When the god whocalled the Osirians to the corvée pronounced the name of the dead man towhom the figures belonged, they arose and answered for him; hence theirdesignation of "Respondents "--_Ûashbîti_. Equipped for agriculturallabour, each grasping a hoe and carrying a seed-bag on his shoulder, they set out to work in their appointed places, contributing therequired number of days of forced labour. 

[Illustration: 277. Jpg THE DEAD MAN AND HIS WIFE PLAYING AT DRAUGHTS INTHE PAVILION. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a vignette in No, 4 Papyrus, Dublin (Naville, _Das Mgyptische Todtenbuch_, vol. I. Pl. Xxvii. Da). The name of draughts is not altogether accurate; a description of the game may be found in Falkner, _Games Ancient and Oriental and how to play them_, pp. 9-101. 

Up to a certain point they thus compensated for those inequalities ofcondition which death itself did not efface among the vassals of Osiris;for the figures were sold so cheaply that even the poorest could alwaysafford some for themselves, or bestow a few upon their relations; andin the Islands of the Blest, fellah, artisan, and slave were indebted tothe Uashbîti for release from their old routine of labour and unendingtoil. While the little peasants of stone or glazed ware dutifully toiledand tilled and sowed, their masters were enjoying all the delightsof the Egyptian paradise in perfect idleness. They sat at ease by thewater-side, inhaling the fresh north breeze, under the shadow of treeswhich were always green. They fished with lines among the lotus-plants;they embarked in their boats, and were towed along by their servants, orthey would sometimes deign to paddle themselves slowly about the canals. 

[Illustration: 278. Jpg THE DEAD MAN SAILING IN HIS BARK ALONG THE CANALSOF THE FIELDS OF IALIT. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the Papyrus of Nebhopît, in Turin. This drawing is from part of the same scene as the illustration on p. 275. 

They went fowling among the reed-beds, or retired within their paintedpavilions to read tales, to play at draughts, to return to their wiveswho were for ever young and beautiful. [**]

 ** Gymnastic exercises, hunting, fishing, sailing, are all pictured in Theban tombs. The game of draughts is mentioned in the title of chap. Xvii. Of the _Book of the Dead_ (Naville's edition, vol. I. Pl. Xxiii. 1. 2), and the women's pavilion is represented in the tomb of Rakhmiri That the dead were supposed to read tales is proved from the fact that broken ostraca bearing long fragments of literary works are found in tombs; they were broken to kill them and to send on their doubles to the dead man in the next world. 

It was but an ameliorated earthly life, divested of all suffering underthe rule and by the favour of the true-voiced Onnophris. The feudal godspromptly adopted this new mode of life. 

[Illustration: 279. Jpg BOAT OF A FUNERARY FLEET ON ITS WAY TO ABYDOS. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Éinil Brugsch-Bey. The original was found in the course of M. De Morgan's excavations at Mêîr, and is now at Gîzeh. The dead man is sitting in the cabin, wrapped in his cloak. As far as I know, this is the only boat which has preserved its original rigging. It dates from the XIth or XIIth dynasty. 

Each of their dead bodies, mummified, and afterwards reanimated inaccordance with the Osirian myth, became an Osiris as did that of anyordinary person. Some carried the assimilation so far as to absorb thegod of Mendes, or to be absorbed in him. At Memphis Phtah-Sokarisbecame Phtah-Sokar-Osiris, and at Thinis Khontamentîfc became OsirisKhontamentît. The sun-god lent himself to this process with comparativeease because his life is more like a man's life, and hence also morelike that of Osiris, which is the counterpart of a man's life. 

[Illustration: 280. Jpg THE SOLAR BARK INTO WHICH THE DEAD MAN IS ABOUTTO ENTER. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a vignette in the Papyrus of Nebqadn, in Paris. 

Born in the morning, he ages as the day declines, and gently passes awayat evening. From the time of his entering the sky to that of his leavingit, he reigns above as he reigned here below in the beginning; but whenhe has left the sky and sinks into Hades, he becomes as one of the dead, and is, as they are, subjected to Osirian embalmment. The same dangersthat menace their human souls threaten his soul also; and when he hasvanquished them, not in his own strength, but by the power of amuletsand magical formulas, he enters into the fields of lalû, and ought todwell there for ever under the rule of Onuophris. He did nothing of thekind, however, for daily the sun was to be seen reappearing in the easttwelve hours after it had sunk into the darkness of the west. Was it anew orb each time, or did the same sun shine every day? In either casethe result was precisely the same; the god came forth from death andre-entered into life. Having identified the course of the sun-god withthat of man, and Râ with Osiris for a first day and a first night, it was hard not to push the matter further, and identify them for allsucceeding days and nights, affirming that man and Osiris might, if theyso wished, be born again in the morning, as Râ was, and together withhim. If the Egyptians had found the prospect of quitting the darkness ofthe tomb for the bright meadows of Ialû a sensible alleviation of theirlot, with what joy must they have been filled by the conception whichallowed them to substitute the whole realm of the sun for a littlearchipelago in an out-of-the-way corner of the universe. Their firstconsideration was to obtain entrance into the divine bark, and thiswas the object of all the various practices and prayers, whose text, together with that which already contained the Osirian formulas, ensuredthe unfailing protection of Râ to their possessor. The soul desirous ofmaking use of them went straight from his tomb to the very spot wherethe god left earth to descend into Hades. This was somewhere in theimmediate neighbourhood of Abydos, and was reached through a narrowgorge or "cleft" in the Libyan range, whose "mouth" opened in frontof the temple of Osiris Khontamentît, a little to the north-west of thecity. The soul was supposed to be carried thither by a small flotilla ofboats, manned by figures representing friends or priests, and laden withfood, furniture, and statues. This flotilla was placed within thevault on the day of the funeral, and was set in motion by means ofincantations recited over it during one of the first nights of the year, at the annual feast of the dead. The bird or insect which had previouslyserved as guide to the soul upon its journey now took the helm to showthe fleet the right way, and under this command the boats left Abydosand mysteriously passed through the "cleft" into that western sea whichis inaccessible to the living, there to await the daily coming of thedying sun-god. 

[Illustration: 282. Jpg THE SOLAR BARK PASSING INTO THE MOUNTAIN OF THEWEST. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a very small photograph published in the Catalogue of the Minutoli Sale. 

As soon as his bark appeared at the last bend of the celestial Nile, the cynocephali, who guarded the entrance into night, began to dance andgesticulate upon the banks as they intoned their accustomed hymn. Thegods of Abydos mingled their shouts of joy with the chant of the sacredbaboons, the bark lingered for a moment upon the frontiers of day, andinitiated souls seized the occasion to secure their recognition andtheir reception on board of it. [*] Once admitted, they took their sharein the management of the boat, and in the battles with hostile deities;but they were not all endowed with the courage or equipment needful towithstand the perils and terrors of the voyage. Many stopped short bythe way in one of the regions which it traversed, either in the realm ofKhontamentît, or in that of Sokaris, or in those islands where the goodOsiris welcomed them as though they had duly arrived in the ferry-boat, or upon the wing of Thot. There they dwelt in colonies under thesuzerainty of local gods, rich, and in need of nothing, but condemnedto live in darkness, excepting for the one brief hour in which thesolar bark passed through their midst, irradiating them with beams oflight. [**]

 * This description of the embarkation and voyage of the soul is composed from indications given in one of the vignettes of chap. Xvi. Of the _Book of the Dead_ (Naville's edition, vol. I. Pl. Xxii. ), combined with the text of a formula which became common from the times of the XIth and XIIth dynasties (Maspero, _Études de Mythologie et l'Archéologie Égyptiennes_, vol. I. Pp. 14-18, and _Études Égyptiennes_, vol. I. Pp. 122, 123). 

 ** Maspero, _Études de Mythologie et d'Archéologie Égyptiennes_, vol. Ii. Pp. 44, 45. 

The few persevered, feeling that they had courage to accompany the sunthroughout, and these were indemnified for their sufferings by the mostbrilliant fate ever dreamed of by Egyptian souls. , Born anew with thesun-god and appearing with him at the gates of the east, they wereassimilated to him, and shared his privilege of growing old and dying, only to be ceaselessly rejuvenated and to live again with ever-renewedsplendour. They disembarked where they pleased, and returned at willinto the world. If now and then they felt a wish to revisit all that wasleft of their earthly bodies, the human-headed sparrow-hawk descendedthe shaft in full flight, alighted upon the funeral couch, and, withhands softly laid upon the spot where the heart had been wont to beat, gazed upwards at the impassive mask of the mummy. 

[Illustration: 284. Jpg THE SOUL DESCENDING THE SEPULCHRAL SHAFT ON ITSWAY TO REJOIN THE MUMMY. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from Dévèria. 

This was but for a moment, since nothing compelled these perfect soulsto be imprisoned within the tomb like the doubles of earlier times, because they feared the light. They "went forth by day, " and dwelt inthose places where they had lived; they walked in their gardens by theirponds of running water; they perched like so many birds on the branchesof the trees which they had planted, or enjoyed the fresh air under theshade of their sycamores; they ate and drank at pleasure; they travelledby hill and dale; they embarked in the boat of Râ, and disembarkedwithout weariness, and without distaste for the same perpetual round. 

This conception, which was developed somewhat late, brought theEgyptians back to the point from which they had started when first theybegan to speculate on the life to come. 

[Illustration: 285. Jpg THE SOUL ON THE EDGE OF THE FUNERAL COUCH, WITHITS HANDS ON THE HEART OF THE MUMMY. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Emil Brugsch- Bey, reproducing the miniature sarcophagus of the scribe Râ (Maspero, _Guide du Visiteur_, pp. 130, 131, No. 1621). 

The soul, after having left the place of its incarnation to which in thebeginning it clung, after having ascended into heaven and there soughtcongenial asylum in vain, forsook all havens which it had found above, and unhesitatingly fell back upon earth, there to lead a peaceful, free, and happy life in the full light of day, and with the whole valley ofEgypt for a paradise. 

The connection, always increasingly intimate between Osiris and Râ, gradually brought about a blending of the previously separate myths andbeliefs concerning each. The friends and enemies of the one became thefriends and enemies of the other, and from a mixture of the originalconceptions of the two deities, arose new personalities, in whichcontradictory elements were blent together, often without true fusion. The celestial Horuses one by one were identified with Horus, son ofIsis, and their attributes were given to him, as his in the same waybecame theirs. Apopi and the monsters--the hippopotamus, the crocodile, the wild boar--who lay in wait for Râ as he sailed the heavenly ocean, became one with Sît and his accomplices. Sit still possessed his halfof Egypt, and his primitive brotherly relation to the celestial Horusremained unbroken, either 'on account of their sharing one temple, as atNûbît, or because they were worshipped as one in two neighbouringnomes, as, for example, at Oxyrrhynchos and at Heracleopolis Magna. The repulsion with which the slayer of Osiris was regarded did noteverywhere dissociate these two cults: certain small districts persistedin this double worship down to the latest times of paganism. It was, after all, a mark of fidelity to the oldest traditions of the race, butthe bulk of the Egyptians, who had forgotten these, invented reasonstaken from the history of the divine dynasties to explain the fact. Thejudgment of Thot or of Sibû had not put an end to the machinations ofSît: as soon as Horus had left the earth, Sît resumed them, and pursuedthem, with varying fortune, under the divine kings of the second Ennead. Now, in the year 363 of Harmakhis, the Typhonians reopened the campaign. Beaten at first near Edfû, they retreated precipitately northwards, stopping to give battle wherever their partisans predominated, --atZatmîfc in the Theban nome, [*] at Khaîtnûtrît to the north-east ofDenderah, and at Hibonû in the principality of the Gazelle. 

 * Zatmît appears to have been situate at some distance from Bayadîyéh, on the spot where the map published by the Egyptian Commission marks the ruins of a modern village. There was a necropolis of considerable extent there, which furnishes the Luxor dealers with antiquities, many of which belong to the first Theban empire. 

[Illustration: 287. Jpg THE SOUL GOING FORTH INTO ITS GARDEN BY DAY. 2]

 2 Copied by Faucher-Gudin from the survey-drawings of the tomb of Anni by Boussac, member of the _Mission française_ in Egypt (1891). The inscription over the arbour gives the list of the various trees in the garden of Anni during his lifetime. 

Several bloody combats, which took place between Oxyrrhynchos andHeracleopolis Magna, were the means of driving them finally out of theNile Valley; they rallied for the last time in the eastern provincesof the Delta, were beaten at Zalû, and giving up all hope of success onland, they embarked at the head of the Gulf of Suez, in order to returnto the Nubian Desert, their habitual refuge in times of distress. The sea was the special element of Typhon, and upon it they believedthemselves secure. Horus, however, followed them, overtook them nearShas-hirît, routed them, and on his return to Edfu, celebrated hisvictory by a solemn festival. By degrees, as he made himself masterof those localities which owed allegiance to Sit, he took energeticmeasures to establish in them the authority of Osiris and of the solarcycle. In all of them he built, side by side with the sanctuary of theTyphonian divinities, a temple to himself, in which he was enthronedunder the particular form he was obliged to assume in order to vanquishhis enemies. Metamorphosed into a hawk at the battle of Hibonû, wenext see him springing on to the back of Sit under the guise of ahippopotamus; in his shrine at Hibonû he is represented as a hawkperching on the back of a gazelle, emblem of the nome where the struggletook place. Near to Zalû he became incarnate as a human-headed lion, crowned with the triple diadem, and having feet armed with claws whichcut like a knife; it was under the form, too, of a lion that he wasworshipped in the temple at Zalû. The correlation of Sit and thecelestial Horus was not, therefore, for these Egyptians of more recenttimes a primitive religious fact; it was the consequence, and so tospeak the sanction, of the old hostility between the two gods. 

[Illustration: 289. Jpg]

Horus had treated his enemy in the same fashion that a victoriousPharaoh treated the barbarians conquered by his arms: he had constructeda fortress to keep his foe in check, and his priests formed a sort ofgarrison as a precaution against the revolt of the rival priesthood andthe followers of the rival deity. In this manner the battles of the godswere changed into human struggles, in which, more than once, Egypt wasdeluged with blood. The hatred of the followers of Osiris to those ofTyphon was perpetuated with such implacability, that the nomes which hadpersisted in adhering to the worship of Sit, became odious to therest of the population: the image of their master on the monuments wasmutilated, their names were effaced from the geographical lists, theywere assailed with insulting epithets, and to pursue and slay theirsacred animals was reckoned a pious act. Thus originated thoseskirmishes which developed into actual civil wars, and were continueddown to Roman times. The adherents of Typhon only became more confirmedin their veneration for the accursed god; Christianity alone overcametheir obstinate fidelity to him. [*]

 * This incident in the wars of Horus and Sit is drawn by Faucher-Gudin from a bas-relief of the temple of Edfû. On the right, Har-Hûdîti, standing up in the solar bark, pierces with his lance the head of a crocodile, a partisan of Sît, lying in the water below; Harmâkhis, standing behind him, is present at the execution. Facing this divine pair, is the young Horus, who kills a man, another partisan of Sît, while Isis and Har-Hûdîti hold his chains; behind Horus, Isis and Thot are leading four other captives bound and ready to be sacrificed before Harmâkhis. 

The history of the world for Egypt was therefore only the history of thestruggle between the adherents of Osiris and the followers of Sît; aninterminable warfare in which sometimes one and sometimes the other ofthe rival parties obtained a passing advantage, without ever gaining adecisive victory till the end of time. The divine kings of the secondand third Ennead devoted most of the years of their earthly reignto this end; they were portrayed under the form of the great warriorPharaohs, who, from the eighteenth to the twelfth century before ourera, extended their rule from the plains of the Euphrates to the marshesof Ethiopia. A few peaceful sovereigns are met with here and there inthis line of conquerors--a few sages or legislators, of whom the mostfamous was styled Thot, the doubly great, ruler of Hermopolis and ofthe Hermopolitan Ennead. A legend of recent origin made him the primeminister of Horus, son of Isis; a still more ancient tradition wouldidentify him with the second king of the second dynasty, the immediatesuccessor of the divine Horuses, and attributes to him a reign of 3226years. He brought to the throne that inventive spirit and that creativepower which had characterized him from the time when he was onlya feudal deity. Astronomy, divination, magic, medicine, writing, drawing--in fine, all the arts and sciences emanated from him as fromtheir first source. He had taught mankind the methodical observationof the heavens and of the changes that took place in them, the slowrevolutions of the sun, the rapid phases of the moon, the intersectingmovements of the five planets, and the shapes and limits of theconstellations which each night were lit up in the sky. Most of thelatter either remained, or appeared to remain immovable, and seemednever to pass out of the regions accessible to the human eye. Thosewhich were situate on the extreme margin of the firmament accomplishedmovements there analogous to those of the planets. 

[Illustration: 293. Jpg ONE OF THE ASTRONOMICAL TABLES OF THE TOMB OFRAMSES IV. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a copy by Lepsius, _Denkm. _, iii. 227, 3. 

Every year at fixed times they were seen to sink one after another belowthe horizon, to disappear, and rising again after an eclipse of greateror less duration, to regain insensibly their original positions. Theconstellations were reckoned to be thirty-six in number, the thirty-six_decani_ to whom were attributed mysterious powers, and of whom Sothiswas queen--Sothis transformed into the star of Isis, when Orion (Sâhû), became the star of Osiris. The nights are so clear and the atmosphere sotransparent in Egypt, that the eye can readily penetrate the depths ofspace, and distinctly see points of light which would be invisiblein our foggy climate. The Egyptians did not therefore need specialinstruments to ascertain the existence of a considerable number of starswhich we could not see without the help of our telescopes; they couldperceive with the naked eye stars of the fifth magnitude, and note themupon their catalogues. [*] It entailed, it is true, a long training anduninterrupted practice to bring their sight up to its maximum keenness;but from very early times it was a function of the priestly collegesto found and maintain schools of astronomy. The first observatoriesestablished on the banks of the Nile seem to have belonged to thetemples of the sun; the high priests of Râ--who, to judge from theirtitle, were alone worthy to behold the sun face to face--were activelyemployed from the earliest times in studying the configuration andpreparing maps of the heavens. The priests of other gods were quick tofollow their example: at the opening of the historic period, there wasnot a single temple, from one end of the valley to the other, that didnot possess its official astronomers, or, as they were called, "watchersof the night. "[**]

 * Biot, however, states that stars of the third and fourth magnitude "are the smallest which can be seen with the naked eye. " I believe I am right in affirming that several of the fellahîn and Bedawîn attached to the "service des Antiquités" can see stars which are usually classed with those of the fifth magnitude. 

 ** _Urshu_: this word is also used for the soldiers on watch during the day upon the walls of a fortress. Birch believed he had discovered in the British Museum a catalogue of observations made at Thebes by several astronomers upon a constellation which answered to the Hyades or the Pleiades; it was merely a question in this text of the quantity of water supplied regularly to the astronomers of a Theban temple for their domestic purposes. 

In the evening they went up on to the high terraces above the shrine, oron to the narrow platforms which terminated the pylons, and fixingtheir eyes continuously on the celestial vault above them, followed themovements of the constellations and carefully noted down the slightestphenomena which they observed. A portion of the chart of the heavens, as known to Theban Egypt between the eighteenth and twelfth centuriesbefore our era, has survived to the present time; parts of it werecarved by the decorators on the ceilings of temples, and especially onroyal tombs. The deceased Pharaohs were identified with Osiris in a moreintimate fashion than their subjects. They represented the god even inthe most trivial details; on earth--where, after having played the partof the beneficent Onnophris of primitive ages, they underwent the mostcomplete and elaborate embalming, like Osiris of the lower world; inHades--where they embarked side by side with the Sun-Osiris to cross thenight and to be born again at daybreak; in heaven--where they shone withOrion-Sâhu under the guardianship of Sothis, and, year by year, led theprocession of the stars. The maps of the firmament recalled to them, orif necessary taught them, this part of their duties: they there sawthe planets and the _decani_ sail past in their boats, and theconstellations follow one another in continuous succession. The listsannexed to the charts indicated the positions occupied each month by theprincipal heavenly bodies--their risings, their culminations, and theirsettings. Unfortunately, the workmen employed to execute these pictureseither did not understand much about the subject in hand, or did nottrouble themselves to copy the originals exactly: they omitted manypassages, transposed others, and made endless mistakes, which made itimpossible for us to transfer accurately to a modern map the informationpossessed by the ancients. 

In directing their eyes to the celestial sphere, Thot had at the sametime revealed to men the art of measuring time, and the knowledge of thefuture. As he was the moon-god _par excellence_, he watched with jealouscare over the divine eye which had been entrusted to him by Horus, andthe thirty days during which he was engaged in conducting it through allthe phases of its nocturnal life, were reckoned as a month. Twelve ofthese months formed the year, a year of three hundred and sixty days, during which the earth witnessed the gradual beginning and ending of thecircle of the seasons. The Nile rose, spread over the fields, sank againinto its channel; to the vicissitudes of the inundation succeeded thework of cultivation; the harvest followed the seedtime: these formedthree distinct divisions of the year, each of nearly equal duration. Thot made of them the three seasons, --that of the waters, Shaît; thatof vegetation, Pirûît; that of the harvest, Shômû--each comprisingfour months, numbered one to four; the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th months ofShaît; the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th months of Pirûît; the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th months of Shômû. The twelve months completed, a new year began, whose birth was heralded by the rising of Sothis in the early days ofAugust. The first month of the Egyptian year thus coincided with theeighth of ours. Thot became its patron, and gave it his name, relegatingeach of the others to a special protecting divinity; in this mannerthe third month of Shaît fell to Hathor, and was called after her; thefourth of Pirûît belonged to Ranûît or Ramûît, the lady of harvests, andderived from her its appellation of Pharmûti. Official documents alwaysdesignated the months by the ordinal number attached to them in eachseason, but the people gave them by preference the names of theirtutelary deities, and these names, transcribed into Greek, and then intoArabic, are still used by the Christian inhabitants of Egypt, side byside with the Mussulman appellations. One patron for each month was, however, not deemed sufficient: each month was subdivided into threedecades, over which presided as many _decani_, and the days themselveswere assigned to genii appointed to protect them. A number of festivalswere set apart at irregular intervals during the course of the year:festivals for the new year, festivals for the beginning of the seasons, months and decades, festivals for the dead, for the supreme gods, andfor local divinities. Every act of civil life was so closely allied tothe religious life, that it could not be performed without a sacrificeor a festival. A festival celebrated the cutting of the dykes, anotherthe opening of the canals, a third the reaping of the first sheaf, orthe carrying of the grain; a crop gathered or stored without a festivalto implore the blessing of the gods, would have been an act of sacrilegeand fraught with disaster. The first year of three hundred and sixtydays, regulated by the revolutions of the moon, did not long meet theneeds of the Egyptian people; it did not correspond with the length ofthe solar year, for it fell short of it by five and a quarter days, andthis deficit, accumulating from twelvemonth to twelvemonth, caused sucha serious difference between the calendar reckoning and the naturalseasons, that it soon had to be corrected. They intercalated, therefore, after the twelfth month of each year and before the first day of theensuing year, five epagomenal days, which they termed the "five daysover and above the year. "[*]

 * There appears to be a tendency among Egyptologists now to doubt the existence, under the Ancient Empire, of the five epagomenal days, and as a fact they are nowhere to be found expressly mentioned; but we know that the five gods of the Osirian cycle were born during the epagomenal day (cf. P. 247 of this History), and the allusions to the Osirian legend which are met with in the Pyramid texts, prove that the days were added long before the time when those inscriptions were cut. As the wording of the texts often comes down from prehistoric times, it is most likely that the invention of the epagomenal days is anterior to the first Thinite and Memphite dynasties. 

The legend of Osiris relates that Thot created them in order to permitNûît to give birth to all her children. These days constituted, at theend of the "great year, " a "little month, " which considerably lessenedthe difference between the solar and lunar computation, but did notentirely do away with it, and the six hours and a few minutes of whichthe Egyptians had not taken count gradually became the source of freshperplexities. They at length amounted to a whole day, which needed tobe added every four years to the regular three hundred and sixty days, a fact which was unfortunately overlooked. The difficulty, at first onlyslight, which this caused in public life, increased with time, and endedby disturbing the harmony between the order of the calendar and that ofnatural phenomena: at the end of a hundred and twenty years, the legalyear had gained a whole month on the actual year, and the 1st of Thotanticipated the heliacal rising of Sothis by thirty days, instead ofcoinciding with it as it ought. The astronomers of the Græco-Romanperiod, after a retrospective examination of all the past history oftheir country, discovered a very ingenious theory for obviating thisunfortunate discrepancy. If the omission of six hours annually entailedthe loss of one day every four years, the time would come, after threehundred and sixty-five times four years, when the deficit would amountto an entire year, and when, in consequence, fourteen hundred andsixty whole years would exactly equal fourteen hundred and sixty-oneincomplete years. The agreement of the two years, which had beendisturbed by the force of circumstances, was re-established of itselfafter rather more than fourteen and a half centuries: the opening of thecivil year became identical with the beginning of the astronomicalyear, and this again coincided with the heliacal rising of Sirius, andtherefore with the official date of the inundation. To the Egyptians ofPharaonic times, this simple and eminently practical method was unknown:by means of it hundreds of generations, who suffered endless troublesfrom the recurring difference between an uncertain and a fixed year, might have consoled themselves with the satisfaction of knowing thata day would come when one of their descendants would, for once inhis life, see both years coincide with mathematical accuracy, andthe seasons appear at their normal times. The Egyptian year might becompared to a watch which loses a definite number of minutes daily. Theowner does not take the trouble to calculate a cycle in which the totalof minutes lost will bring the watch round to the correct time: he bearswith the irregularity as long as his affairs do not suffer by it; butwhen it causes him inconvenience, he alters the hands to the right hour, and repeats this operation each time he finds it necessary, withoutbeing guided by a fixed rule. In like manner the Egyptian year fellinto hopeless confusion with regard to the seasons, the discrepancycontinually increasing, until the difference became so great, that theking or the priests had to adjust the two by a process similar to thatemployed in the case of the watch. 

The days, moreover, had each their special virtues, which it wasnecessary for man to know if he wished to profit by the advantages, orto escape the perils which they possessed for him. There was not oneamong them that did not recall some incident of the divine wars, and hadnot witnessed a battle between the partisans of Sit and those of Osirisor Râ; the victories or the disasters which they had chronicled had asit were stamped them with good or bad luck, and for that reason theyremained for ever auspicious or the reverse. It was on the 17th of Athyrthat Typhon had enticed his brother to come to him, and had murdered himin the middle of a banquet. Every year, on this day, the tragedy thathad taken place in the earthly abode of the god seemed to be repeatedafresh in the heights of heaven. Just as at the moment of the death ofOsiris, the powers of good were at their weakest, and the sovereigntyof evil everywhere prevailed, so the whole of Nature, abandoned to thepowers of darkness, became inimical to man. Whatever he undertook onthat day issued in failure. If he went out to walk by the river-side, a crocodile would attack him, as the crocodile sent by Sît had attackedOsiris. If he set out on a journey, it was a last farewell which he badeto his family and friends: death would meet him by the way. To escapethis fatality, he must shut himself up at home, and wait in inactionuntil the hours of danger had passed and the sun of the ensuing day hadput the evil one to flight. [*]

 * On the 20th of Thot no work was to be done, no oxen killed, no stranger received. On the 22nd no fish might be eaten, no oil lamp was to be lighted. On the 23rd "put no incense on the fire, nor kill big cattle, nor goats, nor ducks; eat of no goose, nor of that which has lived. " On the 26th "do absolutely nothing on this day, " and the same advice is found on the 7th of Paophi, on the 18th, on the 26th, on the 27th, and more than thirty times in the remainder of the Sallier Calendar. On the 30th of Mechir it is forbidden to speak aloud to any one. 

It was to his interest to know these adverse influences; and who wouldhave known them all, had not Thot pointed them out and marked them inhis calendars? One of these, long fragments of which have come down tous, indicated briefly the character of each day, the gods who presidedover it, the perils which accompanied their patronage, or the goodfortune which might be expected of them. The details of it are notalways intelligible to us, as we are still ignorant of many of theepisodes in the life of Osiris. The Egyptians were acquainted with thematter from childhood, and were guided with sufficient exactitude bythese indications. The hours of the night were all inauspicious; thoseof the day were divided into three "seasons" of four hours each, ofwhich some were lucky, while others were invariably of ill omen. "The4th of Tybi: _good, good, good_. Whatsoever thou seest on this day willbe fortunate. Whosoever is born on this day, will die more advanced inyears than any of his family; he will attain to a greater age than hisfather. The 5th of Tybi: _inimical, inimical, inimical_. This is the dayon which the goddess Sokhîfc, mistress of the double white Palace, burntthe chiefs when they raised an insurrection, came forth, and manifestedthemselves. Offerings of bread to Shû, Phtah, Thot: burn incense to Râ, and to the gods who are his followers, to Phtah, Thot, Hû-Sû, on thisday. Whatsoever thou seest on this day will be fortunate. The 6th ofTybi: _good, good, good_. Whatsoever thou seest on this day will befortunate. The 7th of Tybi: _inimical, inimical, inimical_. Do notjoin thyself to a woman in the presence of the Eye of Horus. Beware ofletting the fire go out which is in thy house. The 8th of Tybi: _good, good, good_. Whatsoever thou seest with thine eye this day, the Enneadof the gods will grant to thee: the sick will recover. The 9th of Tybi:_good, good, good_. The gods cry out for joy at noon this day. Bringofferings of festal cakes and of fresh bread, which rejoice the heartof the gods and of the manes. The 10th of Tybi: _inimical, inimical, mimical_. Do not set fire to weeds on this day: it is the day onwhich the god Sap-hôû set fire to the land of Btito. The 11th of Tybi:_inimical, inimical, inimical_. Do not draw nigh to any flame on thisday, for Râ entered the flames to strike all his enemies, and whosoeverdraws nigh to them on this day, it shall not be well with him during hiswhole life. The 12th of Tybi: _inimical, inimical, inimical_. See thatthou beholdest not a rat on this day, nor approachest any rat within thyhouse: it is the day wherein Sokhît gave forth the decrees. " In thesecases a little watchfulness or exercise of memory sufficed to put aman on his guard against evil omens; but in many circumstances all thevigilance in the world would not protect him, and the fatality of theday would overtake him, without his being able to do ought to avert it. No man can at will place the day of his birth at a favourable time; hemust accept it as it occurs, and yet it exercises a decisive influenceon the manner of his death. According as he enters the world on the 4th, 5th, or 6th of Paophi, he either dies of marsh fever, of love, or ofdrunkenness. The child of the 23rd perishes by the jaws of a crocodile:that of the 27th is bitten and dies by a serpent. On the other hand, thefortunate man whose birthday falls on the 9th or the 29th lives to anextreme old age, and passes away peacefully, respected by all. 

[Illustration: 304. Jpg THE GODS FIGHTING FOE THE MAGICIAN WHO HASINVOKED THEM. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the tracing by Golbnischeff, _Die Metternich-Stele_, pi, iii. 14. 

Thot, having pointed out the evil to men, gave to them at the same timethe remedy. The magical arts of which he was the repository, made himvirtual master of the other gods. He knew their mystic names, theirsecret weaknesses, the kind of peril they most feared, the ceremonieswhich subdued them to his will, the prayers which they could not refuseto grant under pain of misfortune or death. His wisdom, transmitted tohis worshippers, assured to them the same authority which he exercisedupon those in heaven, on earth, or in the nether world. The magiciansinstructed in his school had, like the god, control of the words andsounds which, emitted at the favourable moment with the "correct voice, "would evoke the most formidable deities from beyond the confines of theuniverse: they could bind and loose at will Osiris, Sit, Anubis, evenThot himself; they could send them forth, and recall them, or constrainthem to work and fight for them. The extent of their power exposed themagicians to terrible temptations; they were often led to use it to thedetriment of others, to satisfy their spite, or to gratify their grosserappetites. Many, moreover, made a gain of their knowledge, putting it atthe service of the ignorant who would pay for it. When they were askedto plague or get rid of an enemy, they had a hundred different ways ofsuddenly surrounding him without his suspecting it: they tormented himwith deceptive or terrifying dreams; they harassed him with apparitionsand mysterious voices; they gave him as a prey to sicknesses, towandering spectres, who entered into him and slowly consumed him. Theyconstrained, even at a distance, the wills of men; they caused women tobe the victims of infatuations, to forsake those they had loved, andto love those they had previously detested. In order to compose anirresistible charm, they merely required a little blood from a person, afew nail-parings, some hair, or a scrap of linen which he had worn, and which, from contact with his skin, had become impregnated with hispersonality. Portions of these were incorporated with the wax of a dollwhich they modelled, and clothed to resemble their victim; thenceforwardall the inflictions to which the image was subjected were experienced bythe original; he was consumed with fever when his effigy was exposedto the fire, he was wounded when the figure was pierced by a knife. ThePharaohs themselves had no immunity from these spells. [*]

 * Spells were employed against Ramses III. , and the evidence in the criminal charge brought against the magicians explicitly mentions the wax figures and the philters used on this occasion. 

These machinations were wont to be met by others of the same kind, andmagic, if invoked at the right moment, was often able to annul the illswhich magic had begun. It was not indeed all-powerful against fate: theman born on the 27th of Paophi would die of a snake-bite, whatevercharm he might use to protect himself. But if the day of his deathwere foreordained, at all events the year in which it would occur wasuncertain, and it was easy for the magician to arrange that it shouldnot take place prematurely. A formula recited opportunely, a sentenceof prayer traced on a papyrus, a little statuette worn about the person, the smallest amulet blessed and consecrated, put to flight the serpentswho were the instruments of fate. Those curious stelae on which we seeHorus half naked, standing on two crocodiles and brandishing in hisfists creatures which had reputed powers of fascination, were so manyprotecting talismans; set up at the entrance to a room or a house, theykept off the animals represented and brought the evil fate to nought. 

[Illustration: 306. Jpg THE CHILD HORUS ON THE CROCODILES. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from an Alexandrian stele in the Gîzeh Museum. The reason for the appearance of so many different animals in this stele and in others of the same nature, has been given by Maspero, _Études de Mythologie et d'Archéologie Égyptiennes_, vol. Ii. Pp. 417- 419; they were all supposed to possess the evil eye and to be able to fascinate their victim before striking him. 

Sooner or later destiny would doubtless prevail, and the moment wouldcome when the fated serpent, eluding all precautions, would succeed incarrying out the sentence of death. At all events the man would havelived, perhaps to the verge of old age, perhaps to the years of ahundred and ten, to which the wisest of the Egyptians hoped to attain, and which period no man born of mortal mother might exceed. If thearts of magic could thus suspend the law of destiny, how much moreefficacious were they when combating the influences of secondarydeities, the evil eye, and the spells of man? Thot, who was the patronof sortilege, presided also over exorcisms, and the criminal acts whichsome committed in his name could have reparation made for them by othersin his name. To malicious genii, genii still stronger were opposed; toharmful amulets, those which were protective; to destructive measures, vitalizing remedies; and this was not even the most troublesome partof the magicians' task. Nobody, in fact, among those delivered bytheir intervention escaped unhurt from the trials to which, he hadbeen subjected. The possessing spirits when they quitted their victimgenerally left behind them traces of their occupation, in the brain, heart, lungs, intestines--in fact, in the whole body. The illnessesto which the human race is prone, were not indeed all brought about byenchanters relentlessly persecuting their enemies, but they were allattributed to the presence of an invisible being, whether spectreor demon, who by some supernatural means had been made to enter thepatient, or who, unbidden, had by malice or necessity taken up hisabode within him. It was needful, after expelling the intruder, tore-establish the health of the sufferer by means of fresh remedies. Thestudy of simples and other _materiæ medicæ_ would furnish these; Thothad revealed himself to man as the first magician, he became in likemanner for them the first physician and the first surgeon. 

Egypt is naturally a very salubrious country, and the Egyptians boastedthat they were "the healthiest of all mortals;" but they did not neglectany precautions to maintain their health. "Every month, for threesuccessive days, they purged the system by means of emetics or clysters. The study of medicine with them was divided between specialists; eachphysician attending to one kind of illness only. Every place possessedseveral doctors; some for diseases of the eyes, others for the head, or the teeth, or the stomach, or for internal diseases. " But thesubdivision was not carried to the extent that Herodotus would makeus believe. It was the custom to make a distinction only between thephysician trained in the priestly schools, and further instructed bydaily practice and the study of books, --the bone-setter attached tothe worship of Sokhit who treated fractures by the intercession of thegoddess, --and the exorcist who professed to cure by the sole virtue ofamulets and magic phrases. The professional doctor treated all kindsof maladies, but, as with us, there were specialists for certainaffections, who were consulted in preference to general practitioners. If the number of these specialists was so considerable as to attractthe attention of strangers, it was because the climatic character ofthe country necessitated it. Where ophthalmia and affections of theintestines raged violently, we necessarily find many oculists[*] as wellas doctors for internal maladies. The best instructed, however, knew butlittle of anatomy. As with the Christian physicians of the MiddleAges, religious scruples prevented the Egyptians from cutting openor dissecting, in the cause of pure science, the dead body which wasidentified with that of Osiris. The processes of embalming, which wouldhave instructed them in anatomy, were not intrusted to doctors; thehorror was so great with which any one was regarded who mutilated thehuman form, that the "paraschite, " on whom devolved the duty of makingthe necessary incisions in the dead, became the object of universalexecration: as soon as he had finished his task, the assistantsassaulted him, throwing stones at him with such violence that he had totake to his heels to escape with his life. [**]

 * Affections of the eyes occupy one-fourth of the _Ebers Papyrus_. 

 ** Diodorus Siculus, i. 91. 

The knowledge of what went on within the body was therefore but vague. Life seemed to be a little air, a breath which was conveyed by the veinsfrom member to member. "The head contains twenty-two vessels, which drawthe spirits into it and send them thence to all parts of the body. Thereare two vessels for the breasts, which communicate heat to the lowerparts. There are two vessels for the thighs, two for the neck, two forthe arms, two for the back of the head, two for the forehead, two forthe eyes, two for the eyelids, two for the right ear by which enter thebreaths of life, and two for the left ear which in like manner admit thebreaths of death. "

[Illustration: 310. Jpg A DEAD MAN RECEIVING THE BREATH OF LIFE. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a sketch by Naville, in the _Ægyptische Todtenbuch_, vol. I. Pl. Lxix. The deceased carries in this hand a sail inflated by the wind, symbolizing the air, and holds it to his nostrils that he may inhale the breaths which will fill anew his arteries, and bring life to his limbs. 

The "breaths" entering by the right ear, are "the good airs, thedelicious airs of the north;" the sea-breeze which tempers the burningof summer and renews the strength of man, continually weakened by theheat and threatened with exhaustion. These vital spirits, entering theveins and arteries by the ear or nose, mingled with the blood, whichcarried them to all parts of the body; they sustained the animal, andwere, so to speak, the cause of its movement. The heart, the perpetualmover--_hâîti_--collected them and redistributed them throughoutthe body: it was regarded as "the beginning of all the members, " andwhatever part of the living body the physician touched, "whether thehead, the nape of the neck, the hands, the breast, the arms, the legs, his hand lit upon the heart, " and he felt it beating under his fingers. Under the influence of the good breaths, the vessels were inflated andworked regularly; under that of the evil, they became inflamed, wereobstructed, were hardened, or gave way, and the physician had to removethe obstruction, allay the inflammation, and re-establish their vigourand elasticity. At the moment of death, the vital spirits "withdrew withthe soul; the blood, " deprived of air, "became coagulated, the veinsand arteries emptied themselves, and the creature perished" for want ofbreaths. 

The majority of the diseases from which the ancient Egyptians suffered, are those which still attack their successors; ophthalmia, affectionsof the stomach, abdomen, and bladder, intestinal worms, varicose veins, ulcers in the leg, the Nile pimple, and finally the "divine mortalmalady, " the _divinus morbus_ of the Latins, epilepsy. Anaemia, fromwhich at least one-fourth of the present population suffers, was notless prevalent than at present, if we may judge from the number ofremedies which were used against hematuria, the principal cause of it. The fertility of the women entailed a number of infirmities or localaffections which the doctors attempted to relieve, not always withsuccess. [*]

 * With regard to the diseases of women, cf. _Ebers Papyrus_, pis. Xciii. , xcviii. , etc. Several of the recipes are devoted to the solution of a problem which appears to have greatly exercised the mind of the ancients, viz. The determination of the sex of a child before its birth. 

The science of those days treated externals only, and occupied itselfmerely with symptoms easily determined by sight or touch; it neversuspected that troubles which showed themselves in two widely remoteparts of the body might only be different effects of the same illness, and they classed as distinct maladies those indications which we nowknow to be the symptoms of one disease. They were able, however, to determine fairly well the specific characteristics of ordinaryaffections, and sometimes described them in a precise and graphicfashion. "The abdomen is heavy, the pit of the stomach painful, theheart burns and palpitates violently. The clothing oppresses the sickman and he can barely support it. Nocturnal thirsts. His heart is sick, as that of a man who has eaten of the sycamore gum. The flesh losesits sensitiveness as that of a man seized with illness. If he seek tosatisfy a want of nature he finds no relief. Say to this, 'There is anaccumulation of humours in the abdomen, which makes the heart sick. Iwill act. '" This is the beginning of gastric fever so common in Egypt, and a modern physician could not better diagnose such a case; thephraseology would be less flowery, but the analysis of the symptomswould not differ from that given us by the ancient practitioner. Themedicaments recommended comprise nearly everything which can in some wayor other be swallowed, whether in solid, mucilaginous, or liquid form. Vegetable remedies are reckoned by the score, from the most modest herbto the largest tree, such as the sycamore, palm, acacia, and cedar, ofwhich the sawdust and shavings were supposed to possess both antisepticand emollient properties. Among the mineral substances are to be notedsea-salt, alum, nitre, sulphate of copper, and a score of differentkinds of stones--among the latter the "memphite stone" was distinguishedfor its virtues; if applied to parts of the body which were laceratedor unhealthy, it acted as an anaesthetic and facilitated the success ofsurgical operations. Flesh taken from the living subject, the heart, theliver, the gall, the blood--either dried or liquid--of animals, the hairand horn of stags, were all customarily used in many cases where themotive determining their preference above other _materiæ medicæ_ isunknown to us. Many recipes puzzle us by their originality and by thebarbaric character of the ingredients recommended: "the milk of a womanwho has given birth to a boy, " the dung of a lion, a tortoise's brains, an old book boiled in oil. [*]

 * Ebers Papyrus, pl. Lxxviii. 1. 22--lxxix. 1. 1: "To relieve a child who is constipated. --An old book. Boil it in oil, and apply half to the stomach, to provoke evacuation. " It must not be forgotten that, the writings being on papyrus, the old book in question, once boiled, would have an effect analogous to that of our linseed-meal poultices. If the physician recommended taking an old one, it was for economical reasons merely; the Egyptians of the middle classes would always have in their possession a number of letters, copy-books, and other worthless waste papers, of which they would gladly rid themselves in such a profitable manner. 

The medicaments compounded of these incongruous substances were oftenvery complicated. It was thought that the healing power was increased bymultiplying the curative elements; each ingredient acted upon a specificregion of the body, and after absorption, separated itself from the restto bring its influence to bear upon that region. The physician made useof all the means which we employ to-day to introduce remedies intothe human system, whether pills or potions, poultices, or ointments, draughts or clysters. Not only did he give the prescriptions, but hemade them up, thus combining the art of the physician with that of thedispenser. He prescribed the ingredients, pounded them either separatelyor together, he macerated them in the proper way, boiled them, reducedthem by heating, and filtered them through linen. Fat served him as theordinary vehicle for ointments, and pure water for potions; but hedid not despise other liquids, such as wine, beer (fermented orun-fermented), vinegar, milk, olive oil, "ben" oil either crude orrefined, even the urine of men and animals: the whole, sweetened withhoney, was taken hot, night and morning. The use of more than one ofthese remedies became worldwide; the Greeks borrowed them from theEgyptians; we have piously accepted them from the Greeks; and ourcontemporaries still swallow with resignation many of the abominablemixtures invented on the banks of the Nile, long before the building ofthe Pyramids. 

It was Thot who had taught men arithmetic; Thot had revealed to them themysteries of geometry and mensuration; Thot had constructed instrumentsand promulgated the laws of music; Thot had instituted the art ofdrawing, and had codified its unchanging rules. He had been the inventoror patron of all that was useful or beautiful in the Nile valley, and the climax of his beneficence was reached by his invention of theprinciples of writing, without which humanity would have been liable toforget his teaching, and to lose the advantage of his discoveries. Ithas been sometimes questioned whether writing, instead of having beena benefit to the Egyptians, did not rather injure them. An old legendrelates that when the god unfolded his discovery to King Thamos, whoseminister he was, the monarch immediately raised an objection to it. 

[Illustration: 315. Jpg TH0T RECORDS THE YEARS OF THE LIFE OF RAMSES. 1]

 1 Bas-relief of the temple of Seti I. At Abydos, drawn by Boudier; from a photograph by Beato. The god is marking with his reed-pen upon the notches of a long frond of palm, the duration in millions of years of the reign of Pharaoh upon this earth, in accordance with the decree of the gods. 

Children and young people, who had hitherto been forced to applythemselves diligently to learn and retain whatever was taught them, nowthat they possessed a means of storing up knowledge without trouble, would cease to apply themselves, and would neglect to exercise theirmemories. Whether Thamos was right or not, the criticism came too late:"the ingenious art of painting words and of speaking to the eyes" hadonce for all been acquired by the Egyptians, and through them by thegreater part of mankind. It was a very complex system, in which wereunited most of the methods fitted for giving expression to thought, namely: those which were limited to the presentment of the idea, andthose which were intended to suggest sounds. 

[Illustration: 316. Jpg PAGE IMAGE]

At the outset the use was confined to signs intended to awaken the ideaof the object in the mind of the reader by the more or less faithfulpicture of the object itself; for example, they depicted the sun by acentred disc, the moon by a crescent, a lion by a lion in the act ofwalking, a man by a small figure in a squatting attitude. As by thismethod it was possible to convey only a very restricted number ofentirely materialistic concepts, it became necessary to have recourseto various artifices in order to make up for the shortcomings of theideograms properly so-called. The part was put for the whole, the pupilin place of the whole eye, the head of the ox instead of the completeox. The Egyptians substituted cause for effect and effect for cause, theinstrument for the work accomplished, and the disc of the sun signifiedthe day; a smoking brazier the fire: the brush, inkpot, and palette ofthe scribe denoted writing or written documents. They conceived theidea of employing some object which presented an actual or supposedresemblance to the notion to be conveyed; thus, the foreparts of a liondenoted priority, supremacy, command; the wasp symbolized royalty, anda tadpole stood for hundreds of thousands. They ventured finally to useconventionalisms, as for instance when they drew the axe for a god, or the ostrich-feather for justice; the sign in these cases had only aconventional connection with the concept assigned to it. At times two orthree of these symbols were associated in order to express conjointly anidea which would have been inadequately rendered by one of them alone:a five-pointed star placed under an inverted crescent moon denoted amonth, a calf running before the sign for water indicated thirst. 

[Illustration: 317. Jpg PAGE IMAGE]

All these artifices combined furnished, however, but a very incompletemeans of seizing and transmitting thought. When the writer had writtenout twenty or thirty of these signs and the ideas which they weresupposed to embody, he had before him only the skeleton of a sentence, from which the flesh and sinews had disappeared; the tone and rhythm ofthe words were wanting, as were also the indications of gender, number, person, and inflection, which distinguish the different parts of speechand determine the varying relations between them. Besides this, in orderto understand for himself and to guess the meaning of the author, thereader was obliged to translate the symbols which he deciphered, by means of words which represented in the spoken language thepronunciation of each symbol. Whenever he looked at them, they suggestedto him both the idea and the word for the idea, and consequently a soundor group of sounds; when each of them had thus acquired three or fourinvariable associations of sound, he forgot their purely ideographicvalue and accustomed himself to consider them merely as notations ofsound. 

The first experiment in phonetics was a species of rebus, where each ofthe signs, divorced from its original sense, served to representseveral words, similar in sound, but differing in meaning in the spokenlanguage. The same group of articulations, _Naûfir, Nofir_, conveyed inEgyptian the concrete idea of a lute and the abstract idea of beauty;the sign expressed at once the lute and beauty. 

[Illustration: 318. Jpg PAGE IMAGE]

The beetle was called Khopirru, and the verb "to be" was pronounced_khopirû_: the figure of the beetle & consequently signified both theinsect and the verb, and by further combining with it other signs, thearticulation of each corresponding syllable was given in detail. Thesieve _Miaû_, the mat _pu, pi_, the mouth _ra, rû_, gave the formula_khaû-pi-rû_, which was equivalent to the sound of _khopirû_, the verb"to be:" grouped together, they denoted in writing the concept of "tobe" by means of a triple rebus. In this system, each syllable of aword could be represented by one of several signs, all sounding alike. One-half of these "syllables" stood for open, the other half for closedsyllables, and the use of the former soon brought about the formation ofa true alphabet. The final vowel in them became detached, and left onlythe remaining consonant--for example, _r in rû, h in ha, n in ni, b inbû_--so that rû, ha, bû, eventually stood for r, h, n, and b only. Thisprocess in the course of time having been applied to a certain number ofsyllables, furnished a fairly large alphabet, in which several lettersrepresented each of the twenty-two chief articulations, whichthe scribes considered sufficient for their purposes. The signscorresponding to one and the same letter were homophones or "equivalentsin sound"--[ ] are homophones, just as [ ] and [ ], because each ofthem, in the group to which it belongs, may be indifferently used totranslate to the eye the articulations m or n. One would have thoughtthat when the Egyptians had arrived thus far, they would have been led, as a matter of course, to reject the various characters which they hadused each in its turn, in order to retain an alphabet only. 

[Illustration: 319. Jpg PAGE IMAGE]

But the true spirit of invention, of which they had given proof, abandoned them here as elsewhere: if the merit of a discovery was oftentheir due, they were rarely able to bring their invention to perfection. They kept the ideographic and syllabic signs which they had used at theoutset, and, with the residue of their successive notations, made forthemselves a most complicated system, in which syllables and ideogramswere mingled with letters properly so called. There is a little ofeverything in an Egyptian phrase, sometimes even in a word; as, forinstance, in [ ] maszirû, the ear, or [ ] kherôû, the voice; there arethe syllables [ ] kher, the ordinary letters [ ], which complete thephonetic pronunciation, and finally the ideograms, namely, [ ], whichgives the picture of the ear by the side of the written word for it, and[ ] which proves that the letters represent a term designating an actionof the mouth. This medley had its advantages; it enabled the Egyptiansto make clear, by the picture of the object, the sense of words whichletters alone might sometimes insufficiently explain. The systemdemanded a serious effort of memory and long years of study; indeed, many people never completely mastered it. The picturesque appearanceof the sentences, in which we see representations of men, animals, furniture, weapons, and tools grouped together in successive littlepictures, rendered hieroglyphic writing specially suitable for thedecoration of the temples of the gods or the palaces of kings. Mingledwith scenes of worship, sacrifice, battle, or private life, theinscriptions frame or separate groups of personages, and occupy thevacant spaces which the sculptor or painter was at a loss to fill;hieroglyphic writing is pre-eminently a monumental script. For theordinary purposes of life it was traced in black or red ink on fragmentsof limestone or pottery, or on wooden tablets covered with stucco, andspecially on the fibres of papyrus. The exigencies of haste and theunskilfulness of scribes soon changed both its appearance and itselements; the characters when contracted, superimposed and united toone another with connecting strokes, preserved only the most distantresemblance to the persons or things which they had originallyrepresented. This cursive writing, which was somewhat incorrectlytermed hieratic, was used only for public or private documents, foradministrative correspondence, or for the propagation of literary, scientific, and religious works. 

It was thus that tradition was pleased to ascribe to the gods, andamong them to Thot--the doubly great--the invention of all the arts andsciences which gave to Egypt its glory and prosperity. It was clear, not only to the vulgar, but to the wisest of the nation, that, had theirancestors been left merely to their own resources, they would never havesucceeded in raising themselves much above the level of the brutes. Theidea that a discovery of importance to the country could have risen in ahuman brain, and, once made known, could have been spread and developedby the efforts of successive generations, appeared to them impossibleto accept. They believed that every art, every trade, had remainedunaltered from the outset, and if some novelty in its aspect tended toshow them their error, they preferred to imagine a divine intervention, rather than be undeceived. The mystic writing, inserted as chaptersixty-four in the _Book of the Dead_, and which subsequently wassupposed to be of decisive moment to the future life of man, was, asthey knew, posterior in date to the other formulas of which this bookwas composed; they did not, however, regard it any the less as being ofdivine origin. It had been found one day, without any one knowing whenceit came, traced in blue characters on a plaque of alabaster, at thefoot of the statue of Thot, in the sanctuary of Hermopolis. A prince, Hardiduf, had discovered it in his travels, and regarding it as amiraculous object, had brought it to his sovereign. This king, accordingto some, was Hûsaphaîti of the first dynasty, but by others was believedto be the pious Mykerinos. In the same way, the book on medicine, dealing with the diseases of women, was held not to be the work ofa practitioner; it had revealed itself to a priest watching at nightbefore the Holy of Holies in the temple of Isis at Coptos. "Although theearth was plunged into darkness, the moon shone upon it and envelopedit with light. It was sent as a great wonder to the holiness of KingKheops, the just of speech. " The gods had thus exercised a directinfluence upon men until they became entirely civilized, and this workof culture was apportioned among the three divine dynasties accordingto the strength of each. The first, which comprised the most vigorousdivinities, had accomplished the more difficult task of establishing theworld on a solid basis; the second had carried on the education ofthe Egyptians; and the third had regulated, in all its minutiae, thereligious constitution of the country. When there was nothing moredemanding supernatural strength or intelligence to establish it, thegods returned to heaven, and were succeeded on the throne by mortal men. One tradition maintained dogmatically that the first human king whosememory it preserved, followed immediately after the last of the gods, who, in quitting the palace, had made over the crown to man as his heir, and that the change of nature had not entailed any interruption in theline of sovereigns. Another tradition would not allow that the contactbetween the human and divine series had been so close. Between theEnnead and Menés, it intercalated one or more lines of Theban or Thinitekings; but these were of so formless, shadowy, and undefined an aspect, that they were called Manes, and there was attributed to them at mostonly a passive existence, as of persons who had always been in thecondition of the dead, and had never been subjected to the trouble ofpassing through life. Menés was the first in order of those who wereactually living. From his time, the Egyptians claimed to possess anuninterrupted list of the Pharaohs who had ruled over the Nile valley. As far back as the XVIIIth dynasty this list was written upon papyrus, and furnished the number of years that each prince occupied the throne, or the length of his life. [*]

 * The only one of these lists which we possess, the "Turin Royal Papyrus, " was bought, nearly intact, at Thebes, by Drovetti, about 1818, but was accidentally injured by him in bringing home. The fragments of it were acquired, together with the rest of the collection, by the Piedmontese Government in 1820, and placed in the Turin Museum, where Champollion saw and drew attention to them in 1824. Seyffarth carefully collected and arranged them in the order in which they now are; subsequently Lepsius gave a facsimile of them in 1840, in his _Auswahl der wichtigsten Urhunden_, pls. I. -vi. , but this did not include the verso; Champollion-Figeac edited in 1847, in the _Revue Archéologique_, 1st series, vol. Vi. , the tracings taken by the younger Champollion before Seyffarth's arrangement; lastly, Wilkinson published the whole in detail in 1851. Since then, the document has been the subject of continuous investigation: E. De Rougé has reconstructed, in an almost conclusive manner, the pages containing the first six dynasties, and Lauth, with less certainty, those which deal with the eight following dynasties. 

Extracts from it were inscribed in the temples, or even in the tombsof private persons; and three of these abridged catalogues are stillextant, two coming from the temples of Seti I. And Ramses II. AtAbydos, [*] while the other was discovered in the tomb of a personof rank named Tunari, at Saqqâra. [**] They divided this interminablesuccession of often problematical personages into dynasties, followingin this division, rules of which we are ignorant, and which varied inthe course of ages. In the time of the Ramessides, names in the listwhich subsequently under the Lagides formed five groups were made toconstitute one single dynasty. [***]

 * The first table of Abydos, unfortunately incomplete, was discovered in the temple of Ramses II. By Banks, in 1818; the copy published by Caillaud and by Salt served as a foundation for Champollion's first investigations on the history of Egypt. The original, brought to France by Mimaut, was acquired by England, and is now in the British Museum. The second table, which is complete, all but a few signs, was brought to light by Mariette in 1864, in the excavations at Abydos, and was immediately noticed and published by Dùmichen. The text of it is to be found in Mariette, _La Nouvelle Table d'Abydos (Revue Archéologique_, 2nd series, vol. Xiii. ), and _Abydos_, vol. I. Pl. 43. 

 ** The table of Saqqâra, discovered in 1863, has been published by Mariette, _La Table de Saqqâra (Revue Archéologique_, 2nd series, vol. X. P. 169, et seq. ), and reproduced in the _Monuments Divers_, pl. 58. 

 *** The Royal Canon of Turin, which dates from the Ramesside period, gives, indeed, the names of these early kings without a break, until the list reaches Unas; at this point it sums up the number of Pharaohs and the aggregate years of their reigns, thus indicating the end of a dynasty. In the intervals between the dynasties rubrics are placed, pointing out the changes which took place in the order of direct succession. The division of the same group of sovereigns into five dynasties has been preserved to us by Manetho. 

Manetho of Sebennytos, who wrote a history of Europe for the use ofAlexandrine Greeks, had adopted, on some unknown authority, a divisionof thirty-one dynasties from Menés to the Macedonian Conquest, and hissystem has prevailed--not, indeed, on account of its excellence, butbecause it is the only complete one which has come down to us. [*] Allthe families inscribed in his lists ruled in succession. [**]

 * The best restoration of the system of Manetho is that by Lepsius, _Das Konigsbuch der Alten Ægypter_, which should be completed and corrected from the memoirs of Lauth, Lieblein, Krall, and Unger. A common fault attaches to all these memoirs, so remarkable in many respects. They regard the work of Manetho, not as representing a more or less ingenious system applied to Egyptian history, but as furnishing an authentic scheme of this history, in which it is necessary to enclose all the royal names which the monuments have revealed, and are still daily revealing to us. 

 ** E. De Rougé triumphantly demonstrated, in opposition to Bunsen, now nearly fifty years ago, that all Manetho's dynasties are successive, and the monuments discovered from year to year in Egypt have confirmed his demonstration in every detail. 

The country was no doubt frequently broken up into a dozen or moreindependent states, each possessing its own kings during severalgenerations; but the annalists had from the outset discarded thesecollateral lines, and recognized only one legitimate dynasty, of whichthe rest were but vassals. Their theory of legitimacy does not alwaysagree with actual history, and the particular line of princes which theyrejected as usurpers represented at times the only family possessingtrue rights to the crown. [*]

 * It is enough to give two striking examples of this. The royal lists of the time of the Ramessides suppress, at the end of the XVIIIth dynasty, Amenôthes IV. And several of his successors, and give the following sequence--Amenôthes III. , Harmhabît, Ramses I. , without any apparent hiatus; Manetho, on the contrary, replaces the kings who were omitted, and keeps approximately to the real order between Horos (Amenôthes III. ) and Armais (Harmhabît). Again, the official tradition of the XXth dynasty gives, between Ramses II. And Ramses III. , the sequence--Mînephtah, Seti IL, Nakht-Seti; Manetho, on the other hand, gives Amenemes followed by Thûôris, who appear to correspond to the Amenmeses and Siphtah of contemporary monuments, but, after Mînephtah, he omits Seti II. And Nakhîtou-Seti, the father of Ramses III. 

In Egypt, as elsewhere, the official chroniclers were often obliged toaccommodate the past to the exigencies of the present, and to manipulatethe annals to suit the reigning party; while obeying their orders thechroniclers deceived posterity, and it is only by a rare chance thatwe can succeed in detecting them in the act of falsification, and canre-establish the truth. 

[Illustration: 325. Jpg TABLE OF THE KINGS]

The system of Manetho, in the state in which it has been handed downto us by epitomizers, has rendered, and continues to render, service toscience; if it is not the actual history of Egypt, it is a sufficientlyfaithful substitute to warrant our not neglecting it when we wish tounderstand and reconstruct the sequence of events. His dynasties furnishthe necessary framework for most of the events and revolutions, of whichthe monuments have preserved us a record. At the outset, the centre towhich the affairs of the country gravitated was in the extreme northof the valley. The principality which extended from the entrance of theFayûm to the apex of the Delta, and subsequently the town of Memphisitself, imposed their sovereigns upon the remaining nomes, served as anemporium for commerce and national industries, and received homage andtribute from neighbouring peoples. About the time of the VIth dynastythis centre of gravity was displaced, and tended towards the interior;it was arrested for a short time at Heracleo-polis (IXth and Xthdynasties), and ended by fixing itself at Thebes (XIth dynasty). Fromhenceforth Thebes became the capital, and furnished Egypt with herrulers. With the exception of the XIVth Xoïte dynasty, all the familiesoccupying the throne from the XIth to the XXth dynasty were Theban. Whenthe barbarian shepherds invaded Africa from Asia, the Thebaïd became thelast refuge and bulwark of Egyptian nationality; its chiefs struggledfor many centuries against the conquerors before they were able todeliver the rest of the valley. It was a Theban dynasty, the XVIIIth, which inaugurated the era of foreign conquest; but after the XIXth, amovement, the reverse of that which had taken place towards the end ofthe first period, brought back the centre of gravity, little by little, towards the north of the country. From the time of the XXIst dynasty, Thebes ceased to hold the position of capital: Tanis, Bubastis, Mendes, Sebennytos, and above all, Sais, disputed the supremacy with each other, and political life was concentrated in the maritime provinces. Thoseof the interior, ruined by Ethiopian and Assyrian invasions, lost theirinfluence and gradually dwindled away. Thebes became impoverished anddepopulated; it fell into ruins, and soon was nothing more than a resortfor devotees or travellers. The history of Egypt is, therefore, dividedinto three periods, each corresponding to the suzerainty of a town or aprincipality:--

I. --Memphite Period, usually called the "Ancient Empire, " from the Istto the Xth dynasty: kings of Memphite origin ruled over the whole ofEgypt during the greater part of this epoch. 

II. --Theban Period, from the XIth to the XXth dynasty. It is dividedinto two parts by the invasion of the Shepherds (XVIth dynasty):

a. The first Theban Empire (Middle Empire), from the XIth to the XIVthdynasty. 

b. The new Theban Empire, from the XVIIth to the XXth dynasty. 

III. --Saïte Period, from the XXIst to the XXXth dynasty, divided intotwo unequal parts by the Persian Conquest:

a. The first Saïte period, from the XXIst to the XXVIth dynasty. 

b. The second Saïte period, from the XXVIIIth to the XXXth dynasty. 

The Memphites had created the monarchy. The Thebans extended the rule ofEgypt far and wide, and made of her a conquering state: for nearly sixcenturies she ruled over the Upper Nile and over Western Asia. Underthe Saïtes she retired gradually within her natural frontiers, andfrom having been aggressive became assailed, and suffered herself to becrushed in turn by all the nations she had once oppressed. [*]

 * The division into Ancient, Middle, and New Empire, proposed by Lepsius, has the disadvantage of not taking into account the influence which the removal of the seat of the dynasties exercised on the history of the country. The arrangement which I have here adopted was first put forward in the _Revue critique_, 1873, vol. I. Pp. 82, 83. 

The monuments have as yet yielded no account of the events which tendedto unite the country under the rule of one man; we can only surmise thatthe feudal principalities had gradually been drawn together into twogroups, each of which formed a separate kingdom. Heliopolis became thechief focus in the north, from which civilization radiated over therich plains and the marshes of the Delta. Its colleges of priests hadcollected, condensed, and arranged the principal myths of the localreligions; the Ennead to which it gave conception would never haveobtained the popularity which we must acknowledge it had, if its princeshad not exercised, for at least some period, an actual suzerainty overthe neighbouring plains. It was around Heliopolis that the kingdom ofLower Egypt was organized; everything there bore traces of Heliopolitantheories--the protocol of the kings, their supposed descent from Râ, andthe enthusiastic worship which they offered to the sun. The Delta, owingto its compact and restricted area, was aptly suited for government fromone centre; the Nile valley proper, narrow, tortuous, and stretchinglike a thin strip on either bank of the river, did not lend itself to socomplete a unity. It, too, represented a single kingdom, having the reedand the lotus for its emblems; but its component parts were more looselyunited, its religion was less systematized, and it lacked a well-placedcity to serve as a political and sacerdotal centre. Hermopolis containedschools of theologians who certainly played an important part in thedevelopment of myths and dogmas; but the influence of its rulers wasnever widely felt. In the south, Siût disputed their supremacy, andHeracleopolis stopped their road to the north. These three citiesthwarted and neutralized one another, and not one of them ever succeededin obtaining a lasting authority over Upper Egypt. Each of the twokingdoms had its own natural advantages and its system of government, which gave to it a particular character, and stamped it, as it were, with a distinct personality down to its latest days. The kingdomof Upper Egypt was more powerful, richer, better populated, and wasgoverned apparently by more active and enterprising rulers. It is toone of the latter, Mini or Menés of Thinis, that tradition ascribesthe honour of having fused the two Egypts into a single empire, and ofhaving inaugurated the reign of the human dynasties. Thinis figured inthe historic period as one of the least of Egyptian cities. It barelymaintained an existence on the left bank of the Nile, if not on theexact spot now occupied by Girgeh, at least only a short distance fromit. [*]

 * The site of Thinis is not yet satisfactorily identified. It is neither at Kom-es-Sultân, as Mariette thought, nor, according to the hypothesis of A. Schmidt, at El-Kherbeh. Brugsch has proposed to fix the site at the village of Tineh, near Berdis, and is followed in this by Dumichen. The present tendency is to identify it either with Girgeh itself, or with one of the small neighbouring towns--for example, Birbeh--where there are some ancient ruins; this was also the opinion of Champollion and of Nester L'hôte. I may mention that, in a frequently quoted passage of Hellanicos, Zoèga corrects the reading [Greek phrase], which would once more give us the name of Thinis: the mention of this town as being "situated on the river, " would be a fresh reason for its identification with Girgeh. 

[Illustration: 332. Jpg PLAN OF THE RUINS OF ABYDOS, MADE BY MARIETTE IN1865 AND 1875. ]

The principality of the Osirian Reliquary, of which it was themetropolis, occupied the valley from one mountain range to the other, and gradually extended across the desert as far as the Great ThebanOasis. Its inhabitants worshipped a sky-god, Anhûri, or rather two twingods, Anhûri-Shû, who were speedily amalgamated with the solar deitiesand became a warlike personification of Râ. Anhûri-Shû, like all theother solar manifestations, came to be associated with a goddess havingthe form or head of a lioness--a Sokhît, who took for the occasion theepithet of Mîhît, the northern one. Some of the dead from this cityare buried on the other side of the Nile, near the modern village ofMesheikh, at the foot of the Arabian chain, whose steep cliffs hereapproach somewhat near the river: the principal necropolis was at somedistance to the east, near the sacred town of Abydos. It would appearthat, at the outset, Abydos was the capital of the country, for theentire nome bore the same name as the city, and had adopted for itssymbol the representation of the reliquary in which the god reposed. Invery early times Abydos fell into decay, and resigned its political rankto Thinis, but its religious importance remained unimpaired. The cityoccupied a long and narrow strip of land between the canal and the firstslopes of the Libyan mountains. A brick fortress defended it from theincursions of the Bedouin, and beside it the temple of the god of thedead reared its naked walls. Here, Anhûri, having passed from life todeath, was worshipped under the name of Khontamentît, the chief ofthat western region whither souls repair on quitting this earth. It isimpossible to say by what blending of doctrines or by what politicalcombinations this Sun of the Night came to be identified with Osiris ofMendes, since the fusion dates back to a very remote antiquity; it hadbecome an established fact long before the most ancient sacred bookswere compiled. Osiris Khontamentît grew rapidly in popular favour, andhis temple attracted annually an increasing number of pilgrims. TheGreat Oasis had been considered at first as a sort of mysteriousparadise, whither the dead went in search of peace and happiness. It wascalled Uîfc, the Sepulchre; this name clung to it after it had becomean actual Egyptian province, and the remembrance of its ancient purposesurvived in the minds of the people, so that the "cleft, " or gorgein the mountain through which the doubles journeyed towards it, neverceased to be regarded as one of the gates of the other world. At thetime of the New Year festivals, spirits flocked thither from all partsof the valley; they there awaited the coming of the dying sun, in orderto embark with him and enter safely the dominions of Khontamentît. Abydos, even before the historic period, was the only town, and its godthe only god, whose worship, practised by all Egyptians, inspired themall with an equal devotion. The excavations of the last few years havebrought to light some, at all events, of the oldest Pharaohs known tothe Egyptian annalists, namely, those whom they placed in their firsthuman dynasties; and the locality where the monuments of theseprinces were discovered, shows us that these writers were correct inrepresenting Thinis as playing an important part in the history of theearly ages of their country. If the tomb of Menés--that sovereignwhom we are inclined to look upon as the first king of the officiallists--lies near the village of Nagadeh, not far from Thebes, [*] thoseof his immediate successors are close to Thinis, in the cemeteries ofAbydos. [**] They stand at the very foot of the Libyan hills, near theentrance to the ravine--the "Cleft"--through which the mysterious oasiswas reached, and thither the souls flocked in order that they mightenter by a safe way the land beyond the grave. [***]

 * The objects found during these excavations are now in the Gîzeh Museum. 

 ** The credit of having discovered this important necropolis, and of having brought to light the earliest known monuments of the first dynasties, is entirely due to Amélineau. He carried on important work there during four years, from 1895 to 1899: unfortunately its success was impaired by the theories which he elaborated with regard to the new monuments, and by the delay in publishing an account of the objects which remained in his possession. 

 *** For the "Cleft, " cf. Supra, pp. 281, 282, 334. 

The mass of pottery, whole and broken, which has accumulated on thissite from the offerings of centuries has obtained for it among theFellahin the name of Omm-el-G-aâb--"the mother of pots. " The tombs therelie in serried ranks. They present for the most part a rough model ofthe pyramids of the Memphite period--rectangular structures of brickswithout mortar rising slightly above the level of the plain. The funeralchamber occupies the centre of each, and is partly hollowed out of thesoil, like a shallow well, the sides being bricked. It had a flat timberroof, covered by a layer of about three feet of sand; the floor also wasof wood, and in several cases the remains of the beams of both ceilingand pavement have been brought to light. The body of the royal inmatewas laid in the middle of the chamber, surrounded by its funeralfurniture and by a part of the offerings. The remainder was placed inthe little rooms which opened out of the principal vault, sometimeson the same level, sometimes on one higher than itself; after theircontents had been laid within them, the entrance to these rooms wasgenerally walled up. Human bodies have been found inside them, probablythose of slaves killed at the funeral that they might wait upon the deadin his life beyond the grave. [*] The objects placed in these chamberswere mostly offerings, but besides these were coarse stelae bearing thename of a person, and dictated to "the double of his luminary. "[**]Some of them mention a dwarf[***] or a favourite dog of the sovereign, who accompanied his master into the tomb. Tablets of ivory or boneskilfully incised furnish us with scenes representing some of theceremonies of the deification of the king in his lifetime and thesacrifices offered at the time of his burial;[****] in rarer instancesthey record his exploits. 

 * El. Petrie, The Royal Tombs of the First Dynasty, part i. P. 14. 

 ** The "luminous double" or the "double of his luminary" is doubtless that luminous spectre which haunted the tombs and even the houses of the living during the night, and which I have mentioned, supra, p. 160. 

 *** Petrie found the skeletons of two dwarfs, probably the very two to whom the two stelae (Nos. 36, 37) in the tomb of Semempses were raised. Was one of these dwarfs one of the _Danga_ of Puanît who were sought after by the Pharaohs of the Memphite dynasties?

 **** This was the ceremony called by the Egyptians "The Festival of the Foundation "--_habu sadu_. 

The offerings themselves were such as we meet with in burials ofa subsequent age--bread, cakes, meat, and poultry of varioussorts--indeed, everything we find mentioned in the lists inscribed inthe tombs of the later dynasties, particularly the jars of wine andliquors, on the clay bungs of which are still legible the impressionof the signet bearing the name of the sovereign for whose use they weresealed. Besides stuffs and mats, the furniture comprised chairs, beds, stools, an enormous number of vases, some in coarse pottery for commonuse, others in choice stone such as diorite, granite, or rock crystalvery finely worked, on the fragments of all of which may be read cutin outline the names and preamble of the Pharaoh to whom the objectbelonged. The ceremonial of the funerary offering and its significancewas already fully developed at this early period; this can be gatheredby the very nature of the objects buried with the deceased, by theirnumber, quantity, and by the manner in which they were arranged. Liketheir successors in the Egypt of later times, these ancient kingsexpected to continue their material existence within the tomb, andthey took precautions that life there should be as comfortable ascircumstances should permit. Access to the tomb was sometimes gainedby a sloping passage or staircase; this made it possible to see ifeverything within was in a satisfactory condition. After the dead hadbeen enclosed in his chamber, and five or six feet of sand had beenspread over the beams which formed its roof, the position of the tombwas shown merely by a scarcely perceptible rise in the soil of thenecropolis, and its site would soon have been forgotten, if itseasternmost limits had not been marked by two large stelae on whichwere carefully engraved one of the appellations of the king--that of hisdouble, or his Horus name. [*]

 * For the Horus name of the Pharaohs, see vol. ïi. , pp. 23- 25. 

It was on this spot, upon an altar placed between the two stelæ, thatthe commemorative ceremonies were celebrated, and the provisions renewedon certain days fixed by the religious law. Groups of private tombswere scattered around, --the resting-places of the chief officers of thesovereign, the departed Pharaoh being thus surrounded in death bythe same courtiers as those who had attended him during his earthlyexistence. 

The princes, whose names and titles have been revealed to us by theinscriptions on these tombs, have not by any means been all classifiedas yet, the prevailing custom at that period having been to designatethem by their Horus names, but rarely by their proper names, whichlatter is the only one which figures in the official lists which wepossess of the Egyptian kings. A few texts, more explicit than the rest, enable us to identify three of them with the Usaphais, the Miebis, andthe Semempses of Manetho--the fifth, sixth, and seventh kings ofthe Ist dynasty. [*] The fact that they are buried in the necropolis ofAbydos apparently justifies the opinion of the Egyptian chroniclers thatthey were natives of Thinis. Is the Menés who usually figures at theirhead[**] also a Thinite prince?

 * The credit is due to Sethe of having attributed their ordinary names to several of the kings of the Ist dynasty with Horus names only which were found by Amélineau, and these identifications have been accepted by all Egyptologists. Pétrie discovered quite recently on some fragments of vases the Horus names of these same princes, together with their ordinary names. The Usaphais, the Miebis, and the Semempses of Manetho are now satisfactorily identified with three of the Pharaohs discovered by Amélineau and by Pétrie. 

 ** In the time of Seti I. And Ramses II. He heads the list of the Table of Abydos. Under Ramses II. His statue was carried in procession, preceding all the other royal statues. Finally, the "Royal Papyrus" of Turin, written in the time of Ramses I. , begins the entire series of the human Pharaohs with his name. 

Several scholars believe that his ordinary name, Mini, is to be read onan ivory tablet engraved for a sovereign whose Horus name--Ahauîti, thewarlike--is known to us from several documents, and whose tomb also hasbeen discovered, but at Nagadeh. It is a great rectangular structureof bricks 165 feet long and 84 broad, the external walls of which wereoriginally ornamented by deep polygonal grooves, resembling those whichscore the façade of Chaldæan buildings, but the Nagadeh tomjb has asecond brick wall which fills up all the hollows left in the first one, and thus hides the primitive decoration of the monument. The buildingcontains twenty-one chambers, five of which in the centre apparentlyconstituted the dwelling of the deceased, while the others, groupedaround these, serve as storehouses from whence he could draw hisprovisions at will. Did the king buried within indeed bear the nameof Menés, [*] and if such was the case, how are we to reconcile thetradition of his Thinite origin with the existence of his far-off tombin the neighbourhood of Thebes?

 * The sign _Manu_, which appears on the ivory tablet found in this tomb, has been interpreted as a king's name, and consequently inferred to be Menés. This reading has been disputed on various sides, and the point remains, therefore, a contested one until further discovery. 

Objects bearing his Horus name have been found at Omm-el-Gaâb, and it isevident that he belonged to the same age as the sovereigns interred inthis necropolis. If, indeed, Menés was really his personal name, thereis no reason against his being the Menés of tradition, he whom thePharaohs of the glorious Theban dynasties regarded as the earliest oftheir purely human ancestors. Whether he was really the first king whoreigned over the whole of Egypt, or whether he had been precededby other sovereigns whose monuments we may find in some site stillunexplored, is a matter for conjecture. That princes had exercisedauthority in various parts of the country is still uncertain, but thatthe Egyptian historians did not know them, seems to prove that they hadleft no written records of their names. At any rate, a Menés lived whoreigned at the outset of history, and doubtless before long the Nilevalley, when more carefully explored, will yield us monuments recordinghis actions and determining his date. The civilization of the Egypt ofhis time was ruder than that with which we have hitherto been familiaron its soil, but even at that early period it was almost as complete. It had its industries and its arts, of which the cemeteries furnishus daily with the most varied examples: weaving, modelling in clay, wood-carving, the incising of ivory, gold, and the hardest stone wereall carried on; the ground was cultivated with hoe and plough; tombswere built showing us the model of what the houses and palaces must havebeen; the country had its army, its administrators, its priests, itsnobles, its writing, and its system of epigraphy differs so little fromthat to which we are accustomed in later ages, that we can decipher itwith no great difficulty. Frankly speaking, all that we know at presentof the first of the Pharaohs beyond the mere fact of his existence ispractically _nil_, and the stories related of him by the writers ofclassical times are mere legends arranged to suit the fancy of thecompiler. "This Menés, according to the priests, surrounded Memphis withdykes. For the river formerly followed the sandhills for some distanceon the Libyan side. Menés, having dammed up the reach about a hundredstadia to the south of Memphis, caused the old bed to dry up, andconveyed the river through an artificial channel dug midway between thetwo mountain ranges. Then Menés, the first who was king, having encloseda firm space of ground with dykes, there founded that town which isstill called Memphis; he then made a lake round it, to the north andwest, fed by the river, the city being bounded on the east by theNile. "[*]

 * The dyke supposed to have been made by Menés is evidently that of Qosheîsh, which now protects the province of Gîzeh, and regulates the inundation in its neighbourhood. 

The history of Memphis, such as it can be gathered from the monuments, differs considerably from the tradition current in Egypt at the time ofHerodotus. It appears, indeed, that at the outset, the site on whichit subsequently arose was occupied by a small fortress, Anbû-hazû--thewhite wall--which was dependent on Heliopolis, and in which Phtahpossessed a sanctuary. After the "white wall" was separated from theHeliopolitan principality to form a nome by itself, it assumed a certainimportance, and furnished, so it was said, the dynasties which succeededthe Thinite. Its prosperity dates only, however, from the time whenthe sovereigns of the Vth and VIth dynasties fixed on it for theirresidence; one of them, Papi L, there founded for himself and for his"double" after him, a new town, which he called Minnofîrû, from histomb. Minnofîrû, which is the correct pronunciation and the origin ofMemphis, probably signified "the good refuge, " the haven of the good, the burying-place where the blessed dead came to rest beside Osiris. Thepeople soon forgot the true interpretation, or probably it did not fallin with their taste for romantic tales. They were rather disposed, as arule, to discover in the beginnings of history individuals from whom thecountries or cities with which they were familiar took their names:if no tradition supplied them with this, they did not experience anyscruple in inventing one. The Egyptians of the time of the Ptolemies, who were guided in their philological speculations by the pronunciationin vogue around them, attributed the patronship of their city to aPrincess Memphis, a daughter of its founder, the fabulous Uchoreus;those of preceding ages before the name had become altered, thoughtto find in Minnofîrû a "Mini Nofir, " or "Menés the Good, " the reputedfounder of the capital of the Delta. Menés the Good, divested of hisepithet, is none other than Menés, the first king, and he owes thisepisode in his life to a popular attempt at etymology. The legend whichidentifies the establishment of the kingdom with the construction ofthe city, must have originated at the time when Memphis was still theresidence of the kings and the seat of government, at latest about theend of the Memphite period. It must have been an old tradition in thetime of the Theban dynasties, since they admitted unhesitatingly theauthenticity of the statements which ascribed to the northern city somarked a superiority over their own country. 

[Illustration: 343. Jpg NECKLACE, BEARING NAME OF MENES. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin after Prisse d'Avenues. The gold medallions engraved with the name of Menés are ancient, and perhaps go back to the XXth dynasty; the setting is entirely modern, with the exception of the three oblong pendants of cornelian. 

When once this half-mythical Menés was firmly established in hisposition, there was little difficulty in inventing a story which wouldportray him as an ideal sovereign. He was represented as architect, warrior, and statesman; he had begun the temple of Phtah, written lawsand regulated the worship of the gods, particularly that of Hâpis, andhe had conducted expeditions against the Libyans. When he lost his onlyson in the flower of his age, the people improvised a hymn of mourningto console him--the "Maneros"--both the words and the tune of which werehanded down from generation to generation. He did not, moreover, disdainthe luxuries of the table, for he invented the art of serving a dinner, and the mode of eating it in a reclining posture. One day, whilehunting, his dogs, excited by something or other, fell upon him todevour him. He escaped with difficulty, and, pursued by them, fled tothe shore of Lake Moeris, and was there brought to bay; he was on thepoint of succumbing to them, when a crocodile took him on his back andcarried him across to the other side. [*] In gratitude he built a newtown, which he called Crocodilopolis, and assigned to it for its god thecrocodile which had saved him; he then erected close to it the famouslabyrinth and a pyramid for his tomb. Other traditions show him in aless favourable light. They accuse him of having, by horrible crimes, excited against him the anger of the gods, and allege that after a reignof sixty to sixty-two years, he was killed by a hippopotamus which cameforth from the Nile. [**]

 * This is an episode from the legend of Osiris: at Phihe, in the little building of the Antonines, may be seen a representation of a crocodile crossing the Nile, carrying on his back the mummy of the god. The same episode is also found in the tale of Onus el Ujûd and of Uard f'il-Ikmâm, where the crocodile leads the hero to his beautiful prisoner in the Island of Philæ. Ebers, _Ægypte_, French trans. , vol. Ii. Pp. 415, 416, has shown how this episode in the Arab story must have been inspired by the bas-relief at Philæ and by the scene which it portrays: the temple is still called "Kasr, " and the island "Geziret Onus el-Ujûd. "

 ** In popular romances, this was the usual end of criminals of every kind; we shall see that another king, Akhthoes the founder of the IXth dynasty, after committing horrible misdeeds, was killed, in the same way as Menés, by a hippopotamus. 

They also related that the Saïte Tafnakhti, returning from an expeditionagainst the Arabs, during which he had been obliged to renounce the pompand luxuries of royal life, had solemnly cursed him, and had caused hisimprecations to be inscribed upon a stele set up in the temple of Amonat Thebes. Nevertheless, in the memory that Egypt preserved of its firstPharaoh, the good outweighed the evil. He was worshipped in Memphis sideby side with Phtah and Ramses II. ; his name figured at the head of theroyal lists, and his cult continued till the time of the Ptolemies. 

His immediate successors had an actual existence, and their tombs arethere in proof of it. We know where Usaphais, Miebis, and Semempses[*]were laid to rest, besides more than a dozen other princes whose realnames and whose position in the official lists are still uncertain. Theorder of their succession was often a matter of doubt to the Egyptiansthemselves, but perhaps the discoveries of the next few years willenable us to clear up and settle definitely matters which were shroudedin mystery in the time of the Theban Pharaohs. As a fact, the forms ofsuch of their names as have been handed down to us by later tradition, are curt and rugged, indicative of an early state of society, andharmonizing with the more primitive civilization to which they belong:Ati the Wrestler, Teti the Runner, Qenqoni the Crusher, are suitablerulers for a people, the first duty of whose chief was to lead hisfollowers into battle, and to strike harder than any other man in thethickest of the fight. [**]

 * Flinders Pétrie, _The 'Royal Tombs of the First Dynasty_, vol. I. P. 56. 

 ** The Egyptians were accustomed to explain the meaning of the names of their kings to strangers, and the Canon of Eratosthenes has preserved several of their derivations, of which a certain number, as, for instance, that of Menés from aùovioç, the "lasting, " are tolerably correct. M. Krall is, to my knowledge, the only Egyptologist who has attempted to glean from the meaning of these names indications of the methods by which the national historians of Egypt endeavoured to make up the lists of the earliest dynasties. 

Some of the monuments they have left us, seem to show that their reignswere as much devoted to war as those of the later Pharaohs. The kingwhose Horus name was Nârumîr, is seen on a contemporary object which hascome down to us, standing before a heap of beheaded foes; the bodiesare all stretched out on the ground, each with his head placed neatlybetween his legs: the king had overcome, apparently in some importantengagement, several thousands of his enemies, and was inspecting theexecution of their leaders. That the foes with whom these early kingscontended were in most cases Egyptian princes of the nomes, is proved bythe list of city names which are inscribed on the fragments of anotherdocument of the same nature, and we gather from them that Dobu (Edfu), Hasutonu (Cynopolis), Habonu (Hipponon), Hakau (Memphis) and others weresuccessively taken and dismantled. [*]

 * Palette resembling the preceding one, and with it deposited in the Gîzeh Museum; reproduced by Steindokff, and by J. De Morgan. The names of the towns were enclosed within the embattled line which was used later on to designate foreign countries. The animals which surmount them represent the gods of Egypt, the king's protectors; and the king himself, identified with these gods, is making a breach in the wall with a pick-axe. The names of the towns have not been satisfactorily identified: Hat-kau, for instance, may not be Memphis, but it appears that there is no doubt with regard to Habonu. Cf. Sayce, The Beginnings of the Egyptian Monarchy in the Proceedings of the Biblical Archæological Society, 1898, vol. Xx. Pp, 99-101. 

On this fragment King Den is represented standing over a prostrate chiefof the Bedouin, striking him with his mace. Sondi, who is classed in theIInd dynasty, received a continuous worship towards the end of the IIIrddynasty. But did all those whose names preceded or followed his on thelists, really exist as he did? and if they existed, to what extent dothe order and the relation assigned to them agree with the actual truth?The different lists do not contain the same names in the same positions;certain Pharaohs are added or suppressed without appreciable reason. Where Manetho inscribes Kenkenes and Ouenephes, the tables of the timeof Seti I. Gave us Ati and Ata; Manetho reckons nine kings to the IInddynasty, while they register only five. [*]

 * The impossibility of reconciling the names of the Greek with those of the Pharaonic lists has been admitted by most of the savants who have discussed the matter, viz. Mariette, E. De Rouge, Lieblein, Wiedemann; most of them explain the differences by the supposition that, in many cases, one of the lists gives the cartouche name, and the other the cartouche prenomen of the same king. 

The monuments, indeed, show us that Egypt in the past obeyed princeswhom her annalists were unable to classify: for instance, they associatewith Sondi a Pirsenû, who is not mentioned in the annals. We must, therefore, take the record of all this opening period of history forwhat it is--namely, a system invented at a much later date, by means ofvarious artifices and combinations--to be partially accepted in defaultof a better, but without according to it that excessive confidence whichit has hitherto received. The two Thinite dynasties, in direct descentfrom the first human king Menés, furnish, like this hero himself, only atissue of romantic tales and miraculous legends in the place of history. A double-headed stork, which had appeared in the first year of Teti, son of Menés, had foreshadowed to Egypt a long prosperity, but a famineunder Ouenephes, and a terrible plague under Semempses, had depopulatedthe country: the laws had been relaxed, great crimes had been committed, and revolts had broken out. During the reign of Boêthos, a gulf hadopened near Bubastis, and swallowed up many people, then the Nile hadflowed with honey for fifteen days in the time of Nephercheres, andSesochris was supposed to have been a giant in stature. A few detailsabout royal edifices were mixed up with these prodigies. Teti had laidthe foundation of the great palace of Memphis, Ouenephes had built thepyramids of Ko-komè near Saqqara. Several of the ancient Pharaohs hadpublished books on theology, or had written treatises on anatomy andmedicine; several had made laws which lasted down to the beginning ofthe Christian era. One of them was called Kakôû, the male of males, orthe bull of bulls. They explained his name by the statement that he hadconcerned himself about the sacred animals; he had proclaimed as gods, Hâpis of Memphis, Mnevis of Heliopolis, and the goat of Mendes. Afterhim, Binôthris had conferred the right of succession upon all the womenof the blood-royal. The accession of the IIIrd dynasty, a Memphite oneaccording to Manetho, did not at first change the miraculous characterof this history. The Libyans had revolted against Necherophes, and thetwo armies were encamped before each other, when one night the disk ofthe moon became immeasurably enlarged, to the great alarm of the rebels, who recognized in this phenomenon a sign of the anger of heaven, andyielded without fighting. Tosorthros, the successor of Necherophes, brought the hieroglyphs and the art of stone-cutting to perfection. Hecomposed, as Teti did, books of medicine, a fact which caused him tobe identified with the healing god Imhotpu. The priests related thesethings seriously, and the Greek writers took them down from their lipswith the respect which they offered to everything emanating from thewise men of Egypt. 

What they related of the human kings was not more detailed, as we see, than their accounts of the gods. Whether the legends dealt with deitiesor kings, all that we know took its origin, not in popular imagination, but in sacerdotal dogma: they were invented long after the times theydealt with, in the recesses of the temples, with an intention and amethod of which we are enabled to detect flagrant instances on themonuments. Towards the middle of the third century before our era, theGreek troops stationed on the southern frontier, in the forts at thefirst cataract, developed a particular veneration for Isis of Philæ. Their devotion spread to the superior officers who came to inspect them, then to the whole population of the Thebàid, and finally reached thecourt of the Macedonian kings. The latter, carried away by forceof example, gave every encouragement to a movement which attractedworshippers to a common sanctuary, and united in one cult the two racesover which they ruled. They pulled down the meagre building of theSa'ite period which had hitherto sufficed for the worship of Isis, constructed at great cost the temple which still remains almost intact, and assigned to it considerable possessions in Nubia, which, inaddition to gifts from private individuals, made the goddess the richestlandowner in Southern Egypt. Khnûmû and his two wives, Anûkit and Satît, who, before Isis, had been the undisputed suzerains of the cataract, perceived with jealousy their neighbour's prosperity: the civil warsand invasions of the centuries immediately preceding had ruined theirtemples, and their poverty contrasted painfully with the riches of thenew-comer. 

[Illustration: 350. Jpg SATÎT PRESENTS THE PHARAOH AMENÔTHES III. TOKHNÔMÛ. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from one of the bas-reliefs of the temple of Khnûmû, at Elephantine. This bas-relief is now destroyed. 

The priests resolved to lay this sad state of affairs before KingPtolemy, to represent to him the services which they had rendered andstill continued to render to Egypt, and above all to remind him of thegenerosity of the ancient Pharaohs, whose example, owing to the povertyof the times, the recent Pharaohs had been unable to follow. 

[Illustration: 351. Jpg ANÛKIT]

Doubtless authentic documents were wanting in their archives to supporttheir pretensions: they therefore inscribed upon a rock, in the islandof Sehel, a long inscription which they attributed to Zosiri of theIIIrd dynasty. This sovereign had left behind him a vague reputation forgreatness. As early as the XIIth dynasty Usirtasen III. Had claimedhim as "his father"--his ancestor--and had erected a statue to him; thepriests knew that, by invoking him, they had a chance of obtaining ahearing. The inscription which they fabricated, set forth that inthe eighteenth year of Zosiri's reign he had sent to Madîr, lord ofElephantine, a message couched in these terms: "I am overcome withsorrow for the throne, and for those who reside in the palace, and myheart is afflicted and suffers greatly because the Nile has not risen inmy time, for the space of eight years. Corn is scarce, there is a lackof herbage, and nothing is left to eat: when any one calls upon hisneighbours for help, they take pains not to go. The child weeps, theyoung man is uneasy, the hearts of the old men are in despair, theirlimbs are bent. "

Ptolemies admit the claims which the local priests attempted to deducefrom this romantic tale? and did the god regain possession of thedomains and dues which they declared had been his right? The stele showsus with what ease the scribes could forge official documents, whenthe exigencies of they crouch on the earth, they fold their hands; thecourtiers have no further resources; the shops formerly furnishedwith rich wares are now filled only with air, all that was in them hasdisappeared. 

"My spirit also, mindful of the beginning of things, seeks to call uponthe Saviour who was here where I am, during the centuries of the gods, upon Thot-Ibis, that great wise one, upon Imhotpû, son of Phtah ofMemphis. Where is the place in which the Nile is born? Who is the god orgoddess concealed there? What is his likeness?"

[Illustration: 353. Jpg THE STEP PYRAMID OF SAUARA. 1]

 1 Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by Dévèria (1864); in the foreground, the tomb of Ti. 

The lord of Elephantine brought his reply in person. He described to theking, who was evidently ignorant of it, the situation of the island andthe rocks of the cataract, the phenomena of the inundation, the gods whopresided over it, and who alone could relieve Egypt from her disastrousplight. Zosiri repaired to the temple of the principality and offeredthe prescribed sacrifices; the god arose, opened his eyes, panted andcried aloud, "I am Khnûmû who created thee!" and promised him a speedyreturn of a high Nile and the cessation of the famine. Pharaoh wastouched by the benevolence which his divine father had shown him; heforthwith made a decree by which he ceded to the temple all his rightsof suzerainty over the neighbouring nomes within a radius of twentymiles. Henceforward the entire population, tillers and vinedressers, fishermen and hunters, had to yield the tithe of their incomes to thepriests; the quarries could not be worked without the consent of Khnûmû, and the payment of a suitable indemnity into his coffers, and finally, all metals and precious woods shipped thence for Egypt had to submit toa toll on behalf of the temple. Did the daily life forced the necessityupon them; it teaches us at the same time how that fabulous chroniclewas elaborated, whose remains have been preserved for us by classicalwriters. Every prodigy, every fact related by Manetho, was taken fromsome document analogous to the supposed inscription of Zosiri. [*]

 * The legend of the yawning gulf at Bubastis must be connected with the gifts supposed to have been offered by King Boêthos to the temple of that town, to repair the losses sustained by the goddess on that occasion; the legend of the pestilence and famine is traceable to some relief given by a local god, and for which Semempses and Ùenephes might have shown their gratitude in the same way as Zosiri. The tradition of the successive restorations of Denderah accounts for the constructions attributed to Teti I. And to Tosorthros; finally, the prête tided discoveries of sacred books, dealt with elsewhere, show how Manetho was enabled to attribute to his Pharaohs the authorship of works on medicine or theology. 

The real history of the early centuries, therefore, eludes ourresearches, and no contemporary record traces for us those vicissitudeswhich Egypt passed through before being consolidated into a singlekingdom, under the rule of one man. Many names, apparently of powerfuland illustrious princes, had survived in the memory of the people;these were collected, classified, and grouped in a regular manner intodynasties, but the people were ignorant of any exact facts connectedwith the names, and the historians, on their own account, were reducedto collect apocryphal traditions for their sacred archives. Themonuments of these remote ages, however, cannot have entirelydisappeared: they exist in places where we have not as yet thought ofapplying the pick, and chance excavations will some day most certainlybring them to light. The few which we do possess barely go back beyondthe IIIrd dynasty: namely, the hypogeum of Shiri, priest of Sondi andPirsenû; possibly the tomb of Khûîthotpû at Saqqâra; the Great Sphinxof Gîzeh; a short inscription on the rocks of the Wady Maghâra, whichrepresents Zosiri (the same king of whom the priests of Khnûmû in theGreek period made a precedent) working the turquoise or copper mines ofSinai; and finally the Step-Pyramid where this same Pharaoh rests. [*]

 * The stele of Sehêl has enabled us to verify the fact that the preamble [a string of titles] to the inscription of the king, buried in the Step-Pyramid, is identical with that of King Zosiri: it was, therefore, Zosiri who constructed, or arranged for the construction of this monument as his tomb. The Step-Pyramid of Saqqâra was opened in 1819, at the expense of the Prussian General Minutoli, who was the first to give a brief description of the interior, illustrated by plans and drawings. 

It forms a rectangular mass, incorrectly orientated, with a variationfrom the true north of 4° 35', 393 ft. 8 in. Long from east to west, and 352 ft. Deep, with a height of 159 ft. 9 in. It is composed of sixcubes, with sloping sides, each being about 13 ft. Less in width thanthe one below it; that nearest to the ground measures 37 ft. 8 in. Inheight, and the uppermost one 29 ft. 9 in. It was entirely constructedof limestone from the neighbouring mountains. The blocks are small, andbadly cut, the stone courses being concave to offer a better resistanceto downward thrust and to shocks of earthquake. When breaches in themasonry are examined, it can be seen that the external surface ofthe steps has, as it were, a double stone facing, each facing beingcarefully dressed. The body of the pyramid is solid, the chambersbeing cut in the rock beneath. These chambers have been often enlarged, restored, and reworked in the course of centuries, and the passageswhich connect them form a perfect labyrinth into which it is dangerousto venture without a guide. The columned porch, the galleries andhalls, all lead to a sort of enormous shaft, at the bottom of which thearchitect had contrived a hiding-place, destined, no doubt, to containthe more precious objects of the funerary furniture. Until the beginningof this century, the vault had preserved its original lining of glazedpottery. Three quarters of the wall surface were covered with greentiles, oblong and slightly convex on the outer side, but flat on theinner: a square projection pierced with a hole, served to fix them atthe back in a horizontal line by means of flexible wooden rods. 

[Illustration: 356. Jpg ONE OF THE CHAMBERS OF THE STEP-PYRAMID, WITHITS WALL-COVERING OF GLAZED TILES. 1]

 1 Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the coloured sketch by Sogato. M. Stern attributes the decoration of glazed pottery to the XXVI '' dynasty, which opinion is shared by Borchardt. The yellow and green glazed tiles hearing the cartouche of Papi I. , show that the Egyptians of the Memphite dynasties used glazed facings at that early date; we may, therefore, believe, if the tiles of the vault of Zosiri are really of the Saïte period, that they replaced a decoration of the same kind, which belonged to the time of its construction, and of which some fragments still exist among the tiles of more recent date. 

The three bands which frame one of the doors are inscribed with thetitles of the Pharaoh: the hieroglyphs are raised in either blue, red, green, or yellow, on a fawn-coloured ground. Other kings had builttemples, palaces, and towns, --as, for instance, King Khâsakhimu, ofwhose constructions some traces exist at Hieracônpolis, opposite toEl-Kab, or King Khâsakhmui, who preceded by a few years the Pharaohs ofthe IVth dynasty--but the monuments which they raised to be witnesses oftheir power or piety to future generations, have, in the course of ages, disappeared under the tramplings and before the triumphal blasts of manyinvading hosts: the pyramid alone has survived, and the most ancient ofthe historic monuments of Egypt is a tomb. 

[Illustration: 357. Jpg TAILPIECE]

END OF VOL. I.