The Literature of the Ancient Egyptians (anthology)

Another late work of considerable interest is the "Book of Traversing Eternity," the fullest known form of which is found on a papyrus at Vienna. This work describes how the soul of the deceased, when armed with the power which the Book of Traversing Eternity will give it, shall be able to travel from one end of Egypt to the other, and to visit all the holy places, and to assist at the festivals, and to enjoy communion not only with the gods and spirits who assemble there, but also with its kinsfolk and acquaintances whom it left behind alive on the earth. The object of the book was to secure for the deceased the resurrection of his body; it opens with the following words: "Thy soul liveth in heaven in the presence of Rā. Thy Ka hath acquired the divine nature of the gods. Thy body remaineth in the deep house (i.e. tomb) in the presence of Osiris.

Thy spirit-body becometh glorious among the living. Thy descendants flourish upon the earth, in the presence of Keb, upon thy seat among the living, and thy name is stablished by the utterance of those who have their being through the 'Book of Traversing Eternity.' Thou comest forth by day, thou art joined to the Sun-god Aten." The text goes on to state that the deceased breathes, speaks, eats, drinks, sees, hears, and walks, and that all the organs of his body are in their proper places, and that each is performing its proper functions. He floats in the air, hovers in the shadow, rises in the sky, follows the gods, travels with the stars, dekans, and planets, and moves about by night and by day on earth and in heaven at will.

Of the works that were originally composed for recitation on the days of the festivals of Osiris, and were specially connected with the cult of this god, three, which became very popular in the Graeco-Roman period, may be mentioned. These are: (1) The Lamentations of Isis and Nephthys; (2) The Festival Songs of Isis and Nephthys; (3) The Book of making splendid the Spirit of Osiris. The first of these works was recited on the twenty-fifth day of the fourth month of the season Akhet (October-November) by two "fair women," who personified Isis and Nephthys. One of these had the name of Isis on her shoulder, and the other the name of Nephthys, and each held a vessel of water in her right hand, and a "Memphis cake of bread" in her left. The object of the recital was to commemorate the resurrection of Osiris, and if the book were recited on behalf of any deceased person it would make his spirit to be glorious, and stablish his body, and cause his Ka to rejoice, and give breath to his nostrils and air to his throat. The two "fair women" sang the sections alternately in the presence of the Kher-heb and Setem priests. The two first sections, as they are found on a papyrus in Berlin, read thus: - ISIS SAITH: "Come to thy house, come to thy house, O An, come to thy house. Thine enemy [Set] hath perished. O beautiful youth, come to thy house.

Look thou upon me. I am the sister who loveth thee, go not far from me. O Beautiful Boy, come to thy house, straightway, straightway. I cannot see thee, and my heart weepeth for thee; my eyes follow thee about. I am following thee about so that I may see thee. Lo, I wait to see thee, I wait to see thee; behold, Prince, I wait to see thee. It is good to see thee, it is good to see thee; O An, it is good to see thee. Come to thy beloved one, come to thy beloved one, O Un-Nefer, whose word is truth. Come to thy wife, O thou whose heart is still. Come to the lady of thy house; I am thy sister from thy mother's [womb]. Go not thou far from me. The faces of gods and men are turned towards thee, they all weep for thee together. As soon as I saw thee I cried out to thee, weeping with a loud voice which pierced the heavens, and thou didst not hear my voice. I am thy sister who loved thee upon earth; none other loved thee more than [thy] sister, thy sister."

NEPHTHYS SAITH: "O Beautiful Prince, come to thy house. Let thy heart rejoice and be glad, for thine enemies have ceased to be. Thy two Sisters are nigh unto thee; they guard thy bier, they address thee with words [full of] tears as thou liest prone on thy bier. Look thou at the young women; speak to us, O our Sovereign Lord. Destroy thou all the misery that is in our hearts; the chiefs among gods and men look upon thee. Turn thou towards us thy face, O our Sovereign Lord. At the sight of thy face life cometh to our faces; turn not thou thy face from us. The joy of our heart is in the sight of thee. O Beautiful Sovereign, our hearts would see thee. I am thy sister Nephthys who loveth thee. The fiend Seba hath fallen, he hath not being. I am with thee, and I act as the protectress of thy members for ever and ever." The second work, the "Festival Songs of Isis and Nephthys," was sung during the great festival of Osiris, which took place in the fourth month of the Season of Akhet and lasted five days (from the twenty-second to the twenty-sixth day). It was sung by two virgins who wore fillets of sheep's wool on their heads, and held tambourines in their hands; one was called Isis and the other Nephthys. According to the rubrical directions given in the British Museum papyrus, the sections were sung by both women together. The following passage will illustrate the contents of the work:

"Come, come, run to me, O strong heart! Let me see thy divine face, for I do not see thee, and make thou clear the path that we may see thee as we see Rā in heaven, when the heavens unite with the earth, and cause darkness to fall upon the earth each day. My heart burneth as with fire at thy escape from the Fiend, even as my heart burneth with fire when thou turnest thy side to me; O that thou wouldst never remove it from me! O thou who unitest the Two Domains (i.e. Egypt, North and South), and who turnest back those who are on the roads, I seek to see thee because of my love for thee.... Thou fliest like a living being, O Everlasting King; thou hast destroyed the fiend Anrekh. Thou art the King of the South and of the North, and thou goest forth from Tatchesert. May there never be a moment in thy life when I do not fill thy heart, O my divine brother, my lord who goest forth from Aqert.... My arms are raised to protect thee, O thou whom I love. I love thee, O Husband, Brother, lord of love; come thou in peace into thy house.... Thy hair is like turquoise as thou comest forth from the Fields of Turquoise, thy hair is like unto the finest lapis-lazuli, and thou thyself art more blue than thy hair. Thy skin and body are like southern alabaster, and thy bones are of silver. The perfume of thy hair is like unto new myrrh, and thy skull is of lapis-lazuli."

The third work, "The Book of making splendid the Spirit of Osiris," was also sung at the great festival of Osiris that took place during the November-December at Abydos and other great towns in Egypt, and if it were sung on behalf of any man, the resurrection and life, constantly renewed, of that man were secured for his soul and spirit. This Book, written in hieratic, is found in a papyrus in Paris, and the following extract will illustrate its contents: "Come to thy house, come to thy house, O An. Come to thy house, O Beautiful Bull, lord of men and women, the beloved one, the lord of women. O Beautiful Face, Chief of Akert, Prince, Khenti Amentiu, are not all hearts drunk through the love of thee, O Un-Nefer, whose word is truth? The hands of men and gods are lifted up and seek thee, even as the hands of a babe are stretched out to his mother. Come thou to them, for their hearts are sad, and make them to rejoice. The lands of Horus exult, the domains of Set are overthrown because of their fear of thee. Hail, Osiris Khenti Amentiu! I am thy sister Isis. No god and no goddess have done for thee what I have done. I, a woman, made a man child for thee, because of my desire to make thy name to live upon the earth. Thy divine essence was in my body, I brought him forth on the ground.

He pleaded thy case, he healed thy suffering, he decreed the destruction of him that caused it. Set fell under his knife, and the Smamiu fiends of Set followed him. The throne of the Earth-god is thine, O thou who art his beloved son.... There is health in thy members, thy wounds are healed, thy sufferings are relieved, thou shalt never groan again in pain. Come to us thy sisters, come to us; our hearts will live when thou comest. Men shall cry out to thee, and women shall weep glad tears, at thy coming to them.... The Nile appeareth at the command of thy mouth; thou makest men to live on the effluxes that proceed from thy members, and thou makest every field to flourish. When thou comest that which is dead springeth into life, and the plants in the marshes put forth blossoms. Thou art the Lord of millions of years, the sustainer of wild creatures, and the lord of cattle; every created thing hath its existence from thee. What is in the earth is thine. What is in the heavens is thine. What is in the waters is thine. Thou art the Lord of Truth, the hater of sinners, whom thou overthrowest in their sins. The Goddesses of Truth are with thee; they never leave thee. No sinful man can approach thee in the place where thou art. Whatsoever appertaineth to life and to death belongeth to thee, and to thee belongeth everything that concerneth man."

During the period of the occupation of Egypt by the Romans, the three last-named works were still further abridged, and eventually the texts that were considered essential for salvation were written upon small sheets of papyrus from 9 to 12 inches high, and from 5 to 10 inches wide.

If we consider for a moment the vast amount of thought which the Egyptian gave to the problems of the future life, and their deep-seated belief in resurrection and immortality, we cannot fail to conclude that he must have theorised deeply about the constitution of the heaven in which he hoped to live everlastingly, and about its Maker. The translations given in the preceding pages prove that the theologians of Egypt were ready enough to describe heaven, and the life led by the blessed there, and the powers and the attributes of the gods, but they appear to have shrunk from writing down in a connected form their beliefs concerning the Creation and the origin of the Creator. The worshippers of each great god proclaimed him to be the Creator of All, and every great town had its own local belief on the subject. According to the Heliopolitans, Atem, or Tem, and at a later period Rā, was the Creator; according to Memphite theology he was Ptah; according to the Hermopolitans he was Thoth; and according to the Thebans he was Amen (Ammon). In only one native Egyptian work up to the present has there been discovered any connected account of the Creation, and the means by which it was effected, namely, the British Museum Papyrus, No. 10,188. This papyrus was written about 305 B.C., and is therefore of a comparatively late date, but the subject matter of the works contained in it is thousands of years older, and it is only their forms which are of a late date.

The Story of the Creation is found in the last work in the papyrus, which is called the "Book of overthrowing Āapep, the Enemy of Rā, the Enemy of Un-Nefer" (i.e. Osiris). This work is a liturgy, which was said at certain times of the day and night in the great temple of Amen-Rā at Thebes, with the view of preventing the monster Āapep from obstructing the sunrise. Āapep was supposed to lie in wait for the sun daily just before sunrise, with the view of doing battle with him and overthrowing him. When the Sun-god arrived at the place where Āapep was, he first of all cast a spell upon the monster, which rendered him helpless, and then he cast his fiery rays upon him, which shrivelled him up, and the fire of the god consumed him entirely. In the temple of Amen-Rā the priests recited the spells that were supposed to help the Sun-god to burn up Āapep, and they burnt waxen figures of the monster in specially prepared fires, and, uttering curses, they trampled them under foot and defiled them. These spells and burnings were also believed to break up rain clouds, and to scatter fog and mist and to dissipate thunder-storms, and to help the sun to rise on this world in a cloudless sky. Āapep was a form of Set, the god of evil of every kind, and his allies were the "Red Fiends" and the "Black Fiends," and every power of darkness.

In the midst of the magical spells of this papyrus we find two copies of the "Book of knowing how Rā came into being, and of overthrowing Āapep." One copy is a little fuller than the other, but they agree substantially. The words of this book are said in the opening line to have been spoken by the god Nebertcher, i.e. the "Lord to the uttermost limit," or God Himself. The Egyptian Christians, or Copts, in their religious writings use this name as an equivalent of God Almighty, the Lord of All, the God of the Universe. Nebertcher says: "I am the creator of what hath come into being. I myself came into being under the form of the god Khepera. I came into being under the form of Pautti (or, in primeval time), I formed myself out of the primeval matter, I made myself out of the substance that was in primeval time."[1] Nothing existed at that time except the great primeval watery mass called NU, but in this there were the germs of everything that came into being subsequently. There was no heaven, and no earth, and the god found no place on which to stand; nothing, in fact, existed except the god. He says, "I was alone." He first created himself by uttering his own name as a word of power, and when this was uttered his visible form appeared. He then uttered another kind of word of power, and as a result of this his soul (ba) came into being, and it worked in connection with his heart or mind (ab).

Before every act of creation Nebertcher, or his visible form Khepera, thought out what form the thing to be created was to take, and when he had uttered its name the thing itself appeared in heaven or earth. To fill the heaven, or place where he lived, the god next produced from his body and its shadow the two gods Shu and Tefnut. These with Nebertcher, or Khepera, formed the first triad of gods, and the "one god became three," or, as we should say, the one god had three aspects, each of which was quite distinct from the other. The tradition of the begetting of Shu and Tefnut is as old as the time of the pyramids, for it is mentioned in the text of Pepi I, l. 466. The next act of creation resulted in the emerging of the Eye of Nebertcher (later identified with Rā) from the watery mass (NU), and light shone upon its waters. Shu and Tefnut then united and they produced Keb, the Earth-god, and Nut, the Sky-goddess. The text then refers to some calamity which befell the Eye of Nebertcher or of Khepera, but what it was is not clear; at all events the Eye became obscured, and it ceased to give light. This period of darkness is, of course, the night, and to obviate the inconvenience caused by this recurring period of darkness, the god made a second Eye, i.e. the Moon, and set it in the heavens. The greater Eye ruled the day, and the lesser Eye the night. One of the results of the daily darkness was the descent of the Sky-goddess Nut to the Earth-god Keb each evening.

The gods and goddesses next created were five, namely, Osiris, Horus, Set, Isis, and Nephthys. Osiris married Isis, and their son was called Horus; Set married Nephthys, but their son Anpu, or Anubis, is not mentioned in our text. Osiris became the great Ancestor-god of Egypt, and was a reincarnation of his great-grandfather. Men and women were first formed from the tears that fell from the Eye of Khepera, or the Sun-god, upon his body; the old Egyptian word for "men" very closely resembles in form and sound the word for "tears." Plants, vegetables, herbs, and trees owe their origin to the light of the moon falling upon the earth. Our text contains no mention of a special creation of the "beasts of the field," but the god states distinctly that he created the children of the earth, or creeping things of all kinds, and among this class quadrupeds are probably included. The men and women, and all the other living creatures that were made at that time by Nebertcher, or Khepera, reproduced their species, each in his own way, and thus the earth became filled with their descendants as we see at the present time. The elements of this Creation legend are very, very old, and the form in which they are grouped in our text suggests the influence of the priests of Heliopolis. It is interesting to note that only very ancient gods appear as Powers of creation, and these were certainly worshipped for many centuries before the priests of Heliopolis invented their cult of the Sun-god, and identified their god with the older gods of the country. We may note, too, that gods like Ptah and Amen, whose reputation was so great in later times, and even when our text was copied in 305 B.C., find no mention at all.

The Egyptians believed that at one time all the great gods and goddesses lived upon earth, and that they ruled Egypt in much the same way as the Pharaohs with whom they were more or less acquainted. They went about among men and took a real personal interest in their affairs, and, according to tradition, they spared no pains in promoting their wishes and well-being. Their rule was on the whole beneficent, chiefly because in addition to their divine attributes they possessed natures, and apparently bodily constitutions that were similar to those of men. Like men also they were supposed to feel emotions and passions, and to be liable to the accidents that befell men, and to grow old, and even to die. The greatest of all the gods was Rā, and he reigned over Egypt for very many years. His reign was marked by justice and righteousness, and he was in all periods of Egyptian history regarded as the type of what a king should be. When men instead of gods reigned over Egypt they all delighted to call themselves sons of Rā, and every king believed that Rā was his true father, and regarded his mother's husband as his father only in name. This belief was always common in Egypt, and even Alexander the Great found it expedient to adopt it, for he made a journey to the sanctuary of Amen (Ammon) in the Oasis of Sīwāh in order to be officially acknowledged by the god. Having obtained this recognition, he became the rightful lord of Egypt.

This Legend is cut in hieroglyphs on the walls of a small chamber in the tomb of Seti I about 1350 B.C. When Rā, the self-begotten and self-formed god, had been ruling gods and men for some time, men began to complain about him, saying, "His Majesty hath become old. His bones have turned into silver, his flesh into gold, and his hair into real lapis-lazuli." His Majesty heard these murmurings and commanded his followers to summon to his presence his Eye (i.e. the goddess Hathor), Shu, Tefnut, Keb, Nut, and the father and mother gods and goddesses who were with him in the watery abyss of NU, and also the god of this water, NU. They were to come to him with all their followers secretly, so that men should not suspect the reason for their coming, and take flight, and they were to assemble in the Great House in Heliopolis, where Rā would take counsel with them. In due course all the gods assembled in the Great House, and they ranged themselves down the sides of the House, and they bowed down in homage before Rā until their heads touched the ground, and said, "Speak, for we are listening." Then Rā addresing Nu, the father of the first-born gods, told him to give heed to what men were doing, for they whom he had created were murmuring against him. And he said, "Tell me what ye would do.

Consider the matter, invent a plan for me, and I will not slay them until I have heard what ye shall say concerning this thing." Nu replied, "Thou, O my son Rā, art greater than the god who made thee (i.e. Nu himself), thou art the king of those who were created with thee, thy throne is established, and the fear of thee is great. Let thine Eye (Hathor) attack those who blaspheme thee." And Rā said, "Lo, they have fled to the mountains, for their hearts are afraid because of what they have said." The gods replied, "Let thine Eye go forth and destroy those who blasphemed thee, for no eye can resist thine when it goeth forth in the form of Hathor." Thereupon the Eye of Rā, or Hathor, went in pursuit of the blasphemers in the mountains, and slew them all. On her return Rā welcomed her, and the goddess said that the work of vanquishing men was dear to her heart. Rā then said that he would be the master of men as their king, and that he would destroy them. For three nights the goddess Hathor-Sekhmet waded about in the blood of men, the slaughter beginning at Hensu (Herakleopolis Magna).

Then the Majesty of Rā ordered that messengers should be sent to Abu, a town at the foot of the First Cataract, to fetch mandrakes (?), and when they were brought he gave them to the god Sekti to crush. When the women slaves were bruising grain for making beer, the crushed mandrakes (?) were placed in the vessels that were to hold the beer, together with some of the blood of those who had been slain by Hathor. The beer was then made, and seven thousand vessels were filled with it. When Rā saw the beer he ordered it to be taken to the scene of slaughter, and poured out on the meadows of the four quarters of heaven. The object of putting mandrakes (?) in the beer was to make those who drank fall asleep quickly, and when the goddess Hathor came and drank the beer mixed with blood and mandrakes (?) she became very merry, and, the sleepy stage of drunkenness coming on her, she forgot all about men, and slew no more. At every festival of Hathor ever after "sleepy beer" was made, and it was drunk by those who celebrated the feast. Now, although the blasphemers of Rā had been put to death, the heart of the god was not satisfied, and he complained to the gods that he was smitten with the "pain of the fire of sickness." He said, "My heart is weary because I have to live with men;

I have slain some of them, but worthless men still live, and I did not slay as many as I ought to have done considering my power." To this the gods replied, "Trouble not about thy lack of action, for thy power is in proportion to thy will." Here the text becomes fragmentary, but it seems that the goddess Nut took the form of a cow, and that the other gods lifted Rā on to her back. When men saw that Rā was leaving the earth, they repented of their murmurings, and the next morning they went out with bows and arrows to fight the enemies of the Sun-god. As a reward for this Rā forgave those men their former blasphemies, but persisted in his intention of retiring from the earth. He ascended into the heights of heaven, being still on the back of the Cow-goddess Nut, and he created there Sekhet-hetep and Sekhet-Aaru as abodes for the blessed, and the flowers that blossomed therein he turned into stars. He also created the millions of beings who lived there in order that they might praise him. The height to which Rā had ascended was now so great that the legs of the Cow-goddess on which he was enthroned trembled, and to give her strength he ordained that Nut should be held up in her position by the godhead and upraised arms of the god Shu. This is why we see pictures of the body of Nut being supported by Shu.

The legs of the Cow-goddess were supported by the various gods, and thus the seat of the throne of Rā became stable. When this was done Rā caused the Earth-god Keb to be summoned to his presence, and when he came he spake to him about the venomous reptiles that lived in the earth and were hostile to him. Then turning to Thoth, he bade him to prepare a series of spells and words of power, which would enable those who knew them to overcome snakes and serpents and deadly reptiles of all kinds. Thoth did so, and the spells which he wrote under the direction of Rā served as a protection of the servants of Rā ever after, and secured for them the help of Keb, who became sole lord of all the beings that lived and moved on and in his body, the earth. Before finally relinquishing his active rule on earth, Rā summoned Thoth and told him of his desire to create a Light-soul in the Tuat and in the Land of the Caves. Over this region he appointed Thoth to rule, and he ordered him to keep a register of those who were there, and to mete out just punishments to them. In fact, Thoth was to be ever after the representative of Rā in the Other World.

This Legend is found written in the hieratic character upon a papyrus preserved in Turin, and it illustrates a portion of the preceding Legend. We have seen that Rā instructed Thoth to draw up a series of spells to be used against venomous reptiles of all kinds, and the reader will perceive from the following summary that Rā had good reason for doing this. The Legend opens with a list of the titles of Rā, the "self-created god," creator of heaven, earth, breath of life, fire, gods, men, beasts, cattle, reptiles, feathered fowl, and fish, the King of gods and men, to whom cycles of 120 years are as years, whose manifold names are unknown even by the gods. The text continues: "Isis had the form of a woman, and knew words of power, but she was disgusted with men, and she yearned for the companionship of the gods and the spirits, and she meditated and asked herself whether, supposing she had the knowledge of the Name of Rā, it was not possible to make herself as great as Rā was in heaven and on the earth? Meanwhile Rā appeared in heaven each day upon his throne, but he had become old, and he dribbled at the mouth, and his spittle fell on the ground. One day Isis took some of the spittle and kneaded up dust in it, and made this paste into the form of a serpent with a forked tongue, so that if it struck anyone the person struck would find it impossible to escape death.

This figure she placed on the path on which Rā walked as he came into heaven after his daily survey of the Two Lands (i.e. Egypt). Soon after this Rā rose up, and attended by his gods he came into heaven, but as he went along the serpent drove its fangs into him. As soon as he was bitten Rā felt the living fire leaving his body, and he cried out so loudly that his voice reached the uttermost parts of heaven. The gods rushed to him in great alarm, saying, "What is the matter?" At first Rā was speechless, and found himself unable to answer, for his jaws shook, his lips trembled, and the poison continued to run through every part of his body. When he was able to regain a little strength, he told the gods that some deadly creature had bitten him, something the like of which he had never seen, something which his hand had never made. He said, "Never before have I felt such pain; there is no pain worse than this." Rā then went on to describe his greatness and power, and told the listening gods that his father and mother had hidden his name in his body so that no one might be able to master him by means of any spell or word of power. In spite of this something had struck him, and he knew not what it was. "Is it fire?" he asked.

"Is it water? My heart is full of burning fire, my limbs are shivering, shooting pains are in all my members." All the gods round about him uttered cries of lamentation, and at this moment Isis appeared. Going to Rā she said, "What is this, O divine father? What is this? Hath a serpent bitten thee? Hath something made by thee lifted up its head against thee? Verily my words of power shall overthrow it; I will make it depart in the sight of thy light." Rā then repeated to Isis the story of the incident, adding, "I am colder than water, I am hotter than fire. All my members sweat. My body quaketh. Mine eye is unsteady. I cannot look on the sky, and my face is bedewed with water as in the time of the Inundation."[1] Then Isis said, "Father, tell me thy name, for he who can utter his own name liveth."

Rā replied, "I am the maker of heaven and earth. I knit together the mountains and whatsoever liveth on them. I made the waters. I made Mehturit[1] to come into being. I made Kamutef.[2] I made heaven, and the two hidden gods of the horizon, and put souls into the gods. I open my eyes, and there is light; I shut my eyes, and there is darkness. I speak the word[s], and the waters of the Nile appear. I am he whom the gods know not. I make the hours. I create the days. I open the year. I make the river [Nile]. I create the living fire whereby works in the foundries and workshops are carried out. I am Khepera in the morning, Rā at noon, and Temu in the evening." Meanwhile the poison of the serpent was coursing through the veins of Rā, and the enumeration of his works afforded the god no relief from it. Then Isis said to Rā, "Among all the things which thou hast named to me thou hast not named thy name. Tell me thy name, and the poison shall come forth from thee." Rā still hesitated, but the poison was burning in his blood, and the heat thereof was stronger than that of a fierce fire. At length he said, "Isis shall search me through, and my name shall come forth from my body and pass into hers." Then Rā hid himself from the gods, and for a season his throne in the Boat of Millions of Years was empty.

When the time came for the heart of the god to pass into Isis, the goddess said to Horus, her son, "The great god shall bind himself by an oath to give us his two eyes (i.e. the sun and the moon)." When the great god had yielded up his name Isis pronounced the following spell: "Flow poison, come out of Rā. Eye of Horus, come out of the god, and sparkle as thou comest through his mouth. I am the worker. I make the poison to fall on the ground. The poison is conquered. Truly the name of the great god hath been taken from him. Rā liveth! The poison dieth! If the poison live Rā shall die." These were the words which Isis spoke, Isis the great lady, the Queen of the gods, who knew Rā by his own name.

In late times magicians used to write the above Legend on papyrus above figures of Temu and Heru-Hekenu, who gave Rā his secret name, and over figures of Isis and Horus, and sell the rolls as charms against snake bites. THE LEGEND OF HORUS OF BEHUTET AND THE WINGED DISK The text of this Legend is cut in hieroglyphs on the walls of the temple of Edfu, in Upper Egypt, and some of the incidents described in it are illustrated by large bas-reliefs. The form of the Legend here given dates from the Ptolemaic Period, but the subject matter is some thousands of years older. The great historical fact underlying the Legend is the Conquest of Egypt by some very early king who invaded Egypt from the south, and who succeeded in conquering every part of it, even the northern part of the Delta. The events described are supposed to have taken place whilst Rā was still reigning on the earth. The Legend states that in the three hundred and sixty-third year of the reign of Rā-Harmakhis, the ever living, His Majesty was in Ta-sti (i.e. the Land of the Bow, or Nubia) with his soldiers; the enemy had reviled him, and for this reason the land is called "Uauatet" to this day. From Nubia Rā sailed down the river to Apollinopolis (Edfu), and Heru-Behutet, or Horus of Edfu, was with him.

On arriving there Horus told Rā that the enemy were plotting against him, and Rā told him to go out and slay them. Horus took the form of a great winged disk, which flew up into the air and pursued the enemy, and it attacked them with such terrific force that they could neither see nor hear, and they fell upon each other, and slew each other, and in a moment not a single foe was left alive. Then Horus returned to the Boat of Rā-Harmakhis, in the form of the winged disk which shone with many colours, and said, "Advance, O Rā, and look upon thine enemies who are lying under thee in this land." Rā set out on the journey, taking with him the goddess Ashtoreth, and he saw his enemies lying on the ground, each of them being fettered. After looking upon his slaughtered foes Rā said to the gods who were with him, "Behold, let us sail in our boat on the water, for our hearts are glad because our enemies have been overthrown on the earth." So the Boat of Rā moved onwards towards the north, and the enemies of the god who were on the banks took the form of crocodiles and hippopotami, and tried to frighten the god, for as his boat came near them they opened their jaws wide, intending to swallow it up together with the gods who were in it.

Among the crew were the Followers of Horus of Edfu, who were skilled workers in metal, and each of these had in his hands an iron spear and a chain. These "Blacksmiths" threw out their chains into the river and allowed the crocodiles and hippopotami to entangle their legs in them, and then they dragged the beasts towards the bows of the Boat, and driving their spears into their bodies, slew them there. After the slaughter the bodies of six hundred and fifty-one crocodiles were brought and laid out before the town of Edfu. When Thoth saw these he said, "Let your hearts rejoice, O gods of heaven, Let your hearts rejoice, O ye gods who dwell on the earth. The Young Horus cometh in peace. On his way he hath made manifest deeds of valour, according to the Book of slaying the Hippopotamus." And from that day they made figures of Horus in metal.

Then Horus of Edfu took the form of the winged disk, and set himself on the prow of the Boat of Rā. He took with him Nekhebet, goddess of the South, and Uatchet, goddess of the North, in the form of serpents, so that they might make all the enemies of the Sun-god to quake in the South and in the North. His foes who had fled to the north doubled back towards the south, for they were in deadly fear of the god. Horus pursued and overtook them, and he and his blacksmiths had in their hands spears and chains, and they slew large numbers of them to the south-east of the town of Thebes in Upper Egypt. Many succeeded in escaping towards the north once more, but after pursuing them for a whole day Horus overtook them, and made a great slaughter among them. Meanwhile the other foes of the god, who had heard of the defeats of their allies, fled into Lower Egypt, and took refuge among the swamps of the Delta. Horus set out after them, and came up with them, and spent four days in the water slaying his foes, who tried to escape in the forms of crocodiles and hippopotami. He captured one hundred and forty-two of the enemy and a male hippopotamus, and took them to the fore part of the Boat of Rā. There he hacked them in pieces, and gave their inward parts to his followers, and their mutilated bodies to the gods and goddesses who were in the Boat of Rā and on the river banks in the town of Heben.

Then the remnant of the enemy turned their faces towards the Lake of the North, and they attempted to sail to the Mediterranean in boats; but the terror of Horus filled their hearts, and they left their boats and fled to the district of Mertet-Ament, where they joined themselves to the worshippers of Set, the god of evil, who dwelt in the Western Delta. Horus pursued them in his boat for one day and one night without seeing them, and he arrived at the town of Per-Rehui. At length he discovered the position of the enemy, and he and his followers fell upon them, and slew a large number of them; he captured three hundred and eighty-one of them alive, and these he took to the Boat of Rā, then, having slain them, he gave their carcases to his followers or bodyguard, who presumably devoured them. The custom of eating the bodies of enemies is very old in Egypt, and survives in some parts of Africa to this day. Then Set, the great antagonist of Horus, came out and cursed him for the slaughter of his people, using most shameful words of abuse. Horus stood up and fought a duel with Set, the "Stinking Face," as the text calls him, and Horus succeeded in throwing him to the ground and spearing him. Horus smashed his mouth with a blow of his mace, and having fettered him with his chain, he brought him into the presence of Rā, who ordered that he was to be handed over to Isis and her son Horus, that they might work their will on him.

Here we must note that the ancient editor of the Legend has confounded Horus the ancient Sun-god with Horus, son of Isis, son of Osiris. Then Horus, the son of Isis, cut off the heads of Set and his followers in the presence of Rā, and dragged Set by his feet round about throughout the district with his spear driven through his head and back, according to the order of Rā. The form which Horus of Edfu had at that time was that of a man of great strength, with the face and back of a hawk; on his head he wore the Double Crown, with feathers and serpents attached, and in his hands he held a metal spear and a metal chain. And Horus, the son of Isis, took upon himself a similar form, and the two Horuses slew all the enemies on the bank of the river to the west of the town of Per-Rehui. This slaughter took place on the seventh day of the first month of the season Pert,[1] which was ever afterwards called the "Day of the Festival of Sailing."

Now, although Set in the form of a man had been slain, he reappeared in the form of a great hissing serpent, and took up his abode in a hole in the ground without being noticed by Horus. Rā, however, saw him, and gave orders that Horus, the son of Isis, in the form of a hawk-headed staff, should set himself at the mouth of the hole, so that the monster might never reappear among men. This Horus did, and Isis his mother lived there with him. Once again it became known to Rā that a remnant of the followers of Set had escaped, and that under the direction of the Smait fiends, and of Set, who had reappeared, they were hiding in the swamps of the Eastern Delta. Horus of Edfu, the winged disk, pursued them, speared them, and finally slew them in the presence of Rā. For the moment there were no more enemies of Rā to be found in the district on land, although Horus passed six days and six nights in looking for them; but it seems that several of the followers of Set in the forms of water reptiles were lying on the ground under water, and that Horus saw them there. At this time Horus had strict guard kept over the tomb of Osiris in Anrutef,[1] because he learned that the Smait fiends wanted to come and wreck both it and the body of the god.

Isis, too, never ceased to recite spells and incantations in order to keep away her husband's foes from his body. Meanwhile the "blacksmiths" of Horus, who were in charge of the "middle regions" of Egypt, found a body of the enemy, and attacked them fiercely, slew many of them, and took one hundred and six of them prisoners. The "blacksmiths" of the west also took one hundred and six prisoners, and both groups of prisoners were slain before Rā. In return for their services Rā bestowed dwelling-places upon the "blacksmiths," and allowed them to have temples with images of their gods in them, and arranged for offerings and libations to be made to them by properly appointed priests of various classes.

Shortly after these events Rā discovered that a number of his enemies were still at large, and that they had sailed in boats to the swamps that lay round about the town of Tchal, or Tchar, better known as Zoan or Tanis. Once more Horus unmoored the Boat of Rā, and set out against them; some took refuge in the waters, and others landed and escaped to the hilly land on the east. For some reason, which is not quite apparent, Horus took the form of a mighty lion with a man's face, and he wore on his head the triple crown. His claws were like flints, and he pursued the enemy on the hills, and chased them hither and thither, and captured one hundred and forty-two of them. He tore out their tongues, and ripped their bodies into strips with his claws, and gave them over to his allies in the mountains, who, no doubt, ate them. This was the last fight in the north of Egypt, and Rā proposed that they should sail up the river and return to the south. They had traversed all Egypt, and sailed over the lakes in the Delta, and down the arms of the Nile to the Mediterranean, and as no more of the enemy were to be seen the prow of the boat of Rā was turned southwards. Thoth recited the spells that produced fair weather, and said the words of power that prevented storms from rising, and in due course the Boat reached Nubia.

When it arrived Horus found in the country of Uauatet men who were conspiring against him and cursing him, just as they had at one time blasphemed Rā. Horus, taking the form of the winged disk, and accompanied by the two serpent-goddesses, Nekhebet and Uatchet, attacked the rebels, but there was no fierce fighting this time, for the hearts of the enemy melted through fear of him. His foes cast themselves before him on the ground in submission, they offered no resistance, and they died straightway. Horus then returned to the town of Behutet (Edfu), and the gods acclaimed him, and praised his prowess. Rā was so pleased with him that he ordered Thoth to have a winged disk, with a serpent on each side of it, placed in every temple in Egypt in which he (i.e. Rā) was worshipped, so that it might act as a protector of the building, and drive away any and every fiend and devil that might wish to attack it. This is the reason why we find the winged disk, with a serpent on each side of it, above the doors of temples and religious buildings throughout the length and breadth of Egypt.

In many places in the text that contains the above Legend there are short passages in which attempts are made to explain the origins of the names of certain towns and gods. All these are interpolations in the narrative made by scribes at a late period of Egyptian history. As it would be quite useless to reproduce them without many explanatory notes, for which there is no room in this little book, they have been omitted. THE LEGEND OF KHNEMU AND A SEVEN YEARS' FAMINE This Legend is cut in hieroglyphs on a large rounded block of granite, which stands on the south-east portion of Sāhal, a little island in the First Cataract in Upper Egypt, two or three miles to the south of the modern town of Aswān, the ancient Syene. The form of the Legend, and the shapes of the hieroglyphs, and the late spelling of the words, prove that the inscription is the work of the Ptolemaic Period, though it is possible that the Legend in its simplest form is as old as the period to which it is ascribed in the Sāhal text, namely, the third dynasty, about for seven years, in the reign of King Tcheser, and which recalls the seven years' famine that took place in Egypt when Joseph was there. This famine was believed to have been caused by the king's neglect to worship properly the god Khnemu, who was supposed to control the springs of the Nile, which were asserted by the sages to be situated between two great rocks on the Island of Elephantine.

The Legend sets forth that the Viceroy of Nubia, in the reign of Tcheser, was a nobleman called Meter, who was also the overseer of all the temple properties in the South. His residence was in Abu, or Elephantine, and in the eighteenth year of his reign the king sent him a despatch in which it was written thus: "This is to inform thee that misery hath laid hold upon me as I sit upon the great throne, and I grieve for those who dwell in the Great House.[1] My heart is grievously afflicted by reason of a very great calamity, which is due to the fact that the waters of the Nile have not risen to their proper height for seven years. Grain is exceedingly scarce, there are no garden herbs and vegetables to be had at all, and everything which men use for food hath come to an end. Every man robbeth his neighbour. The people wish to walk about, but are unable to move. The baby waileth, the young man shuffleth along on his feet through weakness. The hearts of the old men are broken down with despair, their legs give way under them, they sink down exhausted on the ground, and they lay their hands on their bellies [in pain]. The officials are powerless and have no counsel to give, and when the public granaries, which ought to contain supplies, are opened, there cometh forth from them nothing but wind.

Everything is in a state of ruin. I go back in my mind to the time when I had an adviser, to the time of the gods, to the Ibis-god [Thoth], and to the chief Kher-heb priest Imhetep (Imouthis),[2] the son of Ptah of his South Wall.[3] [Tell me, I pray thee], Where is the birthplace of the Nile? What god or what goddess presideth over it? What kind of form hath the god? For it is he that maketh my revenue, and who filleth the granaries with grain. I wish to go to [consult] the Chief of Het-Sekhmet,[4] whose beneficence strengtheneth all men in their works. I wish to go into the House of Life,[5] and to take the rolls of the books in my own hands, so that I may examine them [and find out these things]."

Having read the royal despatch the Viceroy Meter set out to go to the king, and when he came to him he proceeded to instruct the king in the matters about which he had asked questions. The text makes the king say: "[Meter] gave me information about the rise of the Nile, and he told me all that men had written concerning it; and he made clear to me all the difficult passages [in the books], which my ancestors had consulted hastily, and which had never before been explained to any king since the time when Rā [reigned]. And he said to me: There is a town in the river wherefrom the Nile maketh his appearance. 'Abu' was its name in the beginning: it is the City of the Beginning, it is the Name of the City of the Beginning. It reacheth to Uauatet, which is the first land [on the south]. There is a long flight of steps there (a nilometer?), on which Rā resteth when he determineth to prolong life to mankind. It is called 'Netchemtchem ānkh.' Here are the 'Two Qerti,'[1] which are the two breasts wherefrom every good thing cometh.

Here is the bed of the Nile, here the Nile-god reneweth his youth, and here he sendeth out the flood on the land. Here his waters rise to a height of twenty-eight cubits; at Hermopolis (in the Delta) their height is seven cubits. Here the Nile-god smiteth the ground with his sandals, and here he draweth the bolts and throweth open the two doors through which the water poureth forth. In this town the Nile-god dwelleth in the form of Shu, and he keepeth the account of the products of all Egypt, in order to give to each his due. Here are kept the cord for measuring land and the register of the estates. Here the god liveth in a wooden house with a door made of reeds, and branches of trees form the roof; its entrance is to the south-east. Round about it are mountains of stone to which quarrymen come with their tools when they want stone to build temples to the gods, shrines for sacred animals, and pyramids for kings, or to make statues. Here they offer sacrifices of all kinds in the sanctuary, and here their sweet-smelling gifts are presented before the face of the god Khnemu. In the quarries on the river bank is granite, which is called the 'stone of Abu.' The names of its gods are: Sept (Sothis, the dog-star), Ānqet, Hep (the Nile-god), Shu, Keb, Nut, Osiris, Horus, Isis, and Nephthys. Here are found precious stones (a list is given), gold, silver, copper, iron, lapis-lazuli, emerald, crystal, ruby, &c., alabaster, mother-of-emerald, and seeds of plants that are used in making incense. These were the things which I learned from Meter [the Viceroy]."

Having informed the king concerning the rise of the Nile and the other matters mentioned in his despatch, Meter made arrangements for the king to visit the temple of Khnemu in person. This he did, and the Legend gives us the king's own description of his visit. He says: I entered the temple, and the keepers of the rolls untied them and showed them to me. I was purified by the sprinkling of holy water, and I passed through the places that were prohibited to ordinary folk, and a great offering of cakes, ale, geese, oxen, &c., was offered up on my behalf to the gods and goddesses of Abu. Then I found the god [Khnemu] standing in front of me, and I propitiated him with the offerings that I made unto him, and I made prayer and supplication before him. Then he opened his eyes,[1] and his heart inclined to me, and in a majestic manner he said unto me: "I am Khnemu who fashioned thee. My two hands grasped thee and knitted together thy body; I made thy members sound, and I gave thee thy heart. Yet the stones have been lying under the ground for ages, and no man hath worked them in order to build a god-house, to repair the [sacred] buildings which are in ruins, or to make shrines for the gods of the South and North, or to do what he ought to do for his lord, even though I am the Lord [the Creator].

I am Nu, the self-created, the Great God, who came into being in the beginning. [I am] Hep [the Nile-god] who riseth at will to give health to him that worketh for me. I am the Governor and Guide of all men, in all their periods, the Most Great, the Father of the gods, Shu, the Great One, the Chief of the earth. The two halves of heaven are my abode. The Nile is poured out in a stream by me, and it goeth round about the tilled lands, and its embrace produceth life for every one that breatheth, according to the extent of its embrace.... I will make the Nile to rise for thee, and in no year shall it fail, and it shall spread its water out and cover every land satisfactorily. Plants, herbs, and trees shall bend beneath [the weight of] their produce. The goddess Rennet (the Harvest goddess) shall be at the head of everything, and every product shall increase a hundred thousandfold, according to the cubit of the year.[2] The people shall be filled, verily to their hearts' desire, yea, everyone. Want shall cease, and the emptiness of the granaries shall come to an end. The Land of Mera (i.e. Egypt) shall be one cultivated land, the districts shall be yellow with crops of grain, and the grain shall be good. The fertility of the land shall be according to the desire [of the husbandman], and it shall be greater than it hath ever been before." At the sound of the word "crops" the king awoke, and the courage that then filled his heart was as great as his former despair had been.

Having left the chamber of the god the king made a decree by which he endowed the temple of Khnemu with lands and gifts, and he drew up a code of laws under which every farmer was compelled to pay certain dues to it. Every fisherman and hunter had to pay a tithe. Of the calves cast one tenth were to be sent to the temple to be offered up as the daily offering. Gold, ivory, ebony, spices, precious stones, and woods were tithed, whether their owners were Egyptians or not, but no local tribe was to levy duty on these things on their road to Abu. Every artisan also was to pay tithe, with the exception of those who were employed in the foundry attached to the temple, and whose occupation consisted in making the images of the gods. The king further ordered that a copy of this decree, the original of which was cut in wood, should be engraved on a stele to be set up in the sanctuary, with figures of Khnemu and his companion gods cut above it. The man who spat upon the stele [if discovered] was to be "admonished with a rope."

The god Osiris, as we have seen in the chapter on the Egyptian Religion in the accompanying volume, lived and reigned at one time upon earth in the form of a man. His twin-brother Set was jealous of his popularity, and hated him to such a degree that he contrived a plan whereby he succeeded in putting Osiris to death. Set then tried to usurp his brother's kingdom and to make himself sole lord of Egypt, and, although no text states it distinctly, it is clear that he seized his brother's wife, Isis, and shut her up in his house. Isis was, however, under the protection of the god Thoth, and she escaped with her unborn child, and the following Legend describes the incidents that befell her, and the death and revivification of Horus. It is cut in hieroglyphs upon a large stone stele which was made for Ānkh-Psemthek, a prophet of Nebun in the reign of Nectanebus I, who reigned from 373 B.C. to 360 B.C. The stele was dug up in 1828 at Alexandria, and was given to Prince Metternich by Muhammad Alī Pāsha; it is now commonly known as the "Metternich Stele." The Legend is narrated by the goddess herself, who says:

I am Isis. I escaped from the dwelling wherein my brother Set placed me. Thoth, the great god, the Prince of Truth in heaven and on earth, said unto me: "Come, O goddess Isis [hearken thou], it is a good thing to hearken, for he who is guided by another liveth. Hide thyself with thy child, and these things shall happen unto him. His body shall grow and flourish, and strength of every kind shall be in him. He shall sit upon his father's throne, he shall avenge him, and he shall hold the exalted position of 'Governor of the Two Lands.'" I left the house of Set in the evening, and there accompanied me Seven Scorpions, that were to travel with me, and sting with their stings on my behalf. Two of them, Tefen and Befen, followed behind me, two of them, Mestet and Mestetef, went one on each side of me, and three, Petet, Thetet, and Maatet, prepared the way for me. I charged them very carefully and adjured them to make no acquaintance with any one, to speak to none of the Red Fiends, to pay no heed to a servant (?), and to keep their gaze towards the ground so that they might show me the way. And their leader brought me to Pa-Sui, the town of the Sacred Sandals,[1] at the head of the district of the Papyrus Swamps. When I arrived at Teb I came to a quarter of the town where women dwelt.

And a certain woman of quality spied me as I was journeying along the road, and she shut her door in my face, for she was afraid because of the Seven Scorpions that were with me. Then they took counsel concerning her, and they shot out their poison on the tail of Tefen. As for me, a peasant woman called Taha opened her door, and I went into the house of this humble woman. Then the scorpion Tefen crawled in under the door of the woman Usert [who had shut it in my face], and stung her son, and a fire broke out in it; there was no water to put it out, but the sky sent down rain, though it was not the time of rain. And the heart of Usert was sore within her, and she was very sad, for she knew not whether her son would live or die; and she went through the town shrieking for help, but none came out at the sound of her voice. And I was sad for the child's sake, and I wished the innocent one to live again. So I cried out to her, saying, Come to me! Come to me! There is life in my mouth. I am a woman well known in her town. I can destroy the devil of death by a spell which my father taught me. I am his daughter, his beloved one.

Then Isis laid her hands on the child and recited this spell: "O poison of Tefent, come forth, fall on the ground; go no further. O poison of Befent, come forth, fall on the ground. I am Isis, the goddess, the mistress of words of power. I am a weaver of spells, I know how to utter words so that they take effect. Hearken to me, O every reptile that biteth (or stingeth), and fall on the ground. O poison of Mestet, go no further. O poison of Mestetef, rise not up in his body. O poison of Petet and Thetet, enter not his body. O poison of Maatet, fall on the ground. Ascend not into heaven, I command you by the beloved of Rā, the egg of the goose which appeareth from the sycamore. My words indeed rule to the uttermost limit of the night. I speak to you, O scorpions. I am alone and in sorrow, and our names will stink throughout the nomes.... The child shall live! The poison shall die! For Rā liveth and the poison dieth. Horus shall be saved through his mother Isis, and he who is stricken shall likewise be saved." Meanwhile the fire in the house of Usert was extinguished, and heaven was content with the utterance of Isis. Then the lady Usert was filled with sorrow because she had shut her door in the face of Isis, and she brought to the house of the peasant woman gifts for the goddess, whom she had apparently not recognised. The spells of the goddess produced, of course, the desired effect on the poison, and we may assume that the life of the child was restored to him. The second lot of gifts made to Isis represented his mother's gratitude.

Exactly when and how Isis made her way to a hiding place cannot be said, but she reached it in safety, and her son Horus was born there. The story of the death of Horus she tells in the following words: "I am Isis. I conceived a child, Horus, and I brought him forth in a cluster of papyrus plants (or, bulrushes). I rejoiced exceedingly, for in him I saw one who would make answer for his father. I hid him, and I covered him up carefully, being afraid of that foul one [Set], and then I went to the town of Am, where the people gave thanks for me because they knew I could cause them trouble. I passed the day in collecting food for the child, and when I returned and took Horus into my arms, I found him, Horus, the beautiful one of gold, the boy, the child, lifeless! He had bedewed the ground with the water of his eye and with the foam of his lips. His body was motionless, his heart did not beat, and his muscles were relaxed." Then Isis sent forth a bitter cry, and lamented loudly her misfortune, for now that Horus was dead she had none to protect her, or to take vengeance on Set. When the people heard her voice they went out to her, and they bewailed with her the greatness of her affliction. But though all lamented on her behalf there was none who could bring back Horus to life.

Then a "woman who was well known in her town, a lady who was the mistress of property in her own right," went out to Isis, and consoled her, and assured her that the child should live through his mother. And she said, "A scorpion hath stung him, the reptile Āunab hath wounded him." Then Isis bent her face over the child to find out if he breathed, and she examined the wound, and found that there was poison in it, and then taking him in her arms, "she leaped about with him like a fish that is put upon hot coals," uttering loud cries of lamentation. During this outburst of grief the goddess Nephthys, her sister, arrived, and she too lamented and cried bitterly over her sister's loss; with her came the Scorpion-goddess Serqet. Nephthys at once advised Isis to cry out for help to Rā, for, said she, it is wholly impossible for the Boat of Rā to travel across the sky whilst Horus is lying dead. Then Isis cried out, and made supplication to the Boat of Millions of Years, and the Sun-god stopped the Boat. Out of it came down Thoth, who was provided with powerful spells, and, going to Isis, he inquired concerning her trouble. "What is it, what is it, O Isis, thou goddess of spells, whose mouth hath skill to utter them with supreme effect? Surely no evil thing hath befallen Horus, for the Boat of Rā hath him under its protection.

I have come from the Boat of the Disk to heal Horus." Then Thoth told Isis not to fear, but to put away all anxiety from her heart, for he had come to heal her child, and he told her that Horus was fully protected because he was the Dweller in his disk, and the firstborn son of heaven, and the Great Dwarf, and the Mighty Ram, and the Great Hawk, and the Holy Beetle, and the Hidden Body, and the Governor of the Other World, and the Holy Benu Bird, and by the spells of Isis and the names of Osiris and the weeping of his mother and brethren, and by his own name and heart. Turning towards the child Thoth began to recite his spells and said, "Wake up, Horus! Thy protection is established. Make thou happy the heart of thy mother Isis. The words of Horus bind up hearts and he comforteth him that is in affliction. Let your hearts rejoice, O ye dwellers in the heavens. Horus who avenged his father shall make the poison to retreat. That which is in the mouth of Rā shall circulate, and the tongue of the Great God shall overcome [opposition]. The Boat of Rā standeth still and moveth not, and the Disk (i.e. the Sun-god) is in the place where it was yesterday to heal Horus for his mother Isis. Come to earth, draw nigh, O Boat of Rā, O ye mariners of Rā;

make the boat to move and convey food of the town of Sekhem (i.e. Letopolis) hither, to heal Horus for his mother Isis.... Come to earth, O poison! I am Thoth, the firstborn son, the son of Rā. Tem and the company of the gods have commanded me to heal Horus for his mother Isis. O Horus, O Horus, thy Ka protecteth thee, and thy Image worketh protection for thee. The poison is as the daughter of its own flame; it is destroyed because it smote the strong son. Your temples are safe, for Horus liveth for his mother." Then the child Horus returned to life, to the great joy of his mother, and Thoth went back to the Boat of Millions of Years, which at once proceeded on its majestic course, and all the gods from one end of heaven to the other rejoiced. Isis entreated either Rā or Thoth that Horus might be nursed and brought up by the goddesses of the town of Pe-Tep, or Buto, in the Delta, and at once Thoth committed the child to their care, and instructed them about his future. Horus grew up in Buto under their protection, and in due course fought a duel with Set, and vanquished him, and so avenged the wrong done to his father by Set.

THE LEGEND OF KHENSU-NEFER-HETEP AND THE PRINCESS OF BEKHTEN Here for convenience' sake may be inserted the story of the Possessed Princess of Bekhten and the driving out of the evil spirit that was in her by Khensu-Nefer-hetep. The text of the Legend is cut in hieroglyphs on a large sandstone tablet which was discovered by J.F. Champollion in the temple of Khensu at Thebes, and was removed by Prisse d'Avennes in 1846 to Paris, where it is now preserved in the Bibliothèque Nationale. The form of the Legend which we have is probably the work of the priests of Khensu, about 1000 B.C., who wished to magnify their god, but the incidents recorded are supposed to have taken place at the end of the fourteenth century B.C., and there may indeed be historical facts underlying the Legend. The text states that the king of Egypt, Usermaātrā-setepenrā Rāmeses-meri-Amen, i.e. Rameses II, a king of the nineteenth dynasty about 1300 B.C., was in the country of Nehern, or Mesopotamia, according to his yearly custom, and that the chiefs of the country, even those of the remotest districts from Egypt, came to do homage to him, and to bring him gifts, i.e. to pay tribute. Their gifts consisted of gold, lapis-lazuli, turquoise, and costly woods from the land of the god,[1] and each chief tried to outdo his neighbour in the magnificence of his gifts. Among these tributary chiefs was the Prince of Bekhten, who, in addition to his usual gift, presented to the king his eldest daughter, and he spake words of praise to the king, and prayed for his life. His daughter was beautiful, and the king thought her the most beautiful maiden in the world, and he gave her the name of Neferu-Rā and the rank of "chief royal wife," i.e. the chief wife of Pharaoh. When His Majesty brought her to Egypt she was treated as the Queen of Egypt.

One day in the late summer, in the fifteenth year of his reign, his Majesty was in Thebes celebrating a festival in honour of Father Amen, the King of the gods, in the temple now known as the Temple of Luxor, when an official came and informed the king that "an ambassador of the Prince of Bekhten had arrived bearing many gifts for the Royal Wife." The ambassador was brought into the presence with his gifts, and having addressed the king in suitable words of honour, and smelt the ground before His Majesty, he told him that he had come to present a petition to him on behalf of the Queen's sister, who was called Bentresht (i.e. daughter of joy). The princess had been attacked by a disease, and the Prince of Bekhten asked His Majesty to send a skilled physician to see her. Straightway the king ordered his magicians (or medicine men) to appear before him, and also his nobles, and when they came he told them that he had sent for them to come and hear the ambassador's request. And, he added, choose one of your number who is both wise and skilful; their choice fell upon the royal scribe Tehuti-em-heb, and the king ordered him to depart to Bekhten to heal the princess. When the magician arrived in Bekhten he found that Princess Bentresht was under the influence of a malignant spirit, and that this spirit refused to be influenced in any way by him; in fact all his wisdom and skill availed nothing, for the spirit was hostile to him.

[Illustration: Stele relating the Story of the Healing of Bentresht, Princess of Bekhten.] Then the Prince of Bekhten sent a second messenger to His Majesty, beseeching him to send a god to Bekhten to overcome the evil spirit, and he arrived in Egypt nine years after the arrival of the first ambassador. Again the king was celebrating a festival of Amen, and when he heard of the request of the Prince of Bekhten he went and stood before the statue of Khensu, called "Nefer-hetep," and he said, "O my fair lord, I present myself a second time before thee on behalf of the daughter of the Prince of Bekhten." He then went on to ask the god to transmit his power to Khensu, "Pa-ari-sekher-em-Uast," the god who drives out the evil spirits which attack men, and to permit him to go to Bekhten and release the Princess from the power of the evil spirit. And the statue of Khensu Nefer-hetep bowed its head twice at each part of the petition, and this god bestowed a fourfold portion of his spirit and power on Khensu Pa-ari-sekher-em-Uast. Then the king ordered that the god should set out on his journey to Bekhten carried in a boat, which was accompanied by five smaller boats and by chariots and horses. The journey occupied seventeen months, and the god was welcomed on his arrival by the Prince of Bekhten and his nobles with suitable homage and many cries of joy.

The god was taken to the place where Princess Bentresht was, and he used his magical power upon her with such good effect that she was made whole at once. The evil spirit who had possessed her came out of her and said to Khensu: "Welcome, welcome, O great god, who dost drive away the spirits who attack men. Bekhten is thine; its people, both men and women, are thy servants, and I myself am thy servant. I am going to depart to the place whence I came, so that thy heart may be content concerning the matter about which thou hast come. I beseech Thy Majesty to give the order that thou and I and the Prince of Bekhten may celebrate a festival together." The god Khensu bowed his head as a sign that he approved of the proposal, and told his priest to make arrangements with the Prince of Bekhten for offering up a great offering. Whilst this conversation was passing between the evil spirit and the god the soldiers stood by in a state of great fear. The Prince of Bekhten made the great offering before Khensu and the evil spirit, and the Prince and the god and the spirit rejoiced greatly. When the festival was ended the evil spirit, by the command of Khensu, "departed to the place which he loved." The Prince and all his people were immeasurably glad at the happy result, and he decided that he would consider the god to be a gift to him, and that he would not let him return to Egypt.

So the god Khensu stayed for three years and nine months in Bekhten, but one day, whilst the Prince was sleeping on his bed, he had a vision in which he saw Khensu in the form of a hawk leave his shrine and mount up into the air, and then depart to Egypt. When he awoke he said to the priest of Khensu, "The god who was staying with us hath departed to Egypt; let his chariot also depart." And the Prince sent off the statue of the god to Egypt, with rich gifts of all kinds and a large escort of soldiers and horses. In due course the party arrived in Egypt, and ascended to Thebes, and the god Khensu Pa-ari-sekher-em-Uast went into the temple of Khensu Nefer-hetep, and laid all the gifts which he had received from the Prince of Bekhten before him, and kept nothing for his own temple. This he did as a proper act of gratitude to Khensu Nefer-hetep, whose gift of a fourfold portion of his spirit had enabled him to overcome the power of the evil spirit that possessed the Princess of Bekhten. Thus Khensu returned from Bekhten in safety, and he re-entered his temple in the winter, in the thirty-third year of the reign of Rameses II. The situation of Bekhten is unknown, but the name is probably not imaginary, and the country was perhaps a part of Western Asia. The time

occupied by the god Khensu in getting there does not necessarily indicate that Bekhten was a very long way off, for a mission of the kind moved slowly in those leisurely days, and the priest of the god would probably be much delayed by the people in the towns and villages on the way, who would entreat him to ask the god to work cures on the diseased and afflicted that were brought to him. We must remember that when the Nubians made a treaty with Diocletian they stipulated that the goddess Isis should be allowed to leave her temple once a year, and to make a progress through the country so that men and women might ask her for boons, and receive them.

The historical period of Egyptian history, that is to say, the period during which Egypt was ruled by kings, each one calling himself NESU-BATI, or "King of the South, King of the North," covers about 4400 years according to some Egyptologists, and 3300 years according to others. Of the kings of All Egypt who reigned during the period we know the names of about two hundred, but only about one hundred and fifty have left behind them monuments that enable us to judge of their power and greatness. There is no evidence to show that the Egyptians ever wrote history in our sense of the word, and there is not in existence any native work that can be regarded as a history of Egypt. The only known attempt in ancient times to write a history of Egypt was that made by Manetho, a skilled scribe and learned man, who, in the reign of Ptolemy II Philadelphus (289-246 B.C.), undertook to write a history of the country, which was to be placed in the Great Library at Alexandria. The only portion of this History that has come down to us is the List of Kings, which formed a section of it; this List, in a form more or less accurate, is extant in the works of Africanus and Eusebius. According to the former 553 or 554 kings ruled over Egypt in 5380 years, and according to the latter 421 or 423 kings ruled over Egypt in 4547 or 4939 years.

It is quite certain that the principal acts and wars of each king were recorded by the court scribes, or official "remembrancer" or "recorder" of the day, and there is no doubt that such records were preserved in the "House of Books," or Library, of the local temple for reference if necessary. If this were not so it would have been impossible for the scribes of the eighteenth and nineteenth dynasties to compile the lists of kings found on the Palermo Stone, and in the Turin Papyrus, and on the Tablets set up by Seti I and Rameses II at Abydos, and on the Tablet of Ancestors at Karnak. These Lists, however, seem to show that the learned scribes of the later period were not always sure of the true sequence of the names, and that when they were dealing with the names of the kings of the first two dynasties they were not always certain even about the correct spelling and reading of their names. The reason why the Egyptians did not write the history of their country from a general point of view is easily explained. Each king wished to be thought as great as possible, and each king's courtiers lost no opportunity of showing that they believed him to be the greatest king who had sat on the throne of Egypt. To magnify the deeds of his ancestors was neither politic nor safe, nor did it lead to favours or promotion.

In no inscription of their descendants do we find the mighty deeds and great conquests of Amenemhāt III, or of Usertsen III, or of Thothmes III, praised or described, and no court scribe ever dared to draft a text stating that these were truly three of the greatest kings of Egypt. When a local chief succeeded in making himself king of All Egypt he did not concern himself with preserving records of the great deeds of the king whose throne he had seized. When foreign foes invaded Egypt and conquered it their followers raided the towns, burnt and destroyed all that could be got rid of, and smashed the monuments recording the prowess of the king they had overthrown. The net result of all this is that the history of Egypt can only be partially constructed, and that the sources of our information are a series of texts that were written to glorify individual kings, and not to describe the history of a dynasty, or the general development of the country, or the working out of a policy. In attempting to draw up a connected account of a reign or period the funerary inscriptions of high officials are often more useful than the royal inscriptions. In the following pages are given extracts from annals, building inscriptions, narratives of conquests, and "triumph inscriptions" of an official character; specimens of the funerary inscriptions that describe military expeditions, and supply valuable information about the general history of events, will be given in the chapter on Biographical Inscriptions.

The earliest known annals are found on a stone which is preserved in the Museum at Palermo, and which for this reason is called "The Palermo Stone"; the Egyptian text was first published by Signor A. Pellegrini in 1896. How the principal events of certain years of the reigns of kings from the Predynastic Period to the middle of the fifth dynasty are noted is shown by the following: [Reign of] SENEFERU. Year ... The building of Tuataua ships of mer wood of a hundred capacity, and 60 royal boats of sixteen capacity. Raid in the Land of the Blacks (i.e. the Sūdān), and the bringing in of seven thousand prisoners, men and women, and twenty thousand cattle, sheep, and goats. Building of the Wall of the South and North [called] House of Seneferu. The bringing of forty ships of cedar wood (or perhaps "laden with cedar wood"). [Height of the Nile.] Two cubits, two fingers. [Reign of Seneferu.] Year ... The making of thirty-five ... 122 cattle The construction of one Tuataua ship of cedar wood of a hundred capacity, and two ships of mer wood of a hundred capacity. The numbering for the seventh time. [Height of the Nile.] Five cubits, one hand, one finger.

The royal historical inscriptions of the first eleven dynasties are very few, and their contents are meagre and unimportant. As specimens of historical documents of the twelfth dynasty the following may be quoted: This short inscription is dated in the eighth year of the reign of Usertsen III. "The southern frontier in the eighth year under the Majesty of the King of the South and North, Khākaurā (Usertsen III), endowed with life for ever. No Black whatsoever shall be permitted to pass [this stone] going down stream, whether travelling by land or sailing in a boat, with cattle, asses, goats, &c., belonging to the Blacks, with the exception of such as cometh to do business in the country of Aqen[1] or on an embassy. Such, however, shall be well entreated in every way. No boats belonging to the Blacks shall in future be permitted to pass down the river by the region of Heh."[2] The methods of Usertsen III and his opinions of the Sūdānī folk are illustrated by the following inscription which he set up at Semnah, a fort built by him at the foot of the Second Cataract.

"In the third month[1] of the season Pert His Majesty fixed the boundary of Egypt on the south at Heh (Semnah). I made my boundary and went further up the river than my fathers. I added greatly to it. I give commands [therein]. I am the king, and what is said by me is done. What my heart conceiveth my hand bringeth to pass. I am [like] the crocodile which seizeth, carrieth off, and destroyeth without mercy. Words (or matters) do not remain dormant in my heart. To the coward soft talk suggesteth longsuffering; this I give not to my enemies. Him who attacketh me I attack. I am silent in the matter that is for silence; I answer as the matter demandeth. Silence after an attack maketh the heart of the enemy bold. The attack must be sudden like that of a crocodile. The man who hesitateth is a coward, and a wretched creature is he who is defeated on his own territory and turned into a slave. The Black understandeth talk only. Speak to him and he falleth prostrate. He fleeth before a pursuer, and he pursueth only him that fleeth. The Blacks are not bold men; on the contrary, they are timid and weak, and their hearts are cowed. My Majesty hath seen them, and [what I say] is no lie.

"I seized their women, I carried off their workers in the fields, I came to their wells, I slew their bulls, I cut their corn and I burnt it. This I swear by the life of my father. I speak the truth; there is no doubt about the matter, and that which cometh forth from my mouth cannot be gainsaid. Furthermore, every son of mine who shall keep intact this boundary which My Majesty hath made, is indeed my son; he is the son who protecteth his father, if he keep intact the boundary of him that begot him. He who shall allow this boundary to be removed, and shall not fight for it, is not my son, and he hath not been begotten by me. Moreover, My Majesty hath caused to be made a statue of My Majesty on this my boundary, not only with the desire that ye should prosper thereby, but that ye should do battle for it." The following extract illustrates the inscriptions in which the king describes an expedition into a hostile country which he has conducted with success. It is taken from an inscription of Thothmes II, which is cut in hieroglyphs on a rock by the side of the old road leading from Elephantine to Philæ, and is dated in the first year of the king's reign. The opening lines enumerate the names and titles of the king, and proclaim his sovereignty over the Haunebu, or the dwellers in the northern Delta and on the sea coast, Upper and Lower Egypt, Nubia and the Eastern Desert, including Sinai, Syria, the lands of the Fenkhu, and the countries that lie to the south of the modern town of Khartum.

The next section states: "A messenger came in and saluted His Majesty and said: The vile people of Kash (i.e. Cush, Northern Nubia) are in revolt. The subjects of the Lord of the Two Lands (i.e. the King of Egypt) have become hostile to him, and they have begun to fight. The Egyptians [in Nubia] are driving down their cattle from the shelter of the stronghold which thy father Thothmes [I] built to keep back the tribes of the South and the tribes of the Eastern Desert." The last part of the envoy's message seems to contain a statement that some of the Egyptians who had settled in Nubia had thrown in their lot with the Sūdānī folk who were in revolt. The text continues: "When His Majesty heard these words he became furious like a panther (or leopard), and he said: I swear by Rā, who loveth me, and by my father Amen, king of the gods, lord of the thrones of the Two Lands, that I will not leave any male alive among them. Then His Majesty sent a multitude of soldiers into Nubia, now this was his first war, to effect the overthrow of all those who had rebelled against the Lord of the Two Lands, and of all those who were disaffected towards His Majesty. And the soldiers of His Majesty arrived in the miserable land of Kash, and overthrew these savages, and according to the command of His Majesty they left no male alive, except one of the sons of the miserable Prince of Kash, who was carried away alive with some of their servants to the place where His Majesty was.

His Majesty took his seat on his throne, and when the prisoners whom his soldiers had captured were brought to him they were placed under the feet of the good god. Their land was reduced to its former state of subjection, and the people rejoiced and their chiefs were glad. They ascribed praise to the Lord of the Two Lands, and they glorified the god for his divine beneficence. This took place because of the bravery of His Majesty, whom his father Amen loved more than any other king of Egypt from the very beginning, the King of the South and North, Āakheperenrā, the son of Rā, Thothmes (II), whose crowns are glorious, endowed with life, stability, and serenity, like Rā for ever."

The following is the official account of the Battle of Megiddo in Syria, which was won by Thothmes III in the twenty-third year of his reign. The narrative is taken from the Annals of Thothmes III. The king set out from Thebes and marched into Syria, and received the submission of several small towns, and having made his way with difficulty through the hilly region to the south of the city of Megiddo, he camped there to prepare for the battle. "Then the tents of His Majesty were pitched, and orders were sent out to the whole army, saying, Arm yourselves, get your weapons ready, for we shall set out to do battle with the miserable enemy at daybreak. The king sat in his tent, the officers made their preparations, and the rations of the servants were provided. The military sentries went about crying, Be firm of heart. Be firm of heart. Keep watch, keep watch. Keep watch over the life of the king in his tent. And a report was brought to His Majesty that the country was quiet, and that the foot soldiers of the south and north were ready. On the twenty-first day of the first month of the season Shemu (March-April) of the twenty-third year of the reign of His Majesty, and the day of the festival of the new moon, which was also the anniversary of the king's coronation, at dawn, behold, the order was given to set the whole army in motion.

His Majesty set out in his chariot of silver-gold, and he had girded on himself the weapons of battle, like Horus the Slayer, the lord of might, and he was like unto Menthu [the War-god] of Thebes, and Amen his father gave strength to his arms. The southern half of the army was stationed on a hill to the south of the stream Kīnā, and the northern half lay to the south-west of Megiddo; His Majesty was between them, and Amen was protecting him and giving strength to his body. His Majesty at the head of his army attacked his enemies, and broke their line, and when they saw that he was overwhelming them they broke and fled to Megiddo in a panic, leaving their horses and their gold and silver chariots on the field. [The fugitives] were pulled up by the people over the walls into the city; now they let down their clothes by which to pull them up. If the soldiers of His Majesty had not devoted themselves to securing loot of the enemy, they would have been able to capture the city of Megiddo at the moment when the vile foes from Kadesh and the vile foes from this city were being dragged up hurriedly over the walls into this city; for the terror of His Majesty had entered into them, and their arms dropped helplessly, and the serpent on his crown overthrew them. Their horses and their chariots [which were decorated] with gold and silver were seized as spoil, and their mighty men of war lay stretched out dead upon the ground like fishes, and the conquering soldiers of His Majesty went about counting their shares.

And behold, the tent of the vile chief of the enemy, wherein was his son, was also captured. Then all the soldiers rejoiced greatly, and they glorified Amen, because he had made his son (i.e. the king) victorious on that day, and they praised His Majesty greatly, and acclaimed his triumph. And they collected the loot which they had taken, viz. hands [cut off the dead], prisoners, horses, chariots [decorated with] gold and silver," etc.

In spite of the joy of the army Thothmes was angry with his troops for having failed to capture the city. Every rebel chief was in Megiddo, and its capture would have been worth more than the capture of a thousand other cities, for he could have slain all the rebel chiefs, and the revolt would have collapsed completely. Thothmes then laid siege to the city, and he threw up a strong wall round about it, through which none might pass, and the daily progress of the siege was recorded on a leather roll, which was subsequently preserved in the temple of Amen at Thebes. After a time the chiefs in Megiddo left their city and advanced to the gate in the siege-wall and reported that they had come to tender their submission to His Majesty, and it was accepted. They brought to him rich gifts of gold, silver, lapis-lazuli, turquoise, wheat, wine, cattle, sheep, goats, &c., and he reappointed many of the penitent chiefs to their former towns as vassals of Egypt. Among the gifts were 340 prisoners, 83 hands, 2041 mares, 191 foals, 6 stallions, a royal chariot with a golden pole, a second royal chariot, 892 chariots, total 924 chariots; 2 royal coats of mail, 200 ordinary coats of mail, 502 bows, 7 tent poles inlaid with gold, 1929 cattle, 2000 goats, and 20,500 sheep.

THE CONQUESTS OF THOTHMES III SUMMARISED BY AMEN-RĀ, KING OF THE GODS The conquests of Thothmes III were indeed splendid achievements, and the scribes of his time summarised them very skilfully in a fine text which they had cut in hieroglyphs on a large stele at Karnak. The treatment is, of course, somewhat poetical, but there are enough historical facts underlying the statements to justify a rendering of it being given in this chapter. The text is supposed to be a speech of Amen-Rā, the lord of the thrones of the Two Lands, to the king. He says: "Thou hast come to me, thou hast rejoiced in beholding my beneficence, O my son, my advocate, Menkheperrā, living for ever! I rise upon thee through my love for thee. My heart rejoiceth at thy auspicious comings to my temple. My hands knit together thy limbs with the fluid of life; sweet unto me are thy gracious acts towards my person. I have stablished thee in my sanctuary. I have made thee to be a source of wonder [to men]. I have given unto thee strength and conquests over all lands. I have set thy Souls and the fear of thee in all lands. The terror of thee hath penetrated to the four pillars of the sky. I have made great the awe of thee in all bodies. I have set the roar of Thy Majesty everywhere [in the lands of] the Nine Bows (i.e. Nubia).

The Chiefs of all lands are grouped in a bunch within thy fist. I put out my two hands; I tied them in a bundle for thee. I collected the Antiu of Ta-sti[1] in tens of thousands and thousands, and I made captives by the hundred thousand of the Northern Nations. I have cast down thy foes under thy sandals, thou hast trampled upon the hateful and vile-hearted foes even as I commanded thee. The length and breadth of the earth are thine, and those who dwell in the East and the West are vassals unto thee. Thou hast trodden upon all countries, thy heart is expanded (i.e. glad). No one dareth to approach Thy Majesty with hostility, because I am thy guide to conduct thee to them. Thou didst sail over the Great Circuit of water (the Euphrates) of Nehren (Aram Naharayim, or Mesopotamia) with strength and power. I have commanded for thee that they should hear thy roarings, and run away into holes in the ground. I stopped up their nostrils [shutting out] the breath of life. I have set the victories of Thy Majesty in their minds. The fiery serpent Khut which is on thy forehead burnt them up. It made thee to grasp as an easy prey the Ketu peoples, it burnt up the dwellers in their marshes with its fire. The Princes of the Āamu (Asiatics) have been slaughtered, not one of them remains, and the sons of the mighty men have fallen.

I have made thy mighty deeds to go throughout all lands, the serpent on my crown hath illumined thy territory, nothing that is an abomination unto thee existeth in all the wide heaven, and the people come bearing offerings upon their backs, bowing to the ground before Thy Majesty, in accordance with my decree. I made impotent those who dared to attack thee, their hearts melted and their limbs quaked.

[Illustration: Stele on which is cut the Speech of Amen-Rā, summarising the Conquests of Thothmes III.] "I have come, making thee to trample under foot the Chief of Tchah (Syria), I have cast them down under thy feet in all the lands, I have made them to behold Thy Majesty as the 'lord of beams' (i.e. the Sun-god), thou hast shone on their faces as the image of me. "I have come, making thee to trample under foot the people of Asia, thou hast led away captive the Chiefs of the Āamu of Retenu, I have made them to behold Thy Majesty arrayed in thy decorations, grasping the weapons for battle, [mounted] on thy chariot. "I have come, making thee to trample under foot the land of the East, thou hast trodden upon those who dwell in the districts of the Land of the God, I have made them to see thee as the brilliant star that shooteth out light and fire and scattereth its dew. "I have come, making thee to trample under foot the land of the West, Kefti (Phœnicia) and Asi (Cyprus) are in awe of thee. I have made them to see Thy Majesty as a young bull, steady-hearted, with horns ready to strike, invincible.

"I have come, making thee to trample under foot those who are in their marshes, the Lands of Methen (Mitani) quake through their fear of thee. I have made them to see Thy Majesty as the crocodile, the lord of terror in the water, unassailable. "I have come, making thee to trample under foot those who dwell in the Islands, those who live in the Great Green (Mediterranean) hear thy roarings, I have made them to see Thy Majesty as the slayer when he mounteth on the back of his sacrificial animal. "I have come, making thee to trample under foot the Thehenu (Libyans), the Islands of the Uthentiu [have submitted to] the power of thy Souls. I have made them to see Thy Majesty as a savage lion, which hath scattered the dead bodies of the people throughout their valleys. "I have come, making thee to trample under foot the uttermost ends of the earth, the Circuit of the Great Circuit is in thy grasp, I have made them to see Thy Majesty as the hawk, which seizeth what it seeth when it pleaseth. "I have come, making thee to trample upon those who are on their frontiers(?), thou hast smitten 'those on their sand' (i.e. the desert dwellers), making them living captives. I have made them to see Thy Majesty as a jackal of the south, moving fleetly and stealthily, and traversing the Two Lands.

"I have come, making thee to trample under foot the Antiu of Ta-sti, as far as ... they are in thy grasp. I have made them to see Thy Majesty as the Two Brothers (Set and Horus), I have gathered together their arms about thee with [strength]. "I have placed thy Two Sisters (Isis and Nephthys) near thee as protectresses for thee, the arms of Thy Majesty are [lifted] upwards to drive away evil. I have made thee strong and glorious, O my beloved Son, thou Mighty Bull, crowned in Thebes, begotten by me ..., Thothmes, the everliving, who hast performed for me all that my Ka wished. Thou hast set up my sanctuary with work that shall endure for ever, thou hast lengthened it and broadened it more than ever was done before. The great pylon ... Thou hast celebrated the festival of the beauties of Amen-Rā, thy monuments are greater than those of any king who hath existed, I commanded thee to do it. I am satisfied with it. I have stablished thee upon the throne of Horus for hundreds of thousands of years. Thou shalt guide life ..." [Illustration: A Page of the Hieratic Text, from the Great Harris Papyrus in the British Museum, describing the great Works carried out by Rameses III about 1200 B.C.]

The reign of Rameses III is remarkable in the annals of the New Empire, and the great works which this king carried out, and his princely benefactions to the temples of Egypt, are described at great length in his famous papyrus in the British Museum (Harris, No. 1, No. 9999). The last section of the papyrus contains an excellent historical summary of the reign of Rameses III, and as it is one of the finest examples of this class of literature a translation of it is here given. The text is written in the hieratic character and reads: King Usermaātrā-meri-Amen (Rameses III), life, strength, health [be to him!] the great god, said unto the princes, and the chiefs of the land, and the soldiers, and the charioteers, and the Shartanau soldiers, and the multitudes of the bowmen, and all those who lived in the land of Ta-mera (Egypt), Hearken ye, and I will cause you to know the splendid deeds which I did when I was king of men. The land of Kamt was laid open to the foreigner, every man [was ejected] from his rightful holding, there was no "chief mouth" (i.e. ruler) for many years in olden times until the new period [came]. The land of Egypt [was divided among] chiefs and governors of towns, each one slew his neighbour. ... Another period followed with years of nothingness (famine?). Arsu, a certain Syrian, was with them as governor, he made the whole land to be one holding before him.

He collected his vassals, and mulcted them of their possessions heavily. They treated the gods as if they were men, and they offered up no propitiatory offerings in their temples. Now when the gods turned themselves back to peace, and to the restoration of what was right in the land, according to its accustomed and proper form, they established their son who proceeded from their body to be Governor, life, strength, health [be to him!], of every land, upon their great throne, namely, Userkhārā-setep-en-Amen-meri-Amen, life strength, health [be to him!], the son of Rā, Set-nekht-merr-Rā-meri-Amen, life, strength, health [be to him!]. He was like Khepra-Set when he is wroth. He quieted the whole country which had been in rebellion. He slew the evil-hearted ones who were in Ta-mera (Egypt). He purified the great throne of Egypt. He was the Governor, life, strength, health [be to him!], of the Two Lands, on the throne of Amen. He made to appear the faces that had withdrawn themselves. Of those who had been behind walls every man recognised his fellow. He endowed the temples with offerings to offer as was right to the Nine Gods, according to use and wont. He made me by a decree to be the Hereditary Chief in the seat of Keb. I became the "Great High Mouth" of the lands of Egypt, I directed the affairs of the whole land, which had been made one. He set on his double horizon (i.e. he died) like the Nine Gods. There was performed for him what was performed for Osiris; sailing in his royal boat on the river, and resting [finally] in his house of eternity (i.e. the tomb) in Western Thebes.

My father Amen, the lord of the gods, Rā, Tem, and Ptah of the Beautiful Face made me to be crowned lord of the Two Lands in the place of my begetter. I received the rank of my father with cries of joy. The land had peace, being fed with offerings, and men rejoiced in seeing me, Governor, life, strength, health [be to him!], of the Two Lands, like Horus when he was made to be Governor of the Two Lands on the throne of Osiris. I was crowned with the Atef crown with the serpents, I bound on the crown with plumes, like Tatenn. I sat on the throne of Heru-Khuti (Harmakhis). I was arrayed in the ornaments [of sovereignty] like Tem. I made Ta-mera to possess many [different] kinds of men, the officers of the palace, the great chiefs, large numbers of horse and chariot soldiers, hundreds of thousands of them, the Shartanau and the Qehequ, who were numberless, soldiers of the bodyguard in tens of thousands, and the peasants belonging to Ta-mera. I enlarged all the frontiers of Egypt, I conquered those who crossed over them in their [own] lands. I slaughtered the Tanauna in their islands; the Thakra and the Purastau were made into a holocaust. The Shartanau and the Uasheshu of the sea were made non-existent; they were seized [by me] at one time, and were brought as captives to Egypt, like the sand in the furrows.

I provided fortresses for them to dwell in, and they were kept in check by my name. Their companies were very numerous, like hundreds of thousands. I assessed every one of them for taxes yearly, in apparel and wheat from the stores and granaries. I crushed the Sāara and the tribes of the Shasu (nomad shepherds). I carried off their tents from their men, and the equipment thereof, and their flocks and herds likewise, which were without number. They were put in fetters and brought along as captives, as offerings to Egypt, and I gave them to the Nine Gods as slaves for their temples.

Behold, I will also make you to know concerning the other schemes that have been carried out in Ta-mera during my reign. The Labu (Libyans) and the Mashuashau had made their dwelling in Egypt, for they had captured the towns on the west bank of the Nile from Hetkaptah (Memphis) to Qarabana. They had occupied also both banks of the "Great River," and they had been in possession of the towns (or villages) of Kutut[1] for very, very many years whilst they were [lords] over Egypt. Behold, I crushed them and slaughtered them at one time (i.e. in one engagement). I overthrew the Mashuashau, the Libyans, the Asbatau, the Qaiqashau, the Shaiu, the Hasau, and the Baqanau. [I] slaughtered them in their blood, and they became piles of dead bodies. [Thus] I drove them away from marching over the border of Egypt. The rest of them I carried away, a vast multitude of prisoners, trussed like geese in front of my horses, their women and their children in tens of thousands, and their flocks and herds in hundreds of thousands. I allotted to their chiefs fortresses, and they lived there under my name. I made them officers of the bowmen, and captains of the tribes; they were branded with my name and became my slaves; their wives and their children were likewise turned into slaves. Their flocks and herds I brought into the House of Amen, and they became his live-stock for ever.

I made a very large well in the desert of Āina. It had a girdle wall like a mountain of basalt(?), with twenty buttresses(?) in the foundation [on] the ground, and its height was thirty cubits, and it had bastions. The frame-work and the doors were cut out of cedar, and the bolts thereof and their sockets were of copper. I cut out large sea-going boats, with smaller boats before them, and they were manned with large crews, and large numbers of serving-men. With them were the officers of the bowmen of the boats, and there were trained captains and mates to inspect them. They were loaded with the products of Egypt which were without number, and they were in very large numbers, like tens of thousands. These were despatched to the Great Sea of the water of Qett (i.e. the Red Sea), they arrived at the lands of Punt, no disaster followed them, and they were in an effective state and were awe-inspiring. Both the large boats and the little boats were laden with the products of the Land of the God, and with all kinds of wonderful and mysterious things which are produced in those lands, and with vast quantities of the ānti (myrrh) of Punt, which was loaded on to them by tens of thousands [of measures] that were without number. The sons of the chief of the Land of the God went in front of their offerings, their faces towards Egypt.

They arrived and were sound and well at the mountain of Qebtit (Coptos),[1] they moored their boats in peace, with the things which they had brought as offerings. To cross the desert they were loaded upon asses and on [the backs of] men, and they were [re]loaded into river-barges at the quay of Coptos. They were despatched down the river, they arrived during a festival, and some of the most wonderful of the offerings were carried into the presence of [My Majesty]. The children of their chiefs adored my face, they smelt the earth before my face, and rolled on the ground. I gave them to all the gods of this land to propitiate the two gods in front of me every morning.

I despatched my envoys to the desert of Āataka to the great copper workings that are in this place. Their sea-going boats were laden with [some of] them, whilst those who went through the desert rode on asses. Such a thing as this was never heard of before, from the time when kings began to reign. Their copper workings were found, and they were full of copper, and the metal was loaded by ten thousands [of measures] into their sea-going boats. They were despatched with their faces towards Egypt, and they arrived safely. The metal was lifted out and piled up under the veranda in the form of blocks (or ingots) of copper, vast numbers of them, as it were tens of thousands. They were in colour like gold of three refinings. I allowed everybody to see them, as they were wonderful things. I despatched inspectors and overseers to the turquoise desert (i.e. Sinai) of my mother, the goddess Hathor, the lady of the turquoise. [They] carried to her silver, gold, byssus, fine (?) linen, and many things as numerous as the sand-grains, and laid them before her. And there were brought unto me most wonderfully fine turquoises, real stones, in large numbers of bags, and laid out before me. The like had never been seen before - since kings began to reign.

I caused the whole country to be planted with groves of trees and with flowering shrubs, and I made the people to sit under the shade thereof. I made it possible for an Egyptian woman to walk with a bold step to the place whither she wished to go; no strange man attacked her, and no one on the road. I made the foot-soldiers and the charioteers sit down in my time, and the Shartanau and the Qehequ were in their towns lying at full length on their backs; they were unafraid, for there was no fighting man [to come] from Kash (Nubia), [and no] enemy from Syria. Their bows and their weapons of war lay idle in their barracks, and they ate their fill and drank their fill with shouts of joy. Their wives were with them, [their] children were by their side; there was no need to keep their eyes looking about them, their hearts were bold, for I was with them as strength and protection for their bodies. I kept alive (i.e. fed) the whole country, aliens, artisans, gentle and simple, men and women. I delivered a man from his foe and I gave him air. I rescued him from the strong man, him who was more honourable than the strong man. I made all men to have their rightful positions in their towns. Some I made to live [taking them] in the very chamber of the Tuat.[1] Where the land was bare I covered it over again; the land was well filled during my reign. I performed deeds of beneficence towards the gods as well as towards men; I had no property that belonged to the people. I served my office of king upon earth, as Governor of the Two Lands, and ye were slaves under my feet without [complaint ?]. Ye were satisfactory to my heart, as were your good actions, and ye performed my decrees and my words.

Behold, I have set in Akert (the Other World) like my father Rā. I am among the Great Companies of the gods of heaven, earth, and the Tuat. Amen-Rā hath stablished my son upon my throne, he hath received my rank in peace, as Governor of the Two Lands, and he is sitting upon the throne of Horus as Lord of the Two Nile-banks. He hath put on himself the Atef crown like Ta-Tenn, Usermaātrā-setep-en-Amen, life, strength, health [be to him!], the eldest-born son of Rā, the self-begotten, Rameses (IV)-heqmaāt-meri-Amen, life, strength, health [be to him!], the divine child, the son of Amen, who came forth from his body, rising as the Lord of the Two Lands, like Ta-Tenn. He is like a real son, favoured for his father's sake. Tie ye yourselves to his sandals. Smell the earth before him. Do homage to him. Follow him at every moment. Praise him. Worship him. Magnify his beneficent actions as ye do those of Rā every morning. Present ye before him your offerings [in] his Great House (i.e. palace), which is holy. Carry ye to him the "blessings" (?) of the [tilled] lands and the deserts. Be strong to fulfil his words and the decrees that are uttered among you. Follow (?) his utterances, and ye shall be safe under his Souls. Work all together for him in every work.

Haul monuments for him, excavate canals for him, work for him in the work of your hands, and there will accrue unto you his favour as well as his food daily. Amen hath decreed for him his sovereignty upon earth, he hath made this period of his life twice as long as that of any other king, the King of the South and North, the Lord of the Two Lands, Usermaātrā-setep-en-Amen, life, strength, health [be to him!], the son of Rā, the lord of crowns, Rameses (IV)-heqmaāt-meri-Amen, life, strength, health [be to him!], who is endowed with life for ever.

THE INVASION AND CONQUEST OF EGYPT BY PIĀNKHI, KING OF NUBIA The text describing the invasion and conquest of Egypt by Piānkhi, King of Nubia, is cut in hieroglyphs upon a massive stone stele which was found among the ruins of Piānkhi's temple at Gebel Barkal, near the foot of the Fourth Cataract, and which is now preserved in the Egyptian Museum, Cairo. Although this composition does not belong to the best period of Egyptian Literature, it is a very fine work. The narrative is vivid, and the aim of the writer was rather to state the facts of this splendid expedition than to heap up empty compliments on the king; both the subject-matter and the dress in which it appears are well worthy of reproduction in an English form. The inscription is dated in the twenty-first year of Piānkhi's reign, and the king says: "Hearken ye to [the account of] what I have done more than my ancestors. I am a king, the emanation of the god, the living offspring of the god Tem, who at birth was ordained the Governor whom princes were to fear." His mother knew before his birth that he was to be the Governor, he the beneficent god, the beloved of the gods, the son of Rā who was made by his (the god's) hands, Piānkhi-meri-Amen. One came and reported to His Majesty that the great prince Tafnekht had taken possession of all the

country on the west bank of the Nile in the Delta, from the swamps even to Athi-taui[1], that he had sailed up the river with a large force, that all the people on both sides of the river had attached themselves to him, and that all the princes and governors and heads of temple-towns had flocked to him, and that they were "about his feet like dogs." No city had shut its gates before him, on the contrary, Mer-Tem, Per-sekhem-kheper-Rā, Het-neter-Sebek, Per-Metchet, Thekansh, and all the towns in the west had opened their gates to him.

In the east Het-benu, Taiutchait, Het-suten, and Pernebtepahet had opened to him, and he had besieged Hensu (Herakleopolis) and closely invested it. He had enclosed it like a serpent with its tail in its mouth. "Those who would come out he will not allow to come out, and those who would go in he will not allow to go in, by reason of the fighting that taketh place every day. He hath thrown soldiers round about it everywhere." Piānkhi listened to the report undismayed, and he smiled, for his heart was glad. Presently further reports of the uprising came, and the king learned that Nemart, another great prince, had joined his forces to those of Tafnekht. Nemart had thrown down the fortifications of Nefrus, he had laid waste his own town, and had thrown off his allegiance to Piānkhi completely.

Then Piānkhi sent orders to Puarma and Las(?)-mer-sekni, the Nubian generals stationed in Egypt, and told them to assemble the troops, to seize the territory of Hermopolis, to besiege the city itself, to seize all the people, and cattle, and the boats on the river, and to stop all the agricultural operations that were going on; these orders were obeyed. At the same time he despatched a body of troops to Egypt, with careful instructions as to the way in which they were to fight, and he bade them remember that they were fighting under the protection of Amen. He added, "When ye arrive at Thebes, opposite the Apts,[1] go into the waters of the river and wash yourselves, then array yourselves in your finest apparel, unstring your bows, and lay down your spears. Let no chief imagine that he is as strong as the Lord of strength (i.e. Amen), for without him there is no strength. The weak of arm he maketh strong of arm. Though the enemy be many they shall turn their backs in flight before the weak man, and one shall take captive a thousand. Wet yourselves with the water of his altars, smell the earth before him, and say: O make a way for us! Let us fight under the shadow of thy sword, for a child, if he be but sent forth by thee, shall vanquish multitudes when he attacketh." Then the soldiers threw themselves flat on their faces before His Majesty, saying, "Behold, thy name breedeth strength in us.

Thy counsel guideth thy soldiers into port (i.e. to success). Thy bread is in our bodies on every road, thy beer quencheth our thirst. Behold, thy bravery hath given us strength, and at the mere mention of thy name there shall be victory. The soldiers who are led by a coward cannot stand firm. Who is like unto thee? Thou art the mighty king who workest with thy hands, thou art a master of the operations of war."

"Then the soldiers set out on their journey, and they sailed down the river and arrived at Thebes, and they did everything according to His Majesty's commands. And again they set out, and they sailed down the river, and they met many large boats sailing up the river, and they were full of soldiers and sailors, and mighty captains from the North land, every one fully armed to fight, and the soldiers of His Majesty inflicted a great defeat on them; they killed a very large but unknown number, they captured the boats, made the soldiers prisoners, whom they brought alive to the place where His Majesty was." This done they proceeded on their way to the region opposite Herakleopolis, to continue the battle. Again the soldiers of Piānkhi attacked the troops of the allies, and defeated and routed them utterly, and captured their boats on the river. A large number of the enemy succeeded in escaping, and landed on the west bank of the river at Per-pek. At dawn these were attacked by Piānkhi's troops, who slew large numbers of them, and [captured] many horses; the remainder, utterly terror-stricken, fled northwards, carrying with them the news of the worst defeat which they had ever experienced.

Nemart, one of the rebel princes, fled up the river in a boat, and landed near the town of Un (Hermopolis), wherein he took refuge. The Nubians promptly beleaguered the town with such rigour that no one could go out of it or come in. Then they reported their action to Piānkhi, and when he had read their report, he growled like a panther, and said, "Is it possible that they have permitted any of the Northmen to live and escape to tell the tale of his flight, and have not killed them to the very last man? I swear by my life, and by my love for Rā, and by the grace which Father Amen hath bestowed upon me, that I will myself sail down the river, and destroy what the enemy hath done, and I will make him to retreat from the fight for ever." Piānkhi also declared his intention of stopping at Thebes on his way down the river, so that he might assist at the Festival of the New Year, and might look upon the face of the god Amen in his shrine at Karnak and, said he, "After that I will make the Lands of the North to taste my fingers." When the soldiers in Egypt heard of their lord's wrath, they attacked Per-Metchet (Oxyrrhynchus), and they "overran it like a water-flood"; a report of the success was sent to Piānkhi, but he was not satisfied. Then they attacked Ta-tehen (Tehnah?), which was filled with northern soldiers. The Nubians built a tower with a battering ram and breached the walls, and they poured into the town and slew every one they found. Among the dead was the son of the rebel prince Tafnekht. This success was also reported to Piānkhi, but still he was not satisfied. Het-Benu was also captured, and still he was not satisfied.

In the middle of the summer Piānkhi left Napata (Gebel Barkal) and sailed down to Thebes, where he celebrated the New Year Festival. From there he went down the river to Un (Hermopolis), where he landed and mounted his war chariot; he was furiously angry because his troops had not destroyed the enemy utterly, and he growled at them like a panther. Having pitched his camp to the south-west of the city, he began to besiege it. He threw up a mound round about the city, he built wooden stages on it which he filled with archers and slingers, and these succeeded in killing the people of the city daily. After three days "the city stank," and envoys came bearing rich gifts to sue for peace. With the envoys came the wife of Nemart and her ladies, who cast themselves flat on their faces before the ladies of Piānkhi's palace, saying, "We come to you, O ye royal wives, ye royal daughters, and royal sisters. Pacify ye for us Horus (i.e. the King), the Lord of the Palace, whose Souls are mighty, and whose word of truth is great." A break of fifteen lines occurs in the text here, and the words that immediately follow the break indicate that Piānkhi is upbraiding Nemart for his folly and wickedness in destroying his country, wherein "not a full-grown son is seen with his father, all the districts round about being filled with children." Nemart acknowledged his folly, and then swore fealty to Piānkhi, promising to give him more gifts than any other prince in the country. Gold, silver, lapis-lazuli, turquoise, copper, and precious stones of all kinds were then presented, and Nemart himself led a horse with his right hand, and held a sistrum made of gold and lapis-lazuli in his left.

Piānkhi then arose and went into the temple of Thoth, and offered up oxen, and calves, and geese to the god, and to the Eight Gods of the city. After this he went through Nemart's palace, and then visited the stables "where the horses were, and the stalls of the young horses, and he perceived that they had been suffering from hunger. And he said, 'I swear by my own life, and by the love which I have for Rā, who reneweth the breath of life in my nostrils, that, in my opinion, to have allowed my horses to suffer hunger is the worst of all the evil things which thou hast done in the perversity of thy heart.'" A list was made of the goods that were handed over to Piānkhi, and a portion of them was reserved for the temple of Amen at Thebes. The next prince to submit was the Governor of Herakleopolis, and when he had laid before Piānkhi his gifts he said: "Homage to thee, Horus, mighty king, Bull, conqueror of bulls. I was in a pit in hell. I was sunk deep in the depths of darkness, but now light shineth on me. I had no friend in the evil day, and none to support me in the day of battle. Thou only, O mighty king, who hast rolled away the darkness that was on me [art my friend]. Henceforward I am thy servant, and all my possessions are thine.

The city of Hensu shall pay tribute to thee. Thou art the image of Rā, and art the master of the imperishable stars. He was a king, and thou art a king; he perished not, and thou shalt not perish." From Hensu Piānkhi went down to the canal leading to the Fayyūm and to Illahūn and found the town gates shut in his face. The inhabitants, however, speedily changed their minds, and opened the gates to Piānkhi, who entered with his troops, and received tribute, and slew no one. Town after town submitted as Piānkhi advanced northwards, and none barred his progress until he reached Memphis, the gates of which were shut fast. When Piānkhi saw this he sent a message to the Memphites, saying: "Shut not your gates, and fight not in the city that hath belonged to Shu[1] for ever. He who wisheth to enter may do so, he who wisheth to come out may do so, and he who wisheth to travel about may do so. I will make an offering to Ptah and the gods of White Wall (Memphis). I will perform the ceremonies of Seker in the Hidden Shrine. I will look upon the god of his South Wall (i.e. Ptah), and I will sail down the river in peace. No man of Memphis shall be harmed, not a child shall cry out in distress. Look at the homes of the South! None hath been slain except those who blasphemed the face of the god, and only the rebels have suffered at the block." These pacific words of Piānkhi were not believed, and the people of Memphis not only kept their gates shut, but manned the city walls with soldiers, and they were foolish enough to slay a small company of Nubian artisans and boatmen whom they found on the quay of Memphis.

Tafnekht, the rebel prince of Saīs, entered Memphis by night, and addressed eight thousand of his troops who were there, and encouraged them to resist Piānkhi. He said to them: "Memphis is filled with the bravest men of war in all the Northland, and its granaries are filled with wheat, barley, and grain of all kinds. The arsenal is full of weapons. A wall goeth round the city, and the great fort is as strong as the mason could make it. The river floweth along the east side, and no attack can be made there. The byres are full of cattle, and the treasury is well filled with gold, silver, copper, apparel, incense, honey, and unguents.... Defend ye the city till I return." Tafnekht mounted a horse and rode away to the north.

At daybreak Piānkhi went forth to reconnoitre, and he found that the waters of the Nile were lapping the city walls on the north side of the city, where the sailing craft were tied up. He also saw that the city was extremely well fortified, and that there was no means whereby he could effect an entrance into the city through the walls. Some of his officers advised him to throw up a mound of earth about the city, but this counsel was rejected angrily by Piānkhi, for he had thought out a simpler plan. He ordered all his boats and barges to be taken to the quay of Memphis, with their bows towards the city wall; as the water lapped the foot of the wall, the boats were able to come quite close to it, and their bows were nearly on a level with the top of the wall. Then Piānkhi's men crowded into the boats, and, when the word of command was given, they jumped from the bows of the boats on to the wall, entered the houses built near it, and then poured into the city. They rushed through the city like a waterflood, and large numbers of the natives were slain, and large numbers taken prisoners. Next morning Piānkhi set guards over the temples to protect the property of the gods, then he went into the great temple of Ptah and reinstated the priests, and they purified the holy place with natron and incense, and offered up many offerings. When the report of the capture of Memphis spread abroad, numerous local chiefs came to Piānkhi, and did homage, and gave him tribute.

From Memphis he passed over to the east bank of the Nile to make an offering to Temu of Heliopolis. He bathed his face in the water of the famous "Fountain of the Sun," he offered white bulls to Rā at Shaiqaem-Anu, and he went into the great temple of the Sun-god. The chief priest welcomed him and blessed him; "he performed the ceremonies of the Tuat chamber, he girded on the seteb garment, he censed himself, he was sprinkled with holy water, and he offered (?) flowers in the chamber in which the stone, wherein the spirit of the Sun-god abode at certain times, was preserved. He went up the step leading to the shrine to look upon Rā, and stood there. He broke the seal, unbolted and opened the doors of the shrine, and looked upon Father Rā in Het-benben. He paid adoration to the two Boats of Rā. (Mātet and Sektet), and then closed the doors of the shrine and sealed them with his own seal." Piānkhi returned to the west bank of the Nile, and pitched his camp at Kaheni, whither came a number of princes to tender their submission and offer gifts to him. After a time it was reported to Piānkhi that Tafnekht, the head of the rebellion, had laid waste his town, burnt his treasury and his boats, and had entrenched himself at Mest with the remainder of his army. Thereupon Piānkhi sent troops to Mest, and they slew all its inhabitants.