HIERATIC PAPYRI
Containing the First Sallier Papyrus
and the Poem of Pentaur
by C. W. Goodwin
(Extracted from Cambridge Essays, vol. 3, 1857, pp. 226-82.)
The publication, in 1841, of Champollion's Grammaire Egyptienne placed the study of Egyptian literature upon a solid basis. The discovery of the true method of reading the hieroglyphics was made by him in 1821; and the key having been once obtained, he advanced in the process of decipherment with astonishing rapidity. The grammar, which did not see the light until after his decease, not only completely developed the principles of hieroglyphic writing, but contained a masterly sketch of the language itself. The old Egyptian proved to resemble, as might have been anticipated, the modern Coptic in most of its forms. Notwithstanding the modifications which the language sustained under Persian, Greek, and Roman dynasties, its essential elements have been preserved, and, on the whole, the Coptic as we now possess it differs less from the language of the ancient Pharaohs than modern English does from its mother the Anglo-Saxon.
Had not Champollion been prematurely cut off, he would probably have left little for succeeding scholars to accomplish. All those who have followed him in the research have been struck with the extraordinary accuracy and sagacity which his investigations display; and his grammar still remains the most complete, and almost the only introduction to the study of Egyptian.1 Since his death, however, very considerable progress has been made, by the zealous labours of a host of scholars in France, Germany, Italy, Holland, England, and Ireland. The most striking results are those which have recently been obtained by researches into the hieratic wri- [227] tings; and of these it is the object of the present Essay to give some account.
The reader may require to be informed that there are three
species of Egyptian writing. The first is that of the temples and tombs, in
which all the symbols used appear in their complete forms, well defined, and
often carefully coloured, so that the objects intended to be represented can be
in general clearly recognised. This is the style to which the name hieroglyphics
is primarily applied. It is employed in many of the funereal papyri, or rituals,
which were wont to be buried with the dead, the forms of the objects being drawn
in outline, with slight modifications, according to the taste of the scribe, and
for the sake of speed in writing.
The next species is that termed hieratic, which is a modification of the
preceding, and was used for literary compositions and the purposes of ordinary
life. Funeral rituals were also not unfrequently written in this character. The
forms of many of the hieroglyphics are so much altered in this style, that it
would be impossible to recognise them except by a comparison of identical
passages written in both characters, which the hieratic rituals fortunately
enable us to effect. The hieratic may be broadly described as the cursive
writing in general use in Egypt from the earliest period down to about 600 B.C.,
or nearly to the time of the Persian invasion. During this long period several
varieties of it occur, but the writing is essentially the same. About 600 B.C.
it began to be supplanted by the third species, called by the Greeks demotic,
which is an abbreviated and less cumbrous form of the hieratic.
The principle of all these three kinds of writing is the same. In general each
word is spelt by phonetic signs, which stand either for letters or syllables.
The word thus spelt is followed by one or more symbols, which are not sounded,
but indicate the class of ideas to which the word belongs. Thus there are
symbols to mark ideas of motion, violent action, repose, thought, wickedness,
animals, vegetables, and a host of others. This ingenious combination of
symbolical and phonetic writing has been the means of preserving the Egyptian
language to us, for without the hints afforded by these significant characters
the task of interpretation would be almost hopeless. The discovery of the use of
the determinative symbols was Champollion's grand achievement; the mixture of
them with the alphabetic symbols having perplexed all previous inquirers. The
truth once unfolded, the system appears simple enough. The determinative signs
are the most extensively employed in the hieratic writing, in which we
constantly find three of [228] them applied to a
single word. In the sculptured inscriptions they are more sparingly used.
Besides words phonetically spelt, there are some in all three kinds of writing
represented by mere symbols. The sense of such words is generally pretty clear,
but their sound is not always easy to determine. This may sometimes, how ever,
be done by the help of variants, a word symbolically expressed in one
inscription being found phonetically written in the parallel passage in another.
The radical letters of a large number of Egyptian words are now known, and of
them a considerable portion may be traced in the Coptic, some without
alteration, others under various disguises, of which the laws have been well
ascertained. A good many words have their congeners in Hebrew and Syriac.
Practically, the meaning of a word is first approached by help of the
determinative and the context in which it occurs; if a similar root can be
discovered in Coptic or a cognate language, the value thus obtained may be
confirmed or modified. In many cases, however, these languages leave us without
assistance.
It is obvious that every word of which the meaning is once assured, must lead
the way to the discovery of others; and thus the completion of the old Egyptian
vocabulary is by no means a hopeless task, and it is one in which daily advances
are being made.
The object of this brief explanation is to inspire the reader, if possible, with
some little confidence in the method by which the interpretations which are
about to be placed be fore him have been arrived at.2
This is the more necessary as, notwithstanding the number of popular works which
have been published on Egyptian matters, there is reason to think that great
distrust prevails as to the ability of Egyptologists to expound conclusively the
hieroglyphic texts; a distrust in some degree warranted by the admitted
dissensions of the interpreters themselves.
In Germany a different principle of decipherment from that discovered by
Champollion has been propounded by a philologist named Seyffarth, and has found
a few followers. The Champollionists, however, do not concern themselves with
refuting these ideas, which can be looked upon only as a product of perverse
ingenuity, and which are doubtless des- [229] tined
to die out before long. It is a more serious affair that even those who profess
to follow the system of the great Frenchman, are not always at one in the
results which they produce. These differences, however, are not so great as may
be thought, and tend daily to disappear.
The truth is, that Egyptian philology is yet in its infancy. Champollion got little further than the accidence of the language; and since his time not much has been done in the investigation of the syntax. The attention of scholars has been greatly devoted to the public monuments, funereal inscriptions, and the ritual; none of which give much insight into niceties of construction, and the capabilities of expression which the old Egyptian undoubtedly possessed. The language of the monuments is conventional and abbreviated; that of the ritual, mystical and antiquated. A collection of the London Gazettes and Court Circulars, the Book of Common Prayer, and copies of the tombstones in a dozen of our cathedrals, would present but an imperfect basis for the reconstruction of the English language if it should ever be lost; but these materials would be far more complete for such a purpose than those which have hitherto been the principal object of the explorations of Egyptologists. The so-called ritual is indeed in no way to be classed with our Prayer Book for the importance and variety of its contents. The same barren formulae are repeated over and over again; it is seldom that the context throws any light upon the meaning of a doubtful word; and for the illustration of any but the simplest form of construction, it is altogether valueless. With an incomplete knowledge of the syntax and a slender vocabulary, translation becomes guess-work, and the misconception of a single word or phrase may, it will be readily understood, completely confound the sense. Nevertheless, there can be no doubt that a great mass of monumental inscriptions has been correctly understood, and their substantial sense obtained. The task still remains of reviewing and sifting what has been done. A far richer field of research, however, lies in the papyri, written in the hieratic character, of which the contents are not of a funereal or mystical nature. Here we find the old Egyptian language in all its fullness, and most abundant means of investigating its syntax and extending its vocabulary.
The hieratic literary documents at present available are as
follows: 1. A papyrus recently purchased by the trustees of the British Museum
from Madame d'Orbiney, an English lady, in whose possession it had been for many
years previous. Of this valuable MS. a lithographed facsimile has been made,
which will be published shortly. It contains a romance
[230] or fairy tale, and is of the age of the 19th dynasty, about B.C.
1300. A translation was published in the Revue Archeologique of May, 1852, by
the Vicomte de Rouge, conservator of the Egyptian collection in the Louvre, who
was fortunate enough to obtain a perusal of the papyrus while in the possession
of Madame d'Orbiney 2. A collection of thirteen papyri, also in the British
Museum, of which facsimiles were published in 1844, under the title of Select
Papyri in the Hieratic Character. Nine of these papyri are known as Anastasi,
Nos. 1 to 9, the rest as Sallier, Nos. I to 4, from the names of the persons of
whom they were purchased. They comprise a portion of an historical poem, of
which the subject is an exploit of Rameses II.; a small fragment of history
relating to the Hyksos period; several collections of miscellaneous
correspondence of the Pharaonic scribes; a kind of biographical memoir of a
scribe; the advice of King Amen-em-ha to his son; the precepts of a certain
high functionary addressed to his son; a hymn to the Nile; and a calendar of
lucky and unlucky days and festivals throughout the year. The whole of these
compositions belong to the 18th dynasty. 3. A papyrus of much more ancient date
than any of the above, now in the Bibliothe'que Impe'riale, to which it was
presented by M. Prisse d'Avennes, who had previously published a beautiful
lithographed facsimile of it. It contains a book of proverbial philosophy by an
ancient scribe, and a fragment of another work of the same kind, possibly by
the same author.
Copies of a few hieratic papyri of less value have been published. Some
fragments relating to magic are to be found in the Monumens du Musee Egyptien
des Pays Bas, edited by Dr. Leemans. Important unpublished papyri are believed
to exist in the museums of Europe; one at Berlin is said to belong to the same
remote age as the Prisse papyrus.
The present Essay is written with the intention of presenting to the reader a
view of the old Pharaonic literature as developed in the D'Orbiney, Anastasi,
Sallier, and Prisse papyri, which by help of the labours of several eminent
Egyptologists it is now possible to do. To a considerable extent I rely upon my
own resources; and here I must acknowledge, once for all, the great assistance
which I have derived from Mr. Birch, of the British Museum, whose liberality in
imparting his knowledge upon Egyptian subjects keeps pace with its depth; but
whom I by no means wish to make sponsor for numerous inaccuracies which will
doubtless occur in the translations attempted.
As the interest of the reader in these remains will doubtless
[231] be increased by his being able to place them
in some clear relation to what is known from other sources of the world's
history, something must here be said about chronology. It is well known that the
most contradictory opinions have prevailed among Egyptologists upon this head;
and it is difficult to say, even at the present time, what it is that is taken
on all hands for granted. I will endeavour to give in a few words the views of
Lepsius, and the reasons, which appear to me sufficiently convincing, that the
19th dynasty, to which all except one of our papyri belong, was that under which
the oppression of the Israelites in Egypt, and their departure from that
country, took place. The earliest distinct point of synchronism which we find
between Manetho, the native Egyptian historian, and the Jewish history, is at
the commencement of the 22nd dynasty. Here we have a king Sesonchis, who has
been well identified with Shishak, the conqueror of Rehoboam. The invasion of
Judea by this monarch is usually placed B.C. 960, about forty years after the
date assigned to the building of Solomon's temple. Now, the two preceding
dynasties of Manetho, the 21st and 20th, occupy together 265 or 308 years, the
number varying in the different copies that have been handed down. A comparison
of several genealogies preserved in the Book of Chronicles makes it probable
that between Moses and Solomon there were about ten generations, or something
more than 300 years. This brings us back, then, to the close of the 19th dynasty
as the time of the Exodus, and it is at this point that Manetho, writing from
Egyptian tradition or records, actually places the event. The old chronologers,
indeed, reckoned a much longer period for the time of the Judges, and placed the
Exodus very much further back in Egyptian history; and their view has been
adopted by many modern writers. One argument against it is this: the Israelites are said to have built Pharaoh a city named Rameses, doubtless after the
king himself, which is afterwards mentioned as their point of departure. Now,
the first monarch of that name who appears in Egyptian history is the last but
one of the 18th dynasty, or the first of the 19th, according to Lepsius's
arrangement. His reign is, then, the earliest period to which the oppression of
the Israelites could be assigned. But as he reigned a very short time (four
years, according to Lepsius's latest investigation), he cannot be supposed to be
the king under whom the earlier events mentioned in the Book of Exodus took
place. His grandson, Rameses II., the most celebrated king of the name, whose
reign extended over more than sixty years, is in all probability the oppressor;
and it is certain that he built a city in the north-eastern corner of
[232] Hieratic Papyri.
Egypt, in the region which the Israelites are believed to
have inhabited, some remains of it, bearing his name in scribed, existing to
this day. If we suppose that it was a later king of the name of Rameses for whom
the Israelites built 'treasure cities' for instance, Rameses III., the first
king of the 20th dynasty we must then contract the space of time between Moses
and Solomon into still narrower limits, and beyond what is reasonably warranted
by the genealogies.
It was under a successor of the first oppressor that the departure of the
Israelites took place (Exodus ii. 23); but whether his immediate successor or
not, is not clearly stated. Lepsius places the event under Seti-Meneptah II.,
the second (or third) king from Rameses II., B.C. 1314.
It is to the times of Rameses II., and his successors Ba-en-ra-Meneptah and
Seti-Meneptah II., that the greater part of our papyri relate. Therefore, if the
chronological views of Lepsius be correct, they present to us a picture of
Egyptian life and character, precisely at that period of the history of that
people which has become most interesting to us from its connexion with that of
the Israelites. And this is the utmost I am desirous of impressing upon the
reader; for any direct mention, or even allusion, to the transactions mentioned
in Exodus I believe is not to be found in the papyri.
I begin my account of the contents of these documents, with those which have
already been the most completely and satisfactorily interpreted. The first to be
mentioned is the D'Orbiney papyrus, of which, as has been before stated, the
contents were made known by M. de Rouge as long ago as 1852, although they will
probably be new to a large number of English readers. The papyrus is a roll
containing nineteen pages of writing in the finest style of Egyptian
calligraphy. The first five pages are somewhat damaged, but with a little
trouble, I believe nearly all might be supplied. Some unskilful person has
attempted reparations in a few places, which are executed so as to deceive the
eye of the casual observer, but which betray themselves at once to those
acquainted with the characters. Not only is the handwriting of this MS. clear
and beautiful, but the text is extremely correct, which is by no means the case
with many of the Sallier and Anastasi papyri. The recto and verso of the last
page contain the name of king Seti-Meneptah II., but with the titles of 'ensign-bearer on the king's left, generalissimo of infantry, and king's son,'
from which M. de Rouge concludes that the papyrus belonged to this prince
before his accession to the throne. Had the writer intended to mark the date of
[233] his work, he would probably have inscribed it with the name of the
reigning monarch. It does not appear, however, to have been composed expressly
for the edification of the young Pharaoh, for it is dedicated by the author Enna
to three scribes of his own college, Ka-kabu, Hora, and Meriemap; but we may
fairly conclude that this was a copy made for the use of the prince, to whom we
also may with some probability ascribe the well-thumbed condition of the first
five pages. The contents may be thought childish, and they certainly throw no
light upon history; but the book, from its very simplicity, is the most useful
document yet discovered for the illustration of the Egyptian language. The style
is clear, and there are very few sentences of which the meaning can admit of a
doubt. It affords the means of determining at once, in the most complete manner,
the meaning of a number of words and phrases which could only be guessed at in
other MSS. The opening paragraphs of the story shall be given from the
translation of M. de Rouge:
This relates to two brothers, children of the same mother and father: the name
of the elder was Anepou (Anubis); the name of the younger was Satou.3
Anepou, being the head of the house, married, and he treated his younger brother
as his son.
Some obliterations here occur, but it appears that Satou was a skilful feeder of cattle, and that he led his brother's herds every day to the pasture, and brought them back at night to their stalls.
When he returned from the field he brought back all sorts of
fodder, he sat down with his brother and sister to eat and drink, and then went
to the stall to tend his cattle.
When the earth was again illumined and the dawn appeared, the hour of going to
the fields being come, he called his cattle, and led them to feed in the meadow.
He followed them .... and his cattle told him which were the choicest feeding
places, for he understood all their language. And when he brought them back to
the
stalls, they found them supplied with all the herbs which they loved.
[234] The cattle which he tended
became extremely fat, and multiplied greatly. When the season of tillage
arrived, his elder brother said to him, 'Let us take the teams and go to
plough, for the land appears (i.e. the water of the inundation had subsided),
and is fit for culture. When we have ploughed it, you shall fetch the seed.' So
the young man proceeded to execute what his elder brother told him.
Some erasures occur here which interfere with the continuity of the translation.
The story proceeds to the following effect. The ploughing being finished, the
elder brother sends the younger home to fetch seed. On arriving at the house,
the young man finds his brother's wife engaged in combing her hair. He asks her
for corn, and she bids him go to the granary and help himself while she
completes her toilette. Satou fetches one of his largest baskets, in order to
carry back as much corn as possible. On his return from the granary, laden with
barley and wheat, the lady compliments him upon his strength, and addresses him
in precisely the same fashion as the wife of Potiphar addressed the Hebrew
Joseph. Satou indignantly rejects her advances, and departs with his load,
promising, however, to observe the strictest silence as to what had occurred.
The wife of Anepou determines to be revenged; and when the husband returns, in
the evening, he is astonished to find his house in darkness, the lamp not
lighted, and no one ready to present him with water to wash his bands. On
entering, he finds his wife stretched on the bed, apparently lifeless, stripped
of her clothes, and with all the outward semblance of having been the victim of
violent outrage.
'Who has been speaking with thee?' he inquires. 'No man has spoken to me,' is
the reply, 'but thy younger brother when he came to fetch the corn.'
And she then proceeds to tell the story, mutatis mutandis, and concludes with conjuring her husband to take summary vengeance upon the offender.
The elder brother became as furious as a panther; he sharpened his sword, and took it in his hand. Then he went and stood behind the door of the ox-stall, ready to kill his younger brother on his arrival, in the evening, with his cattle. When the sun set, Satou came back, according to his daily wont. As he approached, the cow which walked first to enter the stall, said to her keeper, 'Methinks thy elder brother is yonder, with his sword, ready to kill thee when thou comest near him.' He heard the words of his first cow, and then came another and said the same. Then he looked under the door of the stall, and he saw the feet of his brother, who stood behind the door, his sword in his hand. He threw his load on the ground, and [235] began to run as fast as he could; and his brother pursued him, sword in hand.
Satou invokes the sun-god Ra:
'My good lord, it is thou who showest on which side is wrong and on which side is right.'
The sun-god hears the complaint, and causes a wide river, full of crocodiles, to flow between the two brothers. The younger calls to the elder to wait until the next day, when he will give a full explanation. Accordingly, when the sun rises, he relates the true state of the affair, reproaches his brother with his credulity, and, calling the sun to witness his innocence, he inflicts a grievous mutilation upon himself, and falls fainting on the bank of the river. The elder brother is much afflicted, but is unable to come to his assistance on account of the crocodiles. Satou at length recovers, and announces his intention of quitting his brother's company and of retiring to the valley of the acacia, a remote place, apparently beyond the limits of Egypt. Here commences a mysterious part of the story. Satou tells his brother that he shall take his heart and place it in the flowers of an acacia-tree. If, at some future time, the brother desires to renew communication with him, he must search for his heart, and, when found, place it in a vessel containing wine, or some other liquid, with certain ceremonies. Satou will then appear to him, and answer any questions which he may put. Having given these directions, Satou departs, and the brother returns home in grief, throwing-dust upon his head. He slays his wife, and casts her to the Satou dwells in the valley of the acacia, where he occupies himself in hunting wild animals; at night he sleeps under the acacia-tree, in the flowers of which he has placed his heart. After a time he builds himself a house. Going out one day, he meets the fraternity of the gods, who had come down to visit their land of Egypt. One of them says to him:
'Oh! Satou, thou divine bull, dost thou remain thus alone, having left thy country on account of the wife of Anepou, thy brother. Lo! he has slain his wife.' Ra, the sun-god, says to Noum, the creator:
'Wilt thou not make a woman for Satou, that he may not remain alone.'
Noum accordingly forms for him a consort more beautiful than
all the women in Egypt, and all the gods endow her with
[236] gifts. The seven Hathors (the sacred cows) come to see her, and
declare with one voice that she is destined to die a violent death. Satou takes
this beautiful creature to his house, and she remains at home while he employs
himself industriously in hunting. One day he says to her:
'When thou goest out to walk, beware lest the river seize thee, for I could not
deliver thee, being a woman even as thou art; for my heart is among the flowers
of the acacia.'
He then explains his history to her. The daughter of the gods loses no time in
going to the acacia-tree to search for her husband's heart, when she perceives
the river overflowing his banks, and advancing towards her. She flees, and the
river pursues, but proceeds no further than the foot of the acacia, where he
makes his moan, and declares to the tree that he is smitten with love of the
wife of Satou. The consolatory acacia throws down a lock of the lady's hair,
which she appears to have left among the branches, and the river, satisfied with
this prize, retires within his banks, and the waters bear down the lock towards
Egypt. All the way the hair diffuses a celestial odour, until it arrives at the
place where the washers5 of
the king of Egypt carry on their business; and it scents the king's linen to
such an extent as to excite extreme surprise among the washers. A vehement
controversy arises among them as to the cause of this extraordinary odour. The
foreman of the washers, going alone one day to the washing-ground, greatly
disgusted with the interminable dispute, is fortunate enough to see the
wonderful lock. He snatches it out of the water, and hastens with it to the
king. His majesty forthwith orders his wise men to be summoned, who, having
inspected the lock, pronounce it to belong to a daughter of the gods. Their
advice is that couriers should be despatched into all parts of the land to
search for the owner of the hair;6
they recommend also that the courier to be sent to the valley of the acacia
should be accompanied by a large body of troops. This advice is followed, and
after many days the various messengers return to bring their reports; but of
those who were [237] sent to the valley of the
acacia, only one came back, for Satou had encountered and slain all the rest.
The king then sends another troop, who on this occasion are provided with rich
dresses and other articles pleasing to female taste.7
This expedition is more successful than the former; the wife of Satou is captivated by the presents, and is brought in triumph to Egypt, where her arrival is the occasion of general rejoicing. The king is greatly smitten with her beauty, confers on her the rank of a princess, and makes her his queen. The daughter of the gods, however, shows herself to be not in all respects so perfect a creature as she outwardly appeared. The gloomy destiny foretold by the sacred cows has prepared us for a bad termination to her career. Curiosity was the first weakness which displayed itself in her character, the love of finery the next, and. more malignant features now develop themselves. She takes an early opportunity of relating to the king the secret of her husband's heart, and advising him to send a troop of men to cut down the acacia, by which means she hopes to get well rid of Satou. This suggestion is followed out by his majesty; the tree is cut down, the heart falls to the ground, and Satou immediately becomes a lifeless corpse.
The story now returns to Anepou, who, after the lapse of
several years, is seized with the desire of seeing his brother again. He
accordingly prepares two vessels, one containing wine, the other some different
species of liquid, for the performance of the ceremonies directed by Satou. He
takes his staff, his shoes, his clothes, and other baggage, and sets off for the
valley of the acacia. On arriving at his brother's house, he finds the body
stretched on a mat. After bewailing his loss, he proceeds to search for the
heart. Three years the search continues without success. In the fourth year the
heart of Satou, which appears to maintain some consciousness, becomes desirous
of returning to Egypt, and says to itself, 'I will leave the celestial sphere,' Anepou had become almost weary of his fruitless toil, but he determines to make
one more search ; and at length, perceiving an acacia-pod lying on the ground,
he turns it over and finds his brother's heart beneath it. He places it in one
of the vessels which he had prepared, and leaves it till night. The heart having
become saturated with moisture, motion returns to the limbs of Satou, and he
opens his eyes and looks at his brother. Anepou then pours the remainder of the
liquor down his throat; the heart returns to its proper place, and Satou is
completely restored [238] to life and activity. The
brothers embrace and compare notes, and the younger then announces that he is
about to assume the form of a sacred bull. He directs his brother to mount upon
his back, and they proceed together to Egypt, where the bull, having been
inspected by the priests, is pronounced to be a genuine Apis, and is immediately
installed as a divinity. Anepou is handsomely rewarded as the discoverer of the
sacred animal. The perfidious queen, going one day to view it, is astonished to
hear herself addressed by a human voice:
'Who art thou?' she inquires. 'I am thy husband, Satou; thou knowest how
thou didst cause the king to destroy the acacia-tree wherein I abode, that I
might not live; but, behold, I am actually alive!'
The queen runs away in terror, and the first time that she feasts with the king
she induces him to swear an oath to grant whatsoever request she shall make. The
request is to have the liver of the bull to eat. The king is much scandalized by
this proposition; but being under the obligation of an oath, he gives orders
that the bull be slain. Satou's head is cut off, and in the operation two drops
of blood fall upon two garden-beds by the side of a staircase in front of one of
the royal palaces. In the course of the night two magnificent persea-trees
spring from these two drops, and the next day the whole population flocks to
witness the miracle. The king is informed of the occurrence, and comes in his
chariot to see, accompanied by the queen. When she approaches the trees, a voice
once more reproaches her with her wickedness, and tells her that Satou is still
alive. A second time she induces the weak monarch to swear an oath to grant her
whatever she shall ask;
whereupon she requests to have the persea-trees cut down, observing that they
will make excellent timber. This is put into execution, the queen standing by to
witness the proceeding.
A chip from one of the trees flies off and enters her mouth. After this
occurrence, the queen produces a son, who is brought to the king, and is
recognised as a royal offspring with great ceremony. The king loves him
exceedingly, and when he grows up, creates him Prince of Ethiopia, the title
borne by the heir-apparent to the throne. After these things, says the narrator,
'the king flew to heaven,' and the young prince, who, it appears, is no other
than Satou himself in a new body, reigns in his stead. He calls his councillors
before him, relates his whole history, and passes judgment upon his faithless
wife. It is not expressly said that she is ordered to be executed, but this
appears to be intended. After this Satou reigns happily for thirty years; he
confers honours and riches upon his [239] brother,
who succeeds him on the throne, and also reigns thirty years: and so ends the
story.
The marvellous indifference to probability and consistency in this singular
legend, might almost lead to the conclusion that it was intended for nothing
more than a child's tale. We shall see presently that Enna, its author, was
capable of much more serious efforts. After all, the Tale of the Two Brothers is
not more extravagant than most of those in the Thousand and One Nights. The
incidents relating to the heart are probably connected with certain religious
notions held by the Egyptians, to whom the separation of the heart from the body
and its restoration was a familiar idea; and this part of the story would not
to them appear particularly monstrous. If the author can be supposed to have
assigned any particular time to the events which he relates, it must be before
the reign of Menes, in that pre-historic period which was filled with dynasties
of demi-gods and heroes, and which must have afforded a fine field for the
expansive imagination of Egyptian mythologists.
The next papyrus to be noticed is Sallier No. 3, containing the larger portion
of a narrative composed by a scribe named Penta-our (of whom we shall hear more
presently), relating to an exploit performed by the great Rameses II. in one of
his campaigns against the Hittites (Oheta).
The commencement is wanting, and the end is somewhat torn, but the date of the
composition and the name of the writer have fortunately escaped. It appears to
have been written in the 9th year of the king whose valour it celebrates.
Champollion saw this papyrus, and had formed some notion of the nature of its
contents, but to M. de Rouge belongs the honour of having first given a
complete translation of it. This was published in the Revue Contemporaine, 1856
(p. 389). The scene of the exploit lies in the neighbourhood of the city of
Katesh,8 the capital of the
Hittites, which stood on the banks of a river named Anrata (or Aranta, as it is
sometimes written), perhaps the Syrian Orontes. It appears, from the sculptures
and inscriptions of Ibsamboul and the Theban Ramesseum, that Rameses II., in the
fifth year of his reign, made an expedition into Asia to suppress a revolt of
the Asiatic tribes headed by [240] side of the
city, certain wandering Arabs came to inform him that the forces of the Hittites
had retired towards the south, to the land of the Khirbou. These Arabs were,
however, in the service of the enemy, and were sent with the intention of
entrapping the Egyptians, the fact being that the Hittites and their allies were
assembled in force to the north of the town. Rameses fell into the trap, and
advanced to the north-west of Katesh while the body of his army proceeded to the
south. Shortly after two Hittite spies were caught and brought to the king, and
under the pressure of the bastonnade, confessed the true state of the affair.
The prince of the Hittites had in the meantime executed a movement to the south
of the city, and thus the king was cut off from the body of his troops, and only
escaped destruction by the dashing exploit which his admiring
subjects seem to have been never weary of commemorating, and which furnished
Penta-our, the court poet, with a brilliant theme. A few extracts from the
recital shall be given, based upon M. de Rouge's version, from which I venture
in a few respects to deviate. The papyrus begins in the middle of a sentence, at
the moment when the king had discovered his mistake.
[The prince of] Heth advanced with men and horses well armed
[or full of provender?]: there were three men to each chariot.9
There were gathered together all the swiftest men of the land of the vile
Hittites, all furnished with arms ... and waited stealthily to the north-west
of the fortress of Katesh. Then they fell upon the bow men of Pharaoh, into the
middle of them, as they marched along and did not expect a battle. The bowmen
and the horsemen of his majesty gave way before them. Behold they were near to
Katesh, on the west bank of the river Anrata. Then was [fulfilled?] the saying
of his majesty. Then his majesty, rising up like the god Mentou [Mars],
undertook to lead on the attack. He seized his arms he was like Bar [Baal] in
his hour. The great horse which, drew his majesty his name was Nekhtou-em-Djom,
of the stud of Rameses-Meiamen ... His majesty halted when he came up to the
enemy, the vile Hittites. He was alone by himself there was no other with him in
this sortie. His majesty looked behind him and saw that he was intercepted by
two thousand five hundred horse men in the way he had to go, by all the fleetest
men of the prince of the base Hittites, and of many lands which were with him of Artou [Aradus], of Maausou, of Patasa, of Kashkash, of Aroun, of Kadjawa-tana,
of Khirbou, of Aktra, Katesh, and Raka. There were three men to each chariot,
they were ... but there were neither captains, nor squires, nor leaders of
bowmen, nor skirmishers [with the king], the Prince of Heth. Arrived near Katesh,
upon the south [241] My archers and my horsemen
forsook me, not one of them remained to fight with me.' Then said his majesty, 'Where art thou now, my father Amen? Behold, does a father forget his son? But
do I confide in my own strength? Walking or standing, is not my face towards
thee? Do I not inquire the counsels of thy mouth? Do I not seek for thy mighty
counsels, thou great lord of Egypt, at whose approach the oppressors of the land
are scattered? What now is the hope of these Aamou? Amen shall abase those who
know not god. Have I not made for thee many and great buildings of stone? have
I not filled thy temple with my spoils, building for thee a temple to last
myriads of years? ... The whole earth unites to bring thee offerings ... [to
enrich] thy domain. I have sacrificed to thee 30,000 oxen, with all kinds of
sweet-scented herbs. Have I not put behind me those who do not thy will? ...
I have built thee a house of great stones, erecting for thee eternal groves; I
have brought for thee obelisks from Abou [Elephantine]; I have caused the
everlasting stones to be fetched, launching for thee boats upon the sea,
importing for thee the manufactures of the lands. When was it ever before said
that such a thing was done? Confounded is every one who resists thy designs;
blessed is every one who obeys thee, O Amen. That which thou doest is dear to my
heart [?] I cry to thee, my father, Amen. I am in the midst of many un known
people gathered together from all lands. But I am alone by myself; there is
none other with me. My bowmen and my horse men have forsaken me; they were
afraid; not one of them listened when I cried to them. Amen is more helpful to
me than myriads of bowmen, than millions of horsemen, than tens of thousands of
chosen youths, though they be all gathered together in one place. The arts of
men prevail not, Amen is more powerful than they; they follow not the commands
of thy mouth, sun! Have I not sought out thy commands? have I not invoked thee
from the ends of the earth.
This invocation is heard, and the king proceeds to make a vigorous charge
against the enemy, who are scattered in all directions. The prince of the
Hittites rallies, and succeeds in bringing them again to the combat, but they
are repulsed by the king. It will be observed that sometimes the writer him self
speaks, but generally the narrative is put into the mouth of the king a poetical
artifice which gives a certain liveliness to the composition.
'I ran towards them, like the god Mentou, I fleshed my hand
upon them in the space of a moment [?] I smote them, I slew them, so that one of
them cried to another, saying, 'It is no man' [super human]. Mighty was he who
was among them, Soutech, the most glorious. Baal was in my limbs; why was every
enemy weak? his hand was in all my limbs. They knew not how to hold the bow and
the spear. As soon as they saw him, they fled far away with
[242] speed, but his majesty was upon them like a
greyhound. He slew them, so that they escaped not.'
The king's squire or armour-bearer is seized with terror, and conjures his
master to fly. The king comforts him; and after charging the enemy six times,
returns victorious from the field. Rameses, on rejoining his troops, addresses
a long tirade to his captains upon their cowardice, and enlarges upon his own
valour without any modest scruples. In the evening the rest of the troops came
dropping in, and were surprised to find the whole country strewed with the
bodies of the dead. The whole army joins in singing the praises of their
courageous leader:
'Hail to the sword, thanks to the bold warrior, strengthener
of hearts, who deliverest thy bowmen and thy horsemen, son of Toum, subduing
the land of the Hittites with thy victorious sword. Thou art king of victories
there is none like thee, a king fighting for his soldiers in the day of battle.
Thou art magnanimous, the first in battle. The whole world joined together
cannot resist thee. Thou art the mighty conqueror, in the face of thy army. The
whole earth falls down before thee saying homage. Thou rulest Egypt, thou
chastisest the foreigners, thou crushest, thou bowest the back of these Hittites
for ever.' Then said his majesty to his bowmen, and his horsemen, likewise his
captains, 'Ye who did not fight, behold none of you have done well, in that ye
left me alone amongst the enemy. The captains of the vanguard, the sergeants of
the infantry, came not to help me. I fought against the myriads of the land
alone. I had the horses Nechtou-em-Djom and Becht-herouta; they were obedient
to the guidance of my hand, when I was alone by myself in the midst of the
enemy. Therefore I grant to them to eat their corn in
the presence of Ka continually, when I am in the gate of the palace, on account
of their having been found in the midst of the enemy: and as for the
armour-bearer who remained with me, I bestow upon him my arms, together with the
things which were upon me, the habiliments of war.' Behold his majesty wore them
in his great victory, overthrowing myriads assembled together with his conquering sword.
The battle is renewed the next day, and the Hittites are thoroughly routed. An
envoy from the chief is now announced, suing for mercy. Rameses acts the part
of a magnanimous conqueror, and grants pardon to the repentant rebels. He then
returns peaceably to Egypt, leaving the terror of his arms in all the countries
of the East.
At the end of the last page of the MS. are the date and
dedication, unfortunately somewhat mutilated. The writer Penta-our dedicates it
not to the king, but to a chief librarian, probably Amen-em-an, with whom he
carried on a correspondence. This poem was so highly appreciated by the king,
[243] that he caused it to be engraved in
hieroglyphics upon the walls of one of his palaces, where some remains of it may
be still seen. If the date be correctly read, it would appear to have been
written four years after the event it celebrates, and, notwithstanding the
exaggerated style of adulation which pervades it, there can be little doubt that
some such occurrence as that which it represents, really took place.
Next to this specimen of cotemporary history must be placed a fragment, possibly
from the pen of the same writer, though in an entirely different style, and
relating to occurrences which had taken place in Egypt several centuries before.
Two thousand years or more B.C. Egypt had been invaded by an Asiatic tribe, who
established themselves in Lower Egypt, and founded a dynasty, which continued
for several centuries to divide the empire with the native kings. These Hyksos,
or shepherd kings, as the Egyptians called them, form Manetho's I5th and 16th
dynasties. Their power was shaken by the Theban kings of the 17th dynasty, of
whom Aahmes was the first (circa 1700 B.C.); and their complete expulsion was
effected by Tothmes III, the first king of the 18th dynasty, according to the
views of Lepsius, about 100 years after. The king Ra-skenen, mentioned in the
fragment about to be given, has been satisfactorily shown from monumental
evidence to have been the immediate predecessor of Aahmes; and the events which
the writer intended to record may be supposed to be those which ultimately led
to the overthrow and expulsion of the shepherds. Unluckily this scrap of
history, which is found at the beginning of the papyrus Sallier No. 1, has been
greatly mutilated. The scribe himself, indeed, never finished the narrative, but
broke it off abruptly, after writing two pages and three lines of a third. M. de
Rouge' was the first to point out the interesting nature of the few lines which
remain, and their reference to the Hyksos period. M. Brugsch has given an
analysis and translation of the first three lines in the Zeitschrift der
Deutschen-Morgenldndischen Gesellschaft for 1855, p. 200. An attempt shall here
be made to give a translation of as much as is legible:
It came to pass, when the land of Egypt was held by the invaders [revolters,
enemies], there was no lord king [i.e. of the whole of Egypt]; in the day,
namely, when king Ra-skenen was ruler [Heka, Hyk] of the land of the south [i.e.
the Thebaid], the invaders holding the district of Aamou. The chief Apepi was in
the palace of Ouar [Avaris]. The whole land paid homage to him, with their
manufactures, in abundance, as well as with all the precious things of the
inhabitants of the country of the north. Now king Apepi set up Soutech for his
[244] lord; he worshipped no other god in the whole land ... built him a
temple of durable workmanship. It came to pass that while he rose up [to
celebrate] a day of dedicating .... a temple to Soutech, the prince [of the
south, prepared] to build a temple to the sun over against it [i.e. in rivalry
with it ?] Then it came to pass that king Apepi desired to ... king Ra-skenen
.... the prince of the south. It came to pass a long time after this ....
Here four lines are totally obliterated, having contained about as much matter
as that which precedes. On the next page the narrative begins in the middle of a
sentence
.... with him, in case of his not consenting [to worship] all the gods, which
are in the whole land, [and to honour?] Amen-Ra, king of the gods. It came to
pass, many days after these things, that king Apepi sent a message to the prince
of the south. The messenger [being gone] he called his wise men together to
inform them. Then the messenger of king Apepi [journeyed] to the chief of the
south. [When he was arrived] he stood in the presence of the chief of the south,
who said to him this saying, viz. to the messenger of king Apepi, 'What message
dost thou bring to the south country? For what cause hast thou set out on this
expedition?' Then the messenger answered him, 'King Apepi sends to thee,
saying, he is about to go to the fountain of the cattle, which is in the region
of the south, seeing that .... has commissioned me to search day and night.'
.... The chief of the south replied to him, that he would do nothing hostile to
him. The fact was, he did not know how to send back (refuse?)... the messenger
of king Apepi. [Then the prince of the south] said to him, 'Behold, thy lord
promised to ...'
Here four lines are obliterated. The third page begins with three or four words concluding a sentence. Then begins a new paragraph
Then the chief of the south called together the princes and great men, likewise all the officers and heads of .... and he told them all the history of the words of the message sent to him by king Apepi, before them [or according to order?] Then they cried with one voice, in anger, they did not wish to return a good answer, but a hostile one. King Apepi sent to .....
At this point the tantalizing scribe snatches the cup of
history from our lips, and presents us, without apology, with a totally
different composition, namely, a collection of letters made by our friend the
poet Penta-our. Were it not for the merciless mutilation which the above piece
has suffered, it would have not been very difficult of translation, as it is in
the plain narrative style of the Tale of the Two Brothers, and the context leads
easily to the sense of the words. As it is, there [245] is much room for
conjecture. In the first line I read 'the district of Aamou,' for which M.
Brugsch gives 'the city of the sun.' believing Heliopolis to be the place
referred to. I am much more satisfied that 'the city of the sun' is not the
right translation here, than that which I have given instead, is so. Aamou was
the generic name given by the Egyptians to the Asiatic nations, and it would be
quite in accordance with what Manetho tells us of the Hyksos, to find the
district which they inhabited called the district of the Aamou; but if that be
the name here intended, it must be admitted that it is not distinctly written,
and that it has not the determinative symbols which usually accompany the word.
King Apepi (or Apepias, as the name may perhaps be read) is apparently one of
the shepherd kings, and his name recalls that of Apophis, the fourth in the
dynasty, as given in Josephus's extract from Manetho. A statue, either of or
dedicated by this king, has been found in Lower Egypt bearing his name, with the
epithet 'lover of Sutech.'
We now proceed to another species of composition, occupying an important place
among the remains of hieratic literature. The papyri Sallier No. 1, Anastasi
Nos. 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6, contain collections of letters written by various
scribes; Anastasi Nos. 8 and 9 contain each a single letter. These letters, or
at least the more remarkable of them, form the subject of a work by the Rev. I.
D. Heath, The Exodus Papyri, London, 1855, m which translations of a great many
are given. Mr. Heath thinks that he finds in them allusions to the transactions
of the Hebrew Exodus. In this I am unable to concur, and the translations which
I am about to offer are widely different from Mr. Heath's, so much so that the
reader who may take the trouble to compare the two, may feel inclined to doubt
the value of a system which produces such different results. My acknowledgments
are, however, due to Mr. Heath for much valuable assistance derived from his
work in commencing the task of decipherment; the difference between our
translations arises partly from the different value given to particular words,
but still more from
a different view of the arrangement and structure of the sentences. Mr. Heath
has certainly striven conscientiously to give a meaning to every word and sign.
But the truth is that a page of Coptic, if rendered in a similar way, word for
word, might be made to yield astounding results. Much which Mr. Heath puts into
the mouths of his scribes is excessively obscure, and he has to resort to most
singular theories to explain it. I hope to succeed in making it appear that the
scribes of Pharaoh expressed themselves in much [246]
the same manner as men in a similar position in other ages and countries have
been in the habit of doing. Mr. Heath imagines that these compositions, to which
he hardly accords the character of letters, were intended to be chanted at
funerals or festivals. My translations will show them to be genuine letters,
which passed between different officers and their subordinates and comrades, and
which were collected and preserved principally as models of epistolary
correspondence, and for the sake of their amusing or instructive contents; just
like the collections of correspondence of which modern literature has so many
and various examples.
The collection in Sallier No. 1, consists of ten letters and a part of an
eleventh, which we are luckily enabled to complete from another papyrus; for the
compilers did not always confine themselves to the stores of their own
portfolios, but borrowed letters from collections which had already become
classical. The collection in question I suspect to be one of the earliest; it
was made by the poet Penta-our, who modestly inserts in it but one letter of his
own, while he gives us ten from the pen of his master and chief Amen-em-an. The
superscription of the whole work is fortunately preserved, and runs thus:
The beginning of the instructions of letters made by the scribe Penta-our in the tenth year, in the month Choiak; the great majesty of Pharaoh being in the house of Rameses II.
If the first words be rightly translated, we have here a clue to the object of the compilation. It was either for instruction in the art of letter-writing, or for the sake of the instructive maxims contained in the letters. I incline to the former idea, because Penta-our's own letter, as will be presently seen, does not, like those of his master, contain instruction or admonition, but might very well find a place here as a model for a junior scribe called upon to give account of his proceedings. The words 'made by the scribe Penta-our,' do not imply that he was the actual copyist of this papyrus, as Mr. Heath throughout assumes. In proof of this I refer to the papyri Sallier No. 2, and Anastasi No. 7, one of which is a duplicate of the other, but in a very different handwriting. The pieces which they contain are in both said to be made by the scribe Enna, who must consequently have been the author, not the transcriber. The name of the Pharaoh in whose tenth year Penta-our's compilation was made, is omitted, just as, in quoting an act of Queen Victoria's reign, we say an act of the tenth year of her majesty. The king in question was probably either the son [247] or grandson of the great Rameses II., whose praises Penta-our had sung many years before.
The letters shall now speak for themselves: Letter I. The chief librarian Amen-em-an, of the royal white house [or treasury?] says to the scribe Penta-our, Whereas, this letter is brought to you, saying, communication.
I must here stop a moment to observe, that each of the
letters of Amen-em-an has this formal heading, which seems to be an abbreviation
of a longer formula, for the sentence beginning whereas has no conclusion, but
is abruptly broken off by the word which, after Mr. Heath, I render
'communication.' It is literally 'with-saying,' 'colloquium.' In some of the
other collections the scribes, for the sake of brevity, drop the first part of
the superscription, and commence with this word. The formula well known to
lawyers, 'This indenture made the day of' &c., in which the nominative case 'indenture' never finds a verb, is an example of a similar kind of mutilation.
The real substance of Amen-em-an's letter commences after the word '
communication,'
Do thou give thy attention to writing by day, whilst thou inditest by night;
seeing that thou art perfectly acquainted with the deeds of the Prince [Hek],
and the whole of his history; how he reviewed all the Smat; how he took their
numbers; how he set the captain over the heavy troops, the lieutenant over the
skirmishers.
[Thou knewest him] as a child, when he left his mother's lap, when he became a
man, and his bones became strong as those of an ass. This is to inspirit thee.
Is there no heart within thee? Thou hast described the deeds of great men on
many occasions. Are thy ink stand and thy portfolio become useless [?] thy mind
a perpetual blank [lit. washed out?] Do thou consider this.
There are many minor points in which the above translation is conjectural, but I
do not wish to incumber the text too much with queries, and the meaning of each
word cannot be discussed or defended here. A duplicate of this letter is found
in the collection Anastasi No. 5 (Pl. civ.). It contains some variations, which
show that we can by no means depend upon the correctness of our copyists. What I
assert with confidence is, that the above represents correctly the general
purport of Amen-em-an's letter, which is, to urge Penta-our to a continuation of
his historical or poetical labours. Who the prince referred to is must remain
for the present in doubt. The title Hek was an old territorial one, which the
kings of Egypt bore in addition to their other more extensive titles, as is the
wont of the kings and princes of modern Europe. Rameses II. is called Hek in the
papyrus Sallier No. .3, and in [248] the fragment of history in Sallier No.
1,
king Ra-skenen is called Hek of the south country, as distinguished from the
king of the whole of Egypt. The person here meant may be the great Rameses II.
himself, and this letter may have been an incitement to the composition of that
poem upon which Penta-our's fame appears principally to have rested. It is more
likely, however, to have been Ba-en-ra-Meneptah, or Seti II., the successors or
co-regents of Rameses. The date of the compilation tells us nothing, as this
letter may have been written many years before it found insertion in the work
before us.
The next letter opens upon a very different subject, and it
will be seen throughout that no order or method is used in the compilation. The
letters are strung together without any link of connexion.
Letter II. The chief librarian, Amen-em-an, of the royal white house, says to
the scribe Perita-our, Whereas this letter is brought to thee, saying,
communication. Why hast thou not sent provisions to the palace? Yet it is the
season for calves, beasts, eggs, ducks, and vegetables. Thou didst send a
message, saying, 'I will send provisions.' Now, when my letter reaches thee,
thou shalt send each kind of the provisions of the very best, namely, calves,
beasts, eggs, ducks, and vegetables, of those which are fit for the hall of the
palace. Beware lest thou make excuse. If there are not oxen in the stall of the
house of Pharaoh, which is under my keeping, thou shalt seek out four oxen, the
very best and biggest, from among my cattle which are in thy keeping, which are
fit for the hall of the house of Pharaoh. Beware lest thou [neglect it]. Do thou
consider this.
This translation is not very far from that of Mr. Heath, but the alterations
made make the letter more perspicuous. Amen-em-an appears to have the control of
a royal farm, and has at the same time land of his own. Penta-our is acting for
the moment as steward of these farms, and it is his duty to send in supplies of
country produce to the city, in which it seems he has displayed some negligence.
The formula, 'Do thou consider this,' occurs at the end of nearly all Amen-em-an's
letters, and seems to have been a usual mode of winding up a letter from a
superior to his inferior. Other forms will occur hereafter.
The next letter is from Penta-our to his master; it is not a reply to the
preceding, but probably to some other letter now lost in which Amen-em-an
complained of his steward's remissness. We now have an example of the style in
which it was considered becoming for an inferior scribe to address his chief,
Letter III. The scribe Penta-our salutes his lord, the chief
libra- [249] rian, Amen-em-an, of the royal white
house. This comes to inform my lord. Again I salute my lord. Whereas I have
executed all the commissions imposed upon me by my lord well and truly,
completely and thoroughly [?] I have done my lord no wrong. Again I salute my
lord. Whereas the house of my lord is well, his servants are well, his oxen
which are in the field are well, the oxen which are in the stall are well,
eating their provender daily; yea, their keepers fetch them provender. The
horses of my lord are well; I cause their mangers to be filled for them daily;
yea, their grooms fetch them provender from the marshes [or papyrus-beds]. I
measure them out their provender daily; I cause their troughs to be filled with
water during the month of .... when there is great heat; their during ten weeks
[?] until the harvest is finished [?].
The uplands of the king which are under the hand of my lord are safe and well,
and in good cultivation. The account of the asses of the corn, which is reaped
daily ....I cause them to be employed in filling a ditch [?]. I cause the
ploughed lands to be filled .... twelve asses of the corn. But during the season
of harvest .... I send [?] every one who can reap to the fields, the grooms, the
female slaves, who carry .... to the manger daily, that the crops may be cut
[speedily?]. I cause [to be fed] daily all the men who work at the harvesting;
I supply them with drink three times in the month. Not one of them complains [?]
to my lord concerning the food and
the drink. I order them well and truly. Behold this message is to inform my
lord.
Mutilations in this letter make the translation of several
parts a very conjectural matter; and some words which can be read plainly
enough stand much in need of elucidation. On the whole, this translation agrees
with that of Mr. Heath as to its general purport; but I do not with him find
anything satirical in it, nor do I believe that Penta-our introduced it here for
any other purpose than as a specimen of letter-writing, for the profit and
imitation of young scribes.
All the letters which follow are from Amen-em-an to Penta-our, and all begin
with exactly the same formula as that previously given. This, for brevity's
sake, shall therefore be dropped.
Letter IV. Why is thy heart volatile, like chaff before the wind? Give thy
heart to something else good for a man to do. Give [not 1] thy heart to
pleasure. Idleness is unprofitable; it is of no service to a man in the day of
account, whether he be a slave, or whether he serves nobles assembled before
him. His work is not ... his
works are found wanting. He has no servants to draw water, he has no women to
make bread. His comrades are disgusted, their services are withdrawn. Such is
the man whose heart is not in his business, whose eye scorns it, who is proud of
heart, malignant, violent, who obeys not when thou givest orders. The
[250] business of the scribe, there is profit in it; it excels all [other] dignities of the king's nobles. Do thou consider this.
This letter is a mild admonition to Penta-our, who, we shall presently see, was
a little wild in his early courses. At the time when he made this compilation he
was a writer of established reputation and had probably risen to high dignities,
so that he could afford to let out a little of the follies of his youth. Some
freedom has been used in the translation, with which I am far from satisfied.
The last paragraph, of which the sense is clear, shows that one main object of
the writer was to exalt the employment of the scribe. We shall come presently to
several letters of a similar tenor. Mr. Heath, whose translation runs very
differently, finds here allusions to the passage of the Red Sea.
Letter V. Whereas it has been told me that thou forsakest
books, and that thou devotest thyself to pleasure [?]; that thou givest
attention to the labours of the field, and turnest thy back upon theology behold! hast thou not considered the estate of the husbandman? When he would gather
in his crops, the caterpillar ravages the herb garden, the beasts devour the
other things. Multitudes of rats are in the fields, the crows alight, the
beasts consume, the sparrows steal. If the husbandman neglect the watching [?]
of the crops, thieves will rob the field. His axe,10
which is of metal, corrodes; the horses die through the labour of ploughing. The
tax-gatherer [scribe of the harbour] is near [?] while he binds up the sheaves;
there are police officers with staves, negroes with dates [?] they pilfer the
corn unless they are beaten off. If he [the husbandman] is carried away by
intoxicating liquors, if he is as one overcome with drink, his wife is carried
off [?] before him, his children are naked [?], his neighbours go away to attend
to their own crops. The business of the scribe is the first in the inner chamber
[lit. chamber of the women], there is not its equal; the work of the
scribe, there, is not its equal. Do thou consider this.
There is a duplicate copy of this letter in the collection Anastasi No. 5, from
which some assistance has been gained in construing the above, but there is much
still requiring elucidation. The letter which follows is in a similar strain,
but presents greater difficulties. There is a duplicate of it m Anastasi No. 2
(Pl. lxxiii.), with considerable variations in the arrangement of the sentences.
On the whole, this latter seems the better copy of the two.
[251] Letter VI. The scribe is released from labour;
he is
the manager of all businesses; he is appointed to ... Dost thou not carry the
inkhorn? That makes a difference between thee and the rower at the oar, he is
condemned to toil; thou hast not many masters, many superiors. When man comes
from the womb of his mother he bows to his superior. The youth must serve the
captain, the lieutenant the superior officer. The herdsman serves the farmer,
the stable-boy the groom. The steward must preside over the works; his horse
goes to the field; he brings vegetables for his wife and children. While his
horse is gone ... The soldier must go to Khar without a staff, without shoes;
he knows not whether to choose life or death. His horse falls among wild beasts.
The thief [?] hides in the bushes, the enemy rushes upon him. The soldier in a
march cries to his god, Deliver me.
The writer goes on to detail the annoyances and discontents of certain other
professions; and in Anastasi No. 2, the letter winds up with the words, 'the
mission of the scribe is the first of all which are in this world.'
In the next letter Amen-em-an again presses Penta-our upon the subject of his
literary labours.
Letter VII. Faint-hearted one, exhortation is thrown away upon thee. Thou seest
a great subject, yet dost not seize it ; a story greater than any thou hast
told. I give thee a hundred urgings, and thou neglectest them all. Thou art
worse [?] than an ass; urge him and he is active for the day. Thou art worse
[?] than the negro; threaten him, and he will carry his load. Whether to catch
a bird in the nest, or to train a hawk, I would make a man of thee, thou bad
youth. Do thou consider this.
The words about the bird in the nest and the hawk seem to be
a quotation or a well-known proverb, expressing probably an easy and a difficult
thing. They occur elsewhere, in another letter, where they are rather more
intelligible. Perhaps some words have slipped out here.
The next letter appears to have been written when Amen-em-an was away from home,
engaged in some mission, and thus he sighs for the comforts of college life.
Letter VIII. O Thoth, would that I were in Sesennou [Hermopolis], thy pleasant
dwelling-place, where thou art entertained with cakes and ale, where thou givest
voice to jocund [?] discourse ... would that when I enter into the presence of
each god, I might go forth justified. [O! for] the great cellar [?] of three
[?] cubits, which has spices [?] in it and grain as well as spices, and liquor
as well as grain. The water-carrier dwells far off. O! that the voice of Thoth
would send me the sweet rain, as to one who is thirsty. The earth is locked up
when he shuts his mouth, it is opened at his voice. When his voice goes forth
the parched place finds the rain: when thou ....
[253] The last word is nearly
erased, and I suspect that this letter is not complete. Possibly Amen-em-an was
about to tell Penta-our to send him a supply of the luxuries which he so
feelingly deplores the want of. The following letter contains a very pompous
announcement of the return of king Ba-en-ra-Meneptah from an expedition:
Letter IX. Rejoice ye in all the land at the good news, at the return of the
lord, the king of all lands. He is pleased to come to his house, the king, lord
of myriads of years, greatest of rulers, even as Horus. Ba-en-ra Meri-amen,
making Egypt to rejoice, the son of Ha, prosperity to the royal lord, Meneptah,
reposing in truth, executing all justice. May ye behold truth dispelling
falsehood; when he strikes down their faces, all the crocodiles turn back. The
river rises, the Nile swells abundantly, to the beginning of the equinox from
the hour of the moon's rising. The gods are pleased, serene, and joyous .... Do
thou consider this.
The purport of this letter seems to be that Penta-our was to give the labourers in his employment a holiday and a feast, by way of showing the loyalty of the master Amen-em-an. A letter from a different scribe, much to the same effect, and filled with similar bombast, occurs in Anast. No. 3, which we shall mention presently.
The following runs like one of those peremptory epistles
which the kings of England are in the habit of addressing to the sheriffs when
it is necessary to interfere between the lieges upon a point of disputed
possession. The Registrum Brevium will furnish some similar forms.
Letter X. Whereas the steward Amen-em-oua, the son of Amen-em-ap, of the great
house of Rameses II., within,11
has notified to us, saying, 'There were given to me, twenty unploughed [?]
fields, producing fodder for the horses of the king, which are under my care,
but behold they have been taken away from me, and given to the major-domo Memma,
of the palace of king Rameses II., in Pa- Amen [Thebes].' This is to say, when
my letter reaches thee, thou shalt deliver up the twenty unploughed fields to
the steward Amen-em-oua, the son of Amen-em-ap, of the great house of Rameses
II., within, with all speed, immediately this letter reaches you. Ye shall
restore to him the royal fields, the royal lodges, the royal stores in the royal
lodges, also the royal magazines, the royal corn lands, the royal crops of ....
the uncultivated places, and all places of pleasure, which ye pay us rent for,
every one of them. Ye shall do it according to the [letter] of the roll, with ... fixed in writing in the lodge of the royal granary.
[253] The various properties to be delivered up are
translated rather conjecturally, but the purport of the letter is abundantly
clear.
Only three lines of the eleventh and last letter remain to us in the papyrus
Sallier No. 1, but Anastasi No. 4 supplies the deficiency. It is not the least
curious in the collection; I can offer only something approaching to a
translation of it; the latter part of it particularly presents considerable
difficulties, but I have no doubt of its general sense.
Letter XI. Whereas it has been told me that thou hast forsaken books, and
devoted thyself to pleasure [?], that thou goest from tavern to tavern, smelling
of beer at the time of evening [?] If beer gets into a man it overcomes thy mind; thou art like an oar started from its place, which is unmanageable every way;
thou art like a shrine without its god, like a house without provisions, whose
walls are found shaky. If thou wieldest the rod of office [?] men run away from
thee Thou knowest that wine is an abomination;
thou hast taken an oath concerning strong drink that thou wouldst not put
[liquor] into thee. Hast thou forgot thy resolution [?] Thou hast been taught
songs concerning .... sayings concerning .... to recite ... about ... to sing
about the ... ' If thou sittest in the school [?], thou art compared to the
sleepers; if thou standest
up to play in, thou art behindhand [?]. Dost thou sit in the presence of the
daughters, art thou anointed with sweet oil, thy garland of flowers [mouse-ear?] about thy neck; thou rollest upon thy belly, thou reelest [?] thou fallest
on thy belly, thou art besmeared like an egg.'
There is much guess-work here, but I believe the thread of the letter has been
seized. If it be thought strange that Pentaour should introduce into his
collection a letter which is not much to his own credit, it must be remembered
that when this compilation was made his character was well established; and
probably, after all, he did not feel himself to have entirely deserved the
solemn remonstrances which his reverend friend and tutor was so fond of
addressing to him. One half suspects that the alleged misdemeanours are entirely
imaginary, and merely assumed as texts for Arnen-em-an's sermons. The
miscellaneous character of the eleven letters here given confirms the view above
taken, that they were strung together as models of epistolary correspondence and
nothing more. Though they are disappointingly silent upon what we call history,
yet, as picturing the thoughts and habits of the Pharaonic scribe of the days of
Joseph and Moses, they are of no small interest.
The papyrus Anastasi No. 2 must be described more briefly than the preceding. It
opens with an historic fragment relating to a treaty made between Rameses II.
and two Asiatic princes; [254] one the chief of
the Hittites, the other of a city or country called Kati, which must not be
confounded with Katesh, the capital of the Hittites. Kati was celebrated for its
beer, or some kind of drink, of which we find frequent mention in the papyri.
This fragment does not add much to our knowledge of the history of Rameses II.;
it seems to be only introduced as a model of an historic exordium for the use of
young literary aspirants.12
The rest of the papyrus is occupied with eight or nine letters, some of which
are found elsewhere; several are adulatory addresses to the reigning monarch,
Ba-en-ra Meriep-tah. The handwriting is the most difficult to read of any in
these papyri; but I believe the text is more correct than in others which are
more distinguished for their calligraphy.
Anastasi No. 3, is a collection of documents made by a scribe named Pinebsa, in
the same miscellaneous way as that of Penta-our. The beginning of the papyrus is
lost, and the first letter is a mutilated fragment. The second letter is from
Pinebsa to his chief, Amen-em-ap, and contains a glowing description of a place
called the house of Rameses, probably the city of Rameses in Lower Egypt, which
the Israelites are said to have built.13
The next piece, a letter, runs as follows:
The scribe Amen-em-ap says to the scribe Pinebsa. Whereas this letter is brought
to thee, saying communication. Thou negligent scribe, this is to admonish thee
rigorously concerning giving thy heart to pleasure [or business pursuits]; yea,
rather thou shouldst shun it. Let books be in thy hand, recite with thy mouth,
be assiduous in giving account of thyself. Dost thou manage the businesses of a
chief, thou shalt find this when thou art old [?] the scribe flourishes who is
energetic in all his businesses.
The writer goes on with a string of similar admonitions, and
concludes thus:
Give thy heart to obey orders; it is for thy benefit, whether to teach [some
animal] to fight [?], whether to break a horse, whether to take a bird in its
nest, whether to train a hawk; it is powerful in its aid; do not thou neglect
it: as for letters, be not weary of them; give thy heart to obey my words.
Thou shalt find letters to thy profit.
We have here again the proverb or quotation about the
[255] bird in the nest and the hawk in rather a fuller and more
intelligible form than in the other case. I own the conjectural nature of
several parts of the above translation; it is little satisfactory to me, but I
have no doubt as to the purport of the letter, which resembles greatly some of
Amen-em-an's letters to Penta-our. A copy of this letter is found in Anastasi
No. 5, PL cii., with a continuation tacked on, unless, indeed (which I rather
suspect) it be a distinct letter which follows this, the careless scribe having
omitted to mark by a break or red letter the commencement of a new piece.
The next piece in Pinebsa's collection is not a letter, but a sort of funeral
oration, addressed to Amen-em-ap him self, who, at the end of it, is described
as deceased. The Egyptians were firm believers in the immortality of the body,
and treated their departed ancestors as perpetually present with them. This is
the burden throughout of the Ritual, or Book of the Dead. The deceased is
believed to walk and sit, to eat, drink, and sleep as he did upon the earth.
Accordingly we find Pinebsa dedicating this collection to his deceased master.
Here is the explicit at the end of the papyrus.
Finished well and in peace; dedicated to the chief of his business [or
profession;] singer [?] ... royal ambassador to the whole earth; superintendent
of lowlands and highlands, Amen-em-ap, deceased. Written in the 3rd year, the
28th day of ...
We find several other precisely similar dedications in the papyri, only they are
made to living persons instead of a dead one, of which this is the only
instance.
After the funeral oration follows a complimentary address to some person in high
position, and of literary eminence, whom we may conjecture to have been the
successor of Amen-em-ap in his presidency of the college to which Pinebsa be
longed. Then come three letters from Amen-em-ap to Pinebsa, in the first of
which the writer contrasts the life and condition of an Ouaou, which means,
apparently, a foot soldier or infantry officer, with that of a scribe. The rough
usage and disasters to which the young recruit is subjected are painted in
amusing detail. The next letter contains a similar picture of the business of a
cavalry soldier, with the same moral, namely, the exaltation of the scribes lot
above that of all other men. Of the concluding letter of the papyrus I will
attempt a translation.
The scribe Amen-em-ap says to the scribe Pinebsa, Whereas this letter comes to
thee saying -communication. When my letter reaches thee, thou shalt take fifty
ounces p] of [some metal of which swords and cutting instruments were made,
perhaps bronze], nay, [256] even an hundred ounces,
at the hand of Aai, the scribe of the metals [cashier], according to the number
of the Smat of the temple of Rameses II., the sun-born, in An [On, Heliopolis],
in order to deliver it to the workmen quickly, in the hour when Ba-en-ra
Meriamen, the high admiral, the victorious weapon, the strong scimitar smiting
foreign nations, the hand-javelin, returns to the place of his birth in An. He
went out conquering the whole earth. Fortunate is the day of thy return; sweet
is thy word of command, when thou buildest the house of Rameses II., where every
land draws near [?], where every country approaches [?], where there are seen
splendid garments, vessels of lapis-lazuli and brass, the place of exercise of
thy horsemen, the place of review of thy bowmen, the place where thy captains
harbour their vessels, bringing the tributes. Honoured be thou when thou
approachest to thy slaves when they behold the prince [Hek] standing up to fight; the enemy [?] do not stand before him, they are afraid. [We are ?] thy
creatures, O! Ba-en-ra Meri amen. Thou art eternal, thou art eternal, thou art
established on the seat of thy father Pharaoh.
This letter relates to the same king whose return to his palace is mentioned in
the ninth letter of Penta-our's collection. It is possible that the occurrence
here referred to took place in the life-time of his father Rameses II. From the
titles, it is not easy to know whether Ba-en-ra is addressed as a sovereign or
as a subject. He would seem to have been employed in superintending the building
of the city of Rameses II.; and the last words in the letter may, perhaps,
express no more than that he was made co-regent with his father. This is the
supposition of Miss Corbaux, whose ingenious speculations upon the chronology
and events of this period are prefixed to Mr. Heath's work; but which, I must
observe, find little support in these papyri, if I have succeeded in rightly
interpreting them. Miss Corbaux thinks that Ba-en-ra died before his father;
Lepsius assigns him an independent reign of twenty years I presume, upon some
monumental authority. He may, notwithstanding, have been co-regent for some
years before his father's death.
Certain people called Smat (or Semt, as Mr. Heath reads it) are spoken of here
as attached to the temple of Rameses II. in On. They have been mentioned once
before in the first letter in Penta-our's collection, where the Hyk (most likely
Ba-en-ra) is said to have enrolled or reviewed them. Who and what these people
were is a question not yet solved. Mr. Heath takes them for the Israelites. The
word Smat or Semt, however, does not seem to be a national name, certainly not
the name of a foreign people, as it has not the determinatives which usually
follow such words. It seems rather to designate [257]
some caste, class, or trade. It has been thought to mean the labourers or serfs
bound to the soil belonging to the temples or royal palaces, who may either have
been aborigines or foreign captives. It will appear presently that Smat were
found at the southern extremity of Egypt as well as at On. They also appear to
have spoken a dialect unintelligible to the pure Egyptians.
The next papyrus, Anastasi No. 4, contains twenty-one pieces, some of them
imperfect; they are principally letters. A fragment of the first page bears the
name of Enna and a date, the first year of some king, in all probability Seti
II., whose name occurs in the papyrus. It may probably be inferred that Enna was
the compiler of this collection, which comprises, as we have already seen,
several pieces taken from earlier collections. It contains a good deal of his
own correspondence, but many of the letters have neither the names of the
writers nor of the persons to whom they were addressed. One piece is a letter of
adulation to the reigning monarch Seti II., and is a copy of one contained in
Anast. No. 2, where the monarch addressed is Ba-en-ra Meneptah his predecessor.
Some of the letters are upon matters of business, and the last two are
particularly valuable, from their containing long lists of provisions,
furniture, and miscellaneous stores, which the scribe, to whom they are
addressed, is ordered to procure for the use of the king. Others are of a
familiar and private character, like some we have seen in the previous
collections. It is evident that the object of such a compilation can have been
no other than that of our Complete Letter Writers, to furnish the young scribes
with models of various kinds for their imitation. I will give a few specimens.
(Pl. Ixxxv. 1. 8.) When I arrived at Abou [Elephantine], I performed my
commission. I reviewed the soldiers of the cavalry, the temples, the Smat, the
lieutenants of the lodges, the captains of his majesty. Do thou go and give
intelligence thereof to the principal register office. My commission swells like
the Nile. Give me thy pity [lit. heart].
This letter shows us that there were Smat at Elephantine, the southern limit of
Egypt, which is not in favour of the idea of their being Israelites.
The next letter to the preceding is written apparently from Memphis, but neither writer nor person addressed are named (Pl. Ixxxv. 1. ult.). The writer complains of being oppressed with business, and worn out with excess of watching, and he Ptah to bring his correspondent to Memphis to help him prays in his difficulties.
[258] In Pl. Ixxxix. 1. 7, we
have a letter from a steward to his employer, but with no names given. Mr. Heath
translates it (Exod. Papyri, p. 218,) and connecting it with the two succeeding
pieces (with which I believe it has nothing to do), he finds in it allusions to
the events of the Exodus. The reader must be referred to his book to see the
ingenious way in which this is done. If the translations here offered be sound,
these theories will fall to pieces of themselves. Here is the letter
in question. The meaning of the opening words is rather doubtful.
Whereas it is but a short time that I am with thee, yet thou placest a load upon
my back; thy reproofs come to my ears; I am like a galloping horse. Do I not
go, do I not search in my heart by day, is it not present with me at night,
namely, how I may act for the benefit of my lord, like a servant useful to his
lord. I have built thee a house of granite; it is for thy residence, it is
floored with timber [or planted with trees], through its whole extent. Thy
stables, as well as thy granaries, are full of grain [Here follow about twenty
different kinds of seeds and fruits, which must be left un translated]. Thy
ox-stalls are .... thy breeding cows are fruitful. I have made thee a garden [?]
of herbs to the south of thy estate; it abounds with melons [?] sugar-canes,
fruits fit for food [?]. Let thy boats come loaden; thou seest what I [?] have
done. May Ptah the beneficent grant thee that which thou desirest.
The scribe has omitted to insert the usual rubric to mark the beginning of
another letter; a small space is, however, left, and then follows a copy of a
letter contained in Anast. No. 3, namely, that from Amen-em-ap to Pinebsa, in
which the condition of the Ouaou, or foot-soldier, is described. No names are
given here, and the introductory words of the epistle are slightly altered, thus: 'Dost thou say that the soldier's [life] is more agreeable than the scribe's? let me tell thee the condition of the soldier,' &c. At the end of this letter
follows, without any break whatever, something which looks like a comment of Enna the compiler upon the piece which he has just quoted. I translate it thus:
The scribe Enna replies to the section concerning the scribe's [life] being
pleasanter than the soldier's: May Amen deliver me from the cold season, when
the sun does not shine, the winter14
comes instead of summer, the month is stormy, the hours shortened [?]. The great
ones cry to thee, Amen! the little ones seek thee, they who are in
[259] the laps of their nurses. Give us thy breath,
Amen! When Amen hears, the sweet wind blows from before him. He grants me to be
winged like a vulture, like a pinnace rigged, bidding [?] the .... go to the
fields, the washers to the pools, the soldiers to go forth to the country [?],
the .... to the pools (?).
A letter in Pl. xci. 1. 8, in which Mr. Heath finds mention of a royal order
allowing the Israelites to quit Egypt, appears to me to be nothing more than the
calling to account of a scribe by his superior officer for not getting
provisions ready for certain spies about to set out upon a foreign mission. It
is succeeded by a letter, which has been already translated, namely, that in
which Amen-em-an admonishes his pupil Penta-our as to his drunken habits; after
which comes one on the subject of hunting, with a postscript about a scribe who
has a toothache. These I must endeavour to give to the reader.
(Pl. xciii. 1. 5.) Since I have been stationed in Kankan I have made no
preparation for thee, there being no one to make brick, no straw at hand, except
that brought to me by ...
There are no asses of burden. My occupation is to look towards the heavens, that
I may find the eye of cheerfulness. The way up to Dja is covered with palms
yielding nothing fit to eat, except their dates, which are not yet ripe [?]. If
the master comes in the dawn of the bird, in the season of the quail [?], the
legs are active, each vein is full. I shall walk like one strong in bone,
traversing the marshes on foot. Then let the barrels be opened which are full of
beer of Kati,15 while men go
forth to prepare the vessels for the journey. There are 200 great hounds,16
be sides 300 wolf-dogs, 500 in all. They stand ready every day at the door of
the house at the time of my rising from sleep. They make their breakfast [?]
when the barrel is opened. Let me have none of the little dogs of the breed of
Ha, the royal scribe. He [i.e. this kind of dog] is a stay-at-home. Deliver me
from them. Hour after hour at the time when I go out, when I am about to go
abroad, I must flog him, I must kick him, until the thongs [?] of the whip [?]
fall one after another. The red dog with the long tail, he goes by night into
the stalls of the oxen. He is equal to the long-faced [dog]. He makes no delay
in hunting. His face is joyful [?] like a god-loose him, he is delighted. The
kennel where he abides he returns not to it [?]. Postscript Whereas a certain
scribe of registration [?] is abiding with me, every vein of whose face is
swelled, ophthalmia [260] is in his eyes, the worm
gnaws his tooth: I know not how to send him away entirely. My stores are
sufficient; let him receive his rations whilst he remains in the neighbourhood
of Kankan.
The two concluding letters of the papyrus consist almost entirely of lists of objects to be provided for the king's use, upon what particular occasion does not appear.
Anastasi No. 5, contains twenty letters, a few of which are
copies of those contained in other papyri. Sometimes they commence simply with
the word 'communication;' in other cases the names of the writers and their
correspondents are given. I suspect that the former are letters borrowed from
some previous collection, and that those in which names are given are such as
the compiler took from correspondence of which he possessed the originals. This
papyrus, like Anastasi No. 4, is very well written, but by a different copyist.
The collection appears to have been made in the reign of Seti II., whose name
occurs several times. I shall give translations of some of these letters.
(Pl. cvii. 1. 2.) Whereas I have heard the message which thou hast sent to me
touching the ox,17 behold, I
know not the place where thy son has put the ox. Behold, has he not taken it
away, and given it to the fan-bearer Ousekh-aten [wide ears]. But if thy heart
is set upon the ox, give me the seeds [?], the cat, the garment, the pouch, the
ten measures of wheat, the ten measures of barley, which thou didst promise me
when thou toldest me to write to my son, when he went away to Khar. I will send
him back to the fortress, it being his turn to go to Egypt for six years.
Upon this follows a letter headed by the words 'another speech,' and which is
probably a postscript to the preceding.
Postscript from Ankh-nou Katuti. I know Ankh-nou the [daughter of] Kar-mahou. I
send a message on her behalf, saying: Let me have the head of cattle which I
Behold, did I not bring them before the scribes of the magistrate, in their
house18 I told them .... that
I would come back to their house again. But do justice to me; behold, if [thou
dost] not come to meet them, when we appear before the magistrate, grant us
delay that we may .., .... may send the asses of the king to their stalls and
their food [stomachs]. I hope that your excellency19 will give attention to my
letter. Be not neglectful of it; be not offended, let not thy tran-
[261] quillity be disturbed. Thou art fixed as the hours, firm is thy
condition, long thy duration, gracious are thy answers. Thine eve beholdeth that
which is good, thou nearest that which is just thou beholdest the good, thou
hearest the truth; thou art prosperous in thy business, thou art worshipped
like a god .... thou stretchest put thy hand to every one that is poor; thou raisest up whomsoever is fallen; thou establishest him that is cast down. There
is none who can argue with thee. When thou comest before the assembly of the
gods, thou goest forth justified.
The latter part of this complimentary speech occurs in another letter in
Anastasi No. 4. It is evidently a common form of adulation, and has no special
reference to a particular transaction, as Mr. Heath thinks. Justification in the
day of judgment, on appearing before the forty-two assessors of Hades, was what
every Egyptian prayed for, and we have seen Amen-em-an ejaculating this prayer
while deploring the loss of the comforts of his cellar. It was, no doubt,
considered an appropriate climax to a string of compliments addressed by an
inferior to a great man to express a confident belief in his salvation. The
supposed allusion to the rebel Moses, and a usurping king or viceroy, Siptah,
which Mr. Heath finds in this letter, vanish entirely in the above translation.
The next letter is a duplicate of that in Sallier No. 1, about the
inconveniences of the agricultural life; and that which follows it is in the
same strain as the admonitory letter of Amen-em-an to Penta-our, about the
frequenting of taverns. It is probably the composition of the same respectable
scribe, but we have no names.
(Pl. cxi. 1. 3). Having heard, saying, that thou goest after pleasure turn not thy face away from my advice; dost thou not give thy heart to all the words of the votaries of pleasure? thy limbs are alive, thy heart is of those who sleep. I, thy superior, forbid thee to go to the taverns. Thou art degraded [?] like the beasts. But we may see many like thee; they are haters of books, they honour not God. God regards not the breakers of oaths,20 the illiterate. On the contrary, those who follow letters, their names are chosen for sending upon embassies. Thou mayest look at me ... When I was as young as thou. I passed my time under the rod [?]; it tamed my members. When three months were ended I was dedicated to the house of God. My father and mother were in the country [far away?], my kindred [?] likewise gone, I am free, I seek advancement. I became one of the first in all kinds of learning which is found in books. Do according to my advice, and thy limbs will be sound, where thou art found ... thou art not rejected [?].
[262] I shall now give a specimen of the military style of
communication. The papyrus is unfortunately mutilated in parts of this letter:
(Pl. cxiii. 1.2.) The captain of bowmen, Ka-kam [Black-bull], [of the land of]
Tekou, to the captain of bowmen Ani, and the captain of bowmen, Bek-en-Ptah. By
the life21 of the worshipper of Amen-Ra, king of the gods, his majesty Seti-Meneptah, our gracious royal lord. I pray that Phra-Horus may establish the
king, our gracious royal lord, may he accomplish millions of festivals, and may
we worship him continually. Communication Whereas I went to them of the hall of
the palace, on the 9th of Epiphi, at the time of evening, in pursuit of the two
slaves; but when I arrived at the fortress of Tekou, on the 10th of Epiphi,
they said that they were gone off to the south. This is to say, when the ... day
of Epiphi arrived .... reached the fortress. They said to me, the .... gone
to the field of ... they approached the valley [?] close by the town of Seti-Meneptah I. .... When my letter reaches you, send me information
concerning everything which has been done.
Dispatch seven [?] troops; dispatch numbers of men [to search] after them. Send me information of all that has been done .... Do ye send plenty of men after them. Farewell.
The next is a letter from a son to his father:
(Pl. cxiv. 1. 6.) The scribe Amen-mesou salutes [his] father,
captain of bowmen, Bek-en-Ptah. By the life of the worshipper of Amen-ra, king
of the gods, I pray to Phra-Horus, to At-mou, and his community of gods, that
thou mayest be well continually. Communication Prithee send me word of thy
condition [lit. thy arm], and thy health, by the hand of every man who comes
from thee, seeing that I desire to hear of thy condition daily. Thou hast not
informed me well; nay, but rather badly. Yea! not a man of those whom thou
hast sent to visit me, has told me concerning thy condition. Pray send me word
of thy condition, of the condition of thy servants, every one of them; seeing
that my desire [heart] is towards them greatly. Moreover, send thou me some good
loaves, and fifty small [?] cakes. The messenger p] brought twenty of them.
[This is] to say, I am undone, if he does not continue to bring fodder because
he did not inform me of the evening when he would come to me. Do thou send some
butter and oil, two boxes [?] by his hand. Farewell.
I am not clear whether the writer does not say that he sends the provisions in
question to his father, instead of ask ing to have them sent to him. The
Egyptian text possibly would allow either construction.
[263] In Pl. cxvi. 1. 6, we have
a letter of general admonition upon the conduct and behaviour becoming a scribe.
There are several lacunae in it, which prevent our making sense of some parts.
It is in the vein of Amen-em-an:
Whereas I am appointed to the chair of instruction [among] the children of the
nobles, to instruct and to conduct these great businesses, behold, I will tell
thee the duty of a scribe, as one who has sat in thy scribe's office before thy
time. Pay attention to thy garments, keep thy sandals clean; thou shalt take
thy clothes [?] daily
to Do not neglect them, every three [days?], one after the other When thou hast
finished inditing letters, thou shalt change [?] clothes. Art thou called upon
to recite words .... with thy mouth, the book in thy hand, dictate with thy
mouth accurately. Thou shalt not idle, thou shalt not pass the day in indolence,
lolling [?] with thy limbs. When engaged in the business of thy chief, obey his
precepts avoid speaking reproachful words.
The next letter follows without the smallest mark of division, as happens in
several other places in this papyrus. It is from the officer of infantry, Ani,
and the officer of infantry, Bek-en-Amen, to another officer named Ma-men, and
relates to the transport of certain obelisks (?) to a foreign place named Djarou.
I shall not attempt a translation, but pass to the next, which is of greater
interest:
(Pl. cxix. 1. 2.) Captain Mai, of Tekou, to the chief of mercenaries,22
Enna, of the race of Phra, the captain of bowmen, Ini, of the race of Phra, in
the name, &c. Communication Whereas captain Ani, captain of captains, notified
to me, saying, 'The chief said to us, "Make a census of the men." But we said
to him, "If we call out the names by which each of them is named, they will not
answer to their names." Let the captain Mai, of Tekou, give them tickets if they
do not give the tickets in due form.
Moreover, whereas it was notified, saying, "If we call out their names before
you, when they are brought to you, do ye not say, on the contrary, ye have
rejected the plan of calling name by name? Yet ye say, 'Dost thou not know the
signals of the mercenaries, and their words of command? Thy intercourse with
them has been extensive. In truth, thou art the child of the Smat; thou art
not a chief; thou wast brought from another [or a small] place, to set thy self
on an equality with the nobles; thou knowest their custom of answering to their
names. Do ye, therefore, bring them to me ...... they speak the language of
the inhabitants of Egypt.
[264] art of the race of the
mercenaries. Let us say again a few words; do ye listen to them. Thou hast done
according to that which belonged to thee; do they not know how to bear it?'"
Farewell.
There is much obscurity in the way in which the parties are mixed up here, and
it is difficult to make sense of the latter part of the letter. But the general
meaning seems sufficiently clear, that the officers of pure Egyptian blood, of
the race of the sun, had difficulty in managing certain troops or work men of
foreign extraction, and request Mai to assist them, as being himself sprung from
their tribe. The Smat seem to be identified with the mercenaries (Madjaiou). Mai
himself
is described as of Tekou, or Dag; but what place this was has not been, as far
as I know, clearly made out. The determinative shows that it was a foreign
country.
The five papyri last described contain, as has been shown, collections of a most
miscellaneous character. Three papyri have now to be mentioned which belong to a
class different from the preceding.
Anastasi No. 6, contains four letters, or fragments of letters, from the scribe
Enna to his chief Ka-kabou, apparently all relating to one affair. The papyrus
is headed with the name and titles of Seti-Meneptah II. in magnificent
characters; but the year of his reign is not given. On the back we find 'The
year 1' which seems meant to supply the omission in the superscription. This
papyrus certainly appears intended as an official record of a transaction,
rather than a specimen of literary composition. Enna gives an account of a long
dispute between himself and some other officers about the management of certain
work-people, whose employment seems to have been weaving or making of clothes,
for a list of different kinds of garments or fabrics is given, said to be of
their workmanship. These people are sometimes described with the mark of the
common gender, sometimes with that of the feminine alone. Mr. Heath calls them 'Spondists' The word is a puzzling one, and stands in need of elucidation. We
find mention made of an officer named Mesu, which may possibly be the Egyptian
for Moshe or Moses, though it is worthy of notice that the name of Ra-mesu or
Rameses, in which the same two syllables occur, is transcribed in Hebrew Ra-meses. Be this as it may, I see nothing in the papyrus to warrant the
idea that the Mesu or Moses here mentioned is identical with the Hebrew patriot.
The name was probably not uncommon among the Egyptians. Mr. Heath finds here
mention of 'Aramites' and 'confederates'; the word which he has thus translated
aruma, I believe to be merely [265] a preposition,
signifying 'together with,' in which sense it occurs m the hieroglyphical
inscription containing the treaty of Rameses II. with the king of the Hittites.
On the whole, this papyrus, though interesting in some parts, does not seem to
have great historical importance. Its exact meaning, however, is not clear to
me, and I shall not attempt a translation here.
Anastasi No. 8, contains but a single letter from a scribe named Ra-mesou to
another named Teti-em-heb. It is so much mutilated that the nature of its
contents can be little more than guessed at.
Anastasi No. 9, also contains a single letter from the scribe Oura to the scribe
Ra-mesou, the author, it may be presumed, of the previous letter. The writer
exculpates himself from some blame which had been attached to him concerning the
management of his chiefs cattle. Mutilations interfere much with the
satisfactory decipherment of this papyrus.
I have now gone through the epistolary part of these papyri. The next to be
noticed is Anastasi No. 1, which introduces us to a different species of
composition. It is what we should call a biographical memoir of a scribe,
written by his pupil, and addressed to the object of the memoir himself. The
Egyptians were great adepts at flattery, and here is a fine specimen of the art.
The author commences by a dedicatory address, in which he ascribes to his patron
every virtue under heaven. The hero's name has unfortunately been torn out; he
appears to have been the son of Oun-nofer (a name which has descended to modern
times in the form of Onuphrius) and his wife Ta-ouser, and to have held high
offices about the person of the king. After the writer has run himself out of
breath in stringing together laudatory epithets, the words 'your excellency,'23
in red letters, announce the actual commencement of the narrative, which is
continued throughout in the second person. Letters written by the patron are
sometimes woven in as well as the anecdotes and discourses with which he was
wont to edify his followers. Mutilations are so numerous that some fragments
only can be translated. The seventh section commences thus:
(Pl. xlii. 1. 7). Thou didst speak saying: 'Inactive, inglorious scribe, that foldest thy arms. I know many men inglorious, inactive, abject, unheroic, they
abound in houses full of feasting ... let me tell thee the business of a
scribe ... [then follows the de- [266] scription
of the model scribe] ... Hast thou heard the name of Amen-ouah-sou, one of the
elders of the royal white house; he lived .... years, and was still vigorous,
&c. I will tell thee of a captain of archers who was in An [Heliopolis], &c.
At the end of this quotation the writer himself again speaks:
Hail, my master, .... behold, I seek after thy [instructions], I delight in them.
In the eighth section mention is made of a prayer (?) of the noble Har-tataf, 'a great mystery,' upon which a commentary is given, through which I do not see my way. The 64th chapter of the Ritual, which is remarkable from its containing a reference to king Menkeres, is associated with prince Har-tataf. The meaning of the passage (Todtenbuch, cap. Ixiv., col. 31) appears to be that in the days of king Menkeres, prince Har-tataf either composed this chapter or found it inscribed in a temple at Hermopolis. It is there described as 'a great mystery' (col. 32); and is probably the prayer alluded to in our papyrus.
The next section (PL xlv. 1. ult.), appears to be a dispute about the pedigree of the writer, or his claim to the rank which he held. He says: 'Thou wilt find my name in the roll of ... in the house of Rameses II.' &c. We next get an account of various active services in which the patron distinguished himself; amongst others, that of directing the transport and erection of an obelisk. It would not be difficult to give approximate translations of some of these passages, but this would involve a good deal of guess-work, and I shall pass now to the most interesting part of the papyrus; that, namely, which relates an expedition of the patron to Palestine, and contains a number of names of cities which he is said to have visited.
(Pl. li. 1. 2.) The writer begins, addressing his patron:
Thou chosen scribe, tried of heart ... thou art a lamp in the darkness before thy troops, to enlighten them. Thou wast sent on a mission to Bahana, before the army, to prepare for it the roads of the enemy [or the bad roads] which are called those of the Aaruna. The soldiers [native troops'?] who were with thee were 1200 in number; Shartana 220, Kahaka 1300, Mashawasha negroes 480, making 3200 in all ... the provisions were brought before thee, bread, beeves, wine. The number of the men was multiplied unto thee, yea, the things were too few for them.
The men are put upon half rations and a mutiny follows, which is suppressed by the determination of the leader.
[267] Such, at least, I suspect
to be the meaning of the passage. The next chapter says:
Thy letters abound in instruction [?], they are loaded with great words .... Do
thou begin again to speak, let us be gratified according to that which thou hast
promised. Would that we were on the way. Thou makest ready, thou yokest the
horses, swift as roes [?] like a gust of wind when it bursts forth ... Thou takest the bow, we behold the deeds of thy hand; I find in it the picture of
the captain [Mahar, some kind of officer, possibly what we should call a
military engineer].... Dost thou not go to the land of Heth? Dost thou not
behold the land of Aup Kharuma, dost thou not know its appearance Ikatai,
likewise, how great it is. The ... of Rameses, the region of Khir [abu], with
its ... and its fleet; how numerous is it! Dost thou not journey to Kati and Tubakhi? Dost thou not go to Shasu with the bowmen? Dost thou not tread the
road to the mountain [?] of heaven ... at the time when it was luxuriant with
aoun [tree], with cypress and acacia,24
piercing the heaven. There are multitudes of bears [?], lions, wild boars [?],
which the Shasu hunt after. Dost thou not ascend the hill Shawa?
[The Mahar retires to his tent fatigued with the labours of the day, and now
comes an adventure.] It is the time of the beginning of the night; it is cold
[?], thou art alone ... Does there not come a thief to steal thy clothes [?]
He goes to the stalls of the horses, he ... backwards in the night; he takes
thy clothes. Thy groom rises in the night; he sees him carrying off his booty.
He falls in with mischief, a place filled with Madjaiou and Shasou. He simulates
[?] the appearance of an Aamou. The enemy having finished plundering ...
things become quiet [?]. Thou risest up; dost thou not pursue them I will speak
to thee also of the mysterious [holy?] place, namely, Senpouna [or Hapouna];
it is a great city. Their goddess is Kisep.25
Dost thou not go the way looking towards Baruta [Berytus] and Dja [tu] na [Zidon],
Djarputa [Zarephath]!26 The
boats of Djana and of Tennouautou, how numerous are they! I must mention also
the city of the sea, Djaru [Zor, Tyre] of the waters is its name. It receives
water by means of boats; it abounds in fish fit for food.
I speak to thee also of the taking of Djaruaou [Palae Tyrus?]. Thou didst burn it
to ashes .... Mayest thou now set out to return to Kaikna. The road is by Aksapu
[Achsaph] leading to the upper province looking towards the mountain Ouser,
whose top [268] is very high. It is the high land
of Ikama; its numbers, who can count them 1 The captain marches to Hadjar [Hazor].
How great is the number of its boats. Would that I might go to Hamata [Hamath],
Tekar, Tekar-aran, the place of meeting of all the captains, looking towards the
..... road. Let me behold Ian .... I will speak to thee of other places which
remain to which didst thou not go ... the land of Ta[ni]sa, Kafirmarruna, Tamenneh,
Katesh, Tapour, Adjai, Harnemmi? Didst thou not behold Karta-anbou with
Bita-toupra?27 dost thou not
know Atur [na], Djataputa like wise. Knowest thou not the name of Khanrudja,
which is in the land of Aup? there are oxen in its provinces; it is the abode
of the lyers in wait, bold men all; it looks towards the statue [?] Sina. Let
me hear of Rehabo [Rehob]; let me visit Bita-shaaran and Tarka-aran, the boats
of Irtuna [Jordan?] fast sailing. Let me tell of the attempt to sack Makta
[Megiddo ?], which was made against it. Thou art the captain, expert in deeds of
courage ; where is a captain like thee, to lead the way before his troops ...
where is the chief [Marina, Syriac, lord], who can be compared with thee to
shoot? When [they came] to the ford of .... the rock of .... 2000 cubits high;
it is of .... stone. Thou makest a halt [?], thou takest thy bow, thou puttest
thy shield [?] on thy left hand, thou beholdest the chiefs graciously, they
yield before thee. Bring bread, prepare venison for the captain to eat. Thou art
named captain, lord of the pioneers p] of the land of Egypt. Thy name is like
that of Kadjartui, the chief of Asar [Assyria?], when he found the wild boars
[?] in the wood, on the rough road of the Shasou, lying in wait beneath the ....
trees. They were of four cubits from their tail to their mouth; their heart is
untameable, they list not to cajoling. Thou art alone there is no ... with thee.
Is not the .... behind thee? Thou findest no ... to make an attack .... Thou
knowest not the way. Thy face is .... the hair of thy head stands up; thy soul
is in thy hand; thy way is full of flint-stones, it is difficult to find,
abounding in thorns and bushes, briers and wolf's-foot [some plant]. The
precipices [?] are on one side of thee, the mountain steep on the other. Thou proceedest to urge on thy chariot towards it. The driver [?] of thy horses is
frightened; they forsake the guidance of thy hand; he runs off to pursue thy
horses, he falls down, thou remainest ; the horses kick the chariot out of the
road .... thou knowest not how to control them ; the shafts [?] are broken from
their place; the horses refuse to bear them. Thy heart is afflicted, thou beginnest to cry to heaven; thirst comes upon thee; the enemy is behind thee.
Thou takest the bow .... the horses become tranquil [?], at the same time thou
findest repose. Thou seest that the sore trouble [is past?]; thou art arrived
at Ip [qu. Joppa,]. Thou findest the fruit trees [269]
blooming in their season; thou hast abundance of food. Thou findest the fair
damsel who keeps the gardens.
While enjoying the pleasures of this agreeable place, an other accident happens
to the traveller. His horses run away in the night, and chariot and harness get
damaged. He meets, however, with experienced and friendly workmen, both
carriage-builders and harness-makers who execute the necessary repairs.
The narrative of this journey occupies ten pages out of the twenty-eight which
the papyrus contains. The translation given is, I am well aware, most imperfect,
and requires immense corrections in details. The MS. abounds in mutilations,
which greatly increase the difficulties of the translator. The reader will
therefore, I hope, look with indulgence upon this attempt to lay before him the
outline of a tour in Palestine made more than 3000 years ago. That Palestine
really was the scene of these adventures, the names Berytus, Sarepta, and Tyre,
which have been satisfactorily identified, leave no doubt. It is rather
remarkable that no name occurs which admits of identification with Damascus. I
must refer the reader to the second part of the Geography of M. Brugsch, in
which the foreign nations known to the Egyptians are treated of, for the most
recent speculations upon the names mentioned in our papyrus.
We have hitherto had to deal with compositions of a prosaic nature, or which, at
least, do not rise much above the level of everyday language. I now come to a
papyrus of a different character, and which presents much greater difficulties
than any of those previously described. Sallier No. 2 contains three separate
pieces; two of them, and probably also the third, the composition of the scribe Enna, the author of the
Tale of the Two Brothers. They are in a poetical style,
much more com pressed and obscure than that of any other of the works of the age
of Seti II. with which we are acquainted. Although their general scope admits of
being clearly made out, I am not in a position to offer anything like a complete
satisfactory interpretation of them at present, and must be content with giving
an outline of their contents. The first is headed thus;
The beginning of the instructions given by his majesty king Ka-shotep-het, son of the sun, Amen-em-ha, deceased; speaking counsels of truth [or precious counsels] to his son, the lord of all.
The word 'instructions' has usually been translated
'adorations,' through the confusion of two separate words, sbai and sbau, and the
piece was understood to contain adorations [270] offered to Amen-em-lia. Lepsius
pointed out this error,28 and
gave the true meaning, spruche (gebete, weisheif), maxims, wisdom. In numerous
places in which I have found it, it evidently indicates the authoritative
teaching, or commands of a superior, to which our word 'instructions' answers
very well. We have seen that Penta-our's collection of letters was headed, 'The
beginning of the instructions of letters,' where the same word is used. It is
preserved in the Coptic sbooue, doctrince. On examining the composition itself,
we find that it, in fact, purports to be the political testament of Amen-em-ha,
the first king of the great 12th dynasty, to his son Ousertasen, who is
mentioned by name in Pl. xii. 1. 3. The expression 'lord of all,' a title which
frequently occurs, perhaps means heir to all the possessions of his father. As
Amen-em-ha lived, at a moderate computation, 1000 years before Enna wrote this
piece, it cannot be regarded as of much historical value; but it is interesting
as showing the ideas that prevailed in the time of Seti II. as to the great
founder of the Theban supremacy. After the heading, the piece proceeds thus:
He saith, 'Rise up like a god, listen to the words that I speak unto thee. Thou
art a king, thou art a ruler of provinces, over the good things which I have
multiplied. Let the Smat be kept in order, for men are not content when they are
exalted. Thou art amongst them, but one alone, in thy magnanimity, like a
brother, not a master. In making thyself accessible to men there is infinite
safety.'
We have here again mention of the Smat or Semt, but as to the nature of the
directions given regarding them I am by no means clear. The word translated
'kept in order,' sakou, is determined by the figure of a crocodile, which I
imagine to indicate some hostile kind of proceeding, but this is not certain.
The Coptic furnishes us with a root, sole, which, among divers other meanings,
has those of opprimere, affligere, castigare. If this be really an injunction to
keep under and afflict the Smat, whom we have seen there is reason to think were
a class of inhabitants of Egypt, speaking a strange language, the fact is a
curious one, this book being no doubt meant for the reading of king Seti II.,
the Pharaoh of the Exodus, according to Lepsius, and in whose first year,
moreover, it was probably written. The rest of the passage, if rightly
translated, does not seem in harmony with this however, unless the frank and
conciliatory policy therein recommended were meant only to apply to
[271] the genuine Egyptian race, or those who are
here styled, par excellence, men (Egypt, temmou, a word apparently identical
with the Hebrew). But a few slight alterations in the turning of the
sentence, and in the meaning assigned to one or two of the words, might so
completely overthrow the sense
above given, that it is not worth while to base theories upon it. The king
proceeds to inculcate to his son certain other duties to which his high position
called him, and enforces his precepts by reference to his own career. He relates
the splendour in which he had lived, and his success in subduing rebels. He
describes a great battle which took place, which was attended with important
results. There was no end of every good thing, so that I cannot tell it. The
king seems to have been surprised in his bed by insurgents, but showed great
personal valour, and himself captured a rebel with arms in his hand. Firmly
established on his throne by the successful event of this affair, the king now
extended his dominion to the farthest parts of Egypt, which had hitherto been
under separate potentates. Elephantine had been the seat of the 5th dynasty,
according to Manetho, Memphis of the 6th, 7th, and 8th; Heracleopolis of the 9th
and l0th. There is much reason to think that some of these dynasties at least
were cotemporaneous; though whether Egypt was at the time of the rise of the
Theban sovereignty divided into three kingdoms, is not yet clearly known. Amen-em-ha
here says, 'I wrote orders to Abou [Elephantine], commands to Athou,' Abou and
Athou are in several passages that I have met with thus conjoined as the most
southern and northern points, the Beersheba and Dan of Egypt. Athou means,
apparently, marshes, the low ground of the Delta, and the word is perhaps
preserved in the Coptic ti-hot, the name of the region between the Canopic and
Pelusiac branches, that is, the whole sea-front of the Delta.
The king says, if I understand him rightly, that he brought the whole of the
country into subjection, and that he effected great improvements in agriculture,
so that corn and grain were produced in abundance by the help of the Nile as a
fertilizing agent, and that there was neither hunger nor thirst in his days. He
exterminated wild beasts and suppressed the crocodiles, brought into subjection
certain foreign peoples called the Wawaiou and the Madjaiou, and caused others
called the Sati, or Satineh, to slink away like cats:
I built a house adorned with gold, its roof and walls with
lapis-lazuli; the floors were laid with stone and metal, the hinges were of
bronze [?]; a structure made for eternity, everlasting are its exalta-
[272] tions. I knew every part of it.29
There were many devices [?] of passages [or streets]: I knew how to tell, how
to find out its treasures, so that no man might know it except thee, Ousertasen; that thy feet might go, thou thyself with thine own eyes behold it; thou
who wast born in a fortunate hour amongst the illustrious ones who do honour to
thee.
This sounds like a description of a labyrinthine treasure-house, of which the
secret was to be left to the king's successor alone. It was a successor and
namesake of this king, Amen-em-ha III., who was the founder of the famous
Labyrinth.
The concluding admonitions relate to the white crown, that of Upper Egypt, and
the treasury where the vessels of the sun's boat were kept. Their precise nature
I do not under stand. The writer adds:
Finished fortunately in peace. Dedicated to [or by command of] the wise and
munificent [or learned] scribe of the white house, Ka-kabou, and to the scribe
of the white house, Oura, [by] the scribe Enna, in the 1st year, the 20th day of
Tobi.
The next piece commences thus (Pl. xii. 1. ult.):
The beginning of the instructions given by a certain
functionary named Sbauf-sa-kharta, to his son named Pepi, when he returned from
Khennu [Silsilis], where he had dwelt in the school of literature. The sons of
the elders [or chiefs], they who are of Khennu, did not equal [?] him.
The object of the work is to extol the profession of the scribe, whose position
is compared with that of men of various other classes. The whole is divided by
rubrics into twenty-nine sections, the translation of a few of which shall be at
tempted:
Sect. 2. Then he said to him, Behold me how I urge thee; give thy heart to
letters. Look at me who am freed from servile works. Surely there is nothing
superior to literature. It is like the waters, plunge [?] thyself to the bottom
of the pool of letters. Thou shalt find this counsel regarding it, namely, if
the scribe is well established in Khennu, he shall not be humiliated.
Sect. 3. Does he dispute [?] with another, he [i.e. the other] comes not off
successful. Look at business also; verily there is this counsel concerning it:
dost thou love letters as thy mother [?], dost thou welcome them unto thee?
they are the best preparation for all business. There is not in this world a
saying equal to it in profit. When one is a child it is helpful, when one is
sent to perform commissions it is of immeasurable [?] utility.
[273] Sect. 4. I have not seen the artificer
[employed in] commissions, nor the weaver [?] sent [upon important affairs]. I
have seen the metal-worker [?] at his labours, at the mouth of his furnace, his
fingers like the claws [?] of the crocodile when he hunts after the eggs of
fishes.
Sect. 5. Every artificer [mason, carpenter?] who handles tools of metal is
exempt from field-labours [?]; his fields are timber, his products are of
metal. At night he is released, but he continues to exert his arms to work; in
the night he lights a candle.
Sect. 6. The son of the stone [quarryman, sculptor?] must seek to carve all
kinds of hewn stone. He labours [?] to complete his tasks; when his arms are
weary he rests ; when he sits at the meals of the sun his knees and his back are
worn out with labour [?].
The next trade mentioned I believe to be that of the maker of shields, or of
leather harness; and he is said to go about from street to street to search for
materials for his trade. 'He strains his arms to fill his belly, like the bees
who eat of their burdens.'
Sect. 8, relates to the boatman (?) who navigates to Athu, that he may receive
wages (?), and who must submit to the blows of the master of the vessel without
a murmur.
Sect. 9, probably relates to the maker of small agricultural
implements; section 10, possibly to the builder of walls.
Several following sections are obscure. No. 17, I conjecture to relate to the
butcher, or perhaps the embalmer. His fingers are said to be filthy, smelling
like a beast or like a fish. He is a person one would not like to meet; his
occupation is cutting or slaughtering; his garments are defiled.
Sect. 18, says of the shoemaker, that he is bad at walking;
but his productions (?) are lasting. His strength is like that of a beast; his
gripe (?) that of the fish Ameskau, the oxyrhyncbus.
Sect. 19, relates to the dyers or washers, the people mentioned in the Tale of
the Two Brothers as having been involved in vehement controversy about the odour
of the wonderful lock. They are said to carry on their business at a pool or
washing ground, and to be the neighbours of the crocodile. The overflowing of
the Nile, the father of waters, puts an end to their labours.
Sects. 20 and 21, dwell upon the difficulties experienced by the bird-catcher
and the fisherman in their several employments.
In section 22, the scribe returns to the praise of his own profession. 'A day
in the house of instruction is profitable to thee; its products are eternal as
the rocks.'
Sect. 23. 'I tell thee also other words to instruct thee, that
[274] thou mayest understand; that thou mayest not
be overcome when thou art entrusted with the execution of affairs. If the
soldier receives charges,30
he knows not how to exe cute them; if lapis-lazuli31
be placed before a wild beast, he crushes it [as though it were] his food [or,
perhaps, he turns his face to his prey in preference].
Sect. 24, contains cautions as to conducting oneself in the presence of a great
man.
Sect. 25, warns against speaking anything offensive to 'the Great Creator.' I
believe the sense to be this: 'If the words are spoken in secret, the interior
of a man is no secret to him who made it; if the words are spoken boastfully,
or openly, he is present with thee though thou be alone.'
Sect. 26, relates to the conduct of the scribe entrusted with the execution of
business; section 27, is about telling lies; sections 28 and 29, contain some
general eulogiums upon the obedient and industrious scribe, and a promise of
much happiness to him.
The work is dedicated in Sail. No. 2, to Kakabou, without any date or author's
name; but in the duplicate Anast. No. 7, we find the names of two other
officers a military scribe Ankha(?), and another Meri, joined with that of
Kakabou. Enna is named as the author, and the date is the sixth year of the
monarch (probably Set II.), the 23rd day of Paoni.
The third piece in the papyrus, Sallier No. 2, is a hymn
entitled 'Adorations of the Nile.' It consists of fourteen verses, distinguished
in the usual way by rubrics. It is dedicated to Kakabou, and although the
author's name is given in neither copy, we can have little hesitation in
assigning it to Enna. Mr. Birch has translated a verse of it in his Introduction
to the Study of the Egyptian Hieroglyphs. The blessings of the fertilizing Nile,
'the lord of fishes,' are dwelt upon with enthusiasm. As any translation which I
could give would be very imperfect, and must contain much guess-work, I will
attempt none here.
There remains but one more papyrus of the 19th dynasty to notice, namely, Sallier No. 4, which contains a calendar of good, bad, and indifferent days
throughout the year. M. de Rouge [275] gave a
synopsis of the contents in the Revue Archeologique, 1854. This is a very
remarkable document, as illustrating the superstitions of ancient Egypt. One day
is unlucky for setting out on a journey, another for lighting a fire, for eating
meat, &c. People born on particular days are destined to die under particular
circumstances, as to die rich and honoured, or be killed by a bull or a
crocodile.32 These notions
are connected in some way with the mythology of the Egyptians; and we find
through out allusions to the contests between Horus and Set, or Sute'ch, the
Typhon of the Greeks, which formed a leading feature in the Egyptian legends. In
PL cxlv. and that which follows, there is a long account of the Typhonic
contest, presenting a close resemblance to that related by Plutarch (De Is.
et Osir. cap. xix.). Horus and Set are said to have changed themselves into
animals of some kind, and in this state to have remained three days. Isis is
then said to have thrown chains [?] upon them; whereupon Horus cried with a loud
voice, 'I am Horus, thy son,' Isis cried to the chains, 'Bind, bind, [?] my son,'
Thoth, the uncle of Horus, is invoked, and a general melée
ensues, of which all the details are not clear, the manuscript having suffered
fractures. Isis appears to take the part of Set, and Horus is said to have
rushed upon his mother, furious as a panther, and to have smitten the royal asp
or diadem from her head. Thoth interferes with magic spells, transforms Horus,
and places a cow's head upon Isis. In PL clii., the white crown, that is the
crown of Upper Egypt, is said to have been given to Horus; the red crown, that
of Lower Egypt, to Set.33
This points to the origin of the mythos, the contest, namely, of two rival
races of different origin, those of Upper and Lower Egypt, which seems to have
been perpetually renewing itself at different periods of Egyptian history.
The whole of the papyri of which an account has been given belong to the I4th
century B.C., doubtless, a highly respectable antiquity. The authors, however,
of these productions, with which the reader has now become to a certain extent
familiar, were once the latest born of time, and in their own eyes were moderns,
behind whom lay a past as respectable to them as that to which we, the
ephemeral 'heirs of all the ages,' look back. I have now to present to the
reader an author to whom Penta-our and Enna would have bowed as
[276] a venerable sage, and have acknowledged
themselves but children in comparison with him. Rise up, Ptah-hotep, king's son,
provincial governor, or lord-lieutenant in the reign of Assa, sovereign of both
Egypts. It will be asked, when then did king Assa reign? Perhaps, no more can
be certainly affirmed of him than that he belongs to one of the earliest
Egyptian dynasties (Lepsius places him in the 7th). Speaking vaguely, he may be
placed about 3000 B.C. The work which bears the name of Ptah-hotep, may not,
perhaps, be quite so old as this. The papyrus which contains it was obtained by
M. Prisse d'Avennes while making explorations among the tombs of the early
Theban kings of the nth dynasty, the ancestors or predecessors of Arnen-em-ha,
the founder of the I2th dynasty.34
In the course of one of these explorations, an Arab employed in the work of
excavation, produced a papyrus which he pretended to have got from a third
party, but which there is every reason to believe he had found in the tomb under
examination. It is in hieratic characters, but extremely different in appearance
from those of the 18th dynasty. A little attention, however, shows that the
writing is essentially the same, and, any one acquainted with the works of the
Ramesside period, will quickly be able to identify the symbols and groups. The
forms of the characters are bold and massive, and at first sight appear clumsy;
but when the archaic forms have been mastered, the manuscript appears to be not
less carefully written than the best of the later epoch, if, indeed, it does not
surpass them in this respect. Mr. Heath was the first to call attention to the
contents of this papyrus, in an essay published in the Monthly Review,
1856, entitled 'On a Manuscript of the Phoenician King Assa, ruling in Egypt earlier
than Abraham.' It has since formed the subject of an able Etude by M.
Chabas, of Chalon-sur-Saone, a distinguished French Egyptologist, published in
the Revue Archeologique during the present year, to which I am indebted
for the extracts I am about to give. Mr. Heath has also lately published a
translation of the whole,35
containing, some valuable hints, but which will require, as I believe,
considerable revision before it can be considered as representing with accuracy
the opinions of Ptah-hotep, whose name Mr. Heath converts into Aphobis.
[277] The Prisse Papyrus
contains eighteen pages of writing, the first two being the conclusion of a
work. Then follows an erasure of the size of a page or two, the papyrus having
been carefully scraped, as if with the intention of inserting a new text. After
this come sixteen pages which comprise a complete work, entitled 'The
Instructions36 of the Magistrate Ptah-Hotep, under His Majesty the King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Assa,
Everliving.'
The author of the fragment on the first two pages, whose name is not given, and
who may or not have been Ptah-hotep, says, 'When the king of both Egypts,
Our-en, died, then the king of both Egypts, Snefrou, became the king of the
whole land. Then was I made a magistrate.' We have here mention of one of the
oldest kings of Egypt of whom any contemporaneous monumental traces remain. The
tablets of king Snefrou, at Wadi-Megara, in the Sinaitic peninsula, recording
his conquests over the Arabs, are thought to be the earliest historical
monuments in existence. Whether, however, our papyrus goes back to this date may
well be doubted. It may, very probably, be a production of some writer of the
court of the Antef kings, of the 11th dynasty, who put his own maxims into the
mouth of a sage of former days, just as we find Enna, of the court of Seti II.,
writing the instructions of Amen-em-ha. There can be little hesitation,
however, in recognising, with MM. Chabas and De Rouge, this MS. as the most
ancient book in the world, unless, indeed, we except another, said to be of the
same epoch, now at Berlin. The contents of both works in the Prisse papyrus,
that of which we possess but the last two pages, and that which fortunately
remains entire, are much of the same kind. They were collections of proverbs or
maxims upon moral and social subjects. The obedience of children to their
parents is particularly dwelt upon. I shall borrow a specimen from M. Chabas:
The obedience of a docile son is a blessing: he who is
obedient walks in his obedience, and he who listens to him becomes obedient. It
is good to listen to everything which produces affection it is the greatest of
blessings. The son who attends to the words of his father will become old
thereby. God loves obedience; disobedience is hated by God. The heart is a
man's master for obedience or for disobedience, but a man through obedience
causes his heart to live; to listen to instruction, to love to obey, this is
the fulfilment of good precepts. The obedience of a son to his father is joy. A
son of whom this can be said is agreeable in all respects,
[278] docile and obedient; he of whom this is said has piety in his
bowels; he is dear to his father, and his fame is in the mouth of the living
who walk upon the earth.
The rebellious one, who obeys not, accomplishes nothing at all; he sees wisdom
in ignorance, virtue in vice. Every day he commits all sorts of frauds with
boldness, and therein he lives as one dead. His are contradiction; he feeds
therein. That which the wise know to be death is his life every day. He goes on
his way, loaded with curses daily.
A son, teachable in God's service, will be happy in consequence of his obedience; he will grow to be old, he will find favour; he will speak in like manner to
his children. Precious for a man is the discipline of his father. Every one will
respect it, as he himself has done. That which he says to his children
concerning it, oh! let their children repeat it, feeding on that which
proceeds from thy mouth, the true seed of life to thy children.' Ptah-hotep
concludes his instructions by saying:
It is thus that I would gain for thee health of body and the king's peace, in
all circumstances, and that thou mayest pass the years of this life without
deceit. I have become an ancient of the earth, I have passed a hundred and ten
years of life by grace of the king, and the approbation of the ancients,
fulfilling my duty towards the king, in the place of their favour.
The scribe adds 'Finished from beginning to end, as it is found in the
original.'
With this venerable utterance of primeval wisdom, I close the present account of
the Hieratic papyri. Enough has been given, I believe, to convince the reader
that we have in them something more than the mere dry bones of the Egyptian
language, and to prove their importance towards the completion of our knowledge
of this wonderful people. The value, however, of the monumental and sepulchral
records must not be underrated. These have yielded the most brilliant results to
the labours of antiquaries. Through their assistance the names of whole
dynasties of forgotten kings have been recovered, and great progress made
towards the completion of the chronicles of Egypt, of which the fragments of
Manetho give us but a bare and defaced outline. The late researches of M.
Mariette in the Serapeum, or tomb of the Apis gods, have been particularly
fruitful in materials for this purpose. From them M. Lepsius has restored the
22nd and some part of the 2ist dynasties. The annals of the reign of Tothmes
III. on the walls of Karnak, which have been successfully translated by Mr.
Birch, are a noble record of the
splendour of the Egyptian monarchy at the commencement of the 18th dynasty. A
treaty of alliance between Rameses II. and the king of the Hittites, engraved in
one of the Theban [279] palaces, is a monument of no common interest. One small
tablet, now preserved in the Bibliotheque Impe'riale, contains the memorial of
an event of so curious a nature that I cannot refrain from introducing an
account of it here. The tablet in question is engraved in the Monumens Egyptiens
of M. Prisse, by whom it was brought from Egypt. The meaning of its contents was
first discovered by Mr. Birch, who published a translation in the Transactions
of the Royal Society of Literature, 1852. This translation has been recently
carefully reviewed by M. de Rouge,37
who does not materially alter the views put forth by Mr. Birch, so that we have
the authority of these two eminent Egyptologists for our belief in the soundness of the interpretation given. The inscription belongs to
the reign of one of the kings of the 20th dynasty, the whole of whom bore the
family name of Rameses, but which of them in dynastic order is not clearly
known. According, therefore, to the chronological views which have been assumed,
it was engraved during some part of that period when Israel was ruled by Judges.
At the top of the tablet is a vignette representing two arks or shrines, one
borne on the shoulders of twelve, the other of four, priests; these arks belong
to two different gods, both named Chons, but with different titles. The
inscription, after the usual flourish of royal names, relates, that when his
majesty the king of Egypt was in Nahar (probably Mesopotamia), collecting
tribute, the princes of the land came to offer him presents. Among them came the
king of a country named Bakhtan, who offered his eldest daughter as a present.
The Egyptian monarch was graciously pleased to accept the princess, who was very
beautiful ; and he took her to Egypt and made her his principal queen. In the
23rd year, on the 22nd of Epiphi (the Egyptians love to be exact in their dates,
though, unluckily, we can seldom derive any direct chronological information
from them), an envoy arrived from the king of Bakhtan, bringing presents to the
queen. The usual compliments having been terminated, the envoy informed the king
that the principal object of his mission was to ask advice and assistance for
the princess Benteresh, the queen's younger sister, who was afflicted with some
disease in her limbs, and he requested that a wise man of Egypt might be sent to
see her. The king summoned his physicians, and ordered them to choose one of
their number to visit the princess. A royal scribe named Tet-em-heb is chosen,
who immediately proceeds to Bakhtan. On arriving there, the wise man instantly
found the princess to be possessed by a spirit or [280]
demon, and declared the cure to be beyond his art. Upon
this the king of Bakhtan sent another embassy to request that a god might be
sent. The king of Egypt applies to one of the gods named Chons apparently the
elder or superior of the two asking his consent that the other may be allowed to
go to Bakhtan to work the princess' cure. The two gods confer together, and the
result is that the younger Chons is despatched to Bakhtan, borne in his ark by
priests, and with a numerous retinue. It is mentioned that the journey from
Egypt to Bakhtan occupied a year and five months. Upon the god being brought to
the princess, the spirit who was in possession of her instantly acknowledged his
inferiority:
Then said the spirit which was in her, to Chons, the mighty one of Thebes, 'Thou art welcome, great god, smiter of rebels, Bakhtan is thy land, its
inhabitants are thy servants; I am thy servant. I will go to the place which I
came from, in submission to thee, that thou mayest approach her. Let the king
command a feast [of reconciliation] between us.'
The god assented to this through the medium of his priest. A
great least was accordingly made, and, in the presence of the king of Bakhtan
and his warriors, who were awe-struck by the solemnity, the spirit departed
whither it pleased him, leaving the god in peaceable possession of the princess.
The king of Bakhtan was so delighted with this success, that he declined to
allow the god to return to Egypt. Accordingly, Chons remained three years, four
months, and five days in Bakhtan. At this time the king as he lay upon his bed
had a dream, in which he beheld the god issuing from his ark in the form of a
hawk, and spreading his wings as though to re turn to Egypt, in which be was
opposed by some other bird, apparently an owl.38
The priest of Chons, to whom the dream was communicated, declared that it
indicated the impatience of the god to return to Egypt, and the king of Bakhtan
consented to let him depart. The god was sent back with magnificent gifts, the
whole of which on his arrival he presented to the elder Chons, keeping back
nothing. The return took place in the 33rd year of the king's reign, on the I9th
day of Mechir.
The land of Bakhtan cannot be identified with certainty. Mr. Birch offers
several conjectures; he thinks it most probable that Bashan is intended. M. de
Rouge inclines to Bagistan or Behistoun. It is worth remarking that an account
of the emigration of an Egyptian god to the East has been preserved by
Macrobius, Sat. lib. i. cap. 23. In this case, [281]
however, the god did not return to Egypt again. Macrobius says:
The Assyrians celebrate with great ceremony, in the city of Heliopolis, the
worship of the sun, under the name of Jove. The image of the god was brought
from a city of Egypt, also called Heliopolis, in the reign of Senemures, or
Senepos. It was first brought to Assyria by Opias, the ambassador of the
Assyrian king Deleboris, and by Egyptian priests, the chief of whom was named
Partemetis. After having been for sometime kept among the Assyrians, it was
conveyed to Heliopolis.
I commend king Deleboris to the notice of the investigators of Assyrian
antiquities. The Egyptian names are evidently corrupt, but the passage is well
worthy of attention, and may possibly hereafter help to furnish a point of
historical contact.
The labours of Egyptologists during the last thirty years have been vigorous and
well-directed, yet how much remains to be done before Egypt's 'place in the
world's history' not chronologically merely, can be defined and appreciated. The
names of her kings have been collected from the stones of their palaces and
tombs with unwearied industry, and now the Konigbuch of Lepsius presents lines
of monarchs more interminable than that which the witches' cauldron disclosed
to Macbeth; but for us the most of them are but ghostly nonentities, as shadows
they come, and so depart. The works of Sir Gardner Wilkinson are in everybody's
hands; and here the Egyptians as painted by themselves move and gesticulate
before us; yet how silently! Who has not felt, in surveying the minute details
of Egyptian life which those interesting volumes present, the wish that these
people could speak for themselves and tell us something of their thoughts and
feelings.
It is through the hieratic papyri that we once more hear the voice of these
ancients, speaking more or less intelligibly, and as man with man. The heart of
Satow is found. By-and-bye these sepulchral utterances will be plainer to us
than they are yet. Penta-our and Enna will yet walk and talk again, 'as they did
upon the earth,' according to the aspiration found in every page of the ritual.
But patience and labour are still required before the vivification is complete.
The crying want now is for more papyri. It is true that the greater part of
those which we already possess have been but imperfectly read, but every
additional one increases the chances and means of discovery. A few more in the
style of the Two Brothers would be of immense value. And some such surely must
exist, either above or below the ground. It is to be feared that an enormous
destruction has taken place of these [282] fragile records. The Anastasi, Sallier, and D'Orbiney papyri probably all came from a single tomb, and are the
remnants of a large collection. What has become of the rest? At one time mere
ignorance and carelessness on the part of the Arabs, who are usually the finders
of these treasures, caused their destruction. At present these people are well
aware of the commercial value of papyri, and unluckily this knowledge is
accompanied by another cause of ruin; for their desire of making the most of
their commodities, leads them to break up the manuscript into fragments. And so
perish the world's records!
Nile tourists would do well to remember how infinitely greater, Europeanly
speaking, is the value of a perfect papyrus, whether in hieratic, Coptic, or
Greek, than that of one torn or cut down the middle, so as to yield only the
ends or be ginnings of the lines, which is the condition in which some have been
brought over.
Those who already possess hieratic papyri of a literary, not funereal,
character, cannot be too strongly urged to make them public. It is possible that
in this land of travellers, undreamed-of treasures may be lying in private
cabinets.
A considerable impediment to Egyptological inquiry exists in this country in the
want of hieroglyphical types. The savans of France and Germany are able to
publish their investigations with complete hieroglyphical illustrations, both
Paris and Berlin possessing excellent collections of types. London has nothing
of the kind. No hieratic types, however, have yet been attempted in any country.
They might be used with as much facility as the hieroglyphical ones, one good
text being taken as the standard for the formation of the letters and symbols,
to which all the scrawls of the less careful writers should be reduced. The
D'Orbiney papyrus is the obvious model to be taken. This alone would not in deed
furnish the whole circle of hieratic symbols, but the wanting ones might be
easily supplied from other good texts, such as Anastasi No. 1, 4, and 5, and
Sallier 2. How small a drop of the waste capital of England would it take to
carry such a design into execution!
C. W. G.
FOOTNOTES
1 The only other treatise that I am aware of, is that contained in Baron Bunsen's work on Egypt, which is of great utility. A demotic grammar has lately been published by M. Brugsch.
2 Those who wish for a complete view of the course of Egyptian discovery and of the system of hieroglyphical interpretation now recognised, will find a popular and at the same time exact, account of these subjects in Mr. Birch's Introduction to the Study of Egyptian Hieroglyphs, published with Sir Gr. Wilkinson's Egyptians in the Time of the Pharaohs.
3 M. de Rouge, in reading this name Satou, expresses a doubt as to its correctness. I believe that the first syllable is Ba, being represented by the hieratic equivalent of a bird with a tuft in front of its neck, of which the sound is well-known to be la, and which is often used to express 'the soul,' Copt. ba. The other syllable is a word which, standing by itself, means 'bread' or 'food,' and of which I believe the sound has not been certainly ascertained. In adopting M. de Rouge's translation of this papyrus, I beg to say that 1 have verified every word of it, and may venture to express a conviction of its general accuracy. On some few points I see cause to differ. This Essay is not, however, the place for discussing at length such variations as I am led to make.
4 Pigs, according to M. de Rouge, but the word occurs in a passage in Anastasi No. 4, from which I think it must mean some kind of dog.
5 M. de Rouge thinks the word which I have translated washers may mean dyers. The word occurs 2 Sall. PL xvii. and 4 Anast. PL xci.; but from neither passage can the meaning with certainty be determined.
6 This part of the story recalls the legend of Rhodope, the Egyptian prototype of Cinderella, related by Ælian. An eagle seized one of her sandals whilst she was bathing at Naucratis, and dropped it in the lap of the king at Memphis, as he sat in the open air administering justice. The king sent messengers throughout the land to find the owner of the sandal, and when she was discovered, made her his queen.
7 I rather think the meaning of the original is, that a woman was sent with this party bearing the presents in question.
8 M. de Rouge reads Atesch, but there are very strong reasons for believing that the first syllable in this word is to be read Kat not At. Of this opinion is M. Brugsch. The Syrian name was probably Kadesh, the Holy City, which the Egyptians, not having the letter d, wrote Katesh. There were several places so called in the East, but the Kadesh here mentioned has not been satisfactorily identified with any of them.
9 The word horse is used in the original for a chariot. Homer uses the plural Imroi in a similar manner.
10 The word translated axe reads in one MS. akau, in the other afcasu. It may be the Copt, ates, cuspis ferrea, Gr. [Greek], Lat. ascia, Eng. axe, hatchet, Fr. hache. Perhaps it means here rather the ploughshare than an axe.
11 The word translated within is of doubtful meaning, but it is clear that it designates a particular palace, perhaps one that stood within the city walls, just as we say St. Botolph's Within.
12 There is another copy of it in Anast. 4. Mr. Heath, Exod. Pap. p. 213, has given the substantial meaning of it.
13 See Brugsch, Geographic. Mr. Heath gives a translation of this letter at p. 73 of his work.
14 M. Brugsch was the first to point out the groups meaning summer and winter. See his Nouvelles Recherches sur la Division de l'Annee des Anciens Egyptiens. Berlin, 1856, p. 10, where a few words of this passage are translated.
15 Can Kati be Gath of the Philistines? The name Gath means a wine-press, and it is not at all certain that the oft-mentioned hek, translated leer, was not a more generous liquor, perhaps a kind of palm wine ...
16 The same animals, I believe, as those to which Anepou is said to have thrown his wife, in the Tale of the Two Brothers. The word translated 'wolf-dogs' is identical with the Coptic ouonsh, wolf.
17 Mr. Heath translates this word 'vessel,' p. 140. I am doubtful if 'ox' be the right meaning. The word is expressed by a single symbol, which much resembles that known to stand for an ox in hieratic.
18 This is the formula usually appended to the name of the king. It is literally, 'thy life, thy health, thy strength.' Mr. Heath has 'thy majesty,' but I doubt if this letter was addressed to the king.
19 An allusion, perhaps, to the temperance pledge, mentioned in Amen-em-an's lecture to Penta-our.
20 Literally, 'By the life, health, and strength,' or 'By the majesty.' I believe the whole expression here is equivalent to our shorter formula, 'In the king's name,' or 'On his majesty's service.'
21 There is much doubt about the meaning of this word Madjaiou. Mr. Heath calls them Midianites, but the Hebrew equivalent would be [Heb.].
22 Literally 'your life, your strength, your health,' the usual pendant to a king's name. It is pretty clear, however, that the personage addressed in this papyrus was not a king.
23 The same word as that translated acacia in the romance. From this passage (query), whether it be not a taller kind of tree perhaps.
24 Have we here the Cassiopeia of the Greeks, the mother of Andromeda, the scene of whose adventure is placed lower down the coast at Joppa.
25 The names of these three places were first identified, I believe, by Dr. Hincks. Trans. Royal Irish Acad. 1848.
26 In the former of these words 'Karta' is the Hebrew [Heb.] in the other 'Bita' answers to [Heb.].
27 Chronologic, p. 49, note.
28 A doubtful phrase here, of which I give what appears the general meaning.
29 An obscure idiom, of which I only guess at the sense.
30 Egypt, teb, comp. Coptic tebi, 'praescriptus labor.' The passage is doubtful.
31 The substance called here 'lapis-lazuli' (kheslet, compare Copt. [Coptic], margarita, electrum, orichalcum) is frequently mentioned in Egyptian texts; it seems to have been regarded by the Egyptians as a most precious substance. There were two sorts, the genuine or Babylonian, and the artificial, believed to have been manufactured by the inhabitants of Cyprus, and regarded as hardly Jess valuable than the other.
32 It will be recollected that in the Tale of the Two Brothers, the seven Hathors, or sacred cows, upon seeing the newly-created daughter of the gods, at once predicted the death she was to die, but upon what grounds is not said.
33 Or, the passage may mean, that on this day the reigning monarch receives the white crown from Horus, the red crown from Set.
34 The British Museum possesses the coffin of one of these kings, the Louvre another. Their family name was Autef, and they seem to have reigned in great splendour, although their rule was probably confined to Upper Egypt.
35 A Record of the Patriarchal Age, or tie Proverbs of Apkobis, B.C. 1900, now first fully translated by Rev. I. D. Heath. London and Eyde.
36 M. Chabas translates this word oraison,'prayer;' Mr. Heath, 'a flute tune.' It is the same as that which I have previously shown reason to believe means 'instructions.'
37 In the Revue Asiatique of 1856 and 1857. The review is not yet complete.
38 There is some doubt of the meaning of this part of the inscription.