CHAPTER XXII.
Another Chapter whereby the Mouth of a person is given to him in the Netherworld.
I shine forth out of the Egg which is in the unseen world.([1]) Let there be given my mouth that I may speak with it in presence of the great god, Lord of the Tuat. Let not my hand be repulsed by the Divine Circle of the great god.
I am Osiris, the Lord of Restau, the same who is at the head of the Staircase.([2])
I am come to do the will of my heart, out of the Tank of Flame, which I extinguish when I come forth.([3])
Notes.
This is one of the chapters of which the text certainly belongs to the earliest epoch. It is one of those copied by Wilkinson from the coffin(2)[(2)] of Queen Mentuhotep. In the Papyrus of Ani it is followed by chapter 21 as its conclusion, and both chapters are appended to chapter 1, before the rubric belonging to that chapter.
[1.] The Egg in the unseen world is the globe of the Sun while yet below the horizon. It is only through a mistranslation of chapter 54, 2 that the Indian notion of a ‘Mundane Egg’ has been ascribed to the Egyptians.
The 17th chapter addresses “Rā in thine Egg, who risest up in thine orb, and shinest from thine Horizon.”
[2.] See the picture of Osiris at the head of the Staircase, which is here given (see [Plate XI]) from the alabaster sarcophagus of Seti I in the Soane Museum. Similar pictures are given on other sarcophagi. The gods on the stairs are called
, ‘the Divine Circle about Osiris.’
The ‘Staircase of the great god’
at Abydos, is frequently mentioned on the funeral stelae.
[3.] The Tank of Flame. See chapter 1, [note 15]. The red glow of the Sky disappears after the Sun has risen, he is therefore said to “extinguish the Flame” after he has come forth. The same notion is expressed in the myth according to which Horus strikes off the head of his mother.