CHAPTER XXXII.

Chapter whereby the Crocodiles are repulsed who come to carry off the Words of Power from the glorified in the Netherworld.

Osiris standeth up upon his feet;([1]) his company of gods raise him up.

O Son who conversest with thy father, do thou protect this Great one from these four([2]) crocodiles here who devour the dead and live by the Words of Power.

I know them by their names and their way of living, and it is I who protect his own father from them.

Back, thou Crocodile of the West, who livest on the Setting Stars.([3]) What thou execratest is upon me. Thou hast devoured the head of Osiris, but I am Rā.([4])

Back, thou Crocodile of the East, who livest upon those who devour their own foulness. What thou execratest is upon me. I have come, and I am Osiris.

Back, thou Crocodile of the South, who livest upon impurities. What thou execratest is upon me. Let not the red flame be upon thee. For I am Septu.([5])

Back, thou Crocodile of the North, who livest upon that which lieth between the hours([6]). What thou execratest is upon me. Let not thy fiery water be inflicted upon me. [For I am Tmu.([7])]

All things which exist are in my grasp, and those depend upon me which are not yet.

I am arrayed and equipped with thy Words of Power, O Rā; with that which is above and with that which is below me.

I have received increase of length and depth, and fulness of breathing within the domain of my father, the Great one.

He hath given to me that beautiful Amenta in which the living are destroyed. But strong is its possessor though he faint in it daily.

My face is unveiled, and my heart is in its place.

The Uræus is upon me daily.

I am Rā, who protecteth himself, and no evil things can overthrow me.

Notes.

This chapter is in even worse condition than the one which precedes it. There are a few scraps of it on a coffin at St. Petersburg which M. Golenischeff assigns to the earliest period. The only early MS. which is of any use, Ba, the Berlin papyrus of Nechtuamon, is here in a very mutilated condition, as may be seen on referring to M. Naville’s edition.

[1.] Osiris standeth up upon his feet. So Ba; but the coffin at St. Petersburg lends its support to the text of Bekenrenef (of the] 26th Dynasty), which opens the chapter with the name of a crocodile

. “Let the Great one fall upon his belly”!

[2.] The ancient text had only four crocodiles, and only four are mentioned in the text of Bekenrenef. The Turin text speaks of eight; two for each of the cardinal points. But the Saitic text already has two invocations instead of one for each crocodile.

[3.] The sense of this myth is obvious. Every star which sets is supposed to be swallowed by the Crocodile of the West. It was stated in [note 3] to chapter 15 that the

are stars.[^[50]] Besides the

the stars which set and the

the circumpolar stars, whose navigation

ⲥⲱⲕ is continuous, there are the

whose name is very significant.

and

have the sense of turning back,[^[51]] and the only stars whose apparent motion is ever retrograde are the planets.

All these stars are supposed as divinities to aid in the navigation of the Bark of Rā. The Egyptians could not have had a correct planetary theory (which only became possible through Kepler), but they understood at least that the motions of the planets were regular, and that they depended upon the Sun. Eudoxus is reported to have derived the data for his theory from his Egyptian instructors.

[4.] Instead of Rā the name of Sut is found in the later texts. Bekenrenef has

[5.] Septu,

, the ‘armed,’ one of the Solar appellations, already found in the Pyramid texts (Unas, 281). He appears in chapter [130, 7], in connection with the block of execution.

[6.] The text is here hopelessly corrupt. M. Pierret has ‘offrande,’ which he most probably derives from

, a reading found in some papyri. But Ba, our oldest authority, has

, and Bekenrenef has

. The Turin copy has

; and the context does not help us. Of these four readings (and there are probably others which I do not know) that of Bekenrenef seems to me the best; but

has so many possible applications that I will not venture to suggest one.

[7.] [I am Tmu.] These words are not in Ba, but they occur in all other copies, and the omission of the divine name which stops the crocodile is an evident fault.

The chapter ends here, and what follows is an addition for which our earliest authority is that of Bekenrenef. But even this text is already corrupt, and requires to be corrected by more recent ones.

[50].