[305] Nearly all ancient Hebrew, as well as Assyrian, proper names are expressive of something about the birth or life of the bearers.
[306] Mythology of Ancient Greece and Rome. Third edition. London, 1854.
[307] The Hebrew word, like the Latin vir, means man in a distinguished sense (virile), and may come from the Egyptian ash, tree of life.
[308] Caleb, or city of the dog, on the coast of Phœnicia, has been accorded the credit of the name of the god. See the Abbé Banier’s Mythology and Fables of the Ancients, etc. (translation), vol. iii, p. 160.
[309] Possibly the first syllable of Æsculapius, like the Hebrew ishi, salutary, and asa, to heal, may have been from the Egyptian usha, health-bringing,—doctor. See Gerald Massey’s Book of Beginnings, vol. ii, p. 301. London, 1881.
[310] Hence the name, Canicular Year.
[311] It does not now rise heliacally until the middle of August. But, 4000 years ago it rose so about the 20th of June, and just preceded the annual rising of the Nile.
[312] History of the Heavens, vol. i, p. 185. Anubis had various functions which cannot be spoken of here. He bore the souls of men to the nether world, like Hermes, of the Greeks, and assisted Horus in weighing them. A passage in the Book of the Dead reads, “He is behind the bier which holds the bowels of Osiris.” Evidently he might be regarded as the god of undertakers.
[313] Typhon, or Set, was regarded, indeed, by the Egyptians as the god Sothis, or Sirius. See Bunsen’s Egypt’s Place, etc., vol. i, p. 429. But Typhon was not, in early times, regarded as simply the personification of evil. See Kenrick’s Ancient Egypt, vol. i, p. 350.
[314] Zend Avesta. Edition by James Darmesteter, in two parts, or volumes, in The Sacred Books of the East, edited by Max Müller, vol. i, p. 83. Oxford, England, 1883.