Translated by Rev. F. C. Cook
This hymn is important as bearing witness to the state of religious thought in Egypt in the time of Merneptah, the son of Rameses II, nineteenth dynasty, according to the generality of Egyptologers, contemporary with Moses. It is extant in two papyri, “Sallier,” ii, p. 11, “Select Papyri,” pls. xx-xxiii, and “Anastasi,” vii. “Select Papyri,” pls. cxxxiv-cxxxix, published by the trustees of the British Museum.
The name of the author Enna is well known. He wrote the “Romance of the Two Brothers” and other works preserved in the “Select Papyri,” and partially translated by Mr. Goodwin, in “Cambridge Essays,” 1858, p. 257, and M. G. Maspero, in “Genre épistolaire chez les anciens Egyptiens,” Paris, 1872.
A translation of this hymn was published by Maspero (“Hymne au Nil”), in 1868, with an introduction and critical notes of great value.
The attention of the reader is specially called to the metrical structure of this poem. The stanzas, containing upon an [pg 336] average ten couplets, are distinctly marked in the original, the first word in each being written in red letters; hence the origin of rubricated MSS. Each clause also has a red point at the close. The resemblance with the earliest Hebrew poems has been pointed out by the translator in the “Introduction to the Book of Psalms,” and in the “Notes on Exodus,” in the “Speaker's Commentary on the Bible.”
Hymn to the Nile
I. Strophe
Adoration of the Nile
1 Hail to thee O Nile!
2 Thou showest thyself in this land,