The fifteenth chapter as it stands in the later recension (represented by the Turin Todtenbuch) is of very recent origin. It is in fact a collection of texts originally independent of each other; (1) a hymn to Râ at his rising, (2) a litany, (3) a hymn to Râ at his setting, (4) a hymn to Tmu at his setting, followed by a statement respecting the spiritual importance of the document.
Of the last hymn there are no copies of ancient date, but the other three compositions are found more or less perfect as far back as the XIXth dynasty. The discrepancies, however, between the ancient texts furnish so much evidence of free composition on the part of the scribes, that it is impossible to suppose that they had before them documents recognised as sacred and canonical. M. Naville has found it necessary to publish four different forms of the hymn to the rising, and three of the hymn to the setting sun. The ideas and expressions throughout these hymns are current in the religious texts of the XVIIIth and XIXth dynasties.
In the translation here given I have followed the form adopted by the later recension, correcting the text when necessary by the copies written in the better periods.
[1.] The text of the Papyrus of Ani has been taken as the basis of the translation of Hymn I. It is the only ancient text which gives the hymn in the form subsequently acknowledged as canonical.
[2.] The sun was represented from the earliest period, as we may see in the pyramid texts, as performing his celestial journey in a boat, which during the morning was called the Māāṭit
and in the evening the Sektit
