After the foregoing attempt to show how, even with my rudimentary and limited knowledge of their language, the sacred symbols of the Egyptians become intelligible and full of significance [pg 421] when studied as examples of pole-star symbolism and primitive rebus writing, I draw attention to the limited number of syllables employed in the astronomical texts; to the ingenuity displayed in expressing the same sound over and over again by means of different words possessing the same sound and to the fact I shall hereafter set forth, that the syllables and rebus-figures employed are found indissolubly linked to pole-star and sacred symbolism. Referring a demonstration of these conclusions to the end of the present investigation, I shall next discuss the forms which the cult of the dualities of nature seemingly assumed in ancient Egypt.
As an introduction I present in fig. [70], the copy of the upper portion of a funeral stela preserved at Bûlâk and published by Perrot and Chipiez (Ægypten, Leipzig, 1884). It exhibits the head or face of Hathor surmounting the tet column and supporting, in turn, the image of a small house or temple, at each side of which is a peculiar projection recalling the circinate line issuing from the red crown of lower Egypt (see fig. [70], 9, 10). In another Hathor stela, figured in the same work (pp. 510 and 780), the same characteristic circinate projections recur. The image of the house, always represented with a single doorway, is obviously a rebus of the name Hathor, explained by Egyptologists as Het-heru, literally “the house of Horus.” “Athor or Hathor of Thebes, identified with Nut, the sky ... was the female power of nature and is often represented under the form of a cow, ... as a woman with a cow's head, with horns and the disk, or wearing a head-dress in the shape of a vulture and above it the disk and horns.” In the familiar representation of the mask of Hathor on columns, the association with the cow is conveyed by large cow's ears=setem, projecting at each side of the face=hra.
A feature generally present in the miniature doorway of the house, is a single erect head of a uræus, bearing the disk or circle on its head and usually exhibiting a distinctly cross-shaped mark on its neck. The latter peculiarity is clearly shown in fig. [70], 1, which exhibits moreover a seated divinity at each side of the doorway, each bearing the throne or seat (auset) on its head, and the ankh sign on its knee. Close examination reveals that one of these deities is Ausar=Osiris, whose name is generally written by means of the throne=auset, and the eye=ari, with or without the determinative for god, i. e., the seated figure (fig. [70], 1 a and 1 b). Opposite to Osiris is Auset=Isis, whose name is usually written as in [pg 422] fig. [70], 1 c, where the auset, the egg=se, and the seated image of a goddess bearing a bowl=neb, on her head, may be distinguished.
Figure 70.
An idea of the import of fig. [70], 1, seems gained when it is remembered that in Egyptian the word house=pi, pir or per, was [pg 423] associated with the title of ruler, the name Pharaoh being derived from per=āa=great house. What is more, the word house=pir or pi, is used in astronomical texts, like the Arabian beth, in relation to stars, it being said of a star that “it ever comes forth from its house”=appears (Brugsch).
The permanent image of the disk and serpent, a form of the Ra sign, in the doorway of the sculptured house, would thus convey the idea of the eternal presence of Amen-Ra, the pole-star god. The accentuation of the cross lines on the neck of the ara indicates, moreover, the intentional allusion to four-fold and two-fold force, the latter being expressed by the eyes of the serpent. The door=ptah, which is open, expresses the name Ptah=the Opener, well known as that of the “father of the gods” and a form of Amen-Ra.
The positions assigned to Osiris and Isis, at either side of the “hidden god,” sufficiently shows that they were intended to represent separate incorporations of the male and female principles which were united in Amen-Ra, the “divine Twain.” The association of both deities with the throne, the eternal seat of repose, identifies both alike with Polaris. A monument in the Berlin Museum (no. 261) which was found in the temple of Isis at Ben-naga, in Nubia, and was a votive offering made by the Ethiopian king Netek-Amen and his consort Amen-Tari, contains the following formula, translated by Lepsius, which associates Isis with eternal enthronement. “Thou remainest, thou remainest, on thy great throne, O Isis, queen of Au-ker, like the sun (Ra) that lives in the horizon ... and thou lettest thy son Netek-Amen flourish on his throne....”
The fact I am about to demonstrate, that the king and queen of Egypt were the respective, “the living images” of Osiris and Isis, proves that, as in ancient Peru and China, the sovereigns, who were at the same time high priest and priestess, were considered as the sacred embodiments of the dual principles of nature. As elsewhere also, a chain of associations became attached to each of the dualities; but in Egypt, as may be clearly discerned, during the lapse of centuries great transformations of thought took place and alternately the male and female elements seem to have been associated with the cults of heaven and earth, light and darkness, sun or moon, morning or evening stars, the southeast and the northwest.