path, and when their elders approach, they rise out of their seat. In
this which follows however they are not in agreement with any of the
Hellenes,--instead of addressing one another in the roads they do
reverence, lowering their hand down to their knee. They wear tunics of
linen about their legs with fringes, which they call _calasiris_; above
these they have garments of white wool thrown over: woolen garments
however are not taken into the temples, nor are they buried with them,
for this is not permitted by religion. In these points they are in
agreement with the observances called Orphic and Bacchic (which are
really Egyptian), and also with those of the Pythagoreans, for one who
takes part in these mysteries is also forbidden by religious rule to be
buried in woolen garments; and about this there is a sacred story told.
Besides these things the Egyptians have found out also to what god each
month and each day belongs, and what fortunes a man will meet with who
is born on any particular day, and how he will die, and what kind of
a man he will be: and these inventions were taken up by those of the
Hellenes who occupied themselves about poesy. Portents too have been
found out by them more than by all other men besides; for when a portent
has happened, they observe and write down the event which comes of it,
and if ever afterwards anything resembling this happens, they believe
that the event which comes of it will be similar. Their divination is
ordered thus:--the art is assigned not to any man but to certain of the
gods, for there are in their land Oracles of Heracles, of Apollo, of
Athene, of Artemis, or Ares, and of Zeus, and moreover that which they
hold most in honour of all, namely the Oracle of Leto which is in the
city of Buto. The manner of divination however is not established among
them according to the same fashion everywhere, but is different
in different places. The art of medicine among them is distributed
thus:--each physician is a physician of one disease and of no more; and
the whole country is full of physicians, for some profess themselves
to be physicians of the eyes, others of the head, others of the teeth,
others of the affections of the stomach, and others of the more obscure
ailments.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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