That admirable investigator and popular exponent of the sculptures and hieroglyphics of the ancient Egyptians, Sir Gardner Wilkinson, writes that “The Cynocephalus Ape, which was particularly sacred to Thoth, held a conspicuous place among the sacred animals of Egypt, being worshipped as the type of the god of letters, and of the moon, which was one of the characters of Thoth. It was even introduced into the sculptures as the god himself, with ‘Thoth, Lord of Letters,’ and other legends inscribed over it; and in astronomical subjects two Cynocephali are frequently represented standing in a boat before the sun, in an attitude of prayer, as emblems of the moon. Their presence in a similar boat with a Pig probably refers to them as types of the divinity, in whose honour that animal was sacrificed; the moon and Bacchus, according to Herodotus, being the sole deities to whom it was lawful to immolate Swine, and that only at the full moon. But the presence of Cynocephali was not confined to Thoth or the moon. On two sides of the pedestals of the obelisks of Luxor four Cynocephali stand in the same attitude, as if in adoration of the deity to whom those monuments were dedicated; a balustrade over the centre doorway of the temple of _Amun_ at Medinet-Aboo is ornamented with the figures of these animals; and a row of them forms the cornice of the exterior of the great temple dedicated to _Ra_ at Aboomubel. Sometimes a Cynocephalus placed on a throne as a god holds a sacred Ibis in its hand; and in the judgment-scenes of the dead it frequently occurs seated on the summit of the balance as the emblem of Thoth, who had an important office on that occasion, and registered the account of the actions of the deceased. The place where this animal was particularly sacred was Hermopolis, the city of Thoth. Thebes and the other towns also treated it with the respect due to the representative of the Egyptian Hermes, and in the necropolis of the capital of Upper Egypt, a particular spot was set apart as the cemetery of the sacred Apes. Mummies of the Cynocephalus were put up in a sitting posture, which is usually that given to the animals in the sculptures when representing the god Thoth; and its head forms one of the covers of the four sepulchral vases deposited in the tombs of the dead. It was then the type of the god _Hopi_, one of the four genii of _Amenti_, who was always figured with the head of a Cynocephalus. Many of this species of Ape were tamed and kept by the Egyptians, and the paintings show that they were even housed for useful purposes.”