Now when the sons of Ra and Rud-didet were born, that deity requested
Isis, Nebhat, Meskhent, Hakt, and Khnumu to go to her, and taking the
form of dancing-girls, all except the god Khnumu, who followed them
as a porter, they descended to earth and approached the house of the
priest Ra-user, Rud-didet's husband, and played before him with their
instruments of music. They endowed the children with various attributes,
and called them User-ref, Sah-ra, and Kaku. They then quitted the
house and bade Ra-user rejoice. In return for their good wishes he
bestowed upon them a bushel of barley, which Khnumu placed upon his
head; but as they were on the way back to their divine abode Isis said
unto the others, "Would it not have been better had we done a marvel
for these children?" To this the others assented, and they there and
then fashioned a likeness of the crowns of Egypt, of the crown of the
Upper Land, and of the crown of the Lower, and hid them in the bushel
of barley. They then returned to the house of Ra-user and requested
permission to leave the barley in a closed chamber, which they sealed
up, and then took their leave. A few weeks afterward Rud-didet asked her
handmaid if the house and all that was in it were in good condition, and
the handmaid replied that all was satisfactory except that the brewing
barley was not yet brought. Her mistress then inquired why that had not
been done, and the servant answered that their store had been given to
the dancing-girls, who had arrived on the day of the children's birth,
and that it now lay in the closed chamber under their seal. Rud-didet
then ordered the maid to use it for the present, saying that Ra-user
could replace it before their return. The girl opened the chamber and,
entering, was surprised to hear people talking and singing, music and
the sound of dancing, and such sounds as one hears in the palace of the
king. She quickly returned and acquainted her mistress with what she
had heard. Rud-didet then entered the room herself and also heard the
sounds, but could not locate them. At last she laid her ear to the sack
which held the barley, and found that the sounds proceeded from it. She
at once placed it in a chest, which she put for security in a greater
chest, and this she bound round with leather and laid in a store-room,
taking the precaution to seal it, and when Ra-user returned she told him
what had occurred.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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