Away from me! I am the Lynx goddess.(4.)
NOTES.
1. It is not possible to say what is here actually meant by ⁂⁂⁂
_ḥat._ Every word almost in this tiny chapter was a puzzle to the
Egyptian scribes, who altered the text in a hundred ways. The Turin text
provides against the persons being _bitten by the Eater of the head_,
⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂, instead of ⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂ as even Bekenrenef
has it.
2. _Open out Eternity_ ⁂⁂⁂⁂. This is the oldest and most
approved reading even in later times. But in _Pe_ the flame ‘shineth on
the brow of the Glorified ones.’
3. A quite unknown deity and most probably a mere blunder. The MS. which
contains it, _Ca_, suggests another reading _Tenpua_ with ⁂, the
determinative of _plants_. This not proving satisfactory,
⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂ _renpit_ was substituted. But all this was mere
conjectural emendation.
4. _The Lynx goddess_, ⁂⁂⁂⁂ Maftit. The name of this deity
is generally translated Lynx, and it is certainly applied to an animal
of the feline species closely resembling the cat. But the notion
expressed by the name is that of _swift speed_ ⁂⁂⁂⁂. (See
Dümichen, _Rec._ IV, 100, where this verb is in parallel with others of
the same sense.)
This deity is again mentioned in the 39th chapter as taking part in the
conflict with the dragon of darkness, and it is named in the strange
magic formulæ already found in the Pyramid texts. She is called
⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂ (Teta 310), and she apparently defends the
deceased (_ib._, l. 303) against two serpent divinities, one of whom at
least, ⁂⁂⁂ _T’eser-ṭepu_ (_praeclaro capite_), is known to us
as one of the forty-two assessors of Osiris (_Todtenbuch_, 125-33).
------------------------------------
CHAPTER XXXV.
_Chapter whereby the person is not devoured by a Serpent in the
Netherworld._
Oh Shu, here is Tattu, _and conversely_, under the wig(1.) of Hathor.
They scent(2.) Osiris.
Here is the one who is to devour me. They wait apart.(3.) The serpent
Seksek passeth over me.
Here are wormwood bruised(4.) and reeds.
Osiris is he who prayeth that he may be buried.
The eyes of the Great One are bent down, and he doth for thee the work
of cleansing;(5.) marking out what is conformable to law and balancing
the issues.(6.)
NOTES.
The translator of this chapter cannot pretend to do more than give an
accurate meaning to each word. The true sense of the chapter must have
been lost when the earliest copies known to us were written.
1. _Wig_, ⁂⁂. The head-dress of the gods is one of the mythical
forms of representing the light cloud at sunrise or sunset, in which the
deity is _pileatus_.
2. _Scent_, ⁂⁂⁂⁂. The Egyptian word is also used for
_nursing_, _putting to sleep_, probably through influencing the
breathing. The _nose_ as a determinative is used in the different senses
of the word.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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