The Golden Bough: A Study in Comparative Religion (Vol. 2 of 2)Frazer, James George
ReligionComparative
The Golden Bough: A Study in Comparative Religion (Vol. 2 of 2)
Frazer, James George
Magic; Mythology; Religion; Superstition
The notion of an external soul has now been traced in folk-tales told by
Aryan peoples from India to Brittany and the Hebrides. We have still to
show that the same idea occurs commonly in the popular stories of
non-Aryan peoples. In the first place it appears in the ancient Egyptian
story of “The Two Brothers.” This story was written down in the reign of
Rameses II, about 1300 years B.C. It is therefore older than our present
redaction of Homer, and far older than the Bible. The outline of the
story, so far as it concerns us here, is as follows: Once upon a time
there were two brethren; the name of the elder was Anupu and the name of
the younger was Bitiu. Now Anupu had a house and a wife, and his younger
brother dwelt with him as his servant. It was Anupu who made the garments,
and every morning when it grew light he drove the kine afield. As he
walked behind them they used to say to him, “The grass is good in such and
such a place,” and he heard what they said and led them to the good
pasture that they desired. So his kine grew very sleek and multiplied
greatly. One day when the two brothers were at work in the field the elder
brother said to the younger, “Run and fetch seed from the village.” So the
younger brother ran and said to the wife of his elder brother, “Give me
seed that I may run to the field, for my brother sent me saying, tarry
not.” She said, “Go to the barn and take as much as you desire.” He went
and filled a jar full of wheat and barley, and came forth bearing it on
his shoulders. When the woman saw him her heart went out to him, and she
laid hold of him and said, “Come, let us rest an hour together.” But he
said, “Thou art to me as a mother, and my brother is to me as a father.”
So he would not hearken to her, but took the load on his back and went
away to the field. In the evening, when the elder brother was returning
from the field, his wife feared for what she had said. So she took soot
and made herself as one who has been beaten. And when her husband came
home, she said, “When thy younger brother came to fetch seed, he said to
me, Come, let us rest an hour together. But I would not, and he beat me.”
Then the elder brother became like a panther of the south; he sharpened
his knife and stood behind the door of the cow-house. And when the sun set
and the younger brother came laden with all the herbs of the field, as was
his wont every day, the cow that walked in front of the herd said to him,
“Behold, thy elder brother stands with a knife to kill thee. Flee before
him.” When he heard what the cow said, he looked under the door of the
cow-house and saw the feet of his elder brother standing behind the door,
his knife in his hand. So he fled and his brother pursued him with the
knife. But the younger brother cried for help to the Sun, and the Sun
heard him and caused a great water to spring up between him and his elder
brother, and the water was full of crocodiles. The two brothers stood, the
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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