Chapter 57

, p. 110; Naville, _Todt._, Einl., p. 28).

3. See _Sphinx_, V, p. 199.

4. ⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂. I consider ⁂⁂ as being here the adverb _afterwards_. His soul goes out, and _afterwards_ he dies, it goes down and _afterwards_ he decays.

5. ⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂, litt. the destroyers; the word occurs again further on: the destroyer who is in his bush(?) or cover, the hidden one. It is evidently a metaphor, for the sense is obvious; it is putrefaction. The word in the Turin papyrus ⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂, litt. locks, might apply to the vegetation or the excrescences which are often the sign of putrefaction.

6. ⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂. The passage is very obscure. I believe the drift of the idea is this: after having described very thoroughly what corruption is, the deceased says: as for me I am protected against those evils. Even should every being fall into corruption, having lost the eye of Shu, it is nothing to me, because I am feared by all.

⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂ “worms do not exist.” ⁂⁂ is explained by two passages. At Abydos the priest says to the god (Mar., _Abydos_, I, p. 34) ⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂. “I have come to perform the ceremonies, for I have not come to do nothing, I have not come in vain.” In the poem of Pentaur, when Rameses II, addressing Amen, recalls all he has done to honour the god, he says: ⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂: “is it nothing, this thy terrace which I built for thee?”

7. The eye of Shu is either an amulet or a magic power residing in some part of the body, which prevents it from becoming worms. It is the defence against corruption. Further the deceased says: “I do not become worms; I do not lose the eye of Shu.”

8. Litt. ploughs into dead bodies.

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