Chapter 17

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13. The Turin text seems better adapted for the basis of a translation of HYMN II than the older papyri. These have been used for checking the later text whenever possible.

14. A difficult passage, but the readings are unanimous. What is ⁂? Brugsch translates it “the Talisman of the Earth,” and Pierret “le salut de la terre.” No objection can be raised against the truth of either of these meanings taken by itself. But we have to look at the entire context. The expression literally signifies “the back of the earth.” In Latin we say _sinus_, _gremium_ and _viscera terrae_. The Egyptians themselves talk of the back of Seb, ⁂⁂⁂, out of which the plants grow, and in a place quoted by Duemichen (_Zeitschrift_, 1871, p. 92, note) ⁂⁂ _ta_ the _Earth_, is substituted for Seb. I believe then that ⁂ is best translated by _Soil of the Earth_.

15. Thy mother Isis. So _Ba_. The Turin text has Nut, which is inconsistent with what follows.

16. _La_ gives Tatunen; _Af_, Tunen; the Turin recension Tanen, names belonging to the god also called Ptah, Sokru and Osiris. See the inscriptions in Mariette’s _Abydos_, I, pl. 16, 6, on the Tat figures.

Horus, the son of Osiris and Isis, seems to be here addressed.

17. This rubric does not occur in the older MSS.

18. This hymn has not yet been found in the older MSS. A text carefully corrected from the papyri of the Louvre will be found in M. Lefébure’s _Traduction comparée des Hymnes au Soleil composant le XV^e chapitre du Ritual Funéraire Egyptien_. Paris, 1868.

19. ‘Chepera, father of the gods.’ Expressions like this are liable to be misunderstood by superficial readers. They are not meant to imply that ‘father of the gods’ was the special attribute of Chepera. ‘Father of the gods’ is predicated in