HAWK AND JACKAL-HEADED DEITIES. These three figures of hawk and jackal-headed Deities are common in the tombs of Thebes, but I do not know their office. Two large figures of the hawk-headed Deity, with similar hieroglyphic legends, are conducting, together with the jackalheaded and other Deities, Remeses III. into the presence of the God of the temple, at Medeenet Haboo. These kneeling figures seem to be beating themselves in the manner the Egyptians are said by Herodotus to have done (in honour of Osiris), and as Athenagoras tells us was the custom at all the great festivals celebrated in the temples. They are sometimes represented in the same attitude before the God Atmoo; and from their hieroglyphic legend, we may suppose them to be the Spirits who pervaded the Earth. THE FOUR GENII OR GODS OF AMENTI. These four Genii of the lower regions perform a conspicuous part in the ceremonies of the dead. They are present before Osiris while presiding in judgment, and every individual who passed into a future state was protected by their influence. When a body was embalmed, the intestines were taken out and divided into several portions, each being dedicated to one of these Deities; and they were either deposited in vases *, which bore their re *These vases have been improperly styled canopi. spective heads, or were returned into the body accompanied by these four figures. Amset, Hapi, Smautf (or Smof), and Kebhnsnof (or Netsonof) were their names. The first had the head of a man*, and was sometimes represented holding the staff and having the form of the other Deities, but only in the tombs ; the second had the head of a Cynocephalus ape, the third of a jackal, and the fourth of a hawk; and, though differing from them in form, they cannot fail to call to mind the four beasts of the Revelations. They were generally in the form of mummies; but they sometimes occur as human figures walking, and even carrying the body of the dead, as in the chamber of Osiris, at Philæ, where they bear the Deity to his tomb, under the form of Sokari. To Amset were dedicated the stomach and large intestines; to Hapi the small intestines; to Smautf the lungs and heart; and to Kebhnsnof the liver and gall-bladder. This point was long a desideratum; and though it was known that the four vases, placed in the Egyptian tombs with the sarcophagi, each of which bore the head of one of these Genii, contained the intestines of the dead, no one had examined them with sufficient care to ascertain the exact portion in each. To Mr. Pettigrew we are indebted for this interesting fact; and in introducing it I have much pleasure in paying a just tribute to the patience and zeal with which he conducted the examination, and in re * I have found one instance of Amset in the form of a woman, on a mummy case in the British Museum. + Rev. iv. 7. turning him the subject. my thanks for his communication upon I have already noticed the assertion of Plutarch, that the Mendesian goat had the same name as the sacred bull Apis; and have shown that the only Deities so called were the Memphite bull, the God Nilus, and one of the Genii of Amenti. Though we may find a difficulty in accounting for such a misconception, it is more probable that this last, which was represented with the head of a Cynocephalus, should have been mistaken for the animal he mentions than the God Nilus. And as he doubtless speaks from a vague report, originating in the ignorance of the Greeks, it is possible that the form of the ape-headed figure, added to the similarity of name, led to his error; which, indeed, is not more inconsistent with truth than Herodotus's belief of the God Pan being represented with the head and legs of a goat. One inference may perhaps be drawn from these erroneous statements, that the name Apis (Hapi) signifies a "genius" or "emblem ;" Apis being the "Genius," or, as Plutarch calls it, "the image of the soul" of Osiris. Hapi-môou may therefore be the Genius of the water, or the Nile; and the Cynocephalus-headed Hapi, the emblem of the terrestrial nature of man. This conjecture, however, I offer, with great diffidence, to the opinion of the learned reader. When the body of a person of quality was em * Vide suprà, p. 32. and 56. Plut. de Is. ii. 73. Herodot. ii. 46. balmed, the intestines were deposited in four vases of alabaster, or other costly materials, according to the expense which the friends of the deceased chose to incur. Some were contented with those of cheaper materials, as limestone, painted wood, or pottery; but in all cases the cover of each vase was surmounted by the head of its own peculiar Deity, according to its contents. In embalming the bodies of poorer people, who could not afford this expense, the intestines, when properly cleansed, were returned into the body by the usual incision in the left side, through which they had been extracted; and the figures of the four Genii, generally of wax, or aromatic composition, enveloped in cloth, were introduced into the cavity. This was done with the same view of protecting the parts under their peculiar influence, as when they were deposited in the vases. The aperture was afterwards closed, and covered with a leaden plate, on which they represented the eye (of Osiris ?), or sometimes the same four Genii who were thought to preside within. But I shall have occasion to mention this hereafter in describing the funeral rites of the Egyptians, where I shall also notice the error of Porphyry respecting their throwing the intestines into the Nile. The hieroglyphic legends painted on the exterior of the vases alluded to the Deity whose head they bore, and it is principally from these that their names have been ascertained. The Goddess Selk is sometimes found accompanying the four Genii, in the paintings of the tombs, and I have once found an instance of Smautf with a human head. The name of Amenti, "that subterraneous region whither they imagined the souls of the dead to go after their decease," signified, according to Plutarch, "the receiver and giver;" in which we may perhaps trace a proof of its being considered a temporary abode. The burial of arms and different objects of use or value with the body may also indicate their belief of a future return to earth, after a certain time, which is said by Herodotus to have been fixed at 3000 years; though Plato gives this period to a philosopher, and 10,000 to an ordinary individual. The resemblance of the names Amenti, "Hades," and Ement, "the West," is remarkable. This last was looked upon as the end, as the East was the beginning, of the world. There the Sun was buried in the darkness of night, and there he was supposed, allegorically, to die and pass through another state, previous to his regeneration and reappearance upon earth, after each diurnal revolution. This analogy between them cannot fail to call to mind the similarity of the Hebrew word Ereb, or Gharb 74, signifying "sunset," "the West," and the Erebus of Greece. Clemens § says that ancient temples were turned towards the West; but this was not the case in Egypt, where the points of the compass do not *Plut. de Is. s. 29. + Vide infrà, on the Hippopotamus, in Ch. xiv. The Gharb, "West," of the Arabs. § Clem. Strom. 7. |