venient quarries for the construction of modern buildings.

To return to Thoth. The Cynocephalus is synonymous with the hieroglyphic of letters; and we even find it holding the tablet, and fulfilling the office of Thoth; which shows that it was not only the emblem, but also the representative of that Deity. Iamblichus says that certain physical properties were common to it and to the Moon; and, according to Horapollo, the latter was represented in hieroglyphic writing by a Cynocephalus. This statement is perfectly borne out by the sculptures, Thoth and the Ape, his emblem, being both introduced in the character of the Moon. Indeed, the crescent is found followed by the figure of Thoth in several hieroglyphic legends, with the phonetic name Aah or Ioh, signifying the "Moon."* This last word occurs in the Plate before ust, accompanied by the Ibis, the sacred bird of Thoth ; and Plutarch states that "Mercury was supposed to accompany the Moon round the world, as Hercules did the Sun." Thoth, therefore, in one of his characters, answers to the Moon, and in another to Mercury.

The Egyptians, represented their Moon as a male Deity, like the German Mond and Monat, or the Lunus of the Latins; and it is worthy of remark, that the same custom of calling it male is retained in the East to the present day, while the Sun is considered female, as in the language of the Germans. + Plate 45. fig. 5.

* Vide infrà, p. 68. note †.

Plut. de Is. s. 41.

Thoth is usually represented as a human figure with the head of an Ibis, holding a tablet, and a pen, or a palm branch, in his hands; and in his character of Lunus he has sometimes a man's face with the crescent of the Moon upon his head, supporting a disk, occasionally with the addition of an ostrich feather; which last appears to connect him with Ao, or with Thmei.

Plutarch says the Egyptians "call the Moon the Mother of the World,' and hold it to be of both sexes; female, as it receives the influence of the Sun; male, as it scatters and disperses through the air the principles of fecundity." He also supposes "Osiris to be the power and influence of the Moon, and Isis the generative faculty which resides in it." t But this is evidently at variance with the authority of the sculptures, which fully establish the claims of Thoth, and disprove any connection between Isis and the Moon. Nor is there any authority for the opinion of Spartianus ‡, who says, although the (Greeks or) Egyptians call the Moon a Goddess, they really consider it in a mystical sense a God, both male and female.

"The Sun and Moon," observes Plutarch, "were described by the Egyptians as sailing round the world in boats, intimating that these bodies owe their power of moving, as well as their support and nourishment, to the principle of humidity §;" which statement is confirmed by the sculptures: and

*Plut. de Is. s. 43. + Plut. de Is. s. 43. 52. Spartian. Vit. Antonini Caracall. cap. vii., quoted by Jablonski, I. Plut. de Is. s. 34.

cap. iii. 6.

some have thought that a species of Scarabæus was sacred to Thoth or the Moon. *

The Ibis-headed Deity was called "Lord of the eight regions of the land of Not," which may imply the South, or the Thebaïd‡, and be a part of the word No-Amun, or Diospolis; or be related to the name of the city where he was particularly worshipped, which is now called Oshmoonein, the yeon В of the Copts. There is, indeed, an evident connection between his title "Lord of the eight regions," and Oshmoonein, the modern name of Hermopolis, which, derived from Shmen or Shmon, signifying eight, implies the "two eights;" and if some have been disposed to think it refers to the eight books of law, which Menes § pretended to have received from the Egyptian Mercury, the demonstrative sign of "land," following this group, sufficiently refutes this opinion. His title "twice great" frequently occurs on the monuments, as in the inscription of the Rosetta Stone, where the Greek styles him "the great and great," or twice great.

The Ibis was particularly sacred to him, and standing on a perch, followed by a half circle and two lines, indicated the name of the God. It was thought to bear some relation to the Moon, "from its feathers being so mixed and blended together,

* Vide Horapollo, i. 10.; and infrà, on the Scarabæus.

+ Unless this word "No" be a sign, which, as Champollion thinks, was merely put after words ending in "n," and which, forming no part of it, was not pronounced. Vide Gram. Champoll. vol.i. ch. iv. p. 107. Vide infrà, on Savak.

Diodor. i. 94. He calls the King Mnevis.

The half circle had the force of T, which was doubled by these lines, reading Tot or Taut.

the black with the white, as to form a representation of the Moon's gibbosity."* "The space between its legs while walking was observed to form an equilateral triangle;" and "the medicinal use it makes of its beak" was thought to be connected with the office of Thoth, who taught mankind the art of curing diseases, and communicated all intellectual gifts from the Deity to man.

Such was the respect paid to this bird, from its destroying the venomous reptiles which infested the country, that any person killing one was punished with instant death†; and "those priests who were most punctual in the performance of their sacred rites, fetched the water they used in their purifications from some place where the Ibis had been seen to drink." +

According to Plutarch§, a sow was sacrificed "to Typho once a year at the full Moon:" and the animal is sometimes represented in a boat, in the paintings of the tombs, accompanied by one or more monkeys. This appears to connect it with Thoth, or the God Lunus; and if, as I suppose, the subject refers to the commencement of a new period, being the beginning of the future state of a soul condemned for its sins to migrate into the body of a pig, the relation it bears to the office of Thoth is readily accounted for. The impression that the animal was offered to Typho may proceed from its

*Plut. de Is. s. 75.

The same motive induced

+ Diodor. i. 83. Cic. Tusc. Quæst. v. 27. the Thessalians to protect the Stork. Plin. x. 23. Plut. de Is. s. 75.

Vide infrà, on the Pig.

Plut. de Is. s. 8.

having been chosen as an emblem of sin. Ælian says, they sacrifice a sow to the Moon once a year;" which statement is confirmed by Herodotus, who asserts, that "the only Deities to whom the Egyptians are permitted to offer the pig are the Moon and Bacchus (Osiris)." But he makes no mention of Typho; and the supposed "discovery of the body of Osiris by Typho, while hunting a wild boar at the full Moon*," would rather lead them to offer it to Osiris than to Typho. For as Plutarch himself confesses, "the opinion of the Egyptians was that sacrifices ought not to be of things in themselves agreeable to the Gods, but, on the contrary, of creatures into which the souls of the wicked have passedt;" and the pig was an emblem of Evil.

I have observed that Thoth, in one of his characters, corresponded to the Moon, in the other to Mercury. In the former, he was the beneficent property of that luminary, the regulator and dispenser of time, who presided over the fate of man, and the events of his life: in the latter, the God of letters and the patron of learning, and the means of communication between the Gods and mankind. It was through him that all mental gifts were imparted to man. He was, in short, a deification of the abstract idea of the intellect, or a personification of the intellect of the Deity. This accords well with a remark of Iamblichus, that Hermes was the God of all celestial knowledge, which being communicated by him to the priests,

*Plut. de Is. s. 18.

+ Plut. de Is. s. 31.