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knew that, centuries before, Maya colonists, coming from India and from the banks of the Euphrates, had established themselves in the valley of the Nile. She naturally sought refuge among them. They received her with open arms, accepted her as their queen, and called her Ioin, "the little sister," an endearing word that in time became changed into Isis.

Apuleius, in his "Metamorphosis," makes her say:

"But

the sun-illumined Ethiopians and the Egyptians, renowned for ancient lore, worshipping me with due ceremonies, call me by my real name Isis." Diodorus causes her to say: “I am Isis, queen of the country, educated by Thoth, Mercury. What I have decreed, no one can annul. I am the eldest daughter of Saturn (Seb), the youngest of the gods. I am the sister and wife of King Osiris. I am the first who taught men the use of corn. I am the mother of Horus.'"'

In the Book of the Dead Isis says: "I am the queen of these regions; I was the first to reveal to mortals the mysteries of wheat and corn. I am she who is risen in the constellation of the dog." 3

Was it she who, to perpetuate the memory of her husband among the coming generations in the land of her adoption, as she had done in the country of her birth, caused the Sphinx to be made in the likeness of that with which she had embellished the mausoleum of her beloved Coh in Chicħen ? There she had represented him as a dying leopard with a human head, his back pierced with three spear wounds. In Egypt she figured him also as a leopard with a human head; but erect and

Apuleius, Metamorphosis, lib. ii., 241. 'Diodorus, Bibl. Hist., lib. i., 27.

Book of the Dead, chap. cx., verses 4-5.

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proud, a glorified soul watching over the country that had insured her safety, giving her a new home; over the people she loved, and who obeyed with reverence her smallest mandate, and after her death deified and worshipped her, calling her the "good mother of the gods and of men," as Maia was called by the Greeks, as Maya was by the Hindoos, and Mayaoel by the Mexicans. Did she entrust to her son Hul the supervision of the execution of the huge statue, that for this reason was named Hu in the texts ?

Shall we answer with certainty in the negative these queries that force themselves on the mind, when we reflect on the influence of Maya customs and Maya civilization on the populations of Asia and Africa; on the similarity of the names, and the striking analogy of the events in the lives of Isis and Osiris, and those of Queen Móo and Prince Coh; particularly when, among other things, we consider the identity of the ancient hieratic Maya and Egyptian alphabets; that of the rites of initiation into the mysteries celebrated in the temples of Mayach and Egypt,' and many other customs and traditions that it is impossible to regard as mere coincidences, these being too numerous to be the effect of hazard?

Furthermore, we may take into consideration the latest discovery made by Col. G. E. Raum, of San Francisco, in excavating the temple between the fore paws of the Sphinx, of the cap that once covered the head of the statue. This cap is painted red and adorned with three lotus stems and a serpent. Might not these indicate that the personage represented by the Sphinx came from a country situated in the midst of the waters, and belonged to the family of the Cans, serpents ??

1

Aug. Le Plongeon, Sacred Mysteries, p. 15, et passim.

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