The bull, in the hieroglyphics, was called by the generic word Aha, cattle,[1]—men, or men men,[2] which bears the same signification,—and Ka, the bull, the radical of the Persian Gau, and the English word cow.[3] It is used throughout the hieroglyphical texts in the sense of "male, masculine." Thus, in the square titles, or the Horus standards, as they are called, of the monarchs of the eighteenth and following dynasties, it is followed by the arm holding the stick, the abridged form of the adjective necht, powerful, often found written in its full form. Then it signifies "the powerful male;"[4] this being that part of the obelisk translated by Hermapion, κρατερὸς.[5] In other instances, it occurs as " the most masculine of millions," in the hyperbolical flattery of the Pharaohs.[6] Its sense of masculine or male is particularly evident in the titles of the god Khem, who appears to have united the principles of the two sexes of the Egyptian pantheon in his title of Ka mutf, meaning, "He who is male and female," the ἀρσενόθηλυς, and not that usually translated.[7] This god, whose name meant " the enshrined," was usually kept carefully secluded from the eyes of the multitude. His festival was called "the festival of the coming forth of Khem,"—heb en her en Khem. It was celebrated on the month of Tybi. A white bull, perhaps Mnevis,—for Mnevis is only the translation of the Egyptian word mena,—walked in the procession. His head was decorated with the sun's disk and two tall plumes.[8] Here, undoubtedly, the bull represented the masculine principle of the god, as the vulture,[9] with which he was decorated, the feminine, or antagonistic, nature. In the same sense, Thoth addresses Osiris, "Oh, male of the West!"[10] Numerous instances,
- ↑ Bunsen, Egypt's Place, 8vo, Lond. 1848. p. 543.
- ↑ Champollion, Gram. p. 126.
- ↑ Bunsen, Egypt's Place, ibid.
- ↑ On the Obelisks passim. Ungarelli Int. Ob. 8vo. Rom. 1842. Champ. Dict., p. 112.
- ↑ Ammian. Marcellin., lib. xvii., s. iv., p. 108, ed. Ernesti.
- ↑ Cf. titles of Rameses II. at Beitoually, Rosellini, M. R., No. LXII.
- ↑ According to Champollion, Lettres Ecrites, Gr. p.282, maritus matris suæ,from a false reading of the word Ka, which is male. (Cf. Champ. Dict. p. 112). not. maritus. Lanci. Lettre sur les hieroglyphes gives a reading still more extraordinary. Champollion, Notice des Monumens Egyptiens du Musée Charles X., 12mo, Paris, 1827, p. 7, considered him an union of Amen the first of the Theban Triad, and Horus the last of the Abydos one; i. e. Amen as the father, Horus as the child; but it would appear from the text he has cited in the explanation of Neith, (cf. Champollion, Panthéon Egyptien, 4to, Par., p. 25, E. Lepsius, Todtenbuch, taf. lxxix., c. 165, and lxxviii., c. 164,) that Neith or Mut united in herself the two principles.
- ↑ Champollion, Mon. Eg.; Rosellini, M. d. C. lxxxiv.; Wilkinson, Manners's and Customs, Vol. v., Pl. 76.
- ↑ For example, on a bronze figure of this god in the British Museum, No. 1619, his bandages have the vulture engraved over them.
- ↑ Lepsius, Todtenbuch, taf. i., l. i.
