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The sun had not wholly disappeared behind the Libyan range when the snorting Pannonians, all flecked with foam, drove back into the court- yard of the governor's residence. The two men had unfortunately gained nothing; for Amru was absent, reviewing the troops between Heliopolis and Onix, and was not expected home till night or even next morning.
The capital of this district was On—afterward Heliopolis, the sacred City of the Sun, a place with which Joseph was especially connected by his marriage with the daughter of the high priest of On. Separated from the Egyptians by their position as shepherds, the children of Jacob retained their patriarchal constitution.
After a siege of thirty days, he took possession of Farmah or Pelusium; and that key of Egypt, as it has been justly named, unlocked the entrance of the country as far as the ruins of Heliopolis and the neighborhood of the modern Cairo.
But in all these varied conceptions and explanations of the universe it is difficult to determine how far the poetical imagery of later periods has transformed the original myths which may lie behind them. As the Egyptian Creator the claims of Ra, the Sun-god of Heliopolis, early superseded those of other deities.
These were intended to be equal to the great original foundations of priestly learning at Heliopolis and Memphis; they were regulated on the same pattern, and with the object of raising the new royal residence of Upper Egypt, namely Thebes, above the capitals of Lower Egypt in regard to philosophical distinction.
A very short account only can be given of the sets of gods of which these are the heads. Ra. Ra means "sun"; his seat is Heliopolis or "On," where Joseph's master Potiphera, or "Priest of Ra," lived. Heliopolis is the "house of the obelisk," the obelisk being a representation of the sun.
The deputation from the temple of Memphis led the procession; this temple had been founded by Mena, the first king who wore the united crowns of Upper and Lower Egypt, and Chamus, the king's son, was the high-priest. The deputation from the not less important temple of Heliopolis came next, and was followed by the representatives of the Necropolis of Thebes.
One was from Contra-Pselcis in Nubia along the east bank of the Nile, to Babylon opposite Memphis, and there turning eastward through Heliopolis and the district of the Jews to Clysmon, where Trajan's canal entered the Red Sea. A second, from Memphis to Pelusium, made use of this for about thirty miles, joining it at Babylon, and leaving it at Scense Veteranorum.
It was commissioned to demand from Psamtik the surrender of his own person and of the city at discretion. Cambyses followed, having first sent off a division of his army under Megabyzus to invest Sais. At Heliopolis he was met by deputations from the Greek inhabitants of Naukratis and the Libyans, praying for peace and his protection, and bringing a golden wreath and other rich presents.
These four baboons were often portrayed as adoring the sun; this idea is due to their habit of chattering at sunrise. The lioness appears in the compound figures of the goddesses Sekhet, Bast, Mahes, and Tefnut. In the form of Sekhet the lioness is the destructive power of Ra, the sun: it is Sekhet who, in the legend, destroys mankind from Herakleopolis to Heliopolis at the bidding of Ra.
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