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Updated: June 16, 2025
The extremities of Ptah and Osiris were enveloped in a kind of sheath, which made their figures look more like mummies than beings with the power of life and motion. It was not so in Chaldæa, as we shall see if we examine the procedure of the Mesopotamian artist when he had to figure the greater gods, those in whom the highest efforts of mental abstraction found concrete expression.
The dispute as to which temple should be assigned as the residence of the newly-found Apis gave Hadrian much to do. From time immemorial this sacred bull had been kept in the temple of Ptah at Memphis, but this venerable city of the Pyramids had been outstripped by Alexandria, and the temple of Serapis outvied that at Memphis in the province of Sokari, tenfold in size and in magnificence.
A king revealed himself to me, adoring Ptah, "Father of the beginnings," who established upon earth, my figures thought, the everlasting justice, and again at the knees of Amen burning incense in his honor. Isis and Osiris stood together, and sacrifice was made before their sacred bark. And Seti worshipped them, and Seshta, goddess of learning, wrote in the book of eternity the name of the king.
That it had been brought into being by the word of a god, who when he uttered any name caused the object thereby to exist. Thōth is the principal creator by this means, and this idea probably belongs to a period soon after the age of the animal gods. The other view is that Ptah framed the world as an artificer, with the aid of eight Khnumu, or earth-gnomes.
"Yes; for, seest thou," interrupted Tutmosis, "this young man is an officer of the priestly regiment of Ptah, and a secretary of the secretary of a lord who carries his fan over the fan-carrier of the nomarch of Habu." "Surely he must be an officer," answered Sarah, looking with thoughtfulness at Ramses. "Maybe he is a great lord himself?" added she, putting her finger on her lips.
Just as the raven follows an army to batten on the dead, so that fellow there stalks on in front of strangers in order to empty their pockets and you, who call yourself an interpreter, and in learning Greek have forgotten the little Egyptian you ever knew, mark this: When you have to guide strangers take them to see the Sphinx, or to consult the Apis in the temple of Ptah, or lead them to the king's beast-garden at Alexandria, or the taverns at Hanopus, but don't bring them here, for we are neither pheasants, nor flute-playing women, nor miraculous beasts, who take a pleasure in being stared at.
And his sons and his councillors came and stood before him, and he said to them, "Know ye a man who can tell me tales of the deeds of the magicians?" Then the royal son Khafra stood forth and said, "I will tell thy majesty a tale of the days of thy forefather Nebka, the blessed; of what came to pass when he went into the temple of Ptah of Ankhtaui."
I was alone. The great cosmic gods, such as Ptah and Khnemu, of whom mention will be made later, are the offspring of another set of religious views, and the cosmogony in which these play the leading parts is entirely different.
Setna then went out from the tomb to the king, and told the king all that Na.nefer.ka.ptah had told him. The king said, "Setna, go to Koptos and bring back Ahura and Mer-ab." He answered the king, "Let one give me the royal boat and its belongings." And they gave him the royal boat and its belongings, and he left the haven, and sailed without stopping till he came to Koptos.
The citizens of Memphis were not permitted to pursue their avocations or ply their trades beyond the hour of noon; then the markets, the booths, the workshops and schools were to be closed, and on the great square in front of the temple of Ptah, where the annual fair was held, dramas both sacred and profane, and shows of all sorts were to be seen, heard and admired by men, women and children provided at the expense of the two kings.
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