Legends of the Gods | Page 2

E. A. WALLIS BUDGE.

BRITISH MUSEUM, November 17,1911.

CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I.
THE LEGEND OF THE CREATION
II. THE LEGEND OF THE DESTRUCTION OF MANKIND
III. THE LEGEND OF RA AND THE SNAKE-BITE
IV. THE LEGEND OF HORUS OF EDFU AND THE WINGED
DISK
V. THE LEGEND OF THE ORIGIN OF HORUS
VI. A LEGEND OF KHENSU NEFER-HETEP AND THE PRINCESS
OF BEKHTEN
VII. THE LEGEND OF KHNEMU AND A SEVEN YEARS'
FAMINE
VIII. THE LEGEND OF THE DEATH AND RESURRECTION OF

HORUS
IX. THE LEGEND OF ISIS AND OSIRIS ACCORDING TO
CLASSICAL WRITERS

LIST OF PLATES AND ILLUSTRATIONS ON OR FOLLOWING
PAGE:
The History of Creation
I. Horus holding the Hippopotamus-fiend with chain and spear
II. Horus spearing the Hippopotamus-fiend
III. Horus spearing the Hippopotamus-fiend
IV. Horus and Isis capturing the Hippopotamus fiend
V. Horus on the back of the Hippopotamus-fiend
VI. The slaughter of the Hippopotamus-fiend
VII. Horus of Behutet and Ra-Harmakhis in a shrine
VIII. Horus of Behutet and Ra-Harmakhis in a shrine
IX. Ashthertet in her chariot
X. Horus holding captive foes and spearing Typhonic animals
XI. Horus spearing human foes
XII. Horus spearing the crocodile
XIII. Horus in the form of a lion
XIV. The Procreation of Horus, son of Isis.

XV. The Resurrection of Osiris.
XVI. The Bekhten Stele
XVII. The Metternich Stele--Obverse
XVIII. The Metternich Stele--Reverse

INTRODUCTION
I.
THE LEGEND OF THE GOD NEB-ER-TCHER, AND THE
HISTORY OF CREATION.

The text of the remarkable Legend of the Creation which forms the first
section of this volume is preserved in a well-written papyrus in the
British Museum, where it bears the number 10,188. This papyrus was
acquired by the late Mr. A. H. Rhind in 1861 or 1862, when he was
excavating some tombs on the west bank of the Nile at Thebes. He did
not himself find it in a tomb, but he received it from the British Consul
at Luxor, Mustafa Agha, during an interchange of gifts when Mr. Rhind
was leaving the country. Mustafa Agha obtained the papyrus from the
famous hiding-place of the Royal Mummies at Der-al-Bahari, with the
situation of which he was well acquainted for many years before it
became known to the Egyptian Service of Antiquities. When Mr. Rhind
came to England, the results of his excavations were examined by Dr.
Birch, who, recognising the great value of the papyrus, arranged to
publish it in a companion volume to Facsimiles of Two Papyri, but the
death of Mr. Rhind in 1865 caused the project to fall through. Mr.
Rhind's collection passed into the hands of Mr. David Bremner, and the
papyrus, together with many other antiquities, was purchased by the
Trustees of the British Museum. In 1880 Dr. Birch suggested the
publication of the papyrus to Dr. Pleyte, the Director of the Egyptian
Museum at Leyden. This savant transcribed and translated some

passages from the Festival Songs of Isis and Nephthys, which is the
first text in it, and these he published in Recueil de Travaux, Paris, tom.
iii., pp. 57-64. In 1886 by Dr. Birch's kindness I was allowed to work at
the papyrus, and I published transcripts of some important passages and
the account of the Creation in the Proceedings of the Society of Biblical
Archaeology, 1886-7, pp. 11-26. The Legend of the Creation was
considered by Dr. H. Brugsch to be of considerable value for the study
of the Egyptian Religion, and encouraged by him[FN#1] I made a full
transcript of the papyrus, which was published in Archaeologia, (vol.
lii., London, 1891), with transliterations and translations. In 1910 I
edited for the Trustees of the British Museum the complete hieratic text
with a revised translation.[FN#2]

[FN#1] Ein in moglichst wortgetreuer Uebersetzung vorglegter
Papyrus- text soll den Schlussstein meines Werkes bilden. Er wird den
Beweis fur die Richtigkeit meiner eigenen Untersuchungen vollenden,
indem er das wichtigste Zeugniss altagyptischen Ursprungs den
zahlreichen, von mir angezogenen Stellen aus den Inschriften hinzufugt.
Trotz mancher Schwierigkeit im Einzelnen ist der Gesammtinhalt des
Textes, den zuerst ein englischer Gelehrter der Wissenschaft
zuganglich gemacht hat, such nicht im geringsten misszuverstehen
(Brugsch, Religion, p. 740). He gives a German translation of the
Creation Legend on pp. 740, 741, and a transliteration on p. 756.
[FN#2] Egyptian Hieratic Papyri in the British Museum, London, 1910,
folio.

The papyrus is about 16 ft. 8 in. in length, and is 9 1/4 in. in width. It
contains 21 columns of hieratic text which are written in short lines and
are poetical in character, and 12 columns or pages of text written in
long lines; the total number of lines is between 930 and 940. The text is
written in a small, very black, but neat hand, and may be assigned to a
time between the XXVIth Dynasty and the Ptolemaic Period. The