The symbolic character , occupying the lower part of plate no. 5, is very rarely reproduced on Egyptian monuments of all periods. It is taken, as well as its legend, and the various colors which cover the varied members of which it is composed, from a fragment of a manuscript on
The image of the god depicted in this plate is very numerous on the religious buildings of Thebes and the rest of Egypt. It occupies the sanctuary of Karnac, the most magnificent of the monuments of the ancient capital; the homage and adoration of which this image is the object,
Most Eastern cosmogonies admit that water existed before the material organization of other parts of the globe, whose germs were confused and intermingled in this fluid. Several Greek philosophers have also systematically maintained that water was the principle of all things; this doctrine came, in all appearance, from the sanctuaries
The Egyptians worshipped, under the name of Ammon-Cnouphis , or Ammon -Chnoubis , the uncreated Spirit , the great Soul of the Universe, from which emanates the intellectual principle which communicates movement and life to all created beings. By the name of Amon (Ammon), the incomprehensibility of his essence was expressed; and by
The hieroglyphic names of this God often vary in their spelling, and this on the same monuments. The various forms of this name will be found on the plate which accompanies this text, and these variations were all known by the Greeks, who transcribed them in a more or less