, shoemakers, florists, cellarers, water-carriers and
milk-carriers. In fact, it was a state within a state, and the prince
took care to keep its government in his own hands, either by investing
one of his children with the titles and functions of chief pontiff',
or by arrogating them to himself. In that case, he provided against
mistakes which would have annulled the sacrifice by associating with
himself several masters of the ceremonies, who directed him in the
orthodox evolutions before the god and about the victim, indicated the
due order of gestures and the necessary changes of costume, and prompted
him with the words of each invocation from a book or tablet which they
held in their hands.[*]

* The title of such a personage was _khri-habi_, the man
with the roll or tablet, because of the papyrus roll, or
wooden tablet containing the ritual, which he held in his
hand.

In addition to its rites and special hierarchy, each of the sacerdotal
colleges thus constituted had a theology in accordance with the nature
and attributes of its god. Its fundamental dogma affirmed the unity of
the nome god, his greatness, his supremacy over all the gods of Egypt
and of foreign lands[*]--whose existence was nevertheless admitted, and
none dreamed of denying their reality or contesting their power.

* In the inscriptions all local gods bear the titles of
_Nutir ua_, only god; Suton nutiru, Suntiru, [ Greek word],
king of the gods; of _Nutir aa nib pit_, the great god, lord
of heaven, which show their pretensions to the sovereignty
and to the position of creator of the universe.

The latter also boasted of their unity, their greatness, their
supremacy; but whatever they were, the god of the nome was master of
them all--their prince, their ruler, their king. It was he alone who
governed the world, he alone kept it in good order, he alone had created
it. Not that he had evoked it out of nothing; there was as yet no
concept of nothingness, and even to the most subtle and refined of
primitive theologians creation was only a bringing of pre-existent
elements into play.

[Illustration: 180.jpg SHU UPLIFTING THE SKY. 2]

2 Drawing by Faucher-Gudin of a green enamelled statuette
in my possession. It was from Shu that the Greeks derived
their representations, and perhaps their myth of Atlas.

The latent germs of things had always existed, but they had slept for
ages and ag