[Illustration.]

Plate V.

In the Edfu zodiac, the latter, whose name furnishes an anagram of
amen=hidden, is represented with the Ra sign on her head and holds a cord
to which the constellation of Ursa Major is attached. This is figured,
with its seven stars, as the thigh (pl. V, 2), with the head of a bull,
elements which furnish the phonetic values of uart, khepes or maskhet and
aua, ka or ah, to which should be added that the Egyptian mode of saying
"a bull"=ua en ka, literally "one of bull," the female form being "uat en
ka" (see Wallis Budge, First steps in Egyptian).

After having studied the hymns and invocations to Amen-Ra we are aware,
not only that the "hidden god" is named "the bull," but that great stress
is laid upon his being "One"=ua, yet double=ka. It therefore appears very
significant to find these words incorporated in the name for Ursa
Major=thigh, uart, and this combined with bull=ua or ka which furnishes
the anagram ak=middle. What is more, the second name for thigh being
khepes, this might form a rebus for the common name for (1) luminary or
star in general=khebs or khabs, literally, lights, lamps, flames, _cf._
seb=star; (2) kheper=life, existence, to come into existence, _cf._
khepdes=uterus, kher khepd=the navel, khepesh=power.

The fact that one title of Amen-Ra was Khepera=the creator, lends
additional interest to the association of his secret sign, the
hippopotamus, with the constellation Ursa Major, which he apparently holds
and guides and which emblematizes life, _i. e._ motion--The thigh=khepes,
scarab=kheper, fish, khepanen, crocodile=seta or sebek, which, inverted,
yields the word khebes=star, and royal sickle=khepes, thus appear to have
been but different modes of expressing the same meaning and the title of
Khepera (fig. 63, 13-16). It can be readily understood why the scarab
beetle, which encloses its egg in a ball of mud and rolls this to a safe
hatching place, became the favorite secret sign for the "hidden god,"
since none but the initiated would see in the beetle, holding the ball of
earth enclosing its egg, the actual rebus of Khepera, the creator,
expressed by the kheper; and the circle or disk, the sign of Ra,
containing the germ of life.

Returning to an examination of the signs for Ursa Major employed by the
Egyptian astronomer scribes, we find, beside the more elaborate form given
by Mr. Wallis Budge (pl. V, 3), the variants