ly
interesting variant of this constellation represents a hawk-headed sphinx,
next to the triangle (pl. VI, 1); 2-4 represent the common form expressing
the name Sopedet. As Brugsch informs us, the above name was changed at a
more recent period into Satit (6-8), which he translates as "she who
shoots, the archeress" or "she who causes the Nile to rise." In these
cases the written name either contains an arrow (6), the pyramid symbol
for earth (7), or a seated figure above whose head is a single star (8). A
rarer form of representing the same constellation is 9 and 10, the group
being transcribed by "Satit Hont Khabsu" which Brugsch translates as
"Sothis, the Queen of the ... stars." From the feminine terminations
employed in the text it is clear that it is a cow which figures here in
the boat, with a single star between its horns and it appears to me to be
obvious that we have to deal here with the feminine form of Polaris, with
Auset=Isis, closely related to the Assyrian "goddess of battle," Ishtar,
the female counterpart of Ausar=Osiris, the Assyrian Anshar, or Ashur, the
"god of battle."

[Illustration.]

Plate VI.

This view is confirmed by further astronomical pictures published by
Brugsch, which appear to me not merely to signify the constellations Orion
and Sirius as Brugsch infers, but to be hieroglyphs intended to be
understood by the initiated only, representing two or more of the forms
under which Amen-Ra was figured. At Edfu (pl. VI, 11) the boat=au, uaa,
and the mummy=sah form a fair rebus for Ausar=Osiris, while the boat
alongside of it contains the cow, a form under which Isis=Hathor was
worshipped in Egypt during centuries. At Denderah (12) there is a cow in
one boat=Isis; and a man in another who holds the sceptre tam, emblematic
of power, and turns his head around, an evident allusion to the action
an=he who turns himself around, or to sah=one who turns away. Between both
is the hawk=bak or Hur-chuti=Horus, standing on the sceptre named aut,
composed of the lotus flower=ankh. A variant of the same group (13) also
symbolizing the "Above, Below and Middle," and from Denderah, represents
Isis only in the celestial boat and Osiris standing (on earth) holding,
beside the tam, the whip=nekhe khu, emblematic of rule. In 14, a female
figure stands in the boat under the written name Auset=Isis and bears in
her hand the ankh sign and the lotus flow