r dragons were
invented by combining parts of these various creatures to express the
different manifestations of the vital powers of water. The process of
elaboration of the attributes of these monsters led to the development
of an amazingly complex myth: but the story became still further
involved when the dragon's life-controlling powers became confused with
man's vital spirit and identified with the good or evil genius which was
regarded as the guest, welcome or unwelcome, of every individual's body,
and the arbiter of his destiny. In my remarks on the _ka_ and the
_fravashi_ I have merely hinted at the vast complexity of these elements
of confusion.

Had I been familiar with [Archbishop] Soederblom's important
monograph,[2] when I was writing Chapters I and III, I might have
attempted to indicate how vital a part the confusion of the individual
_genius_ with the mythical wonder-beast has played in the history of the
myths relating to the latter. For the identification of the dragon with
the vital spirit of the individual explains why the stories of the
former appealed to the selfish interest of every human being. At the
time the lecture on "Incense and Libations" was written, I had no idea
that the problems of the _ka_ and the _fravashi_ had any connexion with
those relating to the dragon. But in the third chapter a quotation from
Professor Langdon's account of "A Ritual of Atonement for a Babylonian
King" indicates that the Babylonian equivalent of the _ka_ and the
_fravashi_, "my god who walks at my side," presents many points of
affinity to a dragon.

When in the lecture on "Incense and Libations" I ventured to make the
daring suggestion that the ideas underlying the Egyptian conception of
the _ka_ were substantially identical with those entertained by the
Iranians in reference to the _fravashi_, I was not aware of the fact
that such a comparison had already been made. In [Archbishop]
Soederblom's monograph, which contains a wealth of information in
corroboration of the views set forth in Chapter I, the following
statement occurs: "L'analyse, faite par M. Brede-Kristensen (_AEgypternes
forestillinger om livet efter doeden_, 14 ss. Kristiania, 1896) du _ka_
egyptien, jette une vive lumiere sur notre question, par la frappante
analogie qui semble exister entre le sens originaire de ces deux termes
_ka_ et _fravashi_" (p. 58, note 4). "La similitude entre le _ka_ et la
_fravashi_ a ete signalee deja par Nestor Lho