s of Osiris. "Horus
comes, he recognizes his father in thee [Osiris], youthful in thy name
of 'Fresh Water'." "Thou art indeed the Nile, great on the fields at the
beginning of the seasons; gods and men live by the moisture that is in
thee." He is also identified with the inundation of the river. "It is
Unis [the dead king identified with Osiris] who inundates the land." He
also brings the wind and guides it. It is the breath of life which
raises the king from the dead as an Osiris. The wine-press god comes to
Osiris bearing wine-juice and the great god becomes "Lord of the
overflowing wine": he is also identified with barley and with the beer
made from it. Certain trees also are personifications of the god.

But Osiris was regarded not only as the waters upon earth, the rivers
and streams, the moisture in the soil and in the bodies of animals and
plants, but also as "the waters of life that are in the sky".

"As Osiris was identified with the waters of earth and sky, he may even
become the sea and the ocean itself. We find him addressed thus: 'Thou
art great, thou art green, in thy name of Great Green (Sea); lo, thou
art round as the Great Circle (Okeanos); lo, thou art turned about, thou
art round as the circle that encircles the Haunebu (AEgeans)."

This series of interesting extracts from Professor Breasted's "Religion
and Thought in Ancient Egypt" (pp. 18-26) gives the earliest Egyptians'
own ideas of the attributes of Osiris. The Babylonians regarded Ea in
almost precisely the same light and endowed him with identical powers.
But there is an important and significant difference between Osiris and
Ea. The former was usually represented as a man, that is, as a dead
king, whereas Ea was represented as a man wearing a fish-skin, as a
fish, or as the composite monster with a fish's body and tail, which was
the prototype of the Indian _makara_ and "the father of dragons".

In attempting to understand the creation of the dragon it is important
to remember that, although Osiris and Ea were regarded primarily as
personifications of the beneficent life-giving powers of water, as the
bringers of fertility to the soil and the givers of life and immortality
to living creatures, they were also identified with the destructive
forces of water, by which men were drowned or their welfare affected in
various ways by storms of sea and wind.

Thus Osiris or the fish-god Ea could destroy mankind. In other words the
fish-dragon, or