EGYPT’S ANCIENT RITES

Manawatu Times, Volume LIV, Issue 6867, 23 March 1929, Page 20 (Supplement)

EGYPT’S ANCIENT RITES

WORSHIP OF SACRED BULL INTERESTING DISCOVERIES Discoveries of vestiges of ancient buildings, which in one case dates back to 1500 8.C., have been made at Armant (the ancient Hermonthis) by the Egyptian Exploration Society. Armant is on the left bank of the Nile and was the centre in the early days of the worship of the sacred bull Buchis.

The results of the excavations show that the worship of the sacred bull continued for many centuries at Hermonthis, and that Alexander the Great and two Roman Emperors were among the worshippers. The excavations have been carried out on the site of the place of interment of the sacred cows that gave birth to the sacred bulls. In earlier excavations a granite sarcophagus was found as well as a Roman brick structure. The excavations were commenced in the 1926-27 season by Mr. Robert Mond and Mr. W. B. Emery and were resumed last November. The recent excavations have shown that the granite sarcophagus was empty, but the society continued to investigate along the exposed walls of red Roman brick. The necropolis of the sacrad bulls of Hermonthis was entirely subterranean and hewn out of the solid rock. The latter is, however, of a very friable nature in this part, and even in Roman times many of the caves and passages had already fallen in. The Romans extensively propped up the interior of the tomb and even buried some of their own dead in it.

The expedition had great difficulty in clearing away the masses of fallen material, but they have already laid bare the remains of four Roman graves and eight earlier graves and are. practically certain of three more. All of the graves had been plundered, and even the stone of some of the sarcophagi had been quarried away. A sloping passage leads down to the building from the west, and here was found a lintel which originally belonged to a building of Thutmosis the Third and another stone bore a cartouche of Aten. Records On Pillars The expedition recovered fragments of limestone sphinxes, and also two fragments of limestone pillars inscribed with the names of Darius Hystaspes and Alexander the Great. They also found one broken and five whole pillars showing the adoration of the Buchis (sacred) bull by the second, fourth and tenth Ptolemies, by a Ptolemy whose cartouche is not filled in, and by two Roman Emperors whom it is difficult to identify. The details in the lives of the sacred bulls—their birth induction in the temple, and their death and burial —were recorded on these pillars, as well as details of the ceremonies accompanying their induction into the temple. A number of offering tables were found, imitating the sacred pool of the temple, with its four stairways, two of which bore an inscription. Small objects were very rare among the, material collected, but the expedition found some figures of Osiris and a model piece of sculpture of the Plotemic period.