ABSTRACT
The hieroglyphic text of the Rosetta Stone, which contains a copy of the Decree of the priests who were assembled in a part of the great temple of Ptah at Memphis on the 18th day of the month Mecheir, in the ninth year of the reign of Ptolemy V. Epiphanes consists of portions of the last fourteen lines of the document only. However, a more useful copy of the hieroglyphic text of the Decree was found inscribed upon a limestone stele, The Stele is now in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. The Greek version calls it 'Lycopolis', and says that it was in the 'Busirite Nome'. The reference to the 'doubles' of the king, which were supposed to dwell in his statues is peculiarly Egyptian, and shows that the belief that the 'doubles' of a living man could inhabit shrines was held by the Egyptians, even in the Ptolemaic period.
