ABSTRACT
The scenes and texts found in the chapel of No. 7 are such as we should expect to find in a tomb of the late Saïte or Ptolemaic period. Here we have the “ false door,” so made as to resemble three or four “ false doors,” on which is a figure of Osiris standing between Isis and Nephthys. Over the door is the Boat of the Sun, which shows that the cult of Rä went hand in hand with the cult of Osiris, in which are the Nile-god Hapi, the Crocodile-god Sebek, and the Hippopatamus-goddess Taurit. The king for whom the pyramid was built is seen in mummified form wearing the A tef crown of Osiris, and his soul is represented as a man-headed hawk Close by is a group of eight gods, each armed with two knives, who were guardians of pylons in the Kingdom of Osiris. Then come scenes of Anubis addressing the king’s mummy, a priest watering and censing a sacred tree, a priest setting up an obelisk before a funerary temple on which rest the Benu bird of
is the Vignette of Chap. X L V I I of the Book of the Dead, and is followed by the Vignette of Chap. L V I I or L I X (the king drinking water from the tree of Hathor), the Vignettes of Chap. X L V , and Chap. X L I I I , which were written to prevent the body decaying in the tomb and the cutting off of the head of the deceased. Another Vignette (Chap. C V l l ) represents the king going in and out, as and when he pleases, of the Tuat, where he joins the followers of Ra and becomes an associate of the souls of Amentet. Elsewhere we see the Sem priest clad in a Leopard’s skin performing the appointed ceremonies, and rows of gods, among them Menu, ithyphallic, and Nefer-Tem, and extracts from ancient Egyptian texts, e.g. “ The gates of the eastern horizon are opened to thee,
Heliopolis , and the hawk of Ra-Harmakhis . This scene
thou findest Ra there, and he embraces thee, O Lord of the Two Lands.” It is interesting to note that the prayer for funerary offerings for the K a of the king is preceded by the formula ^^<=-4 =. “ the king gives an offering” which shows that the draughtsman and scribe did not understand the meaning of these words. In early times the king of Egypt sent gifts of funerary offerings to his dead officials, and later, by courtesy, he was assumed to do so for every one of his people who was buried. But the idea of the king of Egypt sending a funerary gift to a king of Meroe at this time, or of the king of Meroe sending a funerary gift to his own funeral, would seem to be absurd. This pyramid was made for King Aru-Amen who calls himself “ ever-living, beloved of Isis”
another cartouche preceded by the title “ Lord of the Two Lands
loved of Isis” seem to indicate that he lived in the time of the Ptolemies, in whose cartouches they are often found. Griffith (ibid. p. 26) thinks that the sign which comes in both cartouches, has some special phonetic value here, possibly q ¿], and he would read the names Arq-Amani (Ergamenes?) and Meqel-take.
