THE PERSONIFICATION OF STARS--THE TEMPLE OF ISIS AT DENDERAH.
We have now to pass from the building ceremonials and a general
consideration of the temples at Karnak, to the worships to which
the various temples were dedicated. And to do this we must face the
problems of Egyptian mythology, so far as the names and origins of the
various gods and goddesses are concerned.
[Illustration: PLAN OF DENDERAH. (_Mariette._)]
There is ample evidence that each temple was sacred to some god or
goddess, although in many cases the name of the patron divinity has
been lost.
Fortunately, at Denderah the patron divinities are well known, so
it will be well to begin with the temples there. We find a general
plan of Denderah among the magnificent drawings which we owe to the
French expedition of 1798. This shows the wall round the temple-space
containing the temple of Hathor, the great temple; and the smaller
temple of Isis at right angles to it. We find, roughly, that the great
temple points to the north-east; the smaller temple of Isis points to
the south-east. A later plan has been published by Mariette in his work
on Denderah.
These, then, are the main conditions of the temples at Denderah. But
we can go a little more closely into them by referring to the map
which accompanies Biot's memoir, to which I have previously referred.
He gives the axis of the Hathor temple pointing, not merely to the
north-east, but to 18° E. of N. Since the other temple lies at right
angles to the great one, its direction, according to Biot, is 18° S. of
E.
To show the uncertainty in these inquiries brought about by the absence
of a proper survey, I may give the following later values:--
1. LEPSIUS, 1844--
Magnetic azimuth of the axis N. 25° E.
" amplitude " " 65° N. of E.
Correction 8½°
∴ Astronomical amplitude 73½° N. of E.
2. MARIETTE, 1870--
Astronomical azimuth N. 15° E.
" amplitude 75° N. of E.
3. LOCKYER, 1891--
Magnetic azimuth of axis N. 23° E.
" amplitude " 67 N. of E.
Assumed correction 4½°
Astronomical amplitude 71½°
As my value agrees closely with that of Biot, I adhere to it; and it
gives, for the amplitude of the temple of Isis at right angles to the
Hathor temple, 18½° S. of E.
Now, it is stated distinctly in the inscriptions that "the place of the
birth of Isis is to the north-west of the temple of Hathor, its portal
is turned to the east, and the sun shines on its portal when it rises
to illuminate the world."[50] We learn from this that the small temple
was locally celebrated as the birthplace of Isis.
It is, then, a temple of Isis. Who was Isis?
Let us begin by considering the temple, remarking that the
inscriptions, apparently relating to both temples, are found in
one only. On this point, I, for the present, content myself with
quoting Plutarch's statement[51] that Isis and Hathor were the same
divinities--at all events, in later Egyptian times.
If we study the inscriptions--and this, thanks chiefly to Mariette's
magnificent book on Denderah, we can do--we find that they give out a
very certain sound. Here is one of them:--
"She [_i.e._ her Majesty Isis] shines into her temple on New Year's
Day, and she mingles her light with that of her father Rā on the
horizon."
Here we have nothing more nor less than a distinct and perfectly
accurate statement relating to the cosmical rising of a star, _i.e._,
as I have before explained, of the sun and the star both rising at the
same instant of time.
[Illustration: RUINS OF THE MAMISI (PLACE OF BIRTH) OR TEMPLE OF ISIS
AT DENDERAH.]
Further, in the inscriptions the "_rising of Hathor_" is mentioned
distinctly. "La grande déesse Sefekh [Sesheta] apporté les écrits qui
se rapportent à ton lever, ô Hathor, et au lever de Rā."[52] Everybody
knows that "Rā" means the sun, and therefore the rising of Rā is at
once accepted by everybody as obviously meaning sunrise. But if we
find "Hathor" treated in the same way as the sun, then Hathor must be
a celestial body rising like the sun. I consider this a very important
conclusion to arrive at, for many reasons.
But, further, Hathor was also worshipped, according to the
inscriptions,[53] under the name of Sothis.
Now we know, quite independently of all mythology, that Sothis is
simply the Greek form of the Egyptian name (Sept) of the star Sirius.
Taking, then, all these inscriptions together, we have an absolute
astronomical demonstration of the fact that the "rising of Hathor,"
which is referred to mythologically in the inscriptions given by
Mariette, was the rising of Sirius; that the star which "shone into the
temple, and which mingled her light with the light of her father Rā,"
was really the star Sirius. We get the demonstration of the fact that
mythologically the star Sirius was Hathor, or otherwise Isis.
In other words, we find a star personified; Sirius being personified as
Hathor or Isis.
But we can go much further than this. It is possible, as I have shown,
to determine the position of Sirius in past times, and therefore to
determine whether the light of that star ever did fall along the axis
of the temple. We know its orientation approximately--18½° S. of
E.--so that any celestial body which rose at that amplitude would shine
upon any object enshrined in the sanctuary. In the case of Sirius,
the conditions are such that, owing to the precessional movement, the
distance of the star from the equator has been gradually lessening from
the earliest times. Its declination in 8000 B.C. was 50° S.; it became
something more than 17° S. in A.D. 1000.
Knowing the declination, it is easy to determine the amplitude--and
given the conditions at the temple of Isis at Denderah, viz., that we
are practically dealing with a sea horizon, we find that the temple
really pointed to Sirius about 700 B.C., which is the date Biot found
for the construction of the zodiac in the temple of Osiris, referred to
in Chapter XIII.
Further, it is easy to show that Sirius at that date rose with the
sun on the Egyptian New Year's Day;[54] in mythological language, she
mingled her light with that of her father Rā on the great day of the
year.
As this is the first instance of such personification that we have
come across, it behoves us to study it very carefully. Why was Sirius
personified and worshipped?
The summer solstice--that is, the 20th of June, the longest day--was
the most important time of the Egyptian year, as it marked the rise of
the all-fertilising Nile. It was really New Year's Day. It has been
pointed out, times without number, that the inscriptions indicate that
by far the most important astronomical event in Egyptian history was
the rising of the star Sirius at this precise time.
Now it seems as if among all ancient peoples each sunrise, each return
of the sun--or of the sun-god--was hailed, and most naturally, as a
resurrection from the sleep--the death--of night: with the returning
sun, man found himself again in full possession of his powers of
living, of doing, of enjoying. The sun-god had conquered death; man was
again alive. Light and warmth returned with the dawn in those favoured
Eastern climes where man then was, and the dawn itself was a sight, a
sensation, in which everything conspired to suggest awe and gratitude,
and to thrill the emotions of even uncivilised man.
What wonder, then, that sunrise was the chief time of prayer and
thankfulness? But prayer to the sun-god meant, then, sacrifice; and
here a practical detail comes in, apparently a note of discord, but
really the true germ of our present knowledge of the starry heavens
which surround us.
To make the sacrifice at the instant of sunrise, preparations had to be
made, beasts had to be slaughtered, and a ritual had to be followed;
this required time, and a certain definite quantity of it. To measure
this, the only means available then was to watch the rising of a star,
the first glimmer of which past experience had shown to precede sunrise
by just that amount of time which the ritual demanded for the various
functions connected with the sunrise sacrifice.
This, perhaps, went on every morning, but beyond all question the most
solemn ceremonial of this nature in the whole year was that which took
place on New Year's morning, or the great festival of the Nile-rising
and summer solstice, the 1st of Thoth. Besides the morning ceremonial
there were processions of the gods during the day.
How long these morning and special yearly ceremonials went on before
the dawn of history we, of course, have no knowledge. Nor are the
stars thus used certainly known to us. Of course any star would do
which rose at the appropriate time before the sun itself, whether the
star was located in the northern or in the southern heavens. But in
historic times there is no doubt whatever about the star so used. The
warning-star watched by the Egyptians at Thebes, certainly 3000 B.C.,
was Sirius, the brightest of them all, and there is complete evidence
that Sirius was not the star first so used.[55]
[Illustration: CEREMONIAL PROCESSION IN AN EGYPTIAN TEMPLE. (_From a
Restoration by the French Commission._)]
The astronomical conditions of the rising of this star have,
fortunately for us, been most minutely studied both by Biot and, in
more recent times, by Oppolzer, and from their labours it seems to
be abundantly clear that the rising of Sirius at the solstice was
carefully watched certainly as early as 3285 B.C., according to Biot's
calculations; and, further, that the rising of the same star was still
studied in a relatively modern time. At the earlier date its heliacal
rising was observed, but in later times means had been secured of
noticing its cosmical rising, because although it rose long before the
sun on the longest day 3000 B.C., it rose _with_ the sun on the same
day in the later times referred to. This "cosmical rising" observation
was doubtless secured by the construction of their temples, as I have
shown.
We are, then, astronomically on very firm ground indeed. We have got
one step into the domain of mythology. I assume it is agreed that we
have arrived at the certain conclusion that the goddess Hathor or Isis
personified a star, Sirius, rising at the dawn; and that the temple of
Isis at Denderah was built to watch it.