Dawn of civilization : Egypt and Chaldaea /

Front matter

THE ■ DAWN • OF CIVILIZATION

EGYPT AND CHALDEA

PROFESSOR MASPF.RO

Chapter II. The Gods Of Egypt

Their Number and their Nature — The Feudal Gods, Living and Dead —

The Triads — Temples and Priests — The Cosmogonies of the Delta —

The Enneads of Heliopolis and of Hermopolis ... ... ... 81

Chapter III. The Legendary History Of Egypt

The Divine Dynasties : Ra, Sbiu, Osiris, Sit, Horus — Tiiot, and the Invention of Sciences and Writing— Menes, and the Three First Human Dynasties ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 155

Chapter IV. The Political Constitution Of Egypt

The King, the Queen, and the Royal Princes — Administration under the Pharaohs — Feudalism and the Egyptian Priesthood, the Military —

The Citizens and Country Peotle ... . ... ... 247

CONTENTS.

xii

CHAPTER Y.

THE MEMPHITE EMPIRE.

TAG K

The Royal Pyramid Builders: Kheops, Khephren, Mykerinos — Memphite Literature and Art —Extension of Egypt towards the South, and the Conquest of Nubia by the Pharaohs ... ... ... 347

Appendix

The Pharaohs of the Ancient and Middle Empires ... ... ... 785

THE RIVER AND ITS INFLUENCE UPON THE FORMATION AND CHARACTER OF THE COUNTRY

THE OLDEST INHABITANTS OF THE LAND THE FIRST POLITICAL ORGANIZATION OF

THE VALLEY.

The Delta: its gradual formation , its structure , its canals — The valley of Egypt — The two arms of the river — The Eastern Nile — The appearance of its hanks — The hills — The gorge of Gebel Silsileh — The cataracts: the falls of Aswan- — Nubia — The rapids of Wacly Halfah — The Takcizze — The Blue Nile and the White Nile.

The sources of the Nile — The Egyptian cosmography — The four pillars and the four upholding mountains — The celestial Nile the source of the terrestrial Nile — The Southern Sea and the islands of Spirits — The tears of Isis — The rise of the Nile — The Green Nile and the Red Nile — The opening of the dykes — The fall of the Nile — The river at its lo west ebh.

The alluvial deposits and the effects of the inundation upon the soil of Egypt — Paucity of the flora : agnatic plants, the papyrus and the lotus ; the sycamore and the date-palm, the acacias, the clom-palms — The fauna: the domestic and wild animals; serpents, the warns; the hippopotamus and the crocodile; birds; fish, the fahaka.

The Nile god: his form and its varieties — The goddess Mirit — The supposed sources of the Nile, at Elephantine— The festivals of Gebel Silsileh — Hymn to the Nile from papyri in the British Museum.

B

The names of the Nile and Egypt: Romitit and Qbnit — Antiquity of the Egyptian people — Their first horizon — The hypothesis of their Asiatic origin — The probability of their African origin — The language and its Semitic affinities — The race and its principal types.

The primitive civilization of Egypt — Its survival into historic times — The women of Anion — Marriage — Bights of women and children — Houses — Furniture — Dress — Jewels — Wooden and metal arms — Primitive life — Fishing and hunting — The lasso and “bolas” — The domestication of animals — Plants used for food — The lotus — Cereals — The hoe and the plough.

The conquest of the valley — -Dylces — Basins — Irrigation — The princes — The nomes — The first local principalities — Late organization of the Delta — Character of its inhabitants — Gradual division of the principalities and changes of their areas — The god of the city.

MAP TO ILLUSTRATE 'THE DAWN OE CIVILIZATION” BY PROP MASPERO.

THE BANKS OF THE NILE NEAR BENI-SUEF.'