Note 170 — INTRODUCTION TO THE CHRONOLOGY OF THE EGYPTIANS.

The Pastophori do not appear in the train of the priests, and are expressly separated from the priests (ἱερεῖς) by Porphyrius. They were, as their name implies, the bearers of the small sacred chapels of the gods which formed the principal furniture of the temple. That is probably the reason why they appear in the great processions, where the images of the gods were carried about, not as priests, but as under-officers of the temple; and they are, therefore, rightly placed by Porphyrius along with the νεωκόροι, the sweepers of the temple, and the other servants of the temple (ὑπουργοί). As bearers of the sacred shrines they were also their watchmen, and, therefore, especially the overseers of the temple, the watchmen of the temple; therefore their hieroglyphical sign, according to Horapollo, i. 41, is a house watchman, φύλαξ οἴκου, because the temple is guarded by him, διὰ τὸ ὑπὸ τούτου φυλάττεσθαι τὸ ἱερόν. But what could the temple watchmen have had to do with medicine? There is nowhere even the most distant relation indicated between the pastophori and the physicians; indeed, their occupations appear necessarily to exclude them. I therefore believe that there is either some fundamental error, or a false reading, in the passage of Clemens, which cannot yet be solved. The pastophori were the principal under-officers, and therefore were united by their rank with the chanter, the lowest class of the priests. Was this possibly the reason why the books of medicine, which succeeded those of the chanter in this canon, were ascribed to them? There were many more than forty-two sacred books, and they must have all been lodged among the archives of the temple, without, however, being assigned to any particular class of priests.