Note 3 — Chapter XIV · Creation Myths and the God and Goddess Cults

Pʼan Ku, with his implements, links with the Egyptian artificer god Ptah of Memphis, who used his hammer to beat out the metal firmament. Ptah’s name means “to open” in the sense of “to engrave, to carve, to chisel”; the sun and moon were his eyes; he was “the great artificer in metals, and he was at once smelter, and caster, and sculptor, as well as the master architect and designer of everything that exists in the world”. In the Book of the Dead he (or Shu) is said to have performed “the ceremony of opening the mouth of the gods with an iron knife”,3 as “Hasty” and “Heedless” opened the mouth, eyes, ears, and nostrils of Chaos in the Chinese myth. The high priest of Memphis was called Ur Kherp hem, “the great chief of the hammer”. As we have seen, he was closely associated with the Egyptian potter’s wheel, which reached China at an early period. Like Ptah, Pʼan Ku is sometimes depicted as a dwarf, and sometimes as a giant.