Note 44 — INTRODUCTION

The belief that knowledge of the name of a person or thing gave its possessor power over it appears in nearly every chapter of the Book of the Dead as well as in the story of the Places of Râ. Hence it is probable that many of the names given in our text are only pseudonyms borrowed, perhaps, from other sects. Thus the names of Iao and Maskelli are expressly said to be those by which they are called by “the demons” and to correspond to those of certain wicked “Rulers.”