Chapter CX

The Beginning of the Chapters of the Garden of Hotepit, and of the Chapters of coming forth by day; and of entering and coming forth in the Netherworld, and of arriving at the Garden of Aarru, at the Rise(1) in Hotepit and at the Grand Domain, blest with the breezes: that I may take possession there and be in Glory there: that there I may plough and mow: that there I may eat and drink and love: doing whatsoever things are done upon earth.

Horus is seized by Sutu: who looketh as one turning(2) towards the Garden of Hotepit.

But for me Sutu releaseth Horus: and the double path which is nigh to Heaven is thrown open by Sutu. And Sutu taketh his portion of the breeze through the Power of his own day,(3) and he delivereth the bowels of Horus from the gods below.

Lo, I sail the great Bark on the Stream of the god Hotep. I took it at the mansion of Shu.

The mansion of his stars is again and again renewed.(4) I sail upon its streams that I may come to the domains thereof.

For I am in unison with his successive changes and his rules, and his papyrus,(5) and his attendant gods, and his chieftains. He reconcileth the two Warrior gods with those who have the charge of food and the beautiful creation which he raiseth up; and he reconcileth the two Warrior gods with each other.(6)

He severeth the mourners from those who quarrel with them: he putteth a stop to them whose hand is violent against those weaker than themselves: he keepeth within bounds the contentions of the Powers.

May I have possession there.

I know it, and I sail upon its streams that I may come to the domains thereof.

My mouth is potent and secured against the Glorified that they may not have the mastery of me.

May I have the investiture of thy Garden, O Hotep. What thou willest, do thou it.

Let me be glorified there, and eat and drink there, and plough there, and reap there, and grind(7) there, and have my fill of love there.

194May my mouth be potent there, let me there utter my Words of Power and not be slighted.

* * * * * * *

I am in possession of that Word of Power of mine which is the most potent one within this body of mine here: and by means of it I make myself either known or unknown.

I make my progress and I plough.

I take my rest in the divine Domain.

I know the names of the domains, the districts and the streams within the Garden of Hotep.

I am there, I am master there, I am in glory there, I eat there; I plant and I reap there; I plough there, and I take my fill of love. I am united there with the god Hotep.

I cast my seed there, and I sail upon its stream that I may come to the domains thereof, O Hotep.

Lo, my mouth is armed with sharp points. There is given to me the abundance which belongeth to the Ka and to the Glorified.

I give the reckoning of Shu to him who understandeth it.

I sail upon its stream, and I range within the Garden of Hotep, for Rā is in the sky, and Hotep is putting together the oblations.

I hasten to the land, and I fasten my stole upon me, that I may come forth, and that that may be given to me which hath to be given; that I may have joy and take possession of the wealth which Hotep assigneth to me.

Rise in Hotep, I arrive in thee, my soul is with me, and my provision is before the Mistress of the Two Earths, who maketh fast my Words of Power, which recall to mind that which I have forgotten. Let me live free from strife; and be there granted to me enlargement of heart.

Let my arteries be made fast, and let me have the enjoyment of the Breeze.(8)

Rise in Hotep, blest with the Breeze, I arrive in thee, my head is uncovered: Rā sleepeth, but there waketh for me, and there shineth upon me Hesit [the Cow-goddess](9) who lieth at the confines of Heaven by night.

He standeth in my way who heapeth against me his own dross.

But I am in my own domain.

Great Domain, I arrive in thee and I reckon up the abundance as I pass on to Uach.(10)

195I am the Bull, raised on high in the Blue; the lord of the Bull’s field; which Sothis describeth to me at her successive hours.

Uach, I arrive in thee, and I eat my cakes, and take possession of my joints of flesh and meat and fowl.

The winged things of Shu are given to me, and my Kau follow me.(11)

T’efait,(12) I arrive in thee, I put on the stole and fasten upon me the girdle of Rā, whilst he is in heaven,(13) and the gods who are in heaven are following Rā.

Rise in Hotep, Lord of the Two Earths, I arrive in thee: I salute the stream of T’eserit.(14) Lo, here am I, and all impurity is far from me. The great one flourisheth ... I net the ducks, and I eat dainties.

Kankanit,(15) I arrive in thee; that I may see my father and attentively view my mother.

I take care to net the reptiles; and that which protecteth me is that I know the name of that god who is next to T’eserit (goddess with flowing locks and armed with horns), and who reapeth.

I myself plough and reap.

Hesit, I arrive in thee, and I encounter the Blue.

I follow the Breezes, and the company of the gods.

It is the Great goddess who hath given me my head, and he who fasteneth my head upon me is the Great god, the Blue-eyed, who doeth according to his own will.

Userit,(16) I arrive in thee, in face of the mansion where food is produced for me.

Smait,(17) I arrive in thee. My heart is awake: my head is provided with the White crown and I am conveyed over the heavens: and I make those things to prosper which are below me: a joy to the Bull of the gods above, the divine company.

I am the Bull, the Lord of the gods; and I make my way through the midst of the Emerald ones.(18)

Isle of Corn and Barley, divine district, I arrive in thee. I encounter and I bear off that which proceedeth from the head of Rā: the pair of horns which have the force of purification.(19)

I make myself fast to the Block of Moorage on the heavenly stream, and I utter my praise to the gods who are in the Garden of Hotepit.

196Notes.

The text of this chapter handed down by the Turin papyrus and those which agree with it contains nothing very difficult for a translator, but on being compared with the older copies it is found to consist of a collection of small fragments of the older text put together without any regard to their original order or context. And about three-quarters of the old chapter are suppressed in the new recension.

The editors of the fine papyrus of Sutimes in their notes upon this chapter remark, that in the Turin text the sentences are in quite a different order from that of their papyrus, “On peut y voir,” they say, “l’effet de lectures et de transcriptions en rebours du sens, par des scribes ayant mal compris les éditions en colonnes rétrogrades.”

This is, curiously enough, the very fault of the papyrus of Sutimes itself, which is here wrong from beginning to end,^[98] though probably derived from an excellent original. It begins with the “Isle of Corn and Barley,” and jumbles together quite incoherent sentences.

The oldest copy of the chapter yet discovered is that of the Tomb of Chā-em-hait, at Thebes, and by a strange fatality it has been published in such a form that in order to read it correctly, we must begin with what is printed as line 11 and finish with line 1. We have it also in a very incomplete condition. We miss the first eighteen lines contained in the papyrus of Nebseni and the last words of every line.

The papyrus of Nebseni is the only complete text we have, and here as well as elsewhere it is extremely incorrect. Some parts are so corrupt that a translation must necessarily be dependent upon conjectural emendations which can have no genuine claim upon the reader’s confidence. We must be content with waiting till better authorities are discovered.

The Gardens of Hotepit and Aarru are the Paradise, Elysian Fields and Islands of the Blessed of the Egyptian imagination.^[99] They were supposed to be situated in the neighbourhood of the rising Sun, but certain features were apparently suggested by the islets of the Delta.

197The usual meaning of the word Ḥotepit, ,^[100] when written according to the orthography of the Pyramid Texts, is oblations, offerings. This, however, is only a derived meaning. The word really only expresses a predicate of the things offered, as putting together, uniting, reconciling; Ḥotep might signify Rest, or Peace; very appropriate names for such a garden. is the name of a god who dwells here.^[101] There is also a goddess here called Ḥotepit , mentioned in the Pyramid inscription of Pepi I (line 423), as mother of the great Scarab: and the same name is given to Hathor in the temple of Dendera. The name of Ḥotep (with different determinatives^[102]) belongs to one of the islands of this blissful place.

The Pyramid Texts furnish some interesting information not contained in the Book of the Dead. We are told that the approach to the Garden is over the Lake of Putrata (see chapter 40, note 1), that there is a great lake (? that of Konsit) in the middle of the Garden of Ḥotepit, upon which the great gods alight, and that the Achmiu Sekiu, the starry deities who never set, there feed the departed from the wood of life ( lignum vitæ) “upon which they themselves live, in order that he too may live.” Shu and Tefnut are mentioned as divinities of this place. But perhaps the most remarkable fact is that Horus had enemies even here, who, however, were annihilated by the divine weapons at the disposal of the departed worthy, who was led there in order that “he might sit among the stars in heaven.”

And here it was that the beatified personage sat upon his throne of steel, which was decorated in front with faces of the lion-god Maaḥes, the feet of it being the hoofs of the great 198Bull Sma-urà, and extended his hand to the coming generation of men (the ), whilst the gods approached him in submissive attitude, and made offerings to him. It was, perhaps, from these offerings that the Garden derived its name.

The Garden of Aarru, is often mentioned in connection with that of Ḥotepit, and may perhaps be considered as the most notable part of it. It is through its Gate that the Sun-god rises up into Heaven.

It takes its name from a plant ȧarru (later, , B.M. 551; , Ag, Chapter 17; ,^[103] Ba, Chapter 110, by phonetic dissimilation of rr into nr). The usual form in later times is , but we find even shorter forms in , B.M. 32, and . The determinative of a reptile, indicates a creeping, climbing, twining plant, such as the convolvulus, hop, or vine.^[104]

199The term ‘Garden’ implies in this connection nothing more than a cultivated enclosure.

The names of different localities which are invoked by the deceased and appear on the vignette of the chapter, have here been made prominent by means of heavy type.

I suspect that ‘day’ is a faulty interpretation of the ambiguous , and that the true sense of the passage is that Sutu is satisfied with the share which comes to his turn, and thereupon delivers Horus from imprisonment in the lower world. The perplexity, or ignorance of the copyists is seen in the very next words. One has 200‘he who is in Merit,’ others ‘he who is in my mouth,’ and two ‘he who is in the egg,’ if this be the sense of the very questionable group , which looks like a mistake for , a well known title of Anubis.

There can be no doubt about the right reading of the name which is Ḥesit; the is written in so many texts (see Pepi, I, 306, Amamu, 21, 1, Lepsius, Auswahl, IX, and the form at Philae), that there is no reason for confounding the name with that of ḥetemit. We must therefore attach no importance to this latter name when applied in the vignette of the Turin Todtenbuch to one of the divine abodes which bears the name of the goddess, and is written exactly like it.

, , is a word of very rare occurrence. Birch and Naville understood it of the netting, and Brugsch, of the pluming of birds. Both meanings may be disputed, but whatever Shu did, was done to birds, and these are said to be given to the deceased.

The prayer that a person may travel over the blissful parts, followed by his kau , is repeatedly found on the early monuments. Several papyri say that the deceased is followed by ‘the gods and the kau.’

The vignettes of the chapter which are here given from different authorities are explained in their proper place.