Week 1 Assignment

The assignment is to read the handout (see below) and return prepared to discuss the function of each netjer in the narrative. I'm looking forward to a very exciting session next Sunday.

========== HANDOUT BELOW =================

THE PAPYRUS OF KNOWING (THE) FORMS OF RÉ
[AND THE] OVERTHROWING APEP

The Words [of] /nb-r-djr/ [Which] He Spoke After Coming into Being

I am The Creator as [The One Who] comes into being. I was The Creator [of the] forms which came into being, The Creator [of] all the forms that came into being. After my coming into being, many were the manifestations that came into being by coming forth from my mouth.

The sky did not exist. The earth did not exist. The offspring of the earth had not been created, [nor] the crawling (literally, “snakes”) in that place. [I] wove them while they were in /nw/, [in a condition] of great inactivity. I found no place in which to stand. I uttered an incantation in my heart, [and] I laid a foundation in truth. I fashioned every image.

I was alone. I had not spit as /shw/, I had not emitted as /tfn.t/. There did not exist another who worked with me. [So] I laid a foundation in my own heart, [and] there came into being [the] multitude emanations which came into being from the manifestations of births, [and] from that which came into being from their births. I, even I, husbanded with my fist. I had intercourse with my shadow. I poured seed from my own mouth. I spat out as /shw/. I emitted as /tfn.t/ (sic).

Said my father /nw/, “They weakened my eye behind them, since for double eons they proceeded from me after I had become from /ntr/ one, /ntr/ three, that is [to say], from [out of] myself, [after] I had come into being in this earth.”

Rejoiced, therefore, /shw/ [and] /tfn.t/ (sic) in the inert primeval waters in which they were. They brought me my eye from among them. Therefore, after I had united my members, I wept over them. [The] People [of kmt] came into being from [the] tears which came forth from my eye, [but] she raged against me after she came [and] found I had made another in her place. [So I] adorned her with the power I had made. I placed her on my forehead, which is to say, [in] her place on my face. Afterwards, therefore, she has ruled this land to its whole extent.

Have fallen their seasons upon these plants. I adorned them with that which is in them.
I came forth as plants, all crawling things, [and] all that has come into being within them.

Gave birth /shw/ [and] /tfn.t/ [to] /sb/ (sic) and /nw.t/. Gave birth /sb/ and /nw.t/ [to] /Asir(t)/, /hr-khnt-in-maa/, /stsh/, /As.t/ [and] /nb.t-hwt/ from the womb, one right after the other. [And] they gave birth [and] multiplied in this earth.

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Source: Papyrus Nes-Min (Bremner-Rhind), British Museum No. 10188, 4th Century A.D. (Greco-Roman Period). Also appears in E.A. Wallis Budge, The Gods of the Egyptians. Vol. I, pp. 308-313. © Retranslation, Raymond A. Davis, 2007.