217
The fame of Orion was eclipsed in later days by that of Sopd or
Sirius. But this had its reason in the physio-graphical peculiarities
of Egypt. The heliacal rising of Sirius, the Dog Star, that is to say,
its first appearance along with the sun, corresponded with the
rise of the Nile in Upper Egypt, and accordingly became a mark
of time, and the starting-point of the solar year. Its importance [236]
therefore was great, not only for the calendar, but also for
those agricultural operations upon which the very existence of
Egypt depended. We need not wonder, accordingly, if with
the settlement of the Pharaonic Egyptians in the valley of the
Nile the worship and name of Orion fell more and more into
the background, while that of Sirius became pre-eminent. How
far back the pre-eminence of Sirius reaches may be gathered
from the fact that the twentieth nome of Northern Egypt—that of
Goshen—derived its name from a combination of the mummified
hawk of Horus and the cone which, as Brugsch first showed,^189
represents the shaft of zodiacal light that accompanies the rising
of Sirius before the dawn of day. Sopd or Sirius is thus identified
with the dead Horus who presided over Nekhen in Upper Egypt,
and preceded Osiris as the god of the dead.^190
Of the other stars and constellations we do not know much.
The Great Bear was called“the haunch of beef,”and was at
times identified with Set, and made the abode of the souls of the
(Pepi80), and of Akhimt, the grammatically-formed wife of Akhim“planet,”
who is associated with“Babî, the lord of night”(Unas645, 646). One
of the constellations frequently mentioned in the Pyramid texts is“the Bull
of heaven,”which was also an important constellation in early Babylonian
astronomy, where the name formed part of an astronomical system; inUnas
421 the“Bull of heaven”is called theAnor“column”of Heliopolis. We
hear also of“the fresh water of the stars”(Unas210). With the latter may be
compared the goddess Qeb%u, or“Fresh Water,”the daughter of Anubis, the
primitive god of the dead, who poured forth the liquid from four vases (Pepi
393). With the name of the goddess the symbol of the Antæopolite nome of
Upper Egypt is associated.
(^189) In theProc. SBA.xv. p. 233.
(^190) Or rather, perhaps, was the Osiris of primeval Egypt.