previous next
And because the Pans and Satyrs that inhabited the region about Chemmis were the first that knew of this disaster and raised the report of it among the people, all sudden frights and discomposures among the people have been ever since called panics. But when Isis heard of it, she cut off in that very place a lock of her hair, and put on a mourning weed, where there is a town at this day named Kopto; others think that name signifies bereaving, for that some use the word for depriving. And as she [p. 77] wandered up and down in all places, being deeply perplexed in her thoughts, and left no one she met withal unspoken to, she met at last with certain little children, of whom also she enquired about the ark. Now these had chanced to see all that had passed, and they named to her the very mouth of the Nile by which Typhon's accomplices had sent the vessel into the sea; for which reason the Egyptians account little children to have a faculty of divination, and use more especially to lay hold on their omens when they play in sacred places or chance to say an) thing there, whatever it be. And finding afterwards that Osiris had made his court to her sister, and through mistake enjoyed her instead of herself, for token of which she had found the melilot garland which he had left hard by Nephthys, she went to seek for the child; for her sister had immediately exposed it as soon as she was delivered of it, for fear of her husband Typhon. And when with great difficulty and labor she had found it, by means of certain dogs which conducted her to it, she brought it up; and he afterwards became her guardsman and follower, being named Anubis, and reported to guard the Gods as dogs do men.

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.

An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.

load focus English (Frank Cole Babbitt, 1936)
load focus Greek (Gregorius N. Bernardakis, 1889)
hide Display Preferences
Greek Display:
Arabic Display:
View by Default:
Browse Bar: