The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1901-04-12
THE CAT AND THE MOON.

TFrom the Gentlenan's Magazine1
Visitors to the British museum, inspect
ing the antiquities in the Egyptian rooms.
are much interested in the array of cat
mummies in one of the wall cases. Won
der is often expressed why cats and croco-
dies should have been enbalmed and why
the gods of Egypt should have various
animal heads such as the lion, the jacka1
the ibis and the hawk It seems so in
credibly stupid as well as so superstitious
considering how advanced the Egyptians
were in civilization and culture. They
could build temples, erect massive ODE
works. There are scufptured figures IN
the museum which date from $500 B. G.
specimens of writing probably a. thousand
years older than that. This ancient peo-
glyphic writing in which a feather was
the letter A, and lion the letter l.
truth; and all the letters had been en-
blems or symbols of things and guam
Does it not occur to US that perhaps
the animal heads were symbolic also, and
cause of their sacred significance7 The
E i5tf Ras were not fools and we must
without seeking to understand It. Per-
haps they did not really worship it, any
the crucifix- Trees and serpents and many
other things had a place in the religious
tree seems to mark the place of sun
1tiislng on m1osunner gay, ana curlousIy
this tree IN the seventeenth chanteT Of
the Book of the Dead the cat is ex1iaired
to be Ra himself, the chief god. A ser
pent was often carried in long mystical
procession; and in some of the pictures
a cat is represented in the act of cutting
off its head Along with the ass, the cat
Is Es 9al af h saysr OF Ereat words Ts in the
stances are enough to show that the cat
nad 3 pLaes IN t ne reIiiglouSs symbolism or
crocodile, the bull and other animals each
had its Special signfficance The hull vas
fr1nnTfanf a hsa
Apis, was kept at Memphis, and treated
WIN sIeS ~ lsspeel; ~. ne was as NOT al
and the most likely reason is that he rep
years. Which must t tgGli p TMnty1S
When he was taken through the city in
tell how old he was, and he would thus
be a. walking almanac. If he did not die
naturally he was drowned at the age OF
IS. because the new cycle had to begin,
and divine Apis must be found.
But he was honored BY being embalmed
and buried IN granite SarcOphaguS. in
the neighborhood of the pyramids. The
burial place Of the the sacred bulls was
visitor to Egypt goes to see these tOmbs.
Each of the stone cofrins has its memo
twentieth year, the month Mesori, the
twentieth day, under the reign Of King
Psametik I, the majesty of the living Apis
departed to heaven. This god was car
ried in peace ito his burial to the beau
Now, there was burial place for sacred
cats as well as sacred bulls; and the rea-
they had a. place in the symbolic worship.
A cemetery of cats existed near Bubastis.
which is the modern Tel Basta, not far
from Zag-a-zig Junction, the railway.
Buried in the mound, NJ Naville a few
years ago found the ruined temple of
Bast or Pasht the. cat goddess, who gave
her name to the city. The foundation Of
Bubastis carries US back to the beginning
of the historical times of Egypt, and is
contemporary with the pyramids. the old
monuments Herodotus says: THE tenn
pie stands in the middle Of the city and is
visible on all sides as one walks round
it; for, as the city has been raised up by
an embankment, while the temple has
been left untouched in its original COndf-
tion you look down upon it wherever you
are A low wall runs round the inclos-
ure having figures engraved upon it, and
inside there IS a grove of beautiful tall
trees growing round the shrine, which
contains the Image Of the goddess" And
concerning the goddess herself he says.
1.-The Bubastis of the Egyptians is the
this we may add that the Artenis of the
Greeks is generally said to be the same as
the Diana of the Romans, a goddess of
light, representing the moon
Thus we see that BaSt, or Pasht, was
connected with the cat on the one hand
and the moon on the other. So it is quite
a symbol in the Egyptian worship rep
resentS something in the domain of as
tronorny and the calendar Ovid calls the
cat the sister of the moon and saws that
Pasht took the form of a cat to avoid
Typhon. According to Plutarch a cat
placed in a lustrum denoted the moon. Tt
IS a night animal. and its eyes glisten in
the dark Hyde Clarke remarks that there
are phenomena of periodicity in the cat.
which are supposed to have given rise to
its relationship to the moon. What think
clearer than it was before-is, that the cat
was an intercalary month"; added in the
10th year. to rectify the calendar.
Estate casarD Arrasted