CHAPTER XXIII.

[From the Papyrus of Ani (Brit. Mus. No. 10,470, sheet 15).]
From the Papyrus of Ani, ; From the Turin Papyrus.
xxiii, 1-4] OPENING THE MOUTH OF THE DECEASED 133
Vignette: The statue of Ani, the scribe, seated upon a pedestal in the form of the emblem of Madt (i.e, right and truth). Before it stands the Sem priest clad in a panther’s skin and holding in his right hand the ram-headed, serpent-like instrument “ Ur-hekau,” with which he is about to touch the lips of the statue and so perform the ceremony of “ Opening the Mouth.” At his feet are a sepulchral box for holding unguents, &c.; three instruments called respectively “Seb-ur,” “Tun-tet,” and “Temanu”; and the object called “ Pesh-en-kef.” In the Papyrus of Nebseni the scene is described as “the Sem priest performing {the ceremony] of the ‘Opening of the Mouth’” (sheet 5). In the Saite Recension a priest is seen offering a vase of ointment only to the deceased.
Text: (1) THe CHAPTER OF OPENING THE MOUTH oF Ostris. THE SCRIBE ANI, TRIUMPHANT, saith :—
“May the god Ptah open my mouth, and may the god “of my city loose the swathings, even the swathings “which are over my mouth. (2) Moreover, may Thoth,' “being filled and furnished with charms, come and loose “the bandages, even the bandages of Set? which fetter “my mouth (3); and may the god Tem hurl them at “those who would fetter [me] with them, and drive “them back. May my mouth be opened, may my mouth “be unclosed by Shu® (4) with his iron knife wherewith “he opened the mouth of the gods. I am the goddess
1 The allusion here is to the belief that Thoth was the great master of the use of magical names and formulae. He gave the word which resulted in the creation of the world; he supplied Isis with words of magical power which enabled her to effect the
resurrection of Osiris, and also of her son Horus after he had been stung to death by a scorpion.
* The great antagonist of Horus, and god both of darkness and of dark deeds.
3 Some texts call the god Ptah.
134 THE GIVING OF WORDS OF POWER [Chap. xxiii. 5
““Sekhet,! and I sit upon [my] place in the great (5) “wind (?) of heaven. Iam the great goddess Sah who “dwelleth among the Souls of Annu (Heliopolis)2 ‘Now as concerning every charm and all the words “which may be spoken against me, (6) may the gods “resist them, and may each and every one of the “company of the gods withstand them,”