DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.4372#0111
93
strument, awkward and unmanageable as it appears to have been,
derives a peculiar interest from the precise resemblance of its
form to the ^T/ or Agathos Daemon of Kircher; a symbol which
very frequently occurs in hieroglyphical writing; and every
analogy leads us to conclude from this coincidence, that as the
Egyptians certainly introduced among their sacred characters a
variety of instruments, they would very naturally give the prece-
dence to one which was undoubtedly the earliest and simplest in
the oldest and most useful of arts. Nor would the hypothesis
become too forced, if we were to suggest that the Greek alpha
in its original form may be derived from the same source. The men
who arc yoked to the plough draw with their hands thrown back
on their shoulders; the oxen draw from the horns, to which is tied
a cross bar; and a rope suspended from the bar is attached to
the long limb of the plough. As the grain is sown and the ground
rolled immediately after either the hoe or the plough, it is natu-
ral to suppose that a single tillage was then, as it is now, in many
parts of Egypt, sufficient for all purposes of culture. I lerodotus
indeed says that no tillage was requisite to prepare the ground
for the seed; but the historian appears here to allude more
particularly to the country between the lake Maoris and the
coast. Costaz has observed a deficiency in the picture, in not
representing the mode of Avatcring the fields, which now makes
such an important part of Egyptian husbandry; and he imagines
that there may have been a time, when by the judicious dispo-
sition of the canals, and the seasonable distribution of the wa-
ters, this degrading labour may have been dispensed with. But
in Lower Egypt, where the soil is lower, and the inundations con-
sequently more abundant, this seems to have been a long esta-
blished practice, even in the time of Moses; who says to the
Israelites, Ueut. ch. xi. ver. 10. " Eor the laud whither thou goest
in.
strument, awkward and unmanageable as it appears to have been,
derives a peculiar interest from the precise resemblance of its
form to the ^T/ or Agathos Daemon of Kircher; a symbol which
very frequently occurs in hieroglyphical writing; and every
analogy leads us to conclude from this coincidence, that as the
Egyptians certainly introduced among their sacred characters a
variety of instruments, they would very naturally give the prece-
dence to one which was undoubtedly the earliest and simplest in
the oldest and most useful of arts. Nor would the hypothesis
become too forced, if we were to suggest that the Greek alpha
in its original form may be derived from the same source. The men
who arc yoked to the plough draw with their hands thrown back
on their shoulders; the oxen draw from the horns, to which is tied
a cross bar; and a rope suspended from the bar is attached to
the long limb of the plough. As the grain is sown and the ground
rolled immediately after either the hoe or the plough, it is natu-
ral to suppose that a single tillage was then, as it is now, in many
parts of Egypt, sufficient for all purposes of culture. I lerodotus
indeed says that no tillage was requisite to prepare the ground
for the seed; but the historian appears here to allude more
particularly to the country between the lake Maoris and the
coast. Costaz has observed a deficiency in the picture, in not
representing the mode of Avatcring the fields, which now makes
such an important part of Egyptian husbandry; and he imagines
that there may have been a time, when by the judicious dispo-
sition of the canals, and the seasonable distribution of the wa-
ters, this degrading labour may have been dispensed with. But
in Lower Egypt, where the soil is lower, and the inundations con-
sequently more abundant, this seems to have been a long esta-
blished practice, even in the time of Moses; who says to the
Israelites, Ueut. ch. xi. ver. 10. " Eor the laud whither thou goest
in.