The Music of the Egyptians has of course been lost, unless some remains of it survive in the partly monotonous, partly noisy, melodies of the Orient of to-day. It seems to have proceeded but little beyond a rhythmic tinkling. They knew the art of playing several instruments together, and in representations of musical parties there are persons por trayed who are engaged solely in beating time with the hands, and whose disproportionate number indicates the importance of their occupation. The fact that musical instruments are frequently found in the tombs of private persons is an evidence that a taste for music must also have pre vailed among the upper classes. (See Frontispiece, fig. 6.) Games. —The Egyptians had other means of entertainment: they played games with balls, hoops, and rods; even in the palaces of the Pharaohs, as mentioned (p. 127), there was a kind of chess game which was played with wooden figures. Dolls with movable limbs, wooden figures of animals, leather balls, and marbles have been found in the tombs of children. The little ones were permitted to play in the fore courts of the temples.
Raigion.—The acme of the Egyptian's life was, however, his religions worship. In order to comprehend him in this respect we must first cast a glance at his mythology. We can scarcely doubt that in Egypt, as among almost all nations of antiquity, an ancient sun-worship, together with human sacrifices, formed the foundation of the religious system. This retained its barbarous and often very repulsive form throughout the exten sive Asiatic regions. But in the limited of the Nile an exclusive and intelligent priesthood developed it, by the addition of cosmological theories and historical facts, into a mystic system which gave a symbolic meaning to their own services and an ethical basis to the participation of the people.
Even in later times the priest sealed the horn of the sacrificial ox with a ring on the stone of which was engraved the image of a man tied to a stake and threatened with a knife. The bead of the animal was then thrown into the river, with the imprecation that all the misfortunes that endangered Egypt should go with it. But it was impossible, on account of the vast growth of the mythology, that the people should reverently retain the entire circle of legends, even though they believed them.
Different places had their local deities, which, however, did not pre vent the coining together of numerous visitors, even from great distances, to celebrate the feast of some popular god. The veneration of animals, for which the Egyptians were upbraided even in ancient times, had a very innocent origin. In accordance with the usage of hieroglyphic writing, an animal, such as the crocodile, cat, etc., represented the initial letter of the god's name. In time these animals came to be considered as living reminders of the gods, then symbols and representatives of them, and finally they themselves were deified.'
Out of this grew the custom of distinguishing more definitely the statues of the gods, which in consequence of the undeveloped state of art were not clearly defined by their sculpture. This was done by interweaving the hieroglyphics of the gods with their head-dress or by placing upon them the beads of their sacred animals. Thus, for instance, the god Sebak is pictured with the head of a crocodile, because its Egyptian name, Suki, begins with the same sound as the name of the god, and its image was consequently adopted to represent the letter S. It followed from the veneration of local deities that animals representing them were sacred in certain parts of the country, while they remained unnoticed in others. Thus in Thebes no sheep, but goats only, were sacrificed, whereas in Memphis the reverse was the case.
The outlines of Egyptian mythology are briefly as follows: The origi nal cause of all created things was Amon, or Ammon, "king of the gods" and "master of the heavens and of thrones," as he was called. He was represented with the head of a ram, and was particularly venerated in ancient Thebes, in Meroe, and in the oasis of Siwah, where he had a famous sanctuary and an oracle. As the eternally-concealed and mys terious one, Ammon revealed himself to men in the persons of four other creative deities.
Net, or Ncith, represented primitive matter: she furnished the material for the formation of the world, and the heavens, the sun, and the earth came from her. On her shrine at Sais, where she was especially wor shipped, the inscription was as follows: I am all that was, and is, and is to be, and no mortal bath lifted my veil." or represented as a god the force acting in this original matter, or the spiritual part of Ammon, and as such he also took a principal part in the creation of the world, and was believed to be the creator of the gods and of mankind. He was particularly worshipped in Upper Egypt, and had a large temple in Esneh, where Net was enthroned at his side.
The two other members of the tetrad were Pascht and Scbak, "space" and " time." Pascht was represented with a cat's head and the solar disc, around which the nimus was wound, similar to the goddess Tejenrat 14, J. 3); Sebak (fig. TO with the head of a crocodile, above which ex tended the horns of a rain and two feathers, with the solar disc between and the snake at both sides. Pascht was chiefly worshipped in Bubastis, where capital punishment was inflicted for the crime of killing a cat; Sebak at Arsinoe, where a tame crocodile was kept in his honor. To these supernatural powers innumerable working and governing natural forces were added, which, though of inferior rank, in their special per sonifications resembled gods.