Egyptian Literature/The Book of the Dead/Air and Water
AIR AND WATER
[From the Papyrus of Nu (British Museum No. 10,477, sheet 12).]
The Chapter of snuffing the air and of having the mastery over the water in the underworld. The Overseer of the palace, the chancellor-in-chief, Nu, triumphant, saith:
“Hail, Hap-ur, god of heaven, in thy name of ‘Divider of heaven,’ grant thou unto me that I may have dominion over the water, even as the goddess Sekhet had power over Osiris on the night of the storms and floods. Grant thou that I may have power over the divine princes who have their habitations in the place of the god of the inundation, even as they have power over their own holy god of whose name they are ignorant; and may they let me have power even as [he hath let them have power].”
“My nostrils are opened in Tattu,” or (as others say), “My mouth and my nostrils are opened in Tātāu, and I have my place of peace in Annu, which is my house; it was built for me by the goddess Sesheta, and the god Khnemu set it up for me upon its walls. If to this heaven it cometh by the north, I sit at the south; if to this heaven it cometh by the south, I sit at the north; if to this heaven it cometh by the west, I sit at the east; and if to this heaven it cometh by the east, I sit at the west. I draw the hair of my nostrils, and I make my way into every place in which I wish to sit.”
In the Papyrus of Nefer-uben-f (see Naville, op. cit., Bd. I. Bl. 70) this chapter ends quite differently, and reads:
“I am strong in my mouth and in my nostrils, for behold Tern has stablished them; behold, O ye gods and Khus. Rest thou, then, O Tem. Behold the staff which blossometh, and which cometh forth when a man crieth out in your names. Behold, I am Tem, the tree(?) of the gods in [their] visible forms. Let me not be turned back. . . . I am the Am-khent, Nefer-uben-f, triumphant. Let neither my flesh nor my members be gashed with knives, let me not be wounded by knives by you. I have come, I have been judged, I have come forth therein, [I] have power with my father, the Old man, Nu. He hath granted that I may live, he hath given strength unto me, and he hath provided me with the inheritance of my father therein.”