134 cosxMos. 



Besides Sirius, Vega, Deiieb, Reguliis, and SjDioa aie at tha 

 present time decidedly white ; and among the small double 



the members of which, although they apparently differ very widely from 

 each other, admit of being arranged somewhat in the following order. 

 By the three-fold transference of the verbal signification, we obtain from 

 the original meaning, to throw out — projicere (sagiiiam, telum) — first, 

 seminare, to sow; next, extendere,to extend or spread (as spun threads); 

 and, lastly, w^hat is here most important, to radiate light and to shine 

 (as stars and fire). From this series of ideas we may deduce the names 

 of tliG divinities. Satis (the female archer); Sothis, the radiating, and 

 SUh, the fieiy. We may also hieroglyphically explain sit or seti, tha 

 aiTows as well as the ray ; seta, to spin ; setu, scattered seeds. Sothis 

 is especially the brightly radiating, the star regulating the seasons. of 

 the year and periods of time. The small triangle, always represented 

 yellow, which is a symbolical sign for Sothis, is used to designate the 

 radiating sun when arranged in numerous triple rows issuing in a down- 

 ward direction from the sun's disk. Seth is the fiery scorching god, in 

 contradistinction to the warming, fnictifying water of the Nile, the god- 

 dess Satis who inundates the soil. She is also the goddess of the cat- 

 aracts, because the overflowing of the Nile began with the appearance 

 of Sothis in the heavens at the summer solstice. In Vettius Valens the 

 star itself is called 2^0 instead of Sothis; but neither the name nor the 

 subject admits of our identifying Thoth with Seth or Sothis, as Ideler 

 has done. {Handbtich der Chronologie, bd. i., s. 126.)" (Lepsius, bd. 

 i., s. 13G.) 



I will close these observations taken from the early Egyptian periods 

 with some Hfellenic, Zend, and Sanscrit et^'mologies : " I'f/p, the sun," 

 says Professor Franz, '' is an old root, ditlering only in pronunciation 

 from i9fp, ■&Epog, heat, summer, in which we meet with the same change 

 in the vowel sound as in reipog and repog or repac- The coiTeclness of 

 these assigned relations of the radicals asip and d^ep, ■&epo^, is proved 

 not only by the employment of T^epsiTarog in Aratus, v. 149 (Ideler, 

 Sternname7i, s. 241), but also by the later use of the forms aeipog, eel- 

 pcog, and cetpivog, hot, burning, derived from adp. It is worthy of no- 

 tice that aeLpd or -deiptvu i/mTLa is used the same as ■depivu l/uaTLa, light 

 summer clothing. The form oeipiog seems, however, to have had a wider 

 application, for it constitutes the ordinary term appended to all stars in- 

 fluencing the summer heat: hence, according to the version of the poet 

 Archilochus, the sun was adpiog dorrjp, while Ibycus calls the stars gen- 

 erally aeipia, luminous. It can not be doubted that it is the sun to which 

 Archilochus refers in the words TToTiXovg fi£v avrov aelptog Karavavel u^vg 

 kXkdnrruv. According to Hesychius and Suidas, l,eipLog does indeed 

 signify both the sun and the Dog-star; but I fully coincide with M. Mar- 

 tin, the new editor of Theon of Smyrna, in believing that the passage 

 «f Hesiod (Opera ct Dies, v. 417) refers to the sun, as maintained by 

 Tzetzes and Procfus, and not to the Dog-star. From the adjective cei- 

 pioc, which has established itself as the ' epitheton perpetuum^ of the 

 Dog-star, we derive the verb aeipiov, which may be translated * to 

 sparkle.' Aratus, v. 331, says of Siriiis, b^ia aeipLuei, ' it spai'kles strong- 

 1}'.' When standing alone, the word "LEiprjv, the Siren, has a totally dif« 

 ferent etymology ; and your conjecture, that it has merely an accidental 

 similarity of sound with the brightly shining star Sirius, is perfectly well 

 •bunded. The opinion of those who, according to Theon SmyniaEua 

 \Liber de Astronomia, ISiO p. 202 '^. derive ILeipjjv from aEipid^eiv (» 



