SUK WORSHIP — SPINDEN 459 



mal deities, Horns the Hawk, Hathor the Coay, Sekhmet the Lioness, 

 etc., who at best are only semihuman and who wear the solar disk. 

 Another difference is that the nations of ^Mesopotamia developed a defi- 

 nite astronomical science, recording the movements of Venus and other 

 planets, learning to predict eclipses, etc. — achievements that depended 

 on their having a zodiac. Their ritualistic astronomy became astrol- 

 ogy as the planets were plotted in the heavens to determine fate. 

 The Egyptians developed a rigid priestly year of exactly 365 days 

 which they attempted in one formula to correlate both with the rising 

 of Sirius and the flooding of the Nile. These natural events during 

 one 1,460-year cycle of Sathis grow 12 days apart. Yet sun worship 

 was more purely and completely a state religion in Thebes and 

 Memphis than it was in Babylon or Nineveh. 



As a relic of dynastic beginnings in Egypt the Serpent King's 

 ivory comb nicely supplements his fine stela. On the comb Hoinis, 

 the Falcon, rides above the title in a boat which one is tempted to 

 identify as the boat of the sun in later Egyptian art. If this identifi- 

 cation is made, the masonry ship of the sun shrine complex has a 

 fuller meaning and Horus commences his career, so to speak, as a 

 sun god instead of a sky god. Also we find the very early Scorpion 

 King with hoe in hand inaugurating, perhaps, an agricultural 

 season as the master farmer. Irrigation called for regimentation of 

 labor and must have been a factor in the upbuilding of kingly power. 

 Titles indicate a priority of Horus and a somewhat later rise of Re 

 as sun god. The first Re kings belong to the Second Dynasty begin- 

 ning with Neb-re. The great Zoser of the Third dynasty called him- 

 self Re-nub, the Sun of Gold. Some writers claim that there was a 

 violent turn-over in the priesthood as each early Re king was followed 

 by others who did not carry this specific sun title. 



The Egyptian pyramids are associated definitely enough with sun 

 worship, as are also the obelisks. This fact comes out in the inscrip- 

 tions, but in addition the orientation at Giza is almost perfect. The 

 Great Pyramid has a deviation of 0°3'43", averaging the four sides, 

 from the cardinal points. Although the epithet "pyramidiots" has 

 been proposed for astronomical theorists, the orientation of this group 

 of pyramids is too close to be dismissed as accidental ; the associated 

 temples face true east.* The sun shrine of Ne-user-re is placed with 

 pyramids, but really it is a ceremonial enclosu"e with a massive 

 obelisk also showing orientation. The architectural sun ship is 

 outside the enclosure. The inscription, associated with stars and 

 standards, deals with ceremonies planned to renew the forces of the 

 king. 



* In Archeology and Astronomy, Dinsmoor reexamines orientation theories and data. 

 He shows, for Instance, that th« ails of the Parthenon was derived from the sun on 

 the natal day of Athena. 



