1823.] 
were not originated by it, would be as 
perverted a mode of reasoning, as if 
some stranger to our religion were to 
refer the ground-plan of our churches 
to the ornamental crosses in the jewel- 
lers’ shops. . 
There are, besides, some represen- 
tations of altars modelled in the form 
of the Crux Ansata, (a form of struc- 
ture which appears to have extended 
from the Egyptians to the Druids ;) 
and, as these altars have nothing in 
common with either a key or an agri- 
cultural instrument, the fact anmihi- 
lates both those inferences at once. 
Looking at my argument, thercfore, 
in the most sceptical point of view, 
granting that the same model was 
applied to objects so very dissimilar, 
Still the fair inference is, that the forms 
of the temple, the altar, and the tomb, 
among a people so scrupulously reii- 
gious as the Egyptians, preceded, if 
they did not originate, the shape of . 
the key and the drill; and it is most 
probable that the figure employed was 
a religious symbol, applied to arts, 
inventions, and occupations, which 
were fancifully conceived to be of a 
religious character. That the cross 
in question is a key or drill, is at all 
events a surmise ; but that the figures 
I allude to are altars, no one can 
doubt. (See Denon, plate 55, 4to. ed.) 
Indeed, the improbability of the 
Crux Ansata being any thing but an 
abstract symbol, is increased by a 
further investigation of the subject. It 
is not alittle curious, that this cross in 
ancient times was borne as an ensign, 
like that of the latter Roman empire, 
or those of modern Christian princes. 
With the large part extended, it was 
the Egyptian banner, and served as a 
support to the crest or device of the 
Egyptian cities; as, a lion for Leon- 
topolis, a goat for Panopolis, &e. a 
circumstance, by the way, that proves 
that this singular people was the in- 
ventor of this, as well as of every 
other, art. The old banner o/ Persia, 
as appears from the sculptures at 
Shapouz, was also a cross, with the 
addition of a globe to each of the 
three upper arms; by which, no doubt, 
some picce of theology, similar to that 
of the globe, the wing, and the serpent, 
was implied. Vhe Lombards adopt- 
ed a banner in every respect similar ; 
a fact which would seem to imply 
some remote connexion between the 
two races. It also appears on some 
reverses of Saxon coins, and has dc- 
On the Egyptian Tau, or Crux Ansata. 
23 
scended from the Lombards to their 
descendants the pawnbrokers, whose 
device itis. Qn all occasions but the 
latter it seems to have preserved its 
religious character. Banners have 
always been consecrated things ; per- 
haps originally they were talismans 
or palladia, stamped with the sigu of 
the tutelary divinity ; but that among 
the Egyptians they were of a character 
decidedly religious cannot be doubted. 
For there is extant in Kircher (I 
believe copied from the Pamphilion 
Obelisk at Rome,) a prolonved Crux 
Ansata, with a horned serpent sus- 
pended upon it,—which species of 
serpent was a symbol, as is well 
known, of creative wisdem. indeed 
this representation is almost in all 
respects similar to the model adopted 
-by moder artists in pourtraying the 
brazen serpent in the wilderness,—a 
circumstance, in truth, of very extra- 
ordinary coincidence; since the com- 
bined symbol is admitted to have been 
a type (indeed it is so stated by our 
Saviour himself,) of the great Chris- 
tian atonement. 
From a collection of the above 
evidences, I think it will be manifest 
that the sign of the Tau, however dif- 
ferently applied, was the memento of 
some religious mystery, most probably, 
from the peculiar veneration paid to 
it, the most antique in the anticnt 
world; and, without entering. into the 
mysticism of Kircher and his disciples, 
there is quite suflicient ground for 
supposing that it pointed at a mystery 
not very dissimilar from that of the 
Christian cross. The latter, hew- 
ever, is the record of an historical 
miracle; the Crua Ansata must rather 
be considered as tue memento of sone 
predicted benefit to man. 
It is not a little singular that the 
veneration demonstrated for both 
kinds of cross, the Christian and the 
Pagan, although expressed at such 
distant periods of time, should have 
exhibited itself with features so 
strikingly similar. The numerous 
modes in which the Christian cross 
has been combined in old architectural 
orn&ments and carly coins, are suffi- 
ciently notorious. Much the same 
result occurred to the Crux Ansata. It 
is the origin of those beautiful serells, 
by eminence called Greek and Wtrus- 
can, but in reality Egyptian; in some 
of which it appears in a simple tncom- 
pounded state, in others more compli- 
cated and combined, 
The 
