^64< THE ANCIENT EGYPTIANS. CHAP. XIV. 



but seems rather to be a name applied to the lotus, 

 which was so commonly held in the hands of guests 

 in the convivial meetings of the Egyptians. 



Proclus pretends that the lotus was peculiarly 

 typical of the Sun, " which it appeared to honour 

 by the expansion and contraction of its leaves.'* 

 It was an emblem of Nofre-Atmoo, and introduced 

 with the infant Deity Ehoou.* 



" Garlic and onions/' according to Plinyt, "were 

 treated as Gods by the Egyptians when taking an 

 oath;" and Juvenal t derides them for their vene- 

 ration of these garden-born Deities. Plutarch says, 

 being held in abhorrence, the priests abstained from 

 them§ as unlawful food ; the reason of which was 

 probably derived from a sanatory precaution, as in 

 the case of beans and '* other kinds of pulse ."1| 

 But there is no direct evidence from the monuments 

 of their having been sacred; and they were admitted 

 as common offerings on every altar. Onions and 

 other vegetables were not forbidden to the gene- 

 rality of the people, to whom they were a princi- 

 pal article of food^ ; for, whatever religious feeling 

 prohibited their use on certain occasions, this was 

 confined to the initiated, who were required to 

 keep themselves more especially pure for the ser- 

 vice of the Gods. 



The palm branch I have shown to have been 

 adopted to represent a year, as Ilorapollo also 

 states**; and Clemens it considers it the symbol 



* Vide supra, p. 25.; and Vol. T. (2d Scries) p. 410, 411. 



+ Plin. xix. G. 



l Jiiv. Sat. 15. Fide snprd, Vol. I. (2d Series) p. 1G2. 



^ Pint. S.8. II Plut. s. 5. 



1[ Vide anprd. Vol. II. p. yi'S. 



** Ilorapollo, i. 4. Vide svprd, p. 2.; and Vol. I. (2d Series) p. 250. 



■j-f C;lem. Strom. G. 



