238 THE ANCIENT EGYPTIANS. CHAP. XIIT. 



God of Elephantine has the same office as that 

 ascribed to the one he distinguishes by the name of 

 Cnouphis." This is further confirmed by my having 

 " found an inscription in that island beginning 

 Xvou|3/ 0Ha>/," where a temple dedicated to him stood 

 till lately amidst the ruins of the ancient town, the 

 same mentioned by Strabo as that of Cnuphis. It 

 is, indeed, as consistent to suppose the Deity of the 

 inundation to be one of the characters of the God 

 Neph, as **the president of the Western Mountain" 

 to be one of the characters of the Goddess Atlior. 



Herodotus*, Diodorus, and other writers, in 

 speakingofthe Jupiter of Ethiopia, evidently had in 

 view the God Neph ; and there is less difficulty in 

 accounting for the notion of his being the same as 

 Jupiter, since he was, if not the King, at least the 

 leader, of the Gods. He corresponded to no other 

 Deity of the Greek Pantheon ; and the triad of the 

 cataracts, by uniting him with Sate or Juno, appears 

 to give liim a claim to the name of Jove. There 

 is not, however, she same excuse for confounding 

 Neph with Amun, or giving to the latter Deity 

 the head of a ram. 



*' The inhabitants of the Thebais, says Plutarcht, 

 worship their God Kneph only, whom they look 

 upon as without beginning so without end, and 

 are exempt from the tax levied for the maintenance 

 of the sacred animals." But tiiis could only be true 

 if he alludes to the earliest inhabitants of that dis- 

 trict; for the v/orship of Amun, or Amun-Re, was 



* Herodotus says the only two Gods worshipped at Meroe were Ju- 

 piter and Bacchus ; meaning Nejih and Osiris. Jlde p. 249. 267. 

 f Pint, de Is. et Osir. s.^21. 



