CHAP. XIII. NEPH, GOD OF MEROE. PTHAH. 249 



having been carried o^ from Tliehe.s by the Phoe- 

 nicians," is too absurd to be pardoned, even on 

 his usual excuse of having received it from the 

 Egyptian priests. His statement, that the " Libyan 

 oracle of Ammon" was derived from the Thebaid, 

 is liiglily probable ; though he makes the common 

 and unaccountable error of supposing the God of 

 Thebes to have had the head of a ram *, which lias 

 led to much confusion respecting the Deity wor- 

 shipped at Meroe. For to this place a procession, 

 carrying the statue of the Theban Jupiter, with a 

 ram's head, is said annually to have gone from 

 Thebes ; though the Jupiter of Thebes was Amun, 

 and the great Deity of Ethiopia the ram-headed 

 Neph.t 



In the legends of Thebes, Amun has generally 

 the title " King of the Gods," accompanying his 

 name, and these two are sometimes inserted in an 

 oval, or royal Cartouche, as are the names of 

 Osiris, Isis, and Athor. 



Phthah or Pthah, Heph^stus, Vulcanus. 



Pthah, or in the Memphitic dialect Phthah, 

 was the demiurge, or creative power of the Deity ; 

 the "artisan," as lamblichus styles him, "and 

 leader of mundane artisans, or the heavenly Gods." 

 The same author gives a singular confirmation of 

 the fact, as I have elsewhere observed t, of the 

 Goddess, who bears on her head a single ostrich 



* Herodot. ii. 42. &c. 



■\ Vide siqira, p. 148. ; and hifrn, beginning of Chap, xv, 



j Materia Hierog. Pantheon, p. 7. 



