NOTES. 



departing widely from each other, may, however, be arranged as follows : By 

 a threefold transference of the verbal signification, we obtain from the original 

 meaning to project, projicere (sagittam, telum) 1st, seminare, to sow ; then 

 extendere, to extend or stretch (as spun threads) ; and lastly, what is here 

 most important, ' to radiate light,' 'to shine' (as do stars and fire). The 

 names of the divinities Satis (the archer, female), Sothis (the radiant, 

 female), and Seth (the fiery, male}, may be connected with this series of 

 ideas. There may be pointed out hieroglyphically sit or seti, the arrow or 

 dart, as well as the ray; seta, to spin; setu, scattered grains. Sothis is 

 especially the Irig Jit-learning star, regulating seasons and periods. The 

 small triangle, always painted yellow, which is a symbolical sign of Sothis, 

 is employed in the designation of the radiant sun, being placed in triple rows, 

 the triangles always pointing downwards from the sun. Seth is the fire-god, 

 the burning or scorching; in opposition to the warming and fertilizing waters 

 of the inundation of the Nile the female divinity Satis. She is the goddess 

 of the Cataracts, because the swelling of the Nile began with the appearance 

 of the star Sothis, at the time of the summer solstice. In Vettius Valens, the 

 star itself is called SqB- instead of Sothis ; but we cannot by any means, as 

 Ideler has done (Handbuch der Chronologie, Bd. i. S. 126), identify Thoth 

 with Seth or Sothis, either as to name or person." (Lepsius, Bd. i. S. 136.) 

 To these considerations, taken from the earliest Egyptian antiquity, I sub. 

 join some Greek, Zend, and Sanscrit etymologies. " Scrp, the sun," says 

 Professor Franz, " is an ancient radical, differing only in pronunciation from 

 Sep, SepoQ, heat, summer, where the sound of the vowel is altered, as in 

 rtipog and rkpog, or rtpaQ. The correctness of the assigned relations 

 between the radicals fftlp, and &tp, 3-spoc, is confirmed, not only by the 

 application of Sepei'rarof in Aratus, v. 149 (Ideler, Sternnamen, S. 241), 

 but also by the later use of the forms derived from atip, <mpoe, atipiog, 

 ffsipivdg, hot, burning. It deserves remark that (mpa, or atipiva fytaria, 

 is pronounced quite like Srepiva J/zdrta, light summer clothing. But the 

 peculiar form (reiptoQ is of wider application, it is the epithet given to 

 all the heavenly bodies which influence the heat of summer : thus, according 

 to the poet Archilochus, the Sun was called crt iptoQ dvrrjp ; and Ibycus calls 

 the heavenly bodies adpia, ' the shining.' That it is really the sun which 

 is meant in the words of Archilochus, TTO\\OVQ piv avrov <ra'ptog 

 KaTavavti 6vf i\\d[j.7nnv, cannot be doubted. It is true that, accord- 

 ing to Hesychius and Suidas, 2efpio signifies both the Sun and the 

 dog-star ; but I am as certain as is the new editor of Theon of Smyrna, 



