48 ELLIOT Smith, Distribution of Mummification. 



the influence of the Egyptian custom of mummification. 

 Among the more immediate neighbours of the Egyptians, 

 such as the Jews, Greeks and Romans, the evidence for 

 this is clear. Occasionally the full process of embalming 

 was followed, even if it were only a temporary procedure 

 preliminary to the observance of some other burial custom, 

 such as cremation, perhaps inspired by ideas wholly 

 foreign to those which prompted mummification. I need 

 not enumerate instances of this curious syncretism of 

 burial customs, numerous examples of which will be found 

 in Reutter (63, pp. 144-147) and in Hastings' Dictionary 

 (32), as well as in the following pages. 



At the very earliest period in Egypt from which 

 historical records have come down to us (the time of the 

 First Dynasty, 3200 B.C., or even earlier) "the king's 

 favourite title was ' Horus,' by which he identified himself 

 as the successor of the great god [the hawk sun-god] who 

 had once ruled over the kingdom .... [other symbols 

 often appeared] side by side with Buto, the serpent-goddess 

 of the northern capital. As [the king] felt himself still as 

 primarily king of Upper Egypt, it was not until later 

 that he wore the serpent of the North, the sacred uraeus, 

 upon his forehead" (Breasted, 6, p. 38). "The sun-disc, 

 with the outspread wings of the hawk, became the com- 

 monest symbol of their religion " (p. 54). But in the time 

 of the Fourth Dynasty "the priests of Heliopolis now 

 demanded that [the king, who had always been represented 

 as the successor of the sun-god and had borne the title 

 ' Horus'] be the bodily son of Re, who henceforth would 

 appear on earth to become the father of the Pharaoh" 

 (p. 122). 



Now, when the Pharaoh thus became identified with 

 the great sun-god Re, his Pyramid-temple became the 

 place of worship of the sun-god. Megalithic architecture 



