4°6 O N E G Y P T A W » THE N It E 



chaftifement, which he had received* from Is war a, and as a favour confer- 

 red, on him in becoming a fon of Vishnu : this may, therefore, be the origin 

 both of the name and the ftory of Adonis ; and the yearly lamentations of 

 the Syrian damfels may have taken rife from the ditties chanted by Rett, 

 together with the Apfarafes , or nymphs, who had attended Ca'ma, when he 

 provoked the wrath of Maha'de'va : one of the fweetefl meafures in 

 Sanfcrif profody has the name of Reft vildpa f or the dirge of Reti. 



In the only remaining accounts of Egyptian Mythology, we find three 

 kings of that country, named Camephis, which means in Coptick, according 

 to Jablonski, the guardian divinity oi Egypt (a) : the hiftory of thofe kings 

 is very obfcure ; and whether they have any relation to the three defendants 

 of Ca'ma, I cannot pretend to determine. The Caunapas appear to be the 

 Naoifc v)>/950i fuppofed to have reigned in Egypt ; for we learn from Syncel- 

 lu.s {a), that the Egyptians had a ftrange tale concerning a dynafty of dead 

 men; that is, according to the Hindus, of men afflicted with fome fphacelous 

 diforder, and, moil probably, with Elephantiajis. The feat of Cunapa 

 feems to have been Canobus, or Canopus t not far from Alexandria: that Ca- 

 nop us died there of a loathfome difeafe was aiferted by the Greek Mytholo- 

 gifts, according to the writer of the Great Etymological Dictionary under the 

 word 'EAfvaov ; and he is generally reprefented in a black ihroud with a cap 

 clofely fitted to his head, as if his drefs was intended to conceal fome offen- 

 five malady; whence the potters of Canopus often made pitchers with covers 

 in the form of a clofe cap. His tomb was to be feen at Helenium near the 

 town, which bore his name; but that of his wife (who, according to Epi- 

 ; phanius, was named Cumenuthis) was in a place called Menuthis, at the 



* I . ■ ■ ■ ■■ m i- ' < , ■ ' ' 



(fi>) See Alphab. Tibet, p. 145. {b) p. 40. cited by Mr„ Bryant, 



