THE BILINGUAL DECREES OF PHILAE. 79 
THE STATUES COMMEMORATING THE VICTORY—continued. 
HIEROGLYPHIC TEXT. DEMOTIC TEXT. 
Iga Ire 
(Pliw'rwmys] She STE ter Fy Sea ae | Ptlwmys 
P[tolemy, living forever, beloved of Ptah,] Ptolemy, [etc.] : 
1rd 
[k];-tw nf Ptw;rwmys, nb—qn(w) [nt ew] zt n-f Pilwmys | nb qn 
(which) be called: Ptolemy, Lord of Victory, | [which is] called: Ptolemy, Lord of Victory, 
14b 
kh’ rlpylt | nt snt-[hmt|-f hgt nm — rpyt 
and animage of his sister-[wife,] the queen (and) and an image [of his wife,*] 
nb(t) bwy Orw,w;p,dr;(t) t(?) pr‘t | Glwpirleé] 
mistress of both countries, Cleopatra, the queen Cleopatra, 
nirwy pr(wy) m gbh(wy!) [ntrw nt pr| 
the Gods Epiphanes, in the (twofold) holifest !] [the gods Epiphanes] 
place(s) 
n hmt(!)—nb hr rn—f [. ‘\rpy-nb nn p-m’ nt 
of every adytum(!),! on (i.e., bearing) his name,’ {fin} every temple, in the place which (is) 
I4ec lj 
wsht ms‘w(?) nt  ht-ntr wnh n p- | ‘rpy. 
(in) the court of the multitude’ of the temple, (the most) prominent of* the temple. 



’ 
1'Thus, whether we take gdh literally as ‘‘the coolest place,” 7. e., synonymous with the following word, hm 
“adytum,’’ or merely as a general word for ‘‘temple.’’ ‘he awkward translator wanted to use elegant words and 
to emphasize the special holiness of the place, so that we should think of the adytum, the coolest, darkest, and 
holiest room of the temple, if the following words did not contradict this. Not the holiest but the most accessible 
place of the temple is meant. According to the space and traces, the sign gb: has been repeated to express the 
idea: ‘‘temples of the South and North,” as line 16a (literally “‘in the twofold temples’’). 
2 This phrase, “‘on his name,” i. e., where he is worshiped, can be traced back to Ros. hierogl. 6 and 7, where it 
has no counterpart in the Greek, and possibly has been repeated erroneously. Here it is equally vague. Cp. 
Phil, I, rob, rra, 15e, 16¢c. 
8 The first translation would be “‘court of the soldiers,” cp. below, line 17. The soldiers belonging to the 
temples in earlier time have been discussed by Wiedemann, AZ. 1885, 82, Erman, Aegypten, 411, 714. Cp. the 
inscription of Haremheb in Turin, 1. 25: ‘(the king equipped the temples) with priests and ritual priests and 
picked men (stp) of the mnfyt-soldiers.”” It is probable that those soldiers acted as a police troop to keep order, 
principally for the vast domains of the temples. For keeping order in the temple itself and to restrain the multi- 
tude at processions, etc., we find the s‘sty of the temple, Lieblein, Dict. 1186, Cat. Abyd. 1229; Mar. Abyd. II, 8 (also 
Dévéria in his commentary on the Pap. Jud. Turin). Cp. as secular parallels, e. g., the “harbor beadles” (s‘styw 
nt mryt), Pap. Harris I, 28 b. ‘Those ‘‘beadles’’ of the temples sometimes are distinguished from the special 
“gatekeepers”’ of the temple, 1.1. 28, 7, etc. We must assume that the sticks of such small officials usually were 
sufficient to protect the temples; but we can imagine that in the case of some larger and wealthier temples armed 
soldiers may have been necessary to reinforce the temple guardians. Indeed, Revue Egyptol. 1881, No. 2, pl. 35, in 
Greek time enumerates ‘‘the soldiers” —stratiat(e)s, among the personnel of atemple. Revillout, PSBA., 1887, IX, 
230, claims that a temple in Memphis had a garrison of Greek and Egyptian troops. The latter statement needs 
verification; at any rate, we must not think that temple troops in the manner of the Middle Empire were possible 
under the strictly centralized Ptolemaic government. Although we might thus understand the designation 
“soldiers’ court’ as the place at the entrance where soldiers watched the gate, nevertheless that explanation is 
not certain. We find, namely, that in earlier style the above-mentioned place, the court for the laity, is designated 
as wsht Ss(w?), Louvre A 88 (Pierret II, 16) “court of the common people, the multitude” and thus still, Canop. 37 
(in Reinisch’s second edition; det. ‘‘people male and female’’). Consequently, the sign for “‘soldier(s)”’ seems used 
here merely in the sense of ‘‘multitude’”’ and may be read Ss; also the sign ms“ has, in Greek time, the same double 
sense, ‘‘soldiers’’ and ‘“‘multitude, people.’’ See the same orthography as in our text, in Brugsch, Zwei Fest- 
kalender, |. 24, "hyw n(w) p-ms*(?) “the court of the people(?)”. Above, p. 70, we had a certain example of ms‘ 
“multitude” (gf), corresponding with Coptic més, méése. (For the development of sense cp. the use of bezih 
“many, multitude” as equivalent to “troop, army” in Ethiopic.) 
4 A strangely wide space. 
’ The n might also be explained as local: ‘‘the place (most) conspicuous im the temple.’ This would, 
however, be archaic style. 
