Secret_History

438 The Secret History of the World
of gleaming, sharp teeth. Also, sharp toothed can mean that something is radiating
clearly defined “rays”, that are “sharp” like “teeth”.
The word sp occurs by itself in one reference:
“O god; your third is he who orders offerings. The perfume of Iht-wtt is on this
King, a bnbn-loaf is in the Mansion of Sokar, a foreleg is in the House of Anubis.
This King is hale, the Herdsman stands up, the month is born, Sp lives.”
The more I read these texts, the more I think that these are rote repetitions of
something that once really meant something, but through the centuries, with the
changes in language and semantics, they had long ago lost their meaning and were
simply being recited as magical texts. Either that, or the experts in Egyptian
language have a long way to go! An important point is, however, that every single
reference to spdw occurs in a passage about the “great wild bull” and both Osiris
and Seth were referred to as bulls though bulls aren’t generally thought of in the
context of sharp teeth. Seth was the “Bull of the South”. Utterance 580 is a text to
be recited at the sacrifice of a Red Bull. This bull is supposed to represent Seth
being sacrificed by Horus. Addressed to Seth the bull:
“O you who smote my father, who killed one greater than you, you have smitten
my father, you have killed one greater than you.”
This is followed by a passage addressed to the dead king/Osiris:
“O my father Osiris this King, I have smitten for you him who smote you as an ox;
I have killed for you him who killed you as a wild bull; I have broken for you him
who broke you ...[he lists all the parts he has cut off]. Its upper foreleg is on Khopr,
its lower foreleg belongs to Atum, father of the gods, its haunches belong to Shu
and Tefenet, its shanks belong to Hnt-irty and Kherty, its back belongs to Neith and
Selket, its heart belongs to Sakhmet the Great, the contents of its udder belong to
these four gods, the children of Horus, Hapy, Imsety, Duamutef, Kebhsenuf. Its
head, its tail, its arms, and its legs belong to Anubis... 330
Now, of course, we wonder how an ox has an udder... and of course, Faulkner
has an explanation that the scribe “forgot” that he was writing about a bull!
Nevertheless, the reference to Sakhmet brings up a very interesting remark in
Utterance 704:
“This King is the [...] which went forth from Re, this King has come forth from
between the thighs of the Two Enneads; he was conceived by Sakhmet, the King
was borne by Shezmetet. This King is the falcon...”
The footnote tells us that where it says “he was conceived”, that, regarding the
word “he”, the scribe “for once employs the feminine suffix”. So, we think that
certain other translations of “he” may have been “she” or vice versa.
330 Faulkner, ibid.