The dawn of astronomy : a study of the temple-worship and mythology of the ancient Egyptians / by J. Norman Lockyer.

  • Norman Lockyer
Date:
1894
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The dawn of astronomy : a study of the temple-worship and mythology of the ancient Egyptians / by J. Norman Lockyer. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    PREFACE. The enormous advance wliicli lias been recently made in our astronomical knowl(*dg'e, and in our power of investigating the various bodies which people space, is to a very great extent due to the introduction of methods of work and ideas from other branches of science. Much of the recent pi-ogress has been, we may indeed say, entirely dependent upon the introduction of the methods of inquiry to which I refer. While this is generally recognised, it is often forgotten that a knowledge of even elementary astronomy may be of very great assistance to students of other branches of science; in other words, that astronomy is well able to pay her debt. Amongst those branches is obviously that which deals Avitli man's first attempts to grasp the meaning and phenomena of the universe in which he found himself before any scientific methods were available to him ; l^eforc he had any idea of the origins or the con- ditionings of the things around him. In the present volume I propose to give an account of some attempts I have been making in my leisure moments during the past three years to see whether any ideas could be obtained as to the early astronomical views of the Egyptians, from a study of their tem])les and the mythology connected with the various cults. How 1 came to take up this inquiry may be gathered from the following statement:— It chanced that in March, 1890, during a brief holiday, I went to the Levant. I went with a good friend, who,