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Transforming into a Swallow: Coffin Text Spell 294 and Avian Behaviour
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Published/Copyright:
June 2, 2015
Summary
Coffin Texts Spell 294 describes the transformation of the deceased into a mn.t-bird. Examination of the passage from a lexical, mythological, and geographical perspective have highlighted the bird’s solar and Hathoric associations, but additional layers of meaning are revealed when textual references are also examined zoologically. This approach has shown that Spell 294 accurately describes the appearance and natural behaviour of migratory and resident barn swallows (Hirundo rustica), elucidating formerly problematical allusions and leading to a deeper understanding of the spell’s transformative process.
Published Online: 2015-6-2
Published in Print: 2015-6-1
© 2015 by Walter de Gruyter Berlin Boston
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Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Vorwort der Herausgeber
- Theban Graffito no. 1572 Rediscovered and Some New Texts from the “Valley of the Quarries”
- Transforming into a Swallow: Coffin Text Spell 294 and Avian Behaviour
- Eleventh Dynasty Written Evidence on the Relationship between the k˒͗ and the Cult Image
- Don’t Do What I Did!
- Three New Deir el-Medina Absence Lists in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford
- Iteration, Innovation und Dekorum in Opferlisten des Alten Reichs
- The Meroitic “Initial a” Sign as Griffith’s Initial Aleph
- Wenn Archäologie und Philologie nicht harmonieren
Keywords for this article
animal behaviour;
barn swallow;
bird;
Coffin Texts;
funerary literature;
magic;
mythology
Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Vorwort der Herausgeber
- Theban Graffito no. 1572 Rediscovered and Some New Texts from the “Valley of the Quarries”
- Transforming into a Swallow: Coffin Text Spell 294 and Avian Behaviour
- Eleventh Dynasty Written Evidence on the Relationship between the k˒͗ and the Cult Image
- Don’t Do What I Did!
- Three New Deir el-Medina Absence Lists in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford
- Iteration, Innovation und Dekorum in Opferlisten des Alten Reichs
- The Meroitic “Initial a” Sign as Griffith’s Initial Aleph
- Wenn Archäologie und Philologie nicht harmonieren
