Magical Stela c.360–343 BC, 30th Dynasty, reign of Nectanebo II. Greywacke H.83.5 cm The top half of this stela was skilfully carved in a hard dark stone. On the part below the central figure panel, rows of hieroglyphs record thirteen magic spells to protect against poisonous bites and wounds and to cure the illnesses caused by them. The stela was commissioned by the priest Esatum to be set up in the public part of a temple. A victim could recite or drink water that had been poured over the magic words and images on the stela. As a mythic precedent, the hieroglyphic inscription around the base describes the magic cure that was worked upon the infant Horus by Thoth, the god of wisdom and writing. On the stela Isis speaks and recounts that while she and Horus were still hiding in the marshes, the child became ill. In her despair, she cried for help to the "Boat of Eternity" (the sun boat in which the god travels over the sky), "and the sun disk stopped opposite her and did not move from his place." Thoth was sent from the sun boat to help Isis and cured Horus by reciting a catalogue of spells. The spells always ended with the phrase "and the protection of the afflicted as well," indicating that by using these spells, any type of affliction in human beings would be healed. In this detail of the stela, Horus emerges from the background in such high relief that he is posed as an actual three-dimensional statue, with his left leg striding forward and his head directly facing the viewer. He is portrayed in the conventional Egyptian form for youth; that is, he is nude and wearing his hair in a side lock. The soft, rounded forms of the bodies of Horus and the other deities are typical of the style of the period. To symbolize his magic powers, Horus holds snakes and scorpions as well as an antelope (by its horns) and a lion (by its tail) in his closed fists. His feet rest on two crocodiles. Above him is the head of Bes, the dwarf deity with leonine features who had traditionally protected households but by this time had become a more general protective deity. Horus is flanked by three deities who stand upon coiled snakes. On the right is Thoth, identified by his ibis head, and on the left is Isis. Both protectively hold the walls of a curved reed hut, a primeval chapel, in which the Horus child stands together with a figure of Re-harakhty, god of the rising sun, and two standards in the form of papyrus and lotus columns. The lotus standard supports the two feathers of Osiris's headdress. The images incised into the stone at the top of the stela portray the perilous night-time journey of the sun as it passes through the nether world under the earth. Its rebirth each morning is shown at the uppermost point of the stela, where Thoth, four baboons, and the kneeling King Nectanebo II lift their arms in the gesture of adoration and prayer. Nectanebo II was the last indigenous king of ancient Egypt. He struggled valiantly against the Persian empire only to be defeated in the end. After the lost battle, he fled to Upper Egypt, and nothing is known about his end.

A cippus of the late period showing the child Horus exhibiting mastery over dangerous and venomous animals.  As usual the head of Bes appears over Horus and this example, from the British Museum, is embellished with names and representations of various gods and goddesses - including Serqet.  There is also extensive text on the back, sides and base.   Cippi and the Metternich stela Many shrines in both temples and homes in the Late Period of ancient Egypt contained stelae known as cippi which were believed to confer protection from attack by certain animals, particularly snakes, scorpions and crocodiles. A typical cippus shows Horus-the-Child, with side lock, standing on the backs of crocodiles, holding a variety of dangerous animals and thus symbolising his victory over malign forces. In this guise he was known as Horus-the-Saviour.   The head of Bes is often included above the relief of Horus to confer additional protection. In his role as protector from harmful creatures, Horus succeeded the saviour god Shed who fulfilled a similar role in the New Kingdom. Cippi provided a range of texts and incantations which could be recited both for prevention of attack and for relief in the event of a sting or bite. The effect of the incantation could be reinforced by the application of water which had been poured over the stela, thereby absorbing its magical texts and scenes. The incantations inscribed on a cippus were necessarily abbreviated and drawn from a body of texts which have features in common with the Pyramid Texts of the Old Kingdom. Thus, for example, Pyramid Text Utterance 378 says:   I am Horus, the young child with his finger to his mouth; the sandal of Horus is what tramples the nekhi snake. An essential feature of the incantations was that the patient must be identified with a god and particularly with Horus, and so cause the malign forces to reconsider the gravity of what they had done. The most complete and least corrupt version of the texts is found on the unique and extremely elaborate Metternich stela in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. It was commissioned by the priest Nes-Atum in the reign of Nectanebon, the last pharaoh of the 30th Dynasty, immediately before the second Persian conquest in 343 BC. Nes-Atum was an ancient Egyptian antiquarian and went to very considerable trouble to collect the best available texts from cippi and from the burial place of the Mnevis bulls in Heliopolis. His selection of texts was then engraved with meticulous care on a fine block of dark green greywacke, standing almost one metre high and covered on all sides with text. Following the usual pattern of a cippus, the upper part of the front has a panel carved in high relief showing the child Horus standing on the backs of crocodiles, grasping various noxious animals, while attendant deities are shown standing on snakes, all demonstrating their triumph over the powers of evil. The first incantation is against snakes and is followed by an extraordinary spell for a cat stung by a scorpion, here identified with the cat goddess Bastet: O Ra, come to your daughter, whom the scorpion has stung on a lonely road. Her cries reach heaven; harken on your way ...   The spell continues at considerable length and places each part of the cat's body under the protection of a different god: Ra himself is invoked to protect the head. This reflects the placing of the different parts of a deceased person under the protection of individual deities as described in Chapter 42 of the Book of the Dead. A later spell on the stela, addressed to Bastet, seeks help for a sick cat. These texts add to the great body of evidence illustrating the special position of the cat in late Egyptian society. The back of the Metternich stela contains the remarkable story of Isis, Horus and the scorpion, which provides the basis for most incantations against scorpion stings. It describes how Isis set out one evening accompanied by seven scorpions whose names were known to her and who had been assigned for her protection. Isis and her entourage were refused entry at the first house they encountered. The indignant scorpions conferred and then transferred all their venom to their leader, Tefen, who then stung the son of the mistress of the house. Isis hastened to massage the throat of the child and called upon the poison of Tefen to come forth from the child. The story is then interrupted in order that those who might need to use the incantation can be instructed how to relate a stricken child to Isis' son Horus and so to proclaim: May the child live and the poison die. As Horus will be cured for his mother Isis, those who suffer will be cured likewise.   In the next part of the story, Isis found Horus himself unconscious after being stung by a scorpion. She sought advice from Serqet, as the authority on scorpions, and then appealed to the gods, and Ra in particular, with these words: Horns has been stung. 0 Ra; your son Horus has been stung who is without sin.   She then brought the solar barque to a standstill and this disruption of the equilibrium of the cosmos was so grave that Thoth was despatched to help her. This he did by means of the following spell: Awake Horus. ... I am Thoth sent to cure you for your mother Isis and to cure the sufferer likewise. ... The poison dies, its fire is drawn away.