Tutankhamun: The Book of Shadows

‘Who was that?’

‘Khay. Chief Scribe,’ I said.

‘Yes, I know him; walks around as if he has a gold cane up his arse. And what did she say to you?’

‘She had something to show me. A stone. From Akhetaten. A carving of the Aten.’

‘Interesting. But not remarkable.’

‘Not until you saw someone had completely chipped out the Aten disc, the hands holding the ankhs, both the royal and holy names, and the eyes and the noses of the royal figures,’ I said.

Nakht looked off into his garden’s idyllic picture of colour and shade.

‘A little bit of iconoclasm goes a long way, I imagine, especially in that palace.’

‘Exactly. They are all terrified because they don’t know what it means.’

‘And what do you think?’ he enquired.

‘Well, it could mean nothing more than someone with an old gripe has wasted their time working out how to send the royal family a nasty insult.’

‘But the coincidence…’ he pressed me.

‘I know. We don’t believe in coincidences, do we? We believe in connections. The dead boy with the broken bones; the elite amulet; and now also a dead girl with a gold mask hiding her missing face.’

Nakht looked aghast.

‘How awful! Such barbarity. The times are definitely getting worse.’

I nodded.

‘There’s something about the sophistication of all of these things, and the consistency of the style, that makes me think the object left in the palace could be connected; I was wondering if the obliteration of the sun disc could also mean something specific…’

‘Such as?’ he asked, doubtfully.

‘An eclipse,’ I ventured.

‘Well now, that is a very interesting idea,’ he said, absorbed by the ramifications. ‘The Sun in battle destroyed by the force of darkness, and then restored and reborn again…the symbolism is potent. And very much to the point at the moment…’

‘Something like that,’ I replied. ‘So I thought I would consult the man who knows more about the stars than anyone else I know.’

‘Well, it’s an allegory,’ he smiled, quickly warming to his subject.

I had no idea what he meant.

‘Tell me more.’

‘Let’s walk.’

So we strolled up one of the paths, between the flowerbeds, and he began to explain. As always, with Nakht, I listened without understanding everything, for I know that to interrupt him with questions will only lead to another, equally wonderful, but endlessly perplexing digression.

‘Think about how we understand the mysteries of the world around us. Ra, the God of the Sun, sails across the blue ocean of the day in the Golden Ship of Day. But at sunset the God crosses to the Ship of Night and disappears into the Otherworld. The black ocean of the night is revealed, with its bright stars-the Sharp One, the brightest, and the five stars of Horus and the stars of Osiris, the Pathway of the Further Stars in the height of the sky, and the travelling star of the dawn-all sailing the dark waters, following the Sun whose night journey, with its perils and tests, we can never see but only imagine. We liken this in the Book of the Dead to the journey of the soul after death. Are you following me so far?’

I nodded.

‘Just about…’

‘Now, it gets subtler. Listen and concentrate. The most significant, and indeed mysterious, of those perils is the union of the Sun with the body of Osiris at the darkest point of the night. “The Sun at rest in Osiris, Osiris at rest in the Sun” as the saying goes. This is the most secret moment when the Sun descends back into the original waters and their powers of chaos. But it is precisely at this dark moment when he receives new powers of life, and Osiris is reborn. Again we the living can never witness such an event, for it is hidden from human sight in the remotest part of the Unknown. But once again we can imagine it, although with great mental effort. Then, at dawn, the Sun returns, apparent and reborn, for Ra is the self-creator and the creator of everything that exists. And we call that returning form of the God the Scarab, khepri, the evolving one, pushing himself into being from non-being. And so begins the new day! And so all things follow ever onwards, day by day, year by year, life by life, death by death, rebirth by rebirth, perpetually and eternally.’

I knew he loved talking like this. My problem was it sounded too much like a good story. And like all the stories that we tell ourselves, and our children, about how things happen, and why things are as they are, it could never be proved.

‘But what has all that to do with my question?’ I asked.

‘Because there is one time when we the living can witness this divine union.’

‘During an eclipse?’

‘Precisely. Of course, there are different explanations of such an event, depending upon which authority you consult or accept. One is that the Goddess Hathor of the West covers the God with her body. A divine union of light and dark, as it were. Another, opposite one is that some dark power whose name we do not know, and therefore cannot speak, conquers-but light recovers and triumphs in the sky’s divine battle.’

‘Luckily for us.’

‘Indeed. For without light, there can be no life. The Kingdom of Darkness is the land of shadows and death. But there are things, even now, we do not understand. However, I truly believe our knowledge will some day be able to explain all things that exist.’

He stopped at a pomegranate bush, and fiddled with its pink flowers-the latest fashion-and plucked a few fading blooms as if to demonstrate his own godlike powers over his creation.

‘Like a Book of Everything…’ I suggested.

‘Exactly. But words are imperfect, and our system of writing, for all its great glories, has its limitations in terms of its ability to describe creation in all its manifest and hidden glories…So we would have to invent another way of describing things.’

‘Such as?’

‘Ah well, that is the question, but perhaps the answer lies not in words, but in signs; in fact, in numbers…’

At this point my thoughts began to collapse, as they often do when I talk with Nakht. He has an appetite for speculation that sometimes makes me want to do something meaninglessly practical, like sweep the yard.

He smiled as he saw the baffled expression on my face.

I steered the conversation back to my subject.

‘Speaking of which, using the star calendars, I know you can predict the arrival of the inundation, and the beginning of the festivals. But do eclipses appear in the charts?’

He considered the question before replying.

‘I believe not. I have been compiling my own calendars from observation, but I have not yet been lucky enough to witness an eclipse of the Sun, for they are rare events indeed. However, from my roof terrace I have observed an eclipse of the moon. I am intrigued and puzzled by the consistent element of circularity, both in the returning nature of the cosmic events, and also in the implication of the curves of the shadows as they are cast against the face of the moon, for they imply a whole circle-such as we see of the moon and the sun, and such as we might witness in a total eclipse. It suggests the circle is the perfect shape of the heavens, both as idea-for the circle implies infinite return-and in actual fact.’

Grateful for a pause in this torrent of rapid speculation, I asked quickly:

‘But how could we find out more? Could you take me to the astronomical archives?’

‘In the Karnak Temple precinct? To which I have access?’ he smiled.

‘How fortunate I am to count as a close friend a man of such elevated status.’

‘Your sarcasm is so…middle class,’ he replied, cheerfully.