The Egyptian by Mika Waltari

Posted by admin_akashic on Mar 4th, 2022 in Stories

Then my eyes were opened, and I saw that the doctors in the House of Life understood the writings and the traditions but no more. If I asked why a festering wound must be burned while an ordinary one is merely dressed and bandaged and why boils are healed with mildew and cobwebs, they said only, “So it has always been.” In the same way a surgeon might perform the hundred and eighty-two cuts and incisions prescribed, and perform them according to his experience and skill, better or worse, faster or slower, less painfully or causing unnecessary suffering, but more he cannot do because only these are described and illustrated in the books, and nothing else has ever been done.

There were some who grew thin and pale, though the doctor could find in him no disease or injury. However, he could be revived and cured by a diet of raw liver from the sacrificial beasts, bought at a high price, but one must on no account ask why. There were some who had pains in their bellies and whose hands and feet burned. They were given purges and narcotics, and some recovered, others perished, but no doctor could say beforehand who would live and whose belly would swell so that he died. But why some recovered and others perished, no one asked and it was not appropriate to ask.

I soon noticed that I was asking too many questions, for people began to look at me askance, and those who had come after me, advanced faster than me and could give me orders. Then I took off my white robe, cleaned myself and left the House of Life, taking with me the two silver rings that together weighed four deben.

When I left the Temple in the middle of the day which I had not done for years, my eyes opened once more, and I saw that while I had been working and studying, Thebes had changed. I noted it as I walked along the Avenue of Rams and through the markets. There was restlessness everywhere, and people’s dress had become more elaborate and costly so that one could no longer distinguish men from women by their pleated skirts and wigs. From wine taverns and pleasure houses emitted shrill Syrian music, and foreign speech was heard in the streets, where

Syrians and wealthy black men rubbed shoulders with Egyptians unabashedly. The wealth and power of Egypt were immeasurable, and for centuries no enemy had entered its cities, and men who had never known war had reached middle age. But I could not tell whether people were any happier on this account, for their eyes were restless, and their movements hurried; and they seemed always to be waiting impatiently for some new thing and could not be content with the day that was passing.

I walked alone along the streets of Thebes, heart heavy with rebellion and sadness. On coming home, I found that my father Senmut had aged, his back was bent, and he could no longer distinguish characters on paper. My mother Kipa was old also, and she panted as she moved and talked of nothing but her grave. For with his savings, my father had bought a tomb in the City of the Dead on the west bank of the river. I had seen it, and it was a handsome tomb built of mud bricks with the usual inscriptions and pictures on the walls. All around it were hundreds and thousands of similar graves that the priests of Amun sold to honest, thrifty folk at a high price so that they could obtain immortality. To please my mother, I had written out a Book of the Dead to be laid in their tomb so that they should not go astray on the long journey; and it was a flawlessly-written, fine book, though not adorned with coloured pictures like those sold in the book court of Amun’s Temple.

My mother gave me food, and my father asked about my studies, but beyond this we found nothing to say to each other, and the house was strange to me, as were the street and the people in the street. My heart grew heavier still until I remembered the Temple of Ptah and Thutmose who had been my friend and was to become an artist. Then I thought, “I have four deben of silver in my pocket. I will seek out my friend Thutmose, that we may rejoice together and make merry with wine, for I shall find no answer to my questions anyway.”

So I took leave of my parents, saying that I must return to the House of Life, and shortly before sunset, I found the Temple of Ptah, and after asking from the porter where the art school lay, I entered and inquired for the student Thutmose. Only then did I hear that he had been expelled long ago. The students whose hands were dirty from clay spat