The Egyptian by Mika Waltari

Posted by admin_akashic on Mar 4th, 2022 in Stories

auspicious and inauspicious days so that all might regulate their lives thereby. It was said also that they could foretell a man’s destiny, though for this they had to know the day and hour of his birth. Being ignorant of my own, I could not put their science to the test, as much though I wanted to.

Using my clay tablets, I had as much gold as I cared to withdraw from the Temple Counting House, and I took up my dwelling near the Gate of Ishtar at a large inn many stories high, on the roof of which were gardens of fruit trees and myrtle bushes and where streams flowed and fish leaped in the pools. This inn was frequented by eminent people visiting Babylon — from their country estates if they had no town house of their own — and also by foreign envoys. The rooms were carpeted with thick mats and the couches soft with the skins of wild animals, while on the walls were frivolous and joyful pictures colourfully pieced together with glazed tiles. This inn was called Ishtar’s House of Joy and belonged, like all else of note in the city, to the Tower of the God. If I counted all its rooms and inhabitants and servants, I believe that that house alone had as many people as a Theban neighbourhood, but no one who hadn’t stayed there himself would believe this.

Nowhere else in the world are so many different sorts of people to be seen as in Babylon, and nowhere can one hear so many languages spoken on the streets as in Babylon so that the citizens say that all roads lead thither and that it is the centre of the world. They assure that their country is not on the edge of the world, like it is believed in Egypt, and that there are great kingdoms behind the mountains in the east, whose armed caravans occasionally bring wonderful items and fabrics and expensive, fragile vessels to Babylon. I need to tell that in Babylon I saw people whose face was yellow and eyes lopsided on their heads, and they hadn’t painted their faces but were trading and selling clothes that were fine as royal linen but even smoother, shining in all earthly colours like pure oil.

The people of Babylon are first and foremost merchants, and nothing is more highly regarded than commerce, so that even their gods trade amongst each other. For this reason they have no love for war, and they maintain mercenaries and build walls merely to safeguard their business. Their desire is for roads in every country to be kept open to

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all, chiefly because they know themselves to be the greatest merchants of any and that trade is of more advantage to them than war. Yet they are proud of the soldiers who guard their ramparts and temples and who march every day to the Gate of Ishtar, their helmets and breastplates gleaming with gold and silver. Also the hilts of their swords and their spearheads are adorned with gold and silver as a token of their wealth. And they say, “Have you, stranger, ever before seen such troops and such chariots?”

The King of Babylon was a yet beardless boy who had to hang a false beard to his chin when he mounted the throne. His name was Burnaburiash. He loved playthings and strange tales. My fame had sped before me from Mitanni, so that when I put up at Ishtar’s House of Joy and visited the temple and had spoken with the priests and doctors of the Tower, I received word that the King commanded my attendance. Kaptah as usual was anxious, and said, “Do not go, but rather let us fly together, for of Kings no good thing can come.” But I said to him, “You fool, do you not remember that we have the scarab with us?”

He said, “The scarab is the scarab, and I have not forgotten, but certainty is always best and better than uncertainty, and we should not try the scarab’s patience too much. If you are resolved to go, I cannot hinder you, and I will come, too, so that at least we may die together. If we against all likelihood return again to Egypt, I want to tell that I once lied on my stomach in front of the King of Babylon. I would be stupid not to take the opportunity when it becomes available. However, if we go, we must stand upon our dignity and request that a royal chair be sent to fetch us, and we will not go today, for by the custom of the country it is an evil day. The merchants have closed their shops, and the people rest in their houses and do no work, for if they did, it would miscarry, this being the seventh day of the week.”

I pondered this and knew that Kaptah was right. Though to Egyptians all days are alike, save those proclaimed unpropitious according to the stars; yet in this country the seventh day might be unlucky also for an Egyptian, and it was better to select certainty over uncertainty. Therefore I said to the King’s servant, “You must take me for a simple foreigner indeed if you fancy I would appear before the King on such a day as this. Tomorrow I will come if your King will

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