Bonner, SMA – PDF, 53.

It is quite possible that the sign consisting of two curves crossed by a horizontal line is simply another way of writing Iao. Something like it occurs in P. Oxy. 1007, a vellum fragment of Genesis written in the third century. Hunt describes it as “a most remarkable abbreviation of the so-called tetragrammaton, which in the Septuagint is regularly represented by κύριος. This abbreviation consists of a doubled Yod, the initial of the sacred name, written in the shape of a Z with a horizontal stroke through the middle, the stroke being carried without a break through both letters; the same form of Yod is found on coins of the second century B.C.”

Some specimens show the Chnoubis snake on the back, thus adding another stomach charm to that of the ibis.⁹ Still another ill is provided for on a few stones which have the uterine symbol (pp. 79–85) carved on the reverse; and Chnoubis usually appears among the deities who guard that symbol.¹⁰ On a specimen in the Southesk collection (N 42) the ibis and altar seem to be a secondary subject, the obverse design being the uterine symbol with attendant deities. The word Ororiouth, which regularly accompanies that design, occupies a place under the ibis and altar on the reverse.

Because of the ibis's well-known reputation as a devourer of serpents and other reptiles it has been suggested that the imperatives πέσσε and εὐπέπτει are addressed to the bird himself, as if urging him to eat heartily of the harmful vermin.¹¹ But surely φάγε would be more natural if that were the meaning. It is true that on some bronze pendants of a kind common in Syria an ibis-like bird is shown, tied to a pillar or an altar, and about to devour a snake; most pendants of this kind in no way indicate a reference to the stomach, and it may well be that on them the bird is an amulet against reptiles, or against evil in general typified by a snake. But on the specimens here discussed, the stone amulets with the inscription πέσσε or εὐπέπτει, the imperatives are certainly addressed to the stomach, just as we find στόμαχε πέπτε on the reverse of a haematite in the British Museum, which, however, has a different design on the obverse.¹² That this is the right interpretation is further proved by the occurrence of πέσσε, usually thrice repeated, on the reverse of other designs in which the ibis plays no part. A fine gray-blue chalcedony in the University of Michigan collection is made in the shape of a peach stone or persea seed. On one side, in very shallow cutting, is a Chnoubis snake with nimbus and seven rays, on the other, the words πέσσε πέσσε.¹³ A broken haematite in the same collection shows on one side a poorly executed snake-legged demon, on the other, apparently, πέπτε.¹⁴ It is likely that amulets thus inscribed were hung from the neck in such a way as to rest over the uneasy organ; in fact, Galen states expressly that stomach amulets were worn in that position.¹⁵ The magic of the ibis probably lay in his vigorous digestive powers, which the amulet was designed to impart to the wearer.

⁹ Petrie, Amulets, Pl. 21, 135 r.

¹⁰ Ibid., 135 p.

¹¹ Seyrig, op. cit., p. 3.

¹² No. 56497.

¹³ D. 83.

¹⁴ D. 182.

¹⁵ See the next note.

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