CURELOM TO DESOLATION
INTRODUCTION:
In PART 15, page 9, the name CUMENI was discussed. There mention was also made of the hypocoristicon or abbreviation for JEHOVAH, used as a suffix, -IHA. It is the ending of the name CUMENIAH, a name given to a Nephite military leader killed with his ten thousand troops in the last battle between the Nephites and Lamanites. (Morm 6:14, about AD 385) The name CUMENIAH was not included in the discussion, but all that was mentioned about CUMENI would have applied. The name seems to mean "priest of JEHOVAH."
CURELOM: KUR'E-ERES, KUR'E-INURTA, KUR'E-NADIN-ABI, KUR/E-UBALLIT
This curious name for an animal first appears in Ether 9:19: "And they also had horses, and asses, and there were elephants and cureloms and cumoms; all of which were USEFUL unto man, and more especially the elephant and cureloms and cumoms." Some aspects of this were discussed under CUMOMS in PART 15. There are twelve animals specifically identified in the Book of Mormon: ass, cow, dog, goat, wild goat, horse, sheep, ox, swine, elephant, Curelom, and Cumom. (l Ne. 18:25; Ether 9:19; Largey p. 60) Linked with the Elephants as especially useful were the Cureloms and Cumoms, they were beasts of burden or work animals of some sort that were useful in a way as being something used by man, but not considered something to be eaten by man. Though some have tried, a successful identification with a known animal has not been forthcoming. It suggests that those two animals were unfamiliar to Joseph Smith and because it does create something of a mystery, it is considered evidence for an authentic document being translated by Joseph and the names were transliterated into something we would or would not recognize. It seems to suggest that the Jaredites have given a name they may have composed out of elements of their language for beasts that had no counterpart in their original country and so they provided from their language a name that satisfied their particular purposes. In doing so they may have used elements in their language that would have some association with or characteristic for animals they gave names to.
In CURELOM, there are the elements KUR-, KURE-, prefixes, and -LOM , a suffix. Examining the Akkadian Dictionary and the New Assyrian dictionaries might give an interesting hint of what the Jaredites were trying to say in giving such curious names to these two animals that they were using for beasts of burden.
The Jaredites would have been familiar with words used for certain animals that they could modify and apply to similar animals they found in the New World. The four names above, found in Akkadian, while not specific, are related to some kind of "HERD ANIMAL" which may be more than a coincidence. In Akkadian it seems that the prefix KURE may be identified with animals as their protector or GOD. (Baker p. 640. The four names have the following meanings: KUR'E-ERES means "the herd God [KURE] has requested," KUR'E-INURTA means "the Herd god is Ninuerta," KUR'E-NADIN-ABI means "The herd god is the giver of a brother" and KUR'E-UBALLIT means "The herd god has called into life." While this only hints at some animal link, we still do not know what the animals were. They did bring several domestic or small animals, though not identified, from the old world to the New World, no doubt including their dogs. (Ether 6:4) Dog burials have been found in the New World which so far show they are not related to the northwestern or Siberian wolf families, but may have European linkages. Geneticists are getting good and certainly will improve, they can trace even the lice found on mummies. (Zinsser p. 135) They are working on dogs and horses now. (See the series in this web site THEY DID BURY THEIR WEAPONS beginning in 16 May 2009)
The suffix -LOM, would appear in Akkadian as -LUM, since there is no O in Akkadian, but -LUM as a suffix does not seem to have been in use. In Neo-Assyrian the element appears only once and seems to be a hypocoristicon but no meaning is given. It may be just mimation added in forming the word CURELOM for some kind of useful animal.
The Jaredite expansion and coverage in the New World may have taken them further south and some may have been involved in the populating of the Andes where stone carvings of Elephants have been found going back to as early as 3500 BC, and where there are Lamas and Alpacas, beasts of burden.
DAVID: DAVID
The name of King David first appears in the Book of Mormon in 2 Ne. 17:2, again in 17:13, also in 19:7, generally in quoting from Isaiah 7. Also 2 Ne. 19:7 from Isaiah 9. David of old, who wanted many wives and concubines, which the Nephites considered a wicked practice and identified Nephites who pursued these lusts as 'hard in the hearts.' (Jacob 1:25, 2:23-24) The Nephites tried to justify their whoredoms and abominable actions by referring to the Brass Plates records of what David and Solomon did. Like those of old any choice made also means you chose the responsibility for the results of that choice.
However, the Jaredites were not doubt familiar with the use by EBLA of the name DAVID more than 1400 years before such a man would become king of Israel and nearly 1000 years before Hebrew was formalized. (Bermant pp. 1, 63, 185) Jewish authors claim David is of Hebrew origin, meaning beloved, loving. (Mandel p. 107) The name did not mean much to the Jaredites, since he was still a king in the future. When they discovered Ebla, they also recovered ancient documents that had many of the names found in the Hebrew Bible, no doubt included in the Brass Plates, and the names included David, Abraham, Israel, Ishmael, Saul, Michael, et al. (Wilson p. 89; Bermant p. 185) So, the Jaredites were no doubt aware of the use of the name David and it had been use in the general cultural even much earlier, (Bermant pp. 1, 63, 185) , the Ebla tablets would have confirmed the name was ancient. How could Joseph Smith have known this?
The name DAVID means in Hebrew, "Beloved, Loving." (Mandel p. 107) The Hebrew writers claim it is Hebrew in Origin, but they are not aware of the tablets of Ebla, they should be, because the name was in circulation earlier than 2250 BC, the name appears on tablets recovered from a Palace library that was burned by fire that year.
DESERET:
In Ether 2:3 we have: "And they did also carry with them DESERET, which, by INTERPRETATION, is a honey bee; and thus they did carry with them swarms of bees..." The Mormons have turned the honey beehive into a many used symbol of industry and plenty. But bees on an overland journey and a closed ocean voyage? The Jaredites must have been experts at bee care and seemed to know how to accommodate a bee hive in a closed vessel for about a year to get them to the new world. Some day an enterprising geneticist will check out the genes of bees in Central America and find out if they connect with bees in the Mesopotamian central area. Some scholars think the bees may have been left behind because nowhere in the Book of Mormon outside Ether are bees mentioned, or honey, except in reference to the Old World, and there are seven such references. (Nibley p. 194 )
THE EGYPTAIN CONNECTION
The royal symbol in Egypt ”was the bee, and the word for royalty is DESERET ....in the Egyptian symbolism the bee may be substitute for the DESERET crown in any operation." (Nibely 8, p. 334) The consonantal element is DSRT, no other vowels except E would do, so there are three E vowels in the name.
To further quote Nibley: "The most interesting....passenger in Jared's company is DESERET, the honeybee...our text betrays an interest in DESERET that goes far beyond respect for the feat of transporting insects....The word DESERET, "by interpretation is a honeybee" the word... coming from the Jaredite Language, since Ether or Moroni must interpret it...the word DESERET, or something very close to it, enjoyed a position of ritual prominence among...classical Egyptian civilization, who associated it very closely with the symbol of the bee. The people... of the so called Second Civilization...entered Egypt from the northeast as part of the great outward expansion of peoples that sent the makers of the classical Babylonian civilization into Mesopotamia...The founders of the two main parent civilizations of antiquity [Egyptian & Mesopotamian] entering their new home lands at approximately the same time from some common center--apparently the same center from which the Jaredites also took their departure... The Egyptian pioneers carried with them a fully developed cult and symbolism from their Asiatic home. Chief among their cult objects would seem to be the bee...the land they first settled in Egypt was designated in hieroglyphic by the picture of a bee, while every king of Egypt "in his capacity of 'King of Upper and Lower Egypt,' bore the title," he who belongs to the sedge and the bee...students of hieroglyphic were puzzled as to what sound value should be given to the bee-picture...The Egyptians ...had forgotten the original word...the bee-title of honor as unreadable....in the history of the cult and ritual, namely the deliberate avoidance or prohibitions of the sacred word...the bee sign was not always written down but in its place the picture of the Red Crown, the majesty of lower Egypt was "substituted...we did not know the original name of the bee we did know the name of this Red Crown....when it was substituted for the bee. The name was DSRT...the "s" in DSRT had a heavy sound perhaps best represented by "sh" but designated by a special character -on the "s" with a tiny wedge above it by which the Egyptians designated both their land and crown....When the crown appears in place of the bee, it is seems to....suggest deliberate avoidance, especially since DSRT also means RED a word peculiarly at times called BI; yet the bee, though the exact equivalent of the crown, is never called DSRT applicable to bees. If the Egyptians were reluctant to draw the picture of the bee, "for superstitious reasons," they would certainly hesitate to renounce its true name. As meaning "red" the word could be safely uttered, but never as meaning "bee"...to this day no one know how the Hebrew name of God ,YHWH, is to be pronounced...no good Jew would dare to pronounce it even if he knew, ...he sees the written word always substitutes another word, ADONAI, in its place to avoid uttering the awesome sound of the Name...the combination of sounds HWH is a common verb root in Hebrew and as such used all the time...the Egyptians deliberately avoided calling the bee deseret while applying the name to things symbolized by it and even substituted for it is further indicated by another from its original home...enjoying a prominent place in the royal mysteries of the Hittites, [Turkey] turning up in that living archive of prehistory, the Kalevala [Finland], and even surviving in the Eastern rites of certain nations. In ...these the bee is the agent through which the dead king or hero is resurrected from the dead, and it is in this connection that the bee also figures in the Egyptian rites...Now the original "desert people", the founders of the Second Civilization, "the intellectuals of ," [Hyksos] claimed that their king....alone possessed the secret of resurrection. ..the cornerstone of their religion...nothing less than "the King's secret," the power over death by which he held his authority both among men and in the hereafter. If the Bee had any part in the profoundly secret royal resurrection rites of the Old Kingdom...is is plain why it's real name and office were carefully concealed from the world....the DSRT crown is the "bee-crown is indicated by the most prominent feature of the crown, namely the long antenna that protrudes from the base of it..in the oldest drawing is not elaborately curled, as later...exactly resembles the extremely long and prominent antennae of the earliest hieroglyphic bees. The bee was DESERET, a "word of power" too sacred to be entrusted to the vulgar, being one of the keys to the "kings secret".
"In certain editions of the Book of Mormon, thought not the first, the word DESERET is capitalized, for the editors have recognized that it is really a title...seeing in DESERET the national symbol or as it were the totem of Jared's people's. Through the prehistoric haze we seem dimly to describe the tribes moving outward from a common center somewhere to the north of Mesopotamia to plant a common civilization in various regions of the earth. "all the major migrations without exception, have changed the face of the European-Asiatic continent...moved out into the distant regions of the west from a point in Central Asia. And of all these great waves of expansion the most important moved under the aegis of the life-giving bee...Its extreme sacredness and its role in top-secret ritual amply explains many, all but demand, that suppression of its true name in the reading of texts...come...to modern times....when the Lord's people migrated to a promised land in these latter days, they called the land Deseret and took for the symbol of their society and their government the honeybee. The Book of Ether is...directly responsible for this." (Nibely pp. 189-194) The bee hive and honey bee symbol is everywhere, from police cars to Libraries. And most do not have a clue to what it was and is all about. When in the Valley of Kings in the Nile River in l974, the many sites we visited there had frequent presentations of bees in stone carvings and paintings. The following year my son Ty made the same observations
THE CARTOUCHES OF THE PHAROAHS
The Egyptian definition of the universe was "That which the sun encircles...The sign which expressed this idea represented a loop of rope with a knot at the base...to show that the world belonged to Pharaoh, his name was written inside this 'cartouche' which was elongated [as needed] to accommodate it [the name or names of the Pharaoh] ...such was the custom which the Egyptians ...never took the trouble to explain." (Posener p. 39-40) The cartouche was used, nearly always in the elongated form, to provide at least two names of the Pharaoh. The First name was the one for "King of Upper and Lower Egypt," when in fact he was the king of both upper and lower Egypt, which was not always the case. As we noted elsewhere, NAR-MER was the first king to unify Egypt. His initial Cartouche was short, but it did have the FALCON symbol at the end of the name. NAR-MER, when he consolidated LOWER and UPPER EGYPT, may have become known as MEN or MENA, with a CARTOUCHE three times the length as when he was listed as a Pre-dynastic King of Upper Egypt. Of special interest is in the CARTOUCHE OF MEN (MENES) the first name has the BEE hieroglyph, the sign of DESERET. (Budge p. 917) The second name was introduced by "Son of Re," the sun god. Early on and even later, this involved a HORUS NAME which contained the FALCON HIEROGLYPH. "The practice of distinguishing the names made them immediately recognizable, even in the longest and least well written inscriptions...The cartouches were the starting point for the decipherment of hieroglyphs by Champollion ," (Posener p. 40) which he accomplished before 1838. We will discuss additional aspects of the CARTOUCHES when future names in the Jaredite record have HOR endings.
In the list of nine kings before the First Dynasty, none have the BEE symbol, and none have the FALCON HIEROGLYPH, though the eighth king has a Falcon like symbol, probably an OWL because the face is facing towards the viewer, where most often the Falcon has a left facing profile. Beginning with the First Dynasty, of the first twelve Pharaohs, eight have the HORUS FALCON symbols in their last name. Of the same twelve, seven had the DESERET or BEE SYMBOL. At about the time of the Jaredites, Dynasty IV, there were six Pharaohs, five had the BEE SYMBOL, only two had the FALCON SYMBOL. (Budge p. 917-919) Lists available show Pharaohs down to and into the 30th Dynasty. and many Macedonians and early Ptolemic Pharaohs (Pharaohs 383 to 403) , included the FALCON and BEE SYMBOLS in their Cartouches. (Budge pp. 919-945) Some cartouches for some Pharaohs are missing, but those for which there are a fairly complete cartouche show the prevalence of the FALCON and BEE symbols persisting for many generations. With the Ptolemaic Queens and Princesses, the symbols almost completely disappear. Of the Romans who became emperors, a few of the early rulers contained in their names the Falcon and the Bee symbols, showing they had a HORUS, OR BEE NAME. From King Tiberious Claudius Germanicus on; ruler No. 432, (41-45 AD), the symbols ceased to be used. (Budge pp. 945-948) An immense cultural change had taken place. The sun had set on ancient Egypt.
THE OLMECS AND THE JAREDITES AND THE ROYAL BEE
The essential Metropolitan Olmec area had been fairly well delineated by 1950, and based on archaeological sites and monuments too large to be moved, which had been found up to then, seemed to be limited by the Gulf of Mexico to the north and east, and the first slopes of the mountains to the south and by the Papaloapan River to the west [The Papaloapan River may have given or obtained its name from the Popoluca Indians, the BEE keepers] and the basin of the Blasillo-Tonala to the southeast. It even may have extended as far as the basin of the Zanapa river and the Laguna Carmen and somewhat farther to the Grijalva River. In that vast area, much of the latter part of the history and development of the Olmec had taken place. (Bernal pp. 15-17) America's first Civilization, the Olmec, which became known as the "mother culture" of Mesoamerica. (Coe p. 47) The earlier part of the Olmec culture is yet to be fully defined. There is no other combination of history and archaeology than that the Olmec and the Jaredites are the same. In a unique journey of discovery that started in New Orleans, February 1925, Frans Blom and Oliver La Farage, passed through the wretched port of Coatzacoaleos into the mouth of the Tonala River in westernmost Tabasco, pressing on they found on the swamp-bound island of La Venta, the greatest Olmec archaeological site so far discovered, changing Mesoamerican archaeology forever and the search for the lands of the Book of Mormon as certain.
The actual discovery of the OLMECS may go back to Jose Maria Melgar y Serrango, who in 1862 while traveling in the region of San Andres Tuxtla (state of Veracruz) learned of the enormous monolith sculpted in the form of a human head that had been discovered in a place called Hueyapan. He was to publish several years later a short notice in the bulletin of the Mexican Geographical and Statistical Society. Several years later he followed this with a second letter to the same society about migrations from the Old World as the origin for Mesoamerican civilizations. (Soustelle p. 9-11) How right he was, but in detail incorrect. But the door was open for the recognition of the three migrations described in the Book of Mormon, with a case being made that there may have been others from the Pacific side of the world as well. The accumulating information on transoceanic Voyages and migrations to the New World, now must involve flora and fauna transfers, disease transfers, ocean voyaging traditions, ancient watercraft capability, linguistic evidence and religion and theological details. (Sorensen p. 150)
Hermann Beyer was the first to use the term OLMEC in connection with a jade statuette and the monument of San Martin Pajapan. The fact of the Olmecs existence dominates all the indigenous past of Mesoamerica as the original autochthonous (in place) civilization in the Americas. (Soustelle p. 31)
"We know very little about the domestic animals of the Olmecs. The dog is known to be ancient in Mesoamerica, and the same may be said of the turkey. The ROYAL BEE was probably kept for its honey. Even today the PAPOLUCA INDIANS who live in the ancient Olmec area practice a number of rites connected with the keeping of this insect, thus indicating its ancient origin." (Bernal p. 20; Ether 2:3) Just think what modern genetics can eventually do in the genetic study of the dog, turkey and bee and compare the results with Mesoamerican and Mesopotamian genomes. But at least there is an established connection between the Bee, the Jardites and the Olmecs that is more than just coincidence.
DESOLATION:
DESOLATION is both a place name and the name of a city. The land DESOLATION was the place where the people of Jared, the Jaredites, first landed. After a sea journey of 344 days the people of Jared "...did land upon the shore of the promised land. And when they had set their feet upon the shores of the promised land they bowed themselves down upon their face of the land, and did humble themselves before the Lord, and did shed tears of joy before the Lord, because of his tender mercies over them." (Ether 6-11) "...upon the land which they called "Desolation, it being so far northward that it came into the land which had been peopled and been destroyed, of whose bones we have seen, which was discovered by the people of Zarahemla, it being the place of their first land." (Alma 22:30) "...they came from there up into the south wilderness. Thus the land on the northward was called Desolation and the land on the southward was called Bountiful, it being the wilderness which is filled with all manner of wild animals of every kind, a part of which had come from the land northward for food." (Alma 22:31) "Now the land MORON, where the King dwelt, was near the land which is called DESOLATION by the Nephites. " (Ether 7:6) MORON is on the north end of DESOLATION.
It was in this region that Limhi's people discovered the Jaredite ruins, describing the land as being "covered with bones of men" and "ruins of buildings" (Mosiah 8:8; Ether l0:6, about 121 BC.) The City of Desolation was built on the borders of the land Desolation, "by the narrow pass which led into the land southward" (Morm. 3:5-7) The city repeatedly changed hands during battles between Lamanites and Nephites near the end of the Nephite civilization. (about 361-375 BC; Mor. 3:7; 4.2-3) Mormon lamented the barbarity and carnage of the period, declaring that "there never had been so great wickedness among all the children of Lehi, nor even among all the house of Israel" (Morm. 4:10-12) . (Largey p. 232) The name means exactly that: desolation!
"The Jaredites, the people who were historically earlier than the Nephites, dwelt mainly in the land northward, at least through most of their history, particularly in what the Nephties came to call "the land of Desolation" (Mormon 4:2) because it was largely deforested in their day. It lay immediately northward of the narrow neck. The land of Moron was a key area for the Jaredites throughout their history." (Sorensen p. 19) In the first century BC the area was deforested "because of many inhabitants who had before inherited the land" (Helaman 3:3, 5-6). It was also considered a cursed area (3 Nephi 3:24; Sorensen p. 141) The city Moron was located near the northern borders of the Land of Desolation. (See Mormon's Map, Map 11, in Sorensen) The trade routes of the Jaredites may have taken them long distances north and south.
"The land northward consisted of those parts of Mexico immediately west and north of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, involving all or part of the Mexican states of Veracruz, Oaxaca, and Guerrero and limited adjacent areas." (Sorensen p. 12)
EDEN: BIBLICAL
EDEN was the garden home of Adam. (2 Nephi 2:19) A garden, planted eastward in Eden. (Genesis 2:8) But, being an ancient name, it will be discussed in PART 17.
EDOM: BIBLICAL
EDOM occurs in the Book of Mormon as a quote out of Isaiah 11. "But they shall fly upon the shoulders of the Philistines towards the west; they shall spoil them at the east, together, they shall lay their hand upon Edom and Moab; and the children of Ammon shall obey them." (2 Nephi 22:14) The name is Biblical and is not associated with the Jaredites.
Edom is of Hebrew origin. The name means RED. (Genesis 25:30) This is an alternative name for Esau, Jacob's twin brother. He was thus called because he was born red and hairy. His descendants, the Edomites, lived in a region situated south of the Dead Sea, between the Dead Sea and the Gulf of Aqubah. The Edomite nation was very often in war against the Israelites, until they were converted to Judaism, during the period of the Second Temple. Herod the Great was a descendant of an Edomite family. (Mandel p. 130)
EGYPT, EGYPTIAN
EGYPT, was the land of ancient Israel's captivity, located in northeastern Africa. Various prophets have mentioned Egypt in reference to the Lord's power and mercy in delivering the children of Israel out of bondage. (l Ne. 5:15; 17:40; 19:10; 2 Ne. 3:10; 25:20, Mosiah 7:19; 12:34; Alma 36:28. Egypt also figures in the ancestry of Lehi, through Joseph who was sold into Egypt. (l Ne. 3:14; 2 Ne. 3:4; 4:1)
EGYPTIANS were the people from whom the Israelites under Moses escaped bondage by the power and intervention of God. The Exodus narrative has always been used to extoll the power of God to assist his people and deliver them from their enemies. (l Ne. 4:3; 23-27; Alma 20:12; 36:26; Hel. 8:11) Lehi taught in the language of the Egyptians, the language of the engravings on the brass plates. (l Ne. 1:2; Mosiah 1:4)
Recall the text: "Pharaoh, being a righteous man...judged his people wisely and justly...Noah, HIS FATHER, who blessed him with the blessing of earth, and with the blessings of wisdom, but cursed him as pertaining to the Priesthood. (Abraham1:26) ...Recent studies point out...that it was specifically his claim to divinity that was denied him, [creating] legal and moral insecurity of the Pharaoh...a newly discovered text show that the Egyptians of the Fifth Dynasty (See CHRONOLOGICAL CHART in PART 15) had serious doubts about the divinity of Pharaoh... kings spending their days in the archives 'trying to learn about God in his true form,' to be sure of their own divine calling...In what is perhaps the oldest of all the Egyptian ritual texts, used at the installation of Menes, the first king of the First Dynasty, tells how HORUS was blessed with the blessings of the earth ...to be his heir and successor, 'born on the day of the Opening of the Ways.' [the Breathing Texts] the beginning of history...but ...was challenged by Seth...In the Beatty Papyrus No l, is recounted how when all the Council in Heaven approved HORUS as King, the Most High God was silent and angry with the assembly for slighting Seth. The issue was never settled." (Nibley p. 193) The early record about HORUS is his confrontations with Seth (evil, Lucifer), mention of this conflict has been inserted in earlier Parts, and future comments will be made as further discussions of HORUS are provided.
Abraham "sought for the blessings of the fathers, and the right whereunto I should be ordained to administer the same....I became a rightful heir, a High Priest, holding the right belonging to the fathers." (Abraham l:2) Pharaohs had archives which they searched but could not confirm their rights. Abraham had the real archives "the records of the fathers even the patriarchs, concerning the right of Priesthood, the Lord my God preserved in mine own hands...I have kept even unto this day." Abraham 1:31) Abraham received the priesthood under the hands of Melchizedek himself. (D&C 84:14) "Another [ancient] history tells us that he was placed to dwell awhile with SHEM ["THE GREAT HIGH PRIEST," LATER CALLED MELCHIZEDEK D&C 138:42] and lived several years with him....studying the things of God." (Tvedtnes p. xxiii) The ancient Egyptians could not make a claim to fame without the priesthood. Tvedtnes lists more than 16 ancient documents that deal with Abraham having access to the ancient records. (Tvedtnes 546)
Herakleides, the ancient historian, reported: "It was first a woman named Aegyptis who established her son and introduced weaving." (Nibley p. 103) "The land of Egypt being first discovered by a woman, who was the daughter of Ham, and the daughter of Egyptus, which in the Chaldean signifies Egypt, which signifies that which is forbidden;...Now the first government of Egypt was established by Pharaoh, the eldest son of EGYPTUS, the daughter of Ham, and it was after the manner of the government of Ham, which was PATRIARCHAL." (Abraham l :25) Someday, someone will elicit from the records or some yet to be found or recognized, the details of the first governments in Egypt and compare the findings with those of the Patriarchs. They might start with the oldest recognized site in Egypt. COPTOS (Koptos) considered to be the oldest settlement of Egypt. The Papyrus Harris No. l, in the possession of the British Museum, is the most magnificent of all Egyptian state archives. In addition to much of its content, which was updated during the time of Rameses 111, there is references to towns in Syria (upper Mesopotamia) being given to the King of Egypt (Gardiner p. 283), this kind of tribute speaks loudly of the influence and control by Egypt over northern areas through which the Jaredites passed and perhaps lived and at the time they did. It also mentions the names of cities in Egypt, but none farther south than ancient COPTOS. It also references the search by the Egyptians for copper and turquoise for trading. (Gardiner p. 284) Nibley's research into Egypt and Egyptus in 1981, identified a great deal of records and sources confirming Abraham statements regarding the naming and founding of Egypt including: E. Baumgartel, "we find the earliest remains in that part of Egypt where the Wadi Hammamt joins the Nile Valley. Koptos is situated at this junction." R. Weill "It is via Koptos that the Asiatic conquerors entered the Nile Valley in prehistoric times and founded historic Egypt." Moret "Egyptian civilization really began with the arrival of the 'Second Civilization" [the migration out of the Levant southward of the descendants of Ham away from the settlements of Shem] coming from Elam [Southern Iran] through the Wadi Hammamt, arriving at Koptos." Pliny the elder finds it "significant that Hilae, 'the Island sacred to Isis,' the second Eden, was juxta oppodium, Copton right next to Coptos town.Now some have maintained that this place, Coptos, with the oldest temple and the oldest settlement in Egypt gave its name to the country....there existed in Egypt from prehistoric time, a nome [like a county] which bore the still obscure name of QEBTI (KOPTOS)... Derchain [has] shown us that the very oldest sacrifice in Egypt was the slaying of a male gazelle by the goddess in honor of her son Pharaoh, usually at Philae and always near there [COPTOS]. The key to the whole history is the venerable figure of the god Min of Coptos." (Nibley, In Egypt pp. 195-197)
"Min is a historic person... Lord of the Migration, to settle in COPTOS after a long journey from the land of the Gods. He is always Lord of the Desert, Opener of roads, [trade lanes] Patron of Caravans and Beduins, who comes leading his hosts from the East, specifically, Gauthier maintains, from Canaan...His temple is...designated as his dwelling, 'the house of Min in the town of COPTOS of the NOME OF THE two falcons,' [the HORUS LINK] and always had the form of the primitive BEEHIVE [the BEE link], but with a CONICAL ROOF of the first settlers and nomads. [What is the shape of the Utah Beehive? Where did the Jaredites get their command of, and even, their bees, even the shape of the hives? ] ...the persistent traditions surviving among the modern natives of Egypt that Ham [or descendants of Ham] was the founder of COPTOS shows that folk-memory is an enduring depository of lost history...consider the great national celebration of the Egyptians, which was distinctively and properly MIN'S SHOW....'the Coming forth of Min' from Coptos." (Nibley In Egypt pp. 198-201) The whole question is where did the three sons of Noah take up residence? Genesis 10, the account of the Nations, suggest Japheth went east, among the first seven Missionaries who opened up the Japanese mission one was a Canadian born Japanese, he was told he was a descendant of Japheth, son of Noah, and AN ADOPTED SON OF ABRAHAM. Some 90 % of the Japanese getting blessings were told they were from Ephraim. The ancient texts being quoted above, are suggesting that Shem stayed in the area of the Levant, and that from Canaan HAM went south into Egypt and Nubia, essentially settling Egypt with his family. "The whole stretch of lands to the west of Egypt, from the Libyans and Berbers to the north down through the Madjaw and Tehennu, and the eastern and western Mish't--all were supposedly descendants of Min-Khem...this marks also the empire of the biblical Ham." (Nibley In Egypt p. 204)
"When Noah divided up on the lands among his sons, according to the Book of Jubilees, he pronounced a 'curse on every one that sought to seize the portion which had not fallen (to him) by his lot. So when Canaan, the son of Ham coveted and occupied 'the land of Lebanon to the river of Egypt' refusing to move out...they reminded him...he would ....come under 'the curse by which we bound ourselves by an oath in the presence of the holy judge, and in the presence of Noah our father.' So Ham and his descendants were forced out of Lebanon and the coastal areas down to Egypt and the Nile River area, (Nibley p.213) and from there, westward. "From Ham, sprang that race which preserved the curse in the land. " (Abraham 1:24)
The name Egypt has a complicated history. The common old Semitic consonantal combination G-P-T, with changing vowels, with the root always remaining the same designates something forbidden. "Before all, however, came Kh.b.t, the hidden marshes where Isis, according to some accounts, bore, and according to all accounts, nursed the infant Horus--the most secret place in the world and the only place where Seth could not find him; the nest hidden in the bull rushes was the most forbidden place on earth. So we have no shortage of candidates for the original form of 'Egypt, which signifies that which is forbidden.'" (Nibley p. 197; Abraham l:23) See my CD on ABRAHAM. Since then additional research has continued, by 2001more than 30 more documents had been identified, on just the subject of Pharaoh and the Founding of Egypt, assembled and published, by Tvedtnes and others. (Tvedtness pp. 546-547)
ISN'T IT ALL ABOUT BEES?
It is curious that there is no mention of Bees, honey comb, bee hives, or bee keeping in Abraham. Yet the bee presents such a remarkable control over Joseph smith's account of what is supposed to have happened away back in the days of what the Jews call 'the Separation,' i.e. the great migration from the Tower.' "The garden (hsp) before MIN's Beehive House at COPTOS hummed with the sound of busy bees, for Min of COPTOS, the first ruler of Egypt, was 'a god of bees,' and 'fond of honey,' whose priests were called aftitu, 'Bees.' and whose number-two priest was the 'aft n byt', 'Keeper of the Bees.' [In Egyptian BYT, or BIT, is BEE] The mountain behind COPTOS was the Egyptian Hymettus, an important source of that wild honey which the Egyptians always favored...In Egypt the bee is, before all else, a sign of royalty...the oldest title placed before the name of a king was the 'insibya,' signs of the 'sedge and the bee'...the sedge was a later addition...the bee sign originally stood alone as the supreme symbol of sacred primal kingship in Egypt. Queen Hatshepsut still thinks of herself as Leader of the Bee-people." (Nibley p. 226) In 1974, little did I realize as I stood on the stone structure of Hatshepsuts monuments in the Valley of Kings in Egypt so my wife could take a picture of me that there would be a connection with the Jaredites, and I got a picture of her on the steps.
"The bee belonged originally only to the South [HORUS COUNTRY] in hieroglyphic the bee is constantly equated with the Red Crown worn by the first king of Lower Egypt at Sais; but the fact that the oldest representation of that crown comes not from Sais in the Delta, but from Nakada, [opposite COPTOS] being 'characteristic of the first prehistoric civilization' in the domain of 'Min, who was the chief god of Panopolis, also of KOPTOS nearby opposite Nadeh'... [in Egyptian the word for bee is bit]... It was early recognized that the words for bee, Red Crown, and honey, all of which were read the same way, whether as n.t, bi.t or khb.t all had feminine endings...the male rulers of Lower Egypt ...successor and descendants of this royal Bee were given the name of bi-ty, 'he who belongs to the bee,' 'the descendants of the Bee.'...the bee symbol of MIN=HORUS does not tell us that MIN is a bee, but that 'MIN is he who belongs to the Bee'. In the Leiden BOOK OF BREATHINGS, the succession to the throne is assured when HORUS marries the Queen Bee, and takes over the land." (Nibley In Egypt pp. 225-227)
"The bee is...the sponsor inspiration, and guide of the Great Trek...the sole survivor of the great catastrophes that desolated the earth, the bee is first to arrive on the scene and start things going gain....Adam and Eve were accompanied and guided by bees as they moved from the Garden into the dark hour world. The bees brought with them the primordial creative divine power, their honey...food of heaven...Adam bore the olive, vine, date, pomegranate and nard, but to Eve was given the greatest blessing, for she was accompanied by her friends from the garden with their honey...make possible to renew the verdure of the former world in their new one...the bees got to work restoring the fertility of the woods and fields...producing their honey and wax for the benefit of man...[in] the HITITE version the Bee revives the human race after the Flood...the bees were before Adam and Eve, without them, no garden." (Nibley In Egypt, pp. 228-230) The Jaredites passed through the HITITE EMPIRE. As noted in the past PARTS and in the future, there are HITITE names among the Jaredite records.
"The traditions of the Old World are closely matched by the oldest records of the New, the Mayan Book of Ch'ilam Balam, which begins with the settling of the land by bee swarms of the four directions, each a different color under the direction of 'two gods in the form of large bees who govern the bees...the word for wild bees also has a feminine prefix." (Nibley In Egypt,p. 231) This could be an old tradition about the swarms brought over by the Jaredites.
So where did the Jaredites get their bees? "From the earliest times the commonest occurrence of the Bee was in the title sd3wtj bitj, the pronunciation of which has never been settled and the meaning of which Grapow found 'unreadable'...the real significance of the whole thing is exceedingly ancient and, in the opinion of Otto, ever guarded by the Egyptians as one of their deepest secrets. ...indicated by the conspicuous absence of the bee from extensive lists of fauna preserved in the Babylonian texts, implying, according to E.D. Van Buren, that bees HAD TO BE IMPORTED INTO BAYBLONIA FROM EGYPT. ..there was never any real apiculture in Mesopotamia, according to a recent study, and 'wild honey or apiculture do not form a part of ancient Chinese civilization'...incidentally , the prominence of the bee in Mayan migration legends suggest Mediterranean rather than Asiatic origins [for the bees]." (Nibley In Egypt, p. 232) The implications continue, the Jaredites were likely traders, and in the process had acquired bees from Egypt and kept them with them on their epic migration.
The primitive shrine of MIN was a BEEHIVE house with a Bull skull on a pole standing before the door. HATHOR = TEFNUT the COW is herself the BEE-LADY. In the tomb of Seti l, the soul is revived by bees that come from the sacred skin of an ox. Hundreds of golden bees were found in the grave of Childerich, King of the Franks along with a golden bucranium. Ancient Germans and Celts thought of themselves on the march as swarming bees, they marched with the bull-standard at their head. The latest study of ancient bees unites the Great Mother as Queen Bee with the Bull as her paredos who represents 'the pre-Hellenic Zeus or the primitive Mycenean Dionysus' confirming the strange but immemorial wedding of the life-giving pair in Egypt. Food from putrefying corpses was more than a symbol in the MYSTERIES-it was real proof of the resurrection. The Bee, 'born from the ox' in sacred caves sets the scene for the mysteries. An inscription from the temple of Denderah, near COPTOS, says, 'Osiris emulates the Bee in the Temple,' giving instructions "for knowing the hsp (sacred garden) of the BEE in the Other World, in the House of snhty," the last written with the bee hieroglyph. Osiris appears in both the Pyramid Texts and the Coffin Texts, as bi.ti, the resurrected crown and Bee. A. Moret has written extensively about the important part the sacred skin, mekhent, plays in The Egyptian resurrection rites, in which the skin and the bee go together: the Bee born from the skin of the animal is the sign of the resurrection. The Babylonians and Persians embalmed the noble dead in honey "with the same lamentation rites as the Egyptians. Everywhere the Bee is the preserver and restorer of life. (Nibley In Egypt, p. 233)
In the mysteries of Abydos, [see MAP OF THE NILE PART 15] Osiris himself is the bity who keep secret that which is to be concealed in the Holy of Holies. The true nature of the bee-sign could no longer be grasped. In the Pyramid Texts titles are a cryptogram concealing the Hidden one, the most hidden of the Lands. Originally the Bee-title designated a sacred, prehistoric kingship, a [foreordained ] spiritual entity, existing, before the creation of the cosmos, a holy kingdom stretching back even to the preexistence. Pharaoh had a monopoly on the collection and production of honey and that gift of honey was a royal prerogative reserved as the highest honor for high officials, dsr.t as the royal ritual word for Bee was taboo to the vulgar. Even in the Dead Sea Scrolls, the mis-used term Essenes, though the word also means pious, means 'leader of the Bees.' (Nibley In Egypt, p. 244)
"What ties it all together is ASENATH, the Queen of the Deseret hive...mother of Ephraim and Manasseh by Joseph...whom she married in the midst of a swarm of bees, bringing he honey and covering her person to do her reverence... Her name...explained...as 'meaning in Egyptian 'she who belongs to, or is, the servant of the Goddess Neith...Neith being the primal BEE-MOTHER of the Egyptians'...Asenath herself was undeniably the queen-bee when she married Joseph." (Nibley In Egypt, p. 244) So the Jaredites, in bringing Deseret, were not just bringing a swarm of bees as extra baggage, they brought the symbols of the ancients and traditions of the great players in religious history, and the greatest vehicle of all the ancient symbols and traditions, today, is the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.
After the martyrdom of Joseph and Hyrum, "the bodies remained in the cellar of the Nauvoo House where they were buried, until the fall, when they were removed by Dimiek B. Huntington, William D. Huntington, Jonathan H. Holmes, and Gilbert Goldsmith, at Emma's request, to near the Mansion House, and buried side by side, and the BEE HOUSE was then moved and placed over their graves." (Roberts p. 628-629)
BIBLIOGRAPHY
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BAKER, Heather D., The Prosography of the New-Assyrian Empire, Volume 2/1 H-K, University of Helsinki, Finland, 2002
BERMANT, Chaim & Michael Weitzman, Ebla, Times Books, NewYork,1979
BUDGE, Sir Ernest A. Wallis, An Egyptian Hieroglyphic Dictionary, Vol. 11, Cosimo Classic, New York, 2010
COE, Michael D., American's First Civilization, The American Heritage Publishing co., Inc, & the Smithsonian Institution, New York, 1968
BERNAL, Ignacio, The Olmec World, University of California press, Berkeley, 1969
LARGEY, Dennis E., Ed., Book of Mormon Reference Companion, Deseret Book Company, Salt Lake City, Utah 2003
MANDEL, David, Who's Who in Tanakh, Ariel Books, Savyon, Israel, 2004
NIBLEY, Hugh, Lehi in the Desert, The World of the Jaredites, There were Jaredites, FARMS,Vol. 5, Deseret Book Co., Salt Lake City, Utah 1988
............Vol. 8, An Approach to the Book of Mormon, FARMS, Deseret Book Company, Salt Lake City, Utah 1988
............Abraham in Egypt, Deseret Book Company, Salt Lake City, Utah 1981
POSENER, Georges, A Dictionary of Egyptian Civilization, Methuen and Co., London 1962
SOUSTELLE, Jacques, The Olmecs, the Oldest Civilization in Mexico, Doubleday & Co., Inc., Garden City, New York, 1984
SORENSON, John L., Mormon's Codex, Neal A. Maxwell Institute, Deseret Book, Salt Lake City, Utah, 2013
ROBERTS, B.H., Ed., The History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Vol.VI,Deseret Book Co. Salt Lake city, Utah, 1959
TVEDTNES, John A., Brian M. Hauglid, John Gee, Eds., Traditions about the EarlyLife of Abraham, FARMS Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah, 2001
WILSON, Clifford A., The Impact of Ebla on Bible Records, The Word of Truth Publications, Melbourne, Australia,1977
ZINSSER, Hans, Rats, Lice and History, Bantam Books, New York, 1967