over the altar so that it runs down upon the
victim and having called upon the god, they cut its throat, and having
cut its throat they sever the head from the body. The body then of the
beast they flay, but upon the head 43 they make many imprecations first,
and then they who have a market and Hellenes sojourning among them for
trade, these carry it to the market-place and sell it, while they who
have no Hellenes among them cast it away into the river: and this is the
form of imprecation which they utter upon the heads, praying that if any
evil be about to befall either themselves who are offering sacrifice or
the land of Egypt in general, it may come rather upon this head. Now
as regards the heads of the beasts which are sacrificed and the pouring
over them of the wine, all the Egyptians have the same customs equally
for all their sacrifices; and by reason of this custom none of the
Egyptians eat of the head either of this or of any other kind of animal:

40, but the manner of disembowelling the victims and of burning them is
appointed among them differently for different sacrifices; I shall
speak however of the sacrifices to that goddess whom they regard as the
greatest of all, and to whom they celebrate the greatest feast.--When
they have flayed the bullock and made imprecation, they take out the
whole of its lower entrails but leave in the body the upper entrails and
the fat; and they sever from it the legs and the end of the loin and the
shoulders and the neck: and this done, they fill the rest of the body of
the animal with consecrated 44 loaves and honey and raisins and figs and
frankincense and myrrh and every other kind of spices, and having filled
it with these they offer it, pouring over it great abundance of oil.
They make their sacrifice after fasting, and while the offerings are
being burnt, they all beat themselves for mourning, and when they have
finished beating themselves they set forth as a feast that which they
left unburnt of the sacrifice.

41. The clean males then of the ox kind, both full-grown animals and
calves, are sacrificed by all the Egyptians; the females however they
may not sacrifice, but these are sacred to Isis; for the figure of Isis
is in the form of a woman with cow's horns, just as the Hellenes present
Io in pictures, and all the Egyptians without distinction reverence cows
far more than any other kind of cattle; for which reason neither man nor
woman of Egyptian race would kiss