Dr. Baas informs us that this papyrus describes “remedies for diseases of the stomach, the abdomen, and the urinary bladder; for the cure of swellings of the glands in the groin (buboes) and the ‘kehn-mite’; ‘the Book of the Eyes’; remedies for ulcers of the head, for greyness of the hair, and promotion of its growth; ointments to heal and strengthen the nerves; medicines to cure diseases of the tongue, to strengthen the teeth, to remove lice and fleas; remedies for the hearing and for the organs of smell; the preparation of the famous Kyphi; ‘The Secret Book of the Physician’ (the science of the movement of the heart, and the knowledge of the heart, according to the priestly physician Nebsuchet); prescriptions for the eyes according to the views of the priest Chui, a Semite of Byblos; ‘Book of the Banishing of Pains,’ recipes for mouth-pills for women, to render the odour of the mouth agreeable; the various uses of the tequem tree, etc. The papyrus has marginal notes, like _nefer_ (good), etc., which Lauth assigns to the year B.C. 1469—an evidence that its prescriptions had been tested in practice.”[126]
Osiris (who would appear to be the same deity as Apis or Serapis) and the goddess Isis, who was his wife and sister, were held by the Egyptians to have been the inventors of the medical arts. A very ancient inscription on a column says: “My father is Chronos, the youngest of all the gods. I am the king Osiris, who has been through all the earth; even to the habitable lands of the Indies, to those which are under the Bear, even to the sources of the Danube, and besides to the Ocean. I am the eldest son of Chronos, and the scion of a beautiful and noble race; I am the parent of the day, there is no part of the world where I have not been, and I have filled all the world with my benefactions.” Another column has these words: “I am Isis, queen of all this country, who has been instructed by Thoth; no one is able to unbind what I have bound; I am the eldest daughter of Chronos, the youngest of the gods. I am the wife and the sister of King Osiris. It is I who first taught mankind the art of agriculture. I am the mother of King Horus. It is I who shine in the dog-star. It is I who built the city of Bubastis. Farewell, farewell, Egypt, where I have been reared.” It appears from these inscriptions that Isis and Osiris were contemporary with Thoth or Hermes.