after describing how Shu and Tefnut proceeded from himself, "thus from
being one god I became three."

4. SEB was the son of the god Shu. He is called the "Erp[=a]," _i.e._,
the "hereditary chief" of the gods, and the "father of the gods,"
these being, of course, Osiris, Isis, Set, and Nephthys. He was
originally the god of the earth, but later he became a god of the dead
as representing the earth wherein the deceased was laid. One legend
identifies him with the goose, the bird which, in later times was
sacred to him, and he is often called the "Great Cackler," in allusion
to the idea that he made the primeval egg from which the world came
into being.

5. NUT was the wife of Seb and the mother of Osiris, Isis, Set, and
Nephthys. Originally she was the personification of the sky, and
represented the feminine principle which was active at the creation of
the universe. According to an old view, Seb and Nut existed in the
primeval watery abyss side by side with Shu and Tefnut; and later Seb
became the earth and Nut the sky. These deities were supposed to unite
every evening, and to remain embraced until the morning, when the god
Shu separated them, and set the goddess of the sky upon his four
pillars until the evening. Nut was, naturally, regarded as the mother
of the gods and of all things living, and she and her husband Seb were
considered to be the givers of food, not only to the living but also
to the dead. Though different views were current in Egypt as to the
exact location of the heaven of the beatified dead, yet all schools of
thought in all periods assigned it to some region in the sky, and the
abundant allusions in the texts to the heavenly bodies--that is, the
sun, moon, and stars--which the deceased dwells with, prove that the
final abode of the souls of the righteous was not upon earth. The