Hieroglyphs Addenda · Signs

𓆣

scarab

NameL1
Readsḫpr
Meansscarab beetle — kheper: become, transform
Taught in10 · Life, beauty, becoming

Where it comes from

The scarab beetle, drawn from above with its ridged wing-case. It writes ḫpr, “to become, come into being, transform” — the Egyptians watched new beetles climb out of the dung ball and read it as self-creation. The morning sun, becoming itself, is Khepri.

How to remember it

The scarab rolls its ball and life comes out of it — becoming, engineered by a beetle. Every “become,” every transformation, every Khepri-name carries this insect.

In the wild

From a funerary liturgy against Apophis (aes corpus). urn:nabu:aes:bbawtotenlit:A2PTGDCYB5E4XK6OORW6V4QHOE:IBUBdwS3H2bLl0S1n5N8U9CLN1A · license: attribution.

Piece by piece:

  • nn ḫpr≡tn — you shall not become: the scarab, denied
  • nn wn≡tn — you shall not be: the hare-verb, denied too

The curse aims at becoming itself — no transformation, no existence. The sign is taught in 101’s chapter 10.