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[26] Sarapim: an Egyptian deity, apparently at first identical with Osiris, and often later connected in worship with Isis. From Alexandria, where the great Sarapeum stood, the cult spread through Greece and Italy, reaching Rome perhaps as early as the time of Sulla, though it met there with great opposition, and did not attain its height till the end of the first century after Christ. In 58 B.C., only about two years before this poem was written, the worship of the Egyptian divinities had been banished without the city walls. Upon the Campus Martius, however, Isis and Sarapis found a resting-place, and their temples were much frequented by the lower classes. Courtesans especially flocked to Isis, and invalids to Sarapis, whose priests were reputed to have wondrous powers of healing. But Sarapis may stand here for both divinities, and there is no need to suppose the girl was ill because of her professed destination or of her request for the use of a lectica. The spelling Sarapis instead of Serapis is well supported by inscriptions and by Greek usage.


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