# four arms *The Urth list — 1 messages, 1 voices, 07 Sep 2003* > Exported from an unofficial mirror of a public mailing list. Copyright > in each message remains with the person who wrote it. > Email addresses are obscured as `user at host`, the form the original > archive published. This file was rebuilt from parsed fields rather than > retained headers, so it is faithful in content but not byte-exact. --- ### Lisa Schaffer-Doggett *07 Sep 2003, 01:38* From http://216.239.41.104/ search?q=cache:vSmsO6PtHs0J:digital.library.upenn.edu/women/edwards/ pharaohs/pharaohs-4.html+ka-arms&hl=en&ie=UTF-8 : "Now, the Ka is a very interesting personage. He is designated in the Egyptian writing by a special hieroglyph representing a pair of hands and arms upraised as if in adoration. Such is the pictorial symbol of which the phonetic reading is "Ka." This name, or rather the conception represented by this name, has been variously interpreted by European Egyptologists. Dr. Brugsch, in his Hieroglyphic Dictionary, explains it as "the person, the individuality, the being." Professor Maspero, recognizing its incorporeal character, calls it "the double." Mr. Le Page Renouf (32) likens it to the "eidolon" of the Greeks, the "genius" of the Romans; and Dr. Wiedemann has lately written an interesting paper to show that it was not the person, but what he calls "the personality" or "individuality" of the deceased–meaning thereby that which distinguished him in life from other men; in other words, the mental impression which was evoked when his name was mentioned." Don writing now: In statuary the ka arms are above the head of the person represented by the statue, in effect giving it four arms. It is these extra arms that distinguish the ka from the actual person. Could this have any tie to the Vanished People? ---