PROBABLE ORIGIN OF THE WORD BUTTERFLY

Extract

The transformation of a grovelling worm to the glory that attaches to the winged aspirant of the heavens, has won for this insect from remote antiquity the appellation of Spirit or Soul, as typical of the resurrected human body. There is, I think, good reason to believe that the root meaning of the word Butterfly dates back to early Egyptian history, and as a hieroglyphic it is synonymous as representing the qualities of completeness and perfection which characterize the soul. I have supposed that it might serve the interest of this journal to record such historical gleanings bearing upon this subject as have come within my reach. It is said that in Yorkshire in England, the country folk call the night-flying white moths, Souls. This restricted application of the term very forcibly expresses what had been traditionally received by these people, and which they unwittingly have applied to certain white winged species. The English word Moth is said to be the Egyptian MUT or MAT. MAT is to pass; MUT to die; MATT, unfold, unwind, open, as the chrysalis entered the winged state and passed. The winged thing was a symbol of the Soul; it appears in the hieroglyphics as the Moth or Butterfly.