Cambyses II killing the sacred bull Apis or Hapis. Egyptian mythology states that for killing the sacred animal he is punished by madness, in which he commits many other crimes, kills his brother and his sister, and at last loses his empire and dies from a wound in the thigh. Cambyses II, d. 522 BC. Emperor of the Achaemenid Empire. From Ward and Lock's Illustrated History of the World, published c.1882.