Egyptian Mythology and Magick Forum ☥

The God, Horus the Younger

God of the sun, sky and kingship

Horus was often the ancient Egyptians' national patron god. He was usually depicted as a falcon-headed man wearing the pschent, or a red and white crown, as a symbol of kingship over the entire kingdom of Egypt.

Major cult center   Nekhen, Behdet
Symbol   The wedjat eye
Consort   Serket (as Haroeris), Hathor (in one version)
Parents   Osiris and Isis in some myths, and Nut and Geb in others.
Siblings   Osiris, Isis, Set, and Nephthys (as Horus the Elder)
Offspring   Imsety, Hapi, Duamutef, Qebehsenuef (as Haroeris), Sekhemet (as Horus)
Horus is one of the oldest and most significant deities in ancient Egyptian religion, who was worshipped from at least the late Predynastic period through to Greco-Roman times. Different forms of Horus are recorded in history and these are treated as distinct gods by Egypt specialists.[1] These various forms may possibly be different perceptions of the same multi-layered deity in which certain attributes or syncretic relationships are emphasized, not necessarily in opposition but complementary to one another, consistent with how the Ancient Egyptians viewed the multiple facets of reality.[2] He was most often depicted as a falcon, most likely a lanner or peregrine, or as a man with a falcon head.[3]

The earliest recorded form of Horus is the patron deity of Nekhen in Upper Egypt, who is the first known national god, specifically related to the king who in time came to be regarded as a manifestation of Horus in life and Osiris in death.[1] The most commonly encountered family relationship describes Horus as the son of Isis and Osiris but in another tradition Hathor is regarded as his mother and sometimes as his wife.[1] Horus served many functions in the Egyptian pantheon, most notably being a god of the sun, war and protection.

ḥr "Horus"
in hieroglyphs
Horus is recorded in Egyptian hieroglyphs as ḥr.w; the pronunciation has been reconstructed as *Ḥāru, meaning "falcon". Additional meanings are thought to have been "the distant one" or "one who is above, over".[4] By Coptic times, the name became Hōr. It was adopted into Greek as Ὧρος Hōros. The original name also survives in later Egyptian names such as Har-si-ese literally "Horus, son of Isis".

Horus was also known as Nekheny, meaning "falcon". Some[who?] have proposed that Nekheny may have been another falcon-god, worshipped at Nekhen (city of the falcon), with which Horus was identified from early on. Horus may be shown as a falcon on the Narmer Palette dating from about the 31st century BC.

Note of changes over time

In early Egypt, Horus was the brother of Isis, Osiris, Set and Nephthys. As different cults formed, he became the son of Isis and Osiris. Isis remained the sister of Osiris, Set and Nephthys.

Horus and the pharaoh

Pyramid texts ca. 2400–2300 BC[5] describe the nature of the Pharaoh in different characters as both Horus and Osiris. The Pharaoh as Horus in life became the Pharaoh as Osiris in death, where he was united with the rest of the gods. New incarnations of Horus succeeded the deceased pharaoh on earth in the form of new Pharaohs.

The lineage of Horus, the eventual product of unions between the children of Atum, may have been a means to explain and justify Pharaonic power; The gods produced by Atum were all representative of cosmic and terrestrial forces in Egyptian life; by identifying Horus as the offspring of these forces, then identifying him with Atum himself, and finally identifying the Pharaoh with Horus, the Pharaoh theologically had dominion over all the world.

The notion of Horus as the Pharaoh seems to have been superseded by the concept of the Pharaoh as the son of Ra during the Fifth Dynasty of Egypt.[6]

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The God, Anubis

Anubis, Protector of the dead and embalming also god of funerals and death

Major cult center   Lycopolis, Cynopolis
Symbol   the fetish, the flail
Consort   Anput and sometimes Isis
Parents   Nephthys and Set
Offspring   Kebechet and sometimes Ammut
Anubis (/əˈnuːbəs/ or /əˈnjuːbəs/;[2] Ancient Greek: Ἄνουβις) is the Greek name of a jackal-headed god associated with mummification and the afterlife in ancient Egyptian religion.

Like many ancient Egyptian deities, Anubis assumed different roles in various contexts. Depicted as a protector of graves as early as the First Dynasty (c. 3100 – c. 2890 BC), Anubis was also an embalmer. By the Middle Kingdom (c. 2055 – 1650 BC), Anubis was replaced by Osiris in his role as Lord of the underworld. One of his prominent roles was as a god who ushered souls into the afterlife. He attended the weighing scale during the "Weighing of the Heart," in which it was determined whether a soul would be allowed to enter the realm of the dead.[3] Despite being one of the most ancient and "one of the most frequently depicted and mentioned gods" in the Egyptian pantheon, however, Anubis played almost no role in Egyptian myths.[4]

Anubis was depicted in black, a color that symbolized both rebirth and the discoloration of the corpse after embalming. Anubis is associated with Wepwawet (also called Upuaut), another Egyptian god portrayed with a dog's head or in canine form, but with grey or white fur. Historians assume that the two figures were eventually combined.[5] Anubis' female counterpart is Anput. His daughter is the serpent goddess Kebechet.

"Anubis" is a Greek rendering of this god's Egyptian name.[6][7] In the Old Kingdom (c. 2686 BC – c. 2181 BC), the standard way of writing his name in hieroglyphs was composed of the sound inpw followed by a jackal over a ḥtp sign:[8]

According to the Akkadian transcription in the Amarna letters, Anubis' name (inpw) was vocalized in Egyptian as Anapa.[9]

History

Anubis attending the mummy of the deceased.
In Egypt's Early Dynastic period (c. 3100 – c. 2686 BC), Anubis was portrayed in full animal form, with a jackal head and body.[10] A jackal god, probably Anubis, is depicted in stone inscriptions from the reigns of Hor-Aha, Djer, and other pharaohs of the First Dynasty.[11] Since Predynastic Egypt, when the dead were buried in shallow graves, jackals had been strongly associated with cemeteries because they were scavengers which uncovered human bodies and ate their flesh.[12] In the spirit of "fighting like with like," a jackal was chosen to protect the dead.[13]

The oldest known textual mention of Anubis is in the Pyramid Texts of the Old Kingdom (c. 2686 – c. 2181 BC), where he is associated with the burial of the pharaoh.[14]

In the Old Kingdom, Anubis was the most important god of the dead. He was replaced in that role by Osiris during the Middle Kingdom (2000–1700 BC).[15] In the Roman era, which started in 30 BC, tomb paintings depict him holding the hand of deceased persons to guide them to Osiris.[16]

The parentage of Anubis varied between myths, times and sources. In early mythology, he was portrayed as a son of Ra.[17] In the Coffin Texts, which were written in the First Intermediate Period (c. 2181–2055 BC), Anubis is the son of either the cow goddess Hesat or the cat-headed Bastet.[18] Another tradition depicted him as the son of his father Ra and mother Nephthys.[17] The Greek Plutarch (c. 40–120 AD) stated that Anubis was the illegitimate son of Nephthys and Osiris, but that he was adopted by Osiris's wife Isis:[19]


Statue of Hermanubis, a hybrid of Anubis and the Greek god Hermes (Vatican Museums)
For when Isis found out that Osiris loved her sister and had sexual relations with her in mistaking her sister for herself, and when she saw a proof of it in the form of a garland of clover that he had left to Nephthys - she was looking for a baby, because Nephthys abandoned it at once after it had been born for fear of Seth; and when Isis found the baby helped by the dogs which with great difficulties lead her there, she raised him and he became her guard and ally by the name of Anubis.

George Hart sees this story as an "attempt to incorporate the independent deity Anubis into the Osirian pantheon."[18] An Egyptian papyrus from the Roman period (30–380 AD) simply called Anubis the "son of Isis."[18]

In the Ptolemaic period (350–30 BC), when Egypt became a Hellenistic kingdom ruled by Greek pharaohs, Anubis was merged with the Greek god Hermes, becoming Hermanubis.[20][21] The two gods were considered similar because they both guided souls to the afterlife.[22] The center of this cult was in uten-ha/Sa-ka/ Cynopolis, a place whose Greek name means "city of dogs." In Book XI of The Golden Ass by Apuleius, there is evidence that the worship of this god was continued in Rome through at least the 2nd century. Indeed, Hermanubis also appears in the alchemical and hermetical literature of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.

Although the Greeks and Romans typically scorned Egypt's animal-headed gods as bizarre and primitive (Anubis was mockingly called "Barker" by the Greeks), Anubis was sometimes associated with Sirius in the heavens and Cerberus and Hades in the underworld. [23] In his dialogues, Plato often has Socrates utter oaths "by the dog" (kai me ton kuna), "by the dog of Egypt", and "by the dog, the god of the Egyptians", both for emphasis and to appeal to Anubis as an arbiter of truth in the underworld.[24]

Roles

Protector of tombs

In contrast to real jackals, Anubis was a protector of graves and cemeteries. Several epithets attached to his name in Egyptian texts and inscriptions referred to that role. Khenty-imentiu, which means "foremost of the westerners" and later became the name of a different jackal god, alluded to his protecting function because the dead were usually buried on the west bank of the Nile.[25] He took other names in connection with his funerary role, such as "He who is upon his mountain" (tepy-dju-ef) – keeping guard over tombs from above – and "Lord of the sacred land" (neb-ta-djeser), which designates him as a god of the desert necropolis.[26]

Most ancient tombs had prayers to Anubis carved on them.[27]

Embalmer
As "He who is in the place of embalming" (imy-ut), Anubis was associated with mummification. He was also called "He who presides over the god's pavilion" (khanty-she-netjer), in which "pavilion" could be refer either to the place where embalming was carried out, or the pharaoh's burial chamber.[26]

In the Osiris myth, Anubis helped Isis to embalm Osiris.[15] Indeed, when the Osiris myth emerged, it was said that after Osiris had been killed by Set, Osiris's organs were given to Anubis as a gift. With this connection, Anubis became the patron god of embalmers; during the rites of mummification, illustrations from the Book of the Dead often show a jackal-mask-wearing priest supporting the upright mummy.

Weighing of the heart

The "weighing of the heart," from the book of the dead of Hunefer. Anubis is portrayed as both guiding the deceased forward and manipulating the scales, under the scrutiny of the ibis-headed Thoth.
One of the roles of Anubis was as the "Guardian of the Scales."[28] The critical scene depicting the weighing of the heart, in the Book of the Dead, shows Anubis performing a measurement that determined whether the person was worthy of entering the realm of the dead (the underworld, known as Duat). By weighing the heart of a deceased person against Ma'at (or "truth"), who was often represented as an ostrich feather, Anubis dictated the fate of souls. Souls heavier than a feather would be devoured by Ammit, and souls lighter than a feather would ascend to a heavenly existence.[29][30]

Guide of souls

By the late pharaonic era (664–332 BC), Anubis was often depicted as guiding individuals across the threshold from the world of the living to the afterlife.[31] Though a similar role was sometimes performed by the cow-headed Hathor, Anubis was more commonly chosen to fulfill that function.[32] Greek writers from the Roman period of Egyptian history designated that role as that of "psychopomp", a Greek term meaning "guide of souls" that they used to refer to their own god Hermes, who also played that role in Greek religion.[22] Funerary art from that period represents Anubis guiding either men or women dressed in Greek clothes into the presence of Osiris, who by then had long replaced Anubis as ruler of the underworld.[33]

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The God, Sobek

God of the Nile, the Army, military, fertility and of crocodiles

Major cult center   Crocodilopolis, Faiyum, Kom Ombo
Symbol   crocodile
Consort   Renenutet or Meskhenet
Parents   Set/Khnum and Neith[1]
Siblings   Apep and Ra

Sobek (also called Sebek, Sochet, Sobk, and Sobki), in Greek, Suchos (Σοῦχος) and from Latin Suchus, was an ancient Egyptian deity with a complex and fluid nature.[2] He is associated with the Nile crocodile and is either represented in its form or as a human with a crocodile head. Sobek was also associated with pharaonic power, fertility, and military prowess, but served additionally as a protective deity with apotropaic qualities, invoked particularly for protection against the dangers presented by the Nile river.

This statue of Sobek was found at Amenemhat III’s mortuary temple (which was connected to his pyramid at Hawara in the Faiyum), serving as a testament to this king’s devotion to Sobek. Ashmolean Museum, Oxford.
Sobek enjoyed a longstanding presence in the ancient Egyptian pantheon, from the Old Kingdom (c. 2686—2181 BCE) through the Roman period (c. 30 BCE—350 CE). He is first known from several different Pyramid Texts of the Old Kingdom, particularly from spell PT 317.[3] The spell, which praises the pharaoh as living incarnation of the crocodile god, reads:

"Unis is Sobek, green of plumage, with alert face and raised fore, the splashing one who came from the thigh and tail of the great goddess in the sunlight…Unis has appeared as Sobek, Neith's son. Unis will eat with his mouth, Unis will urinate and Unis will copulate with his ****. Unis is lord of semen, who takes women from their husbands to the place Unis likes according to his heart’s fancy."[4]

The origin of his name, Sbk[5] in ancient Egyptian, is debated among scholars, but many believe that it is derived from a causative of the verb "to impregnate."[6]

Though Sobek was worshipped in the Old Kingdom, he truly gained prominence in the Middle Kingdom (c. 2055—1650 BCE), most notably under the Twelfth Dynasty king, Amenemhat III. Amenemhat III had taken a particular interest in the Faiyum region of Egypt, a region heavily associated with Sobek. Amenemhat and many of his dynastic contemporaries engaged in building projects to promote Sobek – projects that were often executed in the Faiyum. In this period, Sobek also underwent an important change: he was often fused with the falcon-headed god of divine kingship, Horus. This brought Sobek even closer with the kings of Egypt, thereby giving him a place of greater prominence in the Egyptian pantheon.[7] The fusion added a finer level of complexity to the god’s nature, as he was adopted into the divine triad of Horus and his two parents: Osiris and Isis.[8]


This Late Period (c. 400 – 250 BCE) statue shows Sobek bearing the falcon head of Re-Harakhti, illustrating the fusion of Sobek and Re into Sobek-Re. Walters Art Museum, Baltimore.
Sobek first acquired a role as a solar deity through his connection to Horus, but this was further strengthened in later periods with the emergence of Sobek-Ra, a fusion of Sobek and Egypt’s primary sun god, Ra. Sobek-Horus persisted as a figure in the New Kingdom (1550—1069 BCE), but it was not until the last dynasties of Egypt that Sobek-Ra gained prominence. This understanding of the god was maintained after the fall of Egypt’s last native dynasty in Ptolemaic and Roman Egypt (c. 332 BCE—390 CE). The prestige of both Sobek and Sobek-Ra endured in this time period and tributes to him attained greater prominence – both through the expansion of his dedicated cultic sites and a concerted scholarly effort to make him the subject of religious doctrine.[9]

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Goddess, Taweret

Goddess of Fertility and Childbirth

The river goddess Taweret, portrayed as a bipedal hippopotamus with limbs like those of a feline. Her hand rests on the sa sign, a hieroglyph that means "protection."
Major cult center   Not applicable; Taweret was a household deity worshipped throughout Egypt.
Symbol   the sa, ivory dagger, Hippopotamus
Consort   Seth, in accordance with Plutarch's account
Offspring   Amun-Re (Ptolemaic)
In Egyptian mythology, Taweret (also spelled Taurt, Tuat, Taouris, Tuart, Ta-weret, Tawaret, Twert, and Taueret, and in Greek, Θουέρις "Thouéris" and Toeris) is the protective ancient Egyptian goddess of childbirth and fertility. The name "Taweret" (Tȝ-wrt) means, "she who is great" or simply, "great one," a common pacificatory address to dangerous deities.[1] The deity is typically depicted as a bipedal female hippopotamus with feline attributes, pendulous female human breasts, and the back of a Nile crocodile. She commonly bears the epithets "Lady of Heaven," "Mistress of the Horizon," "She Who Removes Water," "Mistress of Pure Water," and "Lady of the Birth House."[2]

History and development[edit]
Archaelogical evidence demonstrates that hippopotami inhabited ancient Egypt's Nile River well-before the dawn of dynastic Egypt (before 3000 BCE). The violent and aggressive behavior of these creatures intrigued the individuals that inhabited the region, leading the ancient Egyptians both to persecute and to venerate them. From a very early date, male hippopotami were thought to be manifestations of chaos; consequently, they were overcome in royal hunting campaigns, intended to demonstrate the divine power of the king.[3] However, female hippopotami were revered as manifestations of apotropaic deities, as they studiously protect their young from harm. Protective amulets bearing the likenesses of female hippopotami have been found dating as far back the Predynastic period (ca. 3000–2686 BCE). The tradition of making and wearing these amulets continued throughout Egyptian history into the Ptolemaic and Roman periods (ca. 332 BCE – 390 CE).[4]


This red jasper Ptolemaic amulet bears Taweret's likeness and represents a longstanding tradition of female hippopotamus amulets in ancient Egypt. Walters Art Museum, Baltimore.
From her ideological conception, Taweret was closely grouped with (and is often indistinguishable from) several other protective hippopotamus goddesses: Ipet, Reret, and Hedjet. Some scholars even interpret these goddesses as aspects of the same deity, considering their universally shared role as protective household goddesses. The other hippopotamus goddesses have names that bear very specific meanings, much like Taweret (whose name is formed as a pacificatory address intended to calm the ferocity of the goddess): Ipet's name ("the Nurse") demonstrates her connection to birth, child rearing, and general caretaking, and Reret's name ("the Sow") is derived from the Egyptian's erroneous taxonomical classification of hippopotami as water pigs. However, the origin of Hedjet's name ("the White One") is not as clear and could justly be debated.[5] Evidence for the cult of hippopotamus goddesses exists from the time of the Old Kingdom (ca. 2686 – 2181 BCE) in the corpus of Ancient Egyptian funerary texts entitled the Pyramid Texts. Spell 269 in the Pyramid Texts mentions Ipet and succinctly demonstrates her nurturing role; the spell announces that the deceased king will suck on the goddess's "white, dazzling, sweet milk" when he ascends to the heavens.[6] As maternal deities, these goddesses served to nurture and protect the Egyptian people, both royal (as seen in the Pyramid Texts) and non-royal.


Faience hippopotamus statuettes like this one were placed in tombs and temples to help the deceased be successfully reborn into the afterlife. Brooklyn, Brooklyn Museum.
It was not until the Middle Kingdom (ca. 2055–1650 BCE) that Taweret became featured more prominently as a figure of religious devotion. Her image adorns apotropaic magical objects, the most notable of which being a common type of "wand" or "knife" carved from hippopotamus ivory that was likely used in rituals associated with birth and the protection of infants. Similar images appear also on children's feeding cups, once again demonstrating Taweret's integral role as the patron goddess of child rearing.[7] Quite contrarily, she also took on the role of a funerary deity in this period, evidenced by the commonplace practice of placing hippopotami decorated with marsh flora in tombs and temples. Some scholars believe that this practice demonstrates that hippopotamus goddesses facilitated the process of rebirth after death, just as they aided in earthly births. These statues, then, assisted the deceased's passing into the afterlife.[8]

With the rise of personal piety in the New Kingdom (ca. 1550–1069 BCE), household deities like Taweret gained even more importance. Taweret's image has been found on an array of household objects, demonstrating her central role in the home. In fact, such objects were even found at Amarna from the reign of Akhenaten (ca. 1352–1336 BCE), an Eighteenth Dynasty pharaoh who reorganized Egyptian polytheism into a henotheistic religion focused on the worship of the sun disc, called the Aten. The worship of many traditional gods was proscribed during this period, so Taweret's survival in the artistic corpus found at the Aten's capital demonstrates her overwhelming significance in daily life.[9] In this time period, her role as a funerary deity was strengthened, as her powers became considered not only life-giving, but regenerative as well. Various myths demonstrate her role in facilitating the afterlives of the deceased as the nurturing and purifying "Mistress of Pure Water."[10] However, Taweret and her fellow hippopotamus goddesses of fertility should not be confused with Ammit, another composite hippopotamus goddess who gained prominence in the New Kingdom. Ammit was responsible for devouring the unjust before passing into the afterlife. Unlike Ammit, the other hippopotamus goddesses were responsible for nourishment and aid, not destruction.


Images of protective deities like Taweret and Bes were placed on the outer walls of Ptolemaic temples in order to keep evil forces at bay. Edfu, Egypt.
In the Ptolemaic and Roman periods (ca. 332 BCE – 390 CE), Taweret maintained a central role in daily Egyptian life. In either the latter half of the Late Period (ca. 664–332 BCE) or the early Ptolemaic period, a temple dedicated to Ipet was built at Karnak. This enigmatic temple was thought to witness the daily birth of the sun god from the hippopotamus goddesses that dwelled there. The sun god (Amun-Re) was conceived of as having multiple divine mothers, and by this later period in Egyptian history, Taweret and the other hippopotamus goddesses were included in this body of solar mothers.[11] Taweret's image also appeared on the outside of temples dedicated to other deities due to her apotropaic ability to ward off malevolent forces.[12] Outside of temple settings, the household cult of the goddesses remained strong, and amulets bearing their likenesses peaked in popularity during these years.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Athen, The Sun

Aten (also Aton, Egyptian jtn) is the disk of the sun in ancient Egyptian mythology, and originally an aspect of Ra. The deified Aten is the focus of the monolatristic, henotheistic, monistic or monotheistic religion of Atenism established by Amenhotep IV, who later took the name Akhenaten in worship and recognition of Aten. In his poem "Great Hymn to the Aten", Akhenaten praises Aten as the creator, giver of life, and nurturing spirit of the world. Aten does not have a Creation Myth or family, but is mentioned in the Book of the Dead. The worship of Aten was eradicated by Horemheb.
Overview The Aten, the sun-disk, is first referred to as a deity in The Story of Sinuhe from the 12th dynasty,[1] in which the deceased king is described as rising as god to the heavens and uniting with the sun-disk, the divine body merging with its maker.[2] By analogy, the term "silver aten" was sometimes used to refer to the moon.[3] The solar Aten was extensively worshipped as a god in the reign of Amenhotep III, when it was depicted as a falcon-headed man much like Ra. In the reign of Amenhotep III's successor, Amenhotep IV, the Aten became the central god of Egyptian state religion, and Amenhotep IV changed his name to Akhenaten to reflect his close link with the new supreme deity.[1]

The full title of Akhenaten's god was "Ra-Horakhty who rejoices in the horizon, in his Name as the Light which is in the sun disc." (This is the title of the god as it appears on the numerous stelae which were placed to mark the boundaries of Akhenaten's new capital at Akhetaten, modern Amarna.) This lengthy name was often shortened to Ra-Horus-Aten or just Aten in many texts, but the god of Akhenaten raised to supremacy is considered a synthesis of very ancient gods viewed in a new and different way. The god is also considered to be both masculine and feminine simultaneously. All creation was thought to emanate from the god and to exist within the god. In particular, the god was not depicted in anthropomorphic (human) form, but as rays of light extending from the sun's disk.

Furthermore, the god's name came to be written within a cartouche, along with the titles normally given to a Pharaoh, another break with ancient tradition. Ra-Horus, more usually referred to as Ra-Horakhty (Ra, who is Horus of the two horizons), is a synthesis of two other gods, both of which are attested from very early on. During the Amarna period, this synthesis was seen as the invisible source of energy of the sun god, of which the visible manifestation was the Aten, the solar disk. Thus Ra-Horus-Aten was a development of old ideas which came gradually. The real change, as some see it, was the apparent abandonment of all other gods, especially Amun, and the debatable introduction of monotheism by Akhenaten.[4] The syncretism is readily apparent in the Great Hymn to the Aten in which Re-Herakhty, Shu and Aten are merged into the creator god.[5] Others see Akhenaten as a practitioner of an Aten monolatry,[6] as he did not actively deny the existence of other gods; he simply refrained from worshipping any but the Aten.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia