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Bastet | Bastet was a goddess in ancient Egyptian religion, worshipped as early as the Second Dynasty (2890 BC). As Bast, she was the goddess of warfare in Lower Egypt, the Nile River delta region, before the unification of the cultures of ancient Egypt. Her name is also spelled Baast, Ubaste, and Baset. The two uniting cultures had deities that shared similar roles and usually the same imagery. In Upper Egypt, Sekhmet was the parallel warrior lioness deity to Bast. Often similar deities merged into one with the unification, but that did not occur with these deities with such strong roots in their cultures. Instead, these goddesses began to diverge. During the Twenty-Second Dynasty (c. 945–715 BC), Bast had changed from a lioness warrior deity into a major protector deity represented as a cat. Bastet, the name associated with this later identity, is the name commonly used by scholars today to refer to this deity. NameBastet, the form of the name which is most commonly adopted by Egyptologists today because of its use in later dynasties, is a modern convention offering one possible reconstruction. In early Egyptian, her name appears to have been 𓃀ꜣ𓊃𓏏𓏏. In Egyptian writing, the second 𓏏 marks a feminine ending, but was not usually pronounced, and the aleph ꜣ may have moved to a position before the accented syllable, ꜣ𓃀𓊃𓏏. By the first millennium, then, 𓃀ꜣ𓊃𓏏𓏏 would have been something like *Ubaste (< *Ubastat) in Egyptian speech, later becoming Coptic Oubaste. During later dynasties, Bast was assigned a lesser role in the pantheon bearing the name Bastet, but retained. During the 18th dynasty Thebes became the capital of Ancient Egypt. As they rose to great power the priests of the temple of Amun, dedicated to the primary local deity, advanced the stature of their titular deity to national prominence and shifted the relative stature of others in the Egyptian pantheon. Diminishing her status, they began referring to Bast with the added suffix, as "Bastet" and their use of the new name was well-documented, becoming very familiar to researchers. by the 22nd dynasty the transition had occurred in all regions. The town of Bast's cult (see below) was known in Greek as Boubastis (Βούβαστις). The Hebrew rendering of the name for this town is Pî-beset ("House of Bastet"), spelled without Vortonsilbe. What the name of the goddess means remains uncertain. One recent suggestion by Stephen Quirke (Ancient Egyptian Religion) explains it as meaning "She of the ointment jar". This ties in with the observation that her name was written with the hieroglyph "ointment jar" (𓃀ꜣ𓊃) and that she was associated with protective ointments, among other things. She was the goddess of protection against contagious diseases and evil spirits. She is also known as The Eye of Ra. From lioness-goddess to cat-goddessFrom the 3rd millennium BC, when Bast begins to appear in our records, she is depicted as either a fierce lioness or a woman with the head of a lioness. Images of Bast were created from a local stone, named alabaster today. The lioness was the fiercest hunter among the animals in Africa, hunting in co-operative groups of related females. Originally she was viewed as the protector goddess of Lower Egypt. As protector, she was seen as defender of the pharaoh, and consequently of the later chief male deity, Ra, who was also a solar deity, gaining her the titles Lady of Flame and Eye of Ra. Her role in the Egyptian pantheon became diminished as Sekhmet, a similar lioness war deity, became more dominant in the unified culture of Lower and Upper Egypt known as the Two Lands. In the first millennium BC, when domesticated cats were popularly kept as pets, during the 18th dynasty Bastet began to be represented as a woman with the head of a cat and ultimately, by the 22nd dynasty emerged as the quintessential Egyptian cat-goddess. In the Middle Kingdom, the domestic cat appeared as Bast’s sacred animal and after the New Kingdom she was depicted as a woman with the head of a cat or a lioness, carrying a sacred rattle and a box or basket. |
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Ptah | In Egyptian mythology, Ptah was the deification of the primordial mound in the Ennead cosmogony, which was more literally referred to as Ta-tenen (also spelled Tathenen, Tatjenen, etc), meaning risen land, or as Tanen, meaning submerged land, though Tatenen was a god in his own right, before being assimilated with Ptah. Ptah also is referred to as the noble Djed. It was said (in the Shabaka Stone) that it was Ptah who called the world into being, having dreamt creation in his heart, and speaking it, his name meaning opener, in the sense of opener of the mouth. Indeed the opening of the mouth ceremony, performed by priests at funerals to release souls from their corpses, was said to have been created by Ptah. Atum was said to have been created by Ptah to rule over the creation, sitting upon the primordial mound. In art, he is portrayed as a bearded mummified man, often wearing a skull cap, with his hands holding an ankh, was, and djed, the symbols of life, power and stability, respectively. It was also considered that Ptah manifested himself in the Apis bull. He may have originally been a fertility god because of this. Consequently, Ptah-Seker became considered an underworld deity, and eventually, by the Middle Kingdom, become assimilated by Osiris, the lord of the underworld, occasionally being known as Ptah-Seker-Osiris. Stele dedicated to Ptah by the foreman of Deir el-Medina in the XX dynasty. |
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Ra | Ra (alternatively spelled Ré), Egyptian *ri:ʕu, is the ancient Egyptian sun god. By the Fifth Dynasty he had become a major deity in ancient Egyptian religion, identified primarily with the mid-day sun. The meaning of the name is uncertain, but it is thought that if not a word for 'sun' it may be a variant of or linked to words meaning 'creative power' and 'creator'. In later Egyptian dynastic times, Ra was merged with the god Horus, as Re-Horakhty ("Ra, who is Horus of the Two Horizons"). He was believed to rule in all parts of the created world the sky, the earth, and the underworld. He was associated with the falcon or hawk. When in the New Kingdom the god Amun rose to prominence he was fused with Ra as Amun-Ra. During the Amarna Period, Akhenaten suppressed the cult of Ra in favour of another solar deity, the Aten, the deified solar disc, but after the death of Akhenaten the cult of Ra was restored. The cult of the Mnevis bull, an embodiment of Ra, had its centre in Heliopolis and there was a formal burial ground for the sacrificed bulls north of the city. All forms of life were believed to have been created by Ra, who called each of them into existence by speaking their secret names. Alternatively humans were created from Ra's tears and sweat, hence the Egyptians call themselves the "Cattle of Ra." In the myth of the Celestial Cow it is recounted how mankind plotted against Ra and how he sent his eye as the goddess Sekhmet to punish them. When she became blood thirsty she was pacified by mixing beer with red dye. |
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Shu | In Egyptian mythology, Shu (meaning emptiness and he who rises up) is one of the primordial gods, a personification of air, one of the Ennead of Heliopolis. He was created by Atum, his father and Iusaaset, his mother in the city of Heliopolis. With his sister, Tefnut (moisture), he was the father of Nut and Geb. His daughter, Nut, was the sky goddess whom he held over the Earth (Geb), separating the two. Shu's grandchildren are Osiris, Isis, Set and Nephthys. In a much later myth, representing the terrible weather disaster at the end of the Old Kingdom, it was said that Tefnut and Shu once argued, and Tefnut (moisture) left Egypt for Nubia (which was always more temperate). It was said that Shu quickly decided that he missed her, but she changed into a cat that destroyed any man or god that approached. Thoth, disguised, eventually succeeded in convincing her to return. He carries an Ankh, the symbol of life. |
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Geb | Geb was the Egyptian god of the Earth and a member of the Ennead of Heliopolis. The name was pronounced as such from the Greek period onward, (formerly erroneously read as Seb or as Keb. The original Egyptian was "Gebeb"/"Kebeb", meaning probably: 'weak one', perhaps:'lame one'. It was spelled with either initial -g- (all periods), or with -k-point (gj). The latter initial root consonant occurs once in the Middle Kingdom Coffin Texts, more often in 21st Dynasty mythological papyri as well as in a text from the Ptolemaic tomb of Petosiris at Tuna el-Gebel or was written with initial hard -k-, as e.g. in a 30th Dynasty papyrus text in the Brooklyn Museum dealing with descriptions of and remedies against snakes and their bites. The oldest representation in a fragmentary relief of the god, was as an anthropomorphic bearded being accompanied by his name, and dating from king Djoser's reign, 3rd Dynasty, and was found in Heliopolis. In later times he could also be depicted as a ram, a bull or a crocodile (the latter in a vignet of the Book of the Dead-papyrus of the lady Heryweben in the Egyptian Museum, Cairo, depicted in G.Posener e.a., Dictionnaire de la civilisation égyptienne = Lexikon der ägyptischen Kultur (Wiesbaden, 1960),lemma 'Crocodile'/'Krokodil'). Frequently described mythologically as 'father' of snakes (one of the names for snake was s3-t3 'son of the earth' and in a Coffin Texts-spell Geb was described as 'father' of the primeval snake Nehebkau, while his mother was in that case the goddess Neith) and therefore depicted sometimes (partly) as such. In mythology Geb also often occurs as a primeval divine king of Egypt from whom his 'son' Osiris and his 'grand-son' Horus inherited the land after many contendings with the disruptive god Seth, brother and killer of Osiris. Geb could also be regarded as personified fertile earth and barren desert, the latter containing the dead or setting them free from their tombs, metaphorically described as ' Geb opening his jaws', or imprisoning those there not worthy to go to the fertile North-Eastern heavenly Field of Reeds. In the latter case, one of his otherworldly attributes was an ominous jackal-headed stave (called wsr.t) rising from the ground to which enemies could be bound and punished. In the Heliopolitan Ennead (a group of nine gods created in the beginning by the one god Atum), Geb is the husband of Nut, the sky or visible daytime and nightly firmament, the son of the earlier primordial elements Tefnut ('orphaness', later also conceived of as moisture [e.g.: 'tef']) and Shu ('emptiness' or perhaps 'raiser'[namely of the firmament as air]), and the 'father' to the four lesser gods of the system - Osiris, Seth, Isis and Nephthys. In this context, Geb was believed to have originally been engaged in eternal sex with Nut, and had to be separated from her by Shu, god of the air. Consequently, in mythological depictions, Geb was shown as a 'man' reclining, sometimes with his phallus still pointed towards the sky goddess Nut. As time progressed, the deity became more associated with the habitable land of Egypt and also as one of its early godly rulers. As a chthonic deity he (like Osiris and Min) became naturally associated with the underworld and with vegetation -barley being said to grow upon his ribs- and was depicted with plants and other green patches on his body. His association with vegetation, and sometimes with the underworld, and also with royalty brought Geb the occasional interpretation that he was the husband of Renenutet, primarily a minor goddess of the harvest and also mythological caretaker (the meaning of her name is 'nursing snake')of the young king in the shape of a cobra, who herself could also be regarded as the mother of Nehebkau, a primeval snake god associated with the underworld, who, however, was on the same occasions said to be his son by her. He is also equated by classical authors as the Greek Titan Cronus. |
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Osiris | Osiris (Ancient Greek: Ὄσιρις, also Usiris; the Egyptian language name is variously transliterated Asar, Asari, Aser, Ausar, Ausir, Wesir, Usir, Usire or Ausare) was an Egyptian god, usually identified as the god of the Afterlife, the underworld and the dead. He is classically depicted as a green-skinned man with a pharoah's beard, partially mummy-wrapped at the legs, wearing a distinctive crown with two large ostrich feathers at either side, and holding a symbolic crook and flail. Osiris was at times considered the oldest son of the Earth god Geb, and the sky goddess Nut, as well as being brother and husband of Isis, with Horus being considered his posthumously begotten son. He was also associated with the epithet Khenti-Amentiu, which means "Foremost of the Westerners" — a reference to his kingship in the land of the dead. As ruler of the dead, Osiris was also sometimes called "king of the living", since the Ancient Egyptians considered the blessed dead "the living ones". Osiris is first attested in the middle of the Fifth dynasty of Egypt, although it is likely that he was worshipped much earlier; the term Khenti-Amentiu dates to at least the first dynasty, also as a pharaonic title. Most information we have on the myths of Osiris is derived from allusions contained in the Pyramid Texts at the end of the Fifth Dynasty, later New Kingdom source documents such as the Shabaka Stone and the Contending of Horus and Seth, and, much later, in narrative style from the writings of Greek authors including Plutarch and Diodorus Siculus. Osiris was not only a merciful judge of the dead in the afterlife, but also the underworld agency that granted all life, including sprouting vegetation and the fertile flooding of the Nile River. He is described as the "Lord of love", "He Who is Permanently Benign and Youthful"[8] and the "Lord of Silence". The Kings of Egypt were associated with Osiris in death — as Osiris rose from the dead they would, in union with him, inherit eternal life through a process of imitative magic. By the New Kingdom all people, not just pharaohs, were believed to be associated with Osiris at death if they incurred the costs of the assimilation rituals. Through the hope of new life after death Osiris began to be associated with the cycles observed in nature, in particular vegetation and the annual flooding of the Nile, through his links with Orion and Sirius at the start of the new year. Osiris was widely worshiped as Lord of the Dead until the suppression of the Egyptian religion during the Christian era. |
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Set | In Ancient Egyptian mythology, Set (also spelled Seth, Sheth, Sutekh, Setan or Seteh) is an ancient god, who was originally the god of the desert, storms, darkness, and chaos. The exact meaning of the name Set is unknown, but is usually considered to be either (one who) dazzles or pillar of stability, one connected to the desert, and the other tending to indicate the institution of monarchy[citation needed]. It is reconstructed to have been originally pronounced *Sūtaḫ based on the occurrence of his name in Egyptian hieroglyphics (swtḫ), and his later mention in the Coptic documents with the name Sēt. Set had a brother called Osiris and two sisters called Isis and Nepthys. His Mother was the sky goddess Nut and his father was the earth god Geb. In art, Set was mostly depicted as a mysterious and unknown creature, referred to by Egyptologists as the Set animal or Typhonic beast, known as a Typhon, with a curved snout, square ears, forked tail, and canine body, or sometimes as a human with only the head of the Set animal. It has no complete resemblance to any known creature, although it does resemble a composite of an aardvark, a donkey, a jackal[citation needed]. It is also possible that Set is a representation of the giraffe due to the large flat-topped 'horns' which correspond to a giraffe's ossicones. The main species of aardvark present in ancient Egypt additionally had a reddish appearance[citation needed] (due to thin fur, which shows the skin beneath it). In some descriptions he has the head of a greyhound. The earliest known representation of Set comes from a tomb dating to the Naqada I phase of the Predynastic Period (circa 4000 BC–3500 BC), and the Set-animal is even found on a mace-head of the Scorpion King, a Protodynastic ruler. Was ("power") scepters represent the Set-animal. Was scepters were carried by gods, pharaohs, and priests, as a symbol of power, and in later use, control over the force of chaos (Set). The head and forked tail of the Set-animal are clearly present. Was scepters are often depicted in paintings, drawings, and carvings of gods, and remnants of real Was scepters have been found constructed of faience or wood. These myths generally portray Osiris as a wise lord, king, and bringer of civilization, happily married to his sister, Isis. Set was envious of his younger brother, and he killed and dismembered Osiris. Isis reassembled Osiris' corpse and another god (in some myths Thoth and in others Anubis) embalmed him. As the archetypal mummy, Osiris reigned over the Afterworld as a king among deserving spirits of the dead. Osiris' son Horus was conceived by Isis with Osiris' corpse, or in some versions, only with pieces of his corpse. Horus naturally became the enemy of Set, and many myths describe their conflicts. The myth incorporated moral lessons for relationships between fathers and sons, older and younger brothers, and husbands and wives. Set poked out Horus's left eye so Horus cut off Set's testicles, making him sometimes known as the god of infertility. It has also been suggested that the myth may reflect historical events. According to the Shabaka Stone, Geb divided Egypt into two halves, giving Upper Egypt (the desert south) to Set and Lower Egypt (the region of the delta in the north) to Horus, in order to end their feud. However, according to the stone, in a later judgment Geb gave all Egypt to Horus. Interpreting this myth as a historical record would lead one to believe that Lower Egypt (Horus' land) conquered Upper Egypt (Set's land); but, in fact Upper Egypt conquered Lower Egypt. So the myth cannot be simply interpreted. Several theories exist to explain the discrepancy. For instance, since both Horus and Set were worshiped in Upper Egypt prior to unification, perhaps the myth reflects a struggle within Upper Egypt prior to unification, in which a Horus-worshiping group subjugated a Set-worshiping group. What is known is that during the Second Dynasty, there was a period in which the King Peribsen's name or Serekh — which had been surmounted by a Horus falcon in the First Dynasty — was for a time surmounted by a Set animal, suggesting some kind of religious struggle. It was ended at the end of the Dynasty by Khasekhemwy, who surmounted his Serekh with both a falcon of Horus and a Set animal, indicating some kind of compromise had been reached. Later Egyptians interpreted the myth of the conflict between Set and Osiris/Horus as an analogy for the struggle between the desert (represented by Set) and the fertilizing floods of the Nile (Osiris/Horus). |
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Horus |
Horus is one of the oldest and most significant deities in the 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 Egyptologists.[1] These various forms may possibly be different perceptions of the same multi-layered deity in which certain attributes or syncretic relationships are emphasised, not necessarily in opposition but complementary to one another, consistent with how the Ancient Egyptians viewed the multiple facets of reality. The earliest recorded form is Horus the Falcon who was the patron deity of Nekhen in Upper Egypt and 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. 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 the god of the Sky, god of War and god of Protection. Horus is recorded in Egyptian hieroglyphs as ḥr.w and is reconstructed to have been pronounced *Ḥāru, meaning "Falcon". As a description it has also typically been thought of as having the meaning "the distant one" or "one who is above, over". By Coptic times, the name became Hōr. It was adopted into Greek as Ὥρος Hōros. The original name also survives in later Egyptian names such as Har-Si-Ese literally "Horus, son of Isis". Horus was also sometimes known as Nekheny, meaning "falcon". Some have proposed that Nekheny may have been another falcon-god, worshipped at Nekhen (city of the hawk), but then Horus was identified with him early on. As falcon, Horus may be shown on the Narmer Palette dating from the time of unification of upper and lower Egypt. |
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Thoth | Thoth (pronounced /ˈθoʊθ/ or /ˈtoʊt/; from Greek, from Egyptian ḏḥwty, perhaps pronounced ḏiḥautī) was considered one of the more important deities of the Egyptian pantheon. In art, he was often depicted as a man with the head of an ibis or a baboon, animals sacred to him. His feminine counterpart was Seshat. Thoth's chief shrine was located in the city of Khmun, later renamed Hermopolis Magna during the Greco-Roman era (in reference to him through the Greeks' interpretation that he was the same as their god Hermes) and Eshmûnên in the Coptic rendering. In that city, he led the Ogdoad pantheon of eight principal deities. He also had numerous shrines within the cities of Abydos, Hesert, Urit, Per-Ab, Rekhui, Ta-ur, Sep, Hat, Pselket, Talmsis, Antcha-Mutet, Bah, Amen-heri-ab, and Ta-kens. Thoth was often considered to be the heart—which, according to the ancient Egyptians, is the seat of intelligence or the mind—and tongue of the sun god Ra, as well as the means by which Ra's will was translated into speech. He was also related to the Logos of Plato and the mind of God[ (see The All). He played many vital and prominent roles in Egyptian mythology, such as maintaining the universe, and being one of the two deities (the other being Ma'at, who was also his wife) who stood on either side of Ra's boat. In the later history of ancient Egypt, Thoth became heavily associated with the arbitration of godly disputes, the arts of magic, the system of writing, the development of science, and the judgment of the dead. |
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Ma'at | Maat, Ma'at, Māt or Mayet, thought to have been pronounced *[muʔ.ʕat], was the Ancient Egyptian concept of truth, balance, order, law, morality, and justice. Maat was also personified as a goddess regulating the stars, seasons, and the actions of both mortals and the deities, who set the order of the universe from chaos at the moment of creation. The earliest surviving records indicating Maat is the norm for nature and society, in this world and the next, is recorded during the Old Kingdom in pyramid texts (ca. 2780-2250 BCE). Later, as a goddess in other traditions of the Egyptian pantheon, where most goddesses were paired with a male aspect, her masculine counterpart was Thoth and their attributes are the same. After the rise of Ra they were depicted together in the Solar Barque. As Thoth has been seen to represent the Logos of Plato, so Maat has been viewed as an expression of Divine Wisdom. After her role in creation and continuously preventing the universe from returning to chaos, her primary role in Egyptian mythology dealt with the weighing of souls that took place in the underworld, Duat. Her feather was the measure that determined whether the souls (considered to reside in the heart) of the departed would reach the paradise of afterlife successfully. Pharaohs are often depicted with the emblems of Maat to emphasise their role in upholding the laws of the Creator. |
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