Amen /Amun/ Amon/ Amen-Re/ Amon-Ra/ Amon-Re
Alternate spellings: Amen /Amun/
Amon
Alternate spellings: Re/
Ra
Alternate spellings: Amen-Re/ Amen-Ra/ Amun-Re/ Amun-Ra/ Amon-Re/
Amon-Ra
Amun (pronounced
AM mun)
Amun did not
physically engender the universe. His position as
King of gods developed to the point of virtual monotheism where other gods
became manifestations of him. With Osiris, Amun-Ra is the most widely
recorded of the Egyptian gods.
Amun became depicted in human form, seated
on a throne, wearing on his head a plain, deep circlet from which rise two
straight parallel ostrich plumes, but it can also be worn by a king. It
appears to associate the ruler with Amun and to legitimate his rule under the
god's protection. The plumes were symbolic of the spirit of
duality. The Amun crown can be adorned with horns, disks and uraei.
Chief consort was Mut.
 When the army of the founder of the
Eighteenth dynasty expelled the Hyksos rulers from Egypt, the victor's city of
origin, Thebes, became the most important city in Egypt, the capital of a new
dynasty. The local patron deity of Thebes, Amun, therefore became nationally
important. The pharaohs of that new dynasty attributed all their successful
enterprises to Amun and they lavished much of their wealth and captured spoil on
the construction of temples dedicated to Amun.
Subsequently, when Egypt conquered Kush, they identified
the chief deity of the Kushites as Amun. This Kush deity was depicted as
ram-headed, more specifically a woolly ram with curved horns - so Amun
became associated with the ram. Indeed, due to the aged appearance of the
Kush ram deity, the Egyptians came to believe that this image had been the
original form of Amun and, that Kush was where he had been born. [See Karnak Temple Complex:
Sphinxes]
As the cult of Amun grew in importance, Amun became identified with the chief deity who was worshipped in other areas
during that period, Ra-Herakhty, the merged identities of Ra, and Horus. This
identification led to another merger of identities, with Amun becoming
Amun-Ra. .Ra-Herakhty had been a solar deity and this nature became
ascribed to Amun-Ra as well,
Several words derive from Amun via the Greek form, Ammon:
ammonia and ammonite.
- Wikipedia: Amun
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The
Temple Complex at
Karank honors him.
The word Amen in
Christianity is not derived from the Egyptian god.
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Animals
Cat-headed - Bastel
Cow-headed - Hathor
Cow-headed - Isis
Cobra - Wadjet
Falcon-headed -
HorusFalcon-headed - Ra
Ibis-headed -Thoth
Jackel-headed -
Anubis
Lion-bodied - SphinxLion-headed
- Sekhmet
Vulture's wings - Nephthys
James
Stevens Curl: "... the ancient Egyptians seem to have regarded animals
as possessing the archetypal qualities of their deities (e.g. bull = power and
regeneration; cow = mother; and ram = sexual power and fecundity ... the
reverence shown to animals at certain cult-centres did not mean that the
creatures themselves were worshipped: what was important was what the animals
represented. The main cult centres were as follows:
Animal
|
Temples |
Bull:
|
Heliopolis, Hermonthis, and Memphis |
Cat:
|
Bubastis |
Cow:
|
Aphroditopolis and Dendera |
Crocodile:
|
Crocodilopolis and Kom Ombo |
Falcon:
|
Edfu and
Philae |
Ibis:
|
Abydos and Hermopolis |
Ram:
|
Elephantine, Esna, Herakleopolis, and
Mendes |
See also: Caroline Seawright, Animals and the
Gods of Ancient Egypt and Toby A. H. Wilkinson, Early
Dynastic Egypt: The bull's tail |
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 Ankh (Pron. ANGK or ONK; Plural ankhs)
AKA ansate cross, crux ansata ("handle-shaped
cross")Ancient Egyptian hieroglyph - a
cross shaped like a T with a loop at the top.
Symbol of eternal life,
It is found in ancient
tomb inscriptions, including those of the King Tutankhamen. Egyptian gods are
often portrayed carrying it by its loop, or bearing one in each hand,
arms crossed over their chest. Ra
is usually represented with the body of a man and the head of a hawk, holding an ankh & scepter.
In ancient Egypt, only kings, queens and gods were allowed to carry the ankh,
indicating that only the king or god holding it had the power to give life or
take it away from lesser mortals.
Possible origins:
- A sandal strap, with the loop going around the
ankle
- Belt-buckle of the mother goddess Isis
- Sun crowning over the horizon
- The path of the sun from east to west (with the loop representing the Nile
- Combination of the male and female symbols of Osiris (the cross) and Isis (the oval) respectively,
and therefore signifies the union of heaven and earth
- The oval head represents the Nile delta, the vertical mark represents the
path of the river, while the East and West arms represent the two sides of the
country and their unification
- Illustration: Karnak
Temple Complex
- Daniel Good
Mausoleum
- Kom
Ombo Temple
- Karnak
Temple Complex
- Display
Sign in the Valley of Kings
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Anubis (a NOOB is)
Jackel-headed god of embalming (responsible for
embalming)
Son of Osiris and Isis
His head is black.
Jackals used to haunt cemeteries, so they were linked
with funerals - the idea being that a jackal god would protect the domain of the
dead.
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Apedemak
In Ancient Nubian religion, lion-god.
Apedemak was
called "The Lord of Royal Power." In Nubia, with the kingdoms of Cush, the royal
throne was always depicted as a lion...
Apedemak originated in Meroë
region, and had his main cult centres near the 6th cataract of the Nile river.
The main temples were at the lion temples at Musawwarat al-Sufra and Naqa. There
was also a temple at Meroë itself, and perhaps even at
Basa.
Interestingly, inscriptions at Musawwarat al-Sufra are in
hieroglyphs, not in Meroitic script, indicating a close link with Egyptian
religion, although Apedemak was uniqe to Nubia.
At Naqa, walls are filled
with reliefs of Apedemak together with Egyptian deities, forming a triad with
Isis, with Horus as their son. Apedemak is also
represented together with Hathor and Amon.
There are great similarities between Apedemak and the
obscure Egyptian god, Maahes, who also represented a specific religious
dimension in the oases of the Western Desert. Also, it is possible that the cult
of Sekhmet, Egypt's lion
goddess, was introduced from Nubia, and related to that of Apedemak.
- Looklex Encyclopdia:
Apedemak
|
In Nubian mythology, Isis was his wife.
|
|
Beard
From the Old Kingdom onward, the king often wears a long,
square-ended artificial (or false) beard, fastened by a strap along the
jawbone.
Gods wear curved beards
Kings wear straight beards
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| . |
Crook and flail
Scepters
Most commonly represented together, held across the chest of the kings,
Osiris identified with
them.
See illustration on The
Virtual Egyptian Museum
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Crowns/Headdresses
|
| . |
Eye of Horus / Wedjat / Wadjet / Eye of Ra /
Eye of the Moon / Udjat
An ancient
Egyptian symbol of protection and royal power from deities, in this case from
Horus or Ra.
The
symbol is seen on images of Horus' mother, Isis, and on other deities associated with her.
In the Egyptian
language, the word for this symbol was "Wedjat," a solar deity and this symbol began as her eye, an all seeing
eye. The Wedjat "was intended to protect the king in the afterlife" and to ward
off evil.
The Eyes of Horus: Horus
fought with Seth (his uncle) for the throne of Egypt. In
this battle one of his eyes was injured and later it was healed by Isis (his mother). His right eye represented the sun; his left
eye the moon.
In early artwork, Hathor is also depicted with this eye.
Funerary amulets were often made in the shape of the Eye of Horus.
Ancient Egyptian and Near Eastern sailors would frequently paint the
symbol on the bow of their vessel to ensure safe sea travel. |
| . |
 Griffin: Head and wings of an eagle
and the body of a lion.
The griffin was known in Egypt before 3300 BC and is possibly more ancient
still.
Emanated protective power.
Middle Ages: Griffins not only mated for life, but also,
if either partner died, then the other would continue throughout the rest of its
life alone, never to search for a new mate. The griffin was thus made an emblem
of the Catholic Church's views on remarriage.
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 Hathor (HATH er)
Hathor is commonly depicted as a cow
goddess with head horns in which is set a sun disk with Uraeus.
Hathor is at times the mother, daughter and
wife of Ra and, like Isis, is at
times described as the mother of Horus
Depicted as
"Mistress of the West" welcoming the dead into the next life.
The
Ancient Greeks identified Hathor with the goddess Aphrodite
and the Romans as Venus.
For more information, see Wikipedia:
HathorThe Smaller Temple at Abu
Simbel was dedicated to Hathor.
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| . |
 Horus (HOR us)God of the sky,
depicted as a falcon, or as a hawk/falcon-headed man.
Since Horus was said to be the sky, he was considered to also contain the sun
and moon. It became said that the sun was his right eye and the moon his left,
and that they traversed the sky when he, a falcon, flew across it. Thus he
became known as Harmerty - Horus of two eyes.
Myth of Osiris, Isis and Horus:
Osiris was a king who
taught the Egyptians how to live, worship and grow corn. He was murdered by his
jealous brother, Seth, who cut up
the body, scattering it over Egypt. Osiris's beloved wife, Isis, and her sister collected all the
pieces. Isis used her medical skills first to impregnate herself with the last
drop of semen in her consort's penis, and then to reassemble the corpse as the
first mummy and bring it back to life. The first magic worked, and she
became pregnant with Horus. But
the gods refused to let Osiris return to the world of mortals, and he went to
rule in the Underworld, the lord and judge of the dead.
Myth of Horus and Seth:
Horus would avenge his
father at Edfu
and Horus became known as the Egyptian god of the sky. In that Horus was the son
of Osiris, he became closely associated with the Pharaoh of Lower Egypt (where
Horus was worshipped), and became their patron. Seth was the patron of Upper
Egypt. Horus united Egypt and bestowed divinity upon the pharaohs who were
viewed as incarnations of Horus in life. On the other hand, , once the
two lands were united, Seth and Horus were often shown together crowning the new
pharaohs, as a symbol of their power over both Lower
and Upper Egypt.
For a detailed account, see The Sacred Temple Island
of Philae: The Great Quarrel
Later Egyptians interpreted the myth of the conflict between Set and
Osiris/Horus as an analogy for the struggle between the desert (represented by
Seth) and the fertilizing floods of the Nile
(Osiris/Horus).
The Eyes of Horus:
Horus
fought with Seth (his uncle) for the throne of Egypt. In
this battle one of his eyes was injured and later it was healed by Isis
(his mother). His right eye represented the sun; his left eye the
moon.
Forms of Horus:
Mythologically, the god was imagined as a
celestial falcon, whose right eye was the sun and left eye the moon. The
speckled feathers of his breast were probably considered to be the stars, while
his wings were the sky that created the wind.
The most familiar form of Horus is as a full
falcon, probably the lanner (Falco biarmicus) or peregrine (Falco
peregrinus).
It is as a falcon-headed man that the god most frequently appears, often
wearing one the following crowns:
Double Crown (Pschent)
signifying his kingship over all Egypt.
Atef (white crown with a plume on either side and a small disc
at the top),
Triple atef
Disk with two plumes
Horus is also depicted with wings in a solar disk flanked by 2 cobras and vulture with outspread
wings
See also: Jimmy Dunn, Horus, The God of
Kings
See also illustration on The
Virtual Egyptian Museum
|
| . |
 Isis (EYE
sis)
The principal goddess worshiped by the
Egyptians. She was regarded as the mother of Horus, the sister and wife of Osiris, and the sister of Set and Nebthet. The Egyptians adored her as the
goddess of fecundity, and as the great benefactress of their country, who
instructed their ancestors in the art of agriculture.
Isis, Osiris and Horus are sometimes referred to as a "trinity."
"Her cult continued to grow in importance until it ultimately absorbed that
of nearly all the other goddesses. ... It was not until the middle of the sixth
century, in the reign of Justinian, that the temple of
Philae - her chief sanctuary in the extreme south of the country - was
closed to her cult and turned into a church." - New
Larousse Encyclopedia of Mythology, Prometheus Press, 1972 edition,
p.19
Myth of Osiris Isis and
Horus: Osiris was a king who taught the Egyptians how to live, worship and grow
corn. He was murdered by his jealous brother, Seth, who cut up the body, scattering
it over Egypt. Osiris's beloved wife, Isis, and her sister collected all
the pieces. Isis used her medical skills first to impregnate herself with the
last drop of semen in her consort's penis, and then to reassemble the corpse as
the first mummy and bring it back to life. The first magic worked, and
she became pregnant with Horus. But the gods refused to let Osiris return to the world of
mortals, and he went to rule in the Underworld, the lord and judge of the dead.
Isis became known as the Egyptian goddess of the children. Horus would avenge his father and Horus
became known as the Egyptian god of the sky. In that Horus was the son of
Osiris, he became closely associated with the Pharaoh of Lower Egypt (where
Horus was worshipped), and became their patron. Set(h) was the patron of Upper
Egypt. Horus united Egypt and bestowed divinity upon the pharaohs who were
viewed as incarnations of Horus in life.
The Temple at
Dendur and the Temple at
Philae were dedicated to Isis.
Depictions
Normally
represented as a woman who bears on her head a throne, the ideogram of
her name.
Occasionally, but later, her head-dress is a disk,
set between cow's horns, occasionally flanked with two
feathers.
Finally we sometimes find her represented with a cow's
head set on a human body. These horns and the cow's head merely prove that
Isis was by then identified with Hathor.
Sculpture and painting often represent her beside
Osiris, whom she helps or
protects - as she does the dead - with her winged arms.
She may be
seen mourning at the foot of sarcophagi or watching over canopic
jars.
She also frequently appears in the role of mother
suckling the infant Horus or joining him in his struggles with
Set.
- New Larousse Encyclopedia of
Mythology, Prometheus Press, 1972 edition, p.19
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| Lotus |
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 Nekhbet (Nechbet,
Nekhebit), Vulture GoddessPatron of
Upper Egypt
Depicted as the Egyptian white vulture:
Depicted as the Egyptian white vulture -
the griffon vulture (Gyps fulvus). The
priestesses of Nekhbet wore robes of vulture feathers.
Nekhbet usually was depicted hovering, with her wings
spread above the royal image, clutching a shen symbol, frequently in both
of her claws.
A shen ring is a circle with a line at a tangent
to it, which was used in hieroglyphics as a stylized loop of a rope. In
particular, the circle represented eternity, as circles did in many ancient
cultures (e.g.,. the wedding ring). In numerical use, a circle represented
infinity, all, or everything.
Nekhbet is the protectress of the king and
of the non-royal deceased. As such, she is represented as a vulture extending
one wing to the front, the other to the ground, flying above the person she is
protecting."
Depicted as one of the twin Uraei:
From the 18th Dynasty onwards, she began to be represented as protecting the
royal women in the form of one of the twin Uraei (spitting
cobras) on the headdresses of the queens
In
art, Nekhbet was depicted as the white vulture, always seen on the front of
pharaoh’s double crown along with Wadjet (cobra).
Depicted as woman wearing the Atef-crown
See illustration on Echoes: The Egyptian
Vulture Goddess Nekhbet
See also: Horus who is depicted with wings in a solar disk flanked by 2 cobras and vulture with outspread
wings
See Wikipedia: Nekhbet
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| . |
 Osiris (oh SIRE
is)
God of the Underworld.
Osiris was usually depicted as a green-skinned (green was the
color of rebirth) pharaoh wearing the Atef
crown , a crown worn by the god
Osiris, and by the king. It is composed of a central miter mounted upon two
ram's horns, surmounted by a sun disk and flanked by two ostrich feathers.
Typically he was also depicted holding the crook
and flail which signified divine authority in Egyptian pharaohs and his
feet and lower body were wrapped, as though already partly
mummified.
Myth of Osiris Isis and Horus:
Osiris was a king who taught the
Egyptians how to live, worship and grow corn. He was murdered by his jealous
brother, Seth, who cut up
the body, scattering it over Egypt. Osiris's beloved wife, Isis, and her sister collected all
the pieces. Isis used her medical skills first to impregnate herself with the
last drop of semen in her consort's penis, and then to reassemble the corpse as
the first mummy and bring it back to life. The first magic worked, and
she became pregnant with Horus. But the gods refused to let Osiris return to the world of
mortals, and he went to rule in the Underworld, the lord and judge of the dead.
Isis became known as the Egyptian goddess of the children. Horus would avenge his father and Horus
became known as the Egyptian god of the sky. In that Horus was the son of
Osiris, he became closely associated with the Pharaoh of Lower Egypt (where
Horus was worshipped), and became their patron. Set(h) was the patron of Upper
Egypt. Horus united Egypt and bestowed divinity upon the pharaohs who were
viewed as incarnations of Horus in life.In the Serapeum at Saqqara, archaeologists found the mummies of one and a half
million ibises and hundreds of thousands of falcons.
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 Papyrus scepter
Long, thin shaft surmounted by a triangular umbel
Papyrus
|
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 Pharaoh
"Pharaoh is a title used in
many modern discussions of the ancient Egyptian rulers of
all periods. In antiquity this title began to be used for the ruler who was the
religious and political leader of united ancient Egypt. This was true only
during the New Kingdom, specifically during the middle of the eighteenth
dynasty. For simplification however, there is a general acceptance
amongst modern writers to use the term to relate to all periods." - Wikipedia:
Pharaoh
The pharaoh, or king of Egypt, was viewed as both human
and divine, and thus acted as intermediary between Egypt's people and the
gods.
The king was also associated with several specific deities. While
alive, a pharaoh was identified with Horus, and given the title "Son of Ra." The goddesses Isis, Hathor, and Mut were all seen as the mother of the
pharaoh.
A deceased king was viewed as fully divine, and
identified with Osiris (the
father of Horus) and with Ra.
A common depiction of the king is his holding a
group of enemies of Egypt by the hair and raising his club to smite them.
Crowns / Nemes
Ptolemaic
dynasty
The pharaoh often was depicted as wearing a false beard made of goat hair during rituals and ceremonies
|
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| Ram's
horns |
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 Scarab / dung
beetle
Dung
beetles are beetles that feed partly or exclusively on feces. Many dung beetles,
known as rollers, are noted for rolling dung into spherical balls, which
are used as a food source or brooding chambers.
Scarab dung beetles lay eggs in a pellet which they roll along and the
Egyptians regarded this action as an image of the sun and its course through the
heavens, rolled by a gigantic beetle. Scarabs are associated with the Egyptian
god, Khepri. It was Khepri that pushed the sun across
the sky. The scarab beetle became an ancient Egyptian symbol for rebirth, the
ability to be reborn. Each day the sun disappeared, always to rise again and be
reborn the following day.
The god Khepri, which literally means
"He who is Coming into Being", was a creator god and a solar deity. He was
represented as a scarab or dung beetle, or as a man with a beetle head. Often
represented as a beetle within the sun-disk.
The scarab beetle was observed to roll its eggs in a ball of dung along the
ground, and the ball was identified with the sun. The baby beetles were seen to
emerge from the primeval mound and so dung beetles were thought capable of
spontaneous creation. Hence, the scarab became an important symbol of creation,
resurrection and everlasting life in the religious mythology of ancient Egypt.
Alternate myth: Isis
Small jars and coffins containing dried (mummified) scarabs were often placed
in Egyptian tombs as part of their ancient funeral rites to ensure eternal
resurrection.
Winged scarab / heart scarab:
So-called
heart scarabs, usually flanked with falcon's wings, were funerary talismans. The
stone heart scarab was laid upon the breast of the mummy, and this indicated
that the guilty soul must stand in the judgment hall in the presence of Osiris. The scarab thus used was to secure exemption from the
possible performance of an evil life. Perhaps the most famous example of such
"heart scarabs" is the yellow-green pectoral scarab found among the entombed
provisions of Tutankhamen.
Ra was also pictured as scarab that
has the body of a scarab with outstretched falcon wings, scarab forelegs, and
falcon back legs.
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Scepter
A rod or wand borne in the hand as an emblem of regal or
imperial power.
The hieroglyph
for "nobleman" or "official" shows a man carrying a long staff of office in
front of him.
See alsoAncient Egypt
Online: mks, Heqa, Was, Flail
See also: Toby A. H. Wilkinson, Early
Dynastic Egypt: mks, Heqa, Was, Flail
See also: Toby A. H. Wilkinson, Early
Dynastic Egypt: Mace and long staff
See also: Wiklipedia: Sekmen
scepter
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 Sekhmet, Sachmet,
Sakhet, Sekmet, Sakhmet and Sekhet
Appearance: Woman with the head of a lioness. She was envisioned as a fierce
lioness, and in art, was depicted as such, or as a woman with the head of a
lioness, who was dressed in red, the colour of blood.
Sekhmet was the
goddess of war.
For more information, see Wikipedia: Sekhmet
See also a poem by Margaret Atwood, Sekhmet,
the Lion-headed Goddess of War
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Set(h)Osiris was a king who taught the Egyptians how to live, worship and grow
corn. He was murdered by his jealous brother, Seth, who cut up the body, scattering it
over Egypt. Osiris's beloved wife, Isis, and her sister collected all the pieces. Isis used her medical
skills first to impregnate herself with the last drop of semen in her consort's
penis, and then to reassemble the corpse as the first mummy and bring it
back to life. The first magic worked, and she became pregnant with Horus.
Seth and his
followers changed themselves into crocodiles to escape Horus. The ancient
Egyptians believed that by honoring the fearsome crocodile as a god, they would
be safe from attacks.
Horus would avenge his father at Edfu
and Horus became known as the Egyptian god of the sky. In that Horus was the son
of Osiris, he became closely associated with the Pharaoh of Lower Egypt (where
Horus was worshipped), and became their patron.
Seth was the patron of
Upper Egypt. Horus united Egypt and bestowed divinity upon the pharaohs who were
viewed as incarnations of Horus in life. On the other hand, once the two
lands were united, Seth and Horus were often shown together crowning the new
pharaohs, as a symbol of their power over both Lower
and Upper Egypt.
For a detailed account, see
The Sacred
Temple Island of Philae: The Great Quarrel |
| . |
Solar (Sun) disk flanked by 2 cobras and outspread
wings:
Solar disk represents Ra, the sun god.
Cobras
represent the Uraeuses
(Wadjet and Nekhbet)
Wings: Vulture
wings represent Nekhbet -
OR Falcon wings represent Horus
A symbol of protection.
Often occurring on a cavetto cornice.
The Winged Sun Disc is thought to have originated from
the corona effect of a solar eclipse which can give the appearance of
wings.
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 Sun god
Overall, the sun god was the dominant deity in Egyptian religion, although he
could take different forms.. The earliest deities associated with the sun are Wadjet,
Sekhmet, Hathor, Nut, Bast, Bat, and Menhit. First
Hathor, and then Isis, give birth
to and nurse Horus and
Ra.
In the eighteenth dynasty, Akhenaten changed the
polytheistic religion of Egypt to a pseudo-monotheistic one, Atenism. All other
deities were replaced by the Aten, including, Amun, the reigning sun god of
Akhenaten's own region. Unlike other deities, the Aten did not have multiple
forms. His only image was a disk - a symbol of the sun.
Most common forms:
- At dawn - Khepri, the scarab beetle rolling the sun disk above the eastern
horizon
- In evening - Atum, an old man - Atum-Ra
- Re-Harakhty, the great hawk/falcon soaring in the sky, responsible
for all creation. Amalgamation of Ra and Horus; Falcon-headed Ra, sometimes crowned with a solar disk and Uraeus (see illustration at left)
- Amun-Re, king of the gods and protector of the
pharaoh when he was on military campaigns. he handed the scimitar to great
warrior pharaohs like Tuthmosis III.
Other depictions:
- Atum
- A man wearing a pharaoh's
crown (a sign of his leadership of the deities) and the wadjet (cobra with the wings of a
vulture), with sun disk above his head.
- Body of a man and the head of a
hawk, holding an ankh & scepter.
"Re" is an alternate form of "Ra."
Sun
boat: Ra was thought to travel in a sun boat (The Boat of the
Millions) to protect its fires from the primordial waters of the underworld it
passed through during the night. Ra traveled in the sun boat with various other
deities including Set and
Mehen who defended against the monsters of the underworld, and Ma'at who guided
the boat's course. The monsters included Apep, an enormous serpent who tried to
stop the sun boat's journey every night by consuming it. The Ra myth saw the
sunrise as the rebirth of the sun by the goddess Nut and the sky, thus
attributing the concept of rebirth and renewal to Ra and strengthening
his role as a creator god. Alternate myth: See "Scarab "
below.
The benu bird is Ra's bird and a symbol of fire and
rebirth (see Obelisk).
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 Thoth (TOTE)
Ibis-headed (sometimes, however, a baboon) god of
wisdom.
The Sacred Ibis (Threskiornis aethiopicus) is now extinct.
The curved beak of the ibis was like the crescent moon,
so the bird became the symbol of the moon god Thoth.
The ancient Egyptians believed that Thoth gave them the gift of hieroglyphic
writing.
At the town of Hermopolis, ibises were reared
specifically for sacrificial purposes and in the Serapeum at Saqqara, archaeologists found the mummies of one and a half
million ibises and hundreds of thousands of falcons.
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 Uraeus (you REE us) (plural: Uraei or Uraeuses) Wadjet (spitting cobra) and Sun disk.
Nekhbet, vulture wings added
later.
Spitting cobra:
The Uraeus is the stylized, upright form of an Egyptian
spitting cobra used as a symbol of sovereignty, royalty, deity, and divine
authority in ancient Egypt.
The Uraeus is a symbol for the goddess Wadjet , one of the earliest of
Egyptian deities, who often was depicted as a cobra. The center of her
cult was in Per-Wadje. She became the patroness of the Nile Delta and the
protector of all of Lower Egypt
Spitting cobra plus white
vulture:
At the time of the unification of Egypt, the image of
Nekhbet, who was
represented as a white vulture and held the same position as the patron
of Upper Egypt, joined the image of Wadjet on the Uraeus that would
encircle the crown of the pharaohs who ruled the unified Egypt. Together they
were known as, The Two Ladies, who became the joint protectors and
patrons of the unified Egypt.
Worn by the Pharaoh as a golden emblem on the forehead as
a sort of crown; it was the symbol of supreme rulers, and a symbol of Pharaoh's
power.Beside the Uraeus being used as an ornament for statuary or
as an adornment on the pharaoh, it also was used for jewelry
and in amulets. However another important use is as the
hieroglyph.In that the Uraeus was seen as a royal symbol, Horus and Set also were
depicted wearing one.
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Wadjet / Wadjit /
Wedjet / Uadjet / Ua Zit
Cobra goddess; Patron of Lower Egypt.
AKA The Green
One
Depicted as a cobra in the Uraeus. After unification of Egypt,
joined by her sister Nekhbet
with the wings of a vulture in the Uraeus.
She came to be the patron and protector of Lower Egypt,
and upon unification with Upper Egypt, the joint protector and patron of all of
Egypt with the goddess of Upper Egypt (Nekhbet).
The Two
Ladies: The vulture-goddess Nekhbet
and the cobra-goddess Wadjet, representing the Upper Egypt and Lower Egypt
respectively.
See above: Uraeus and Eye of Horus |
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 Was-scepter
Stood for domination and power.
It was very common among gods/kings
in all times.
Sometimes depicted as a stylized animal head on top and a
forked end.
A staff made from a dried bull's penis that was the symbol for the goddess
Wosret or Wasret.
Also used to hold up roofs.
See also on another website: 9
illustrations
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Wings
Horus
Isis
Nekhbet Re-Harakhty
Scarab |
