Ancient Egyptian writings and personal names indicate that the main god or goddess at the nearest large town would be a central part of religious life for the individual. A list of workers from different towns, on a papyrus dated about 1800 BC, shows that already then many people named their children after the 'god of the city' (Hayes 1955). So, if you lived near Koptos, a town north of Thebes in Upper Egypt, you might well have been named after the local main god Min, with a name like Minhotep 'Min is content'. The religious map of Egypt changed over time. The cult of Amun, restricted to Thebes in the Middle Kingdom (about 2025-1700 BC), was installed at several other sites in the first millennium BC. Similarly, the cult of Isis was not prominent in temples before the fourth century BC, when vast new temple structures were planned at Philae on the southern border beyond Elephantine, and at Behbeit el-Hagar near Samanud in the central Delta: the great goddess of the early temples is Hathor.
Amun (Amun-Ra) - God of the sun and air. One of the most ... Anubis - God of the dead associated with embalming. Son of ... The boy was going to die from the venom but Isis saved him and forgave the woman.
The title of this series: “Magic and Religion in Ancient Egypt” is a description of its con-tent – but also a statement of its perspective.
The position of this series is, that the magic and religion of ancient Egypt both have their roots in the same mental background, and that, for the ancient Egyptians themselves, a distinction between magic and religion was meaningless. That is why both will be treated here on an equal footing.
The first part of the series will be devoted to this common background of magic and religion. Part II is to be a cycle of descriptions of 81 gods. It will be published in nine groups of nine gods each. For the ancient Egyptians, the number nine had a special significance. Their language knew three “numbers”: the singular, the dual and the plural. The dual was a
specialized format for any pair of objects, such as a person’s two lips, two hands or two eyes. The plural included anything from the number of three upwards. In writing, this was expressed by indicating the plural of a noun with three strokes or dots, or by simply repeating an ideogram three times. Now when “three” equals “plural”, “three times three”
equals “a host”.
That is why for the Egyptians a “circle” or “body” of gods counted nine
members: an Ennead. Part II is meant as an introduction to the most important gods of ancient Egypt, but it is also designed to further clarify the principles of god-forming, as laid out in Part I. For this reason,
also some less important, but particularly illustrative gods and goddesses will be included. For the same reason, several chapters will include a more elaborate treatment of certain general themes. With respect to sources,
I've concentrated on the older material. Only rarely will anything
be used from the period after the New Kingdom. Starting with the Third Intermediate Period, the so-called “syncretic” aspect of ancient Egyptian religion turns it into a cacophony of multiple gods and crossed-over epithets, that to me has little appeal.
Amentet
The name of this goddess simply means: “The West”. She was the goddess of the West,and since the West was the region where the dead would go,1her character was primarily that of a funerary deity.
There were two different words for “west” - and hence two names for the goddess Amentet. The sign or in these writings is actually the symbol for “the West”. In depictions of thegoddess, she wears it on her head as a means to identify her. Another god whose name was compounded with the word for “west” (and who also was primarily a funerary god) is Khentiamentiu. His name means “Foremost of the Westerners”,
i.e. “He in charge of the dead”. He was the necropolis deity of Abydos. Although both his name and his function are clearly related to those of Amentet, they never act in conjunction.
Djefa: god of Abundance.
Heka: god of Magic.
Maat: goddess of Truth and cosmic Order.
Sekhet: the Fen-goddess.
Shai: god of Fate.
Sia: god of Intelligence.
Gods of this type share the following three characteristics:
Their name is a noun which denotes their domain.
Their gender is that of said noun. They're always depicted in human form, with as sole attribute their name or an object that refers to their domain, on their head - or without any attribute at all, in which case
they are simply identified by their name, written above or beside them.
The word “heka” means “magic”, so a god Heka of magic is magic personified. The word
“sia” means “intelligence”, so a god Sia of intelligence is Intelligence personified. The word
“amentet” means “the west”, so a goddess Amentet is The West personified.
Meskhenet: a birth goddess (the personification of the birth tile).
Shesmu: the god of the wine- and oil-press.
Tayt: the goddess of weaving.
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