the antithetical nature of light and darkness. In one text at least as ancient as the XVIIIth Dynasty (the copy that we have dates Later developments. only from the Ethiopian period) an ingenious attempt is made to represent Ptah as the source of all life: from him, it is said, emanated Horus as “heart” or “mind” and Thoth as “tongue,” and through the conjoint action of these two, the mind conceiving the design and the tongue uttering the creative command, all gods and men and beasts obtained their being. Of this kind of speculation much more must have existed than has reached us. It is doubtless such explanations as these that the Greeks had in view when they praised the wisdom of the ancient Egyptians; and in the classical period similar semi-philosophical interpretations altogether supplanted, among the learned at least, the naive literal beliefs of earlier times. Plutarch in his treatise on Isis and Osiris well exemplifies this standpoint: for him every god and every rite is symbolic of some natural or moral truth.
The final stages of the Egyptian religion are marked by a renewed popularity of all its more barbarous elements. Despairing, as it would seem, of discovering the higher wisdom that the more philosophic of the priests supposed that religion to conceal, the simpler-minded sought to work out their own salvation by restoring the worship of the gods to its most primitive forms. Hence came the fanatical revival of animal-worship which led to feud and bloodshed between neighbouring towns—a feature of Egyptian religion that at once amused and scandalized contemporary Greek and Latin authors (Plut. De Iside, 72; Juv. xv. 33). Nevertheless Egyptian cults, and particularly those of Serapis and Isis, found welcome acceptance on European soil; and the shrines of Egyptian deities were established in all the great cities of the Roman Empire. Serapis was a god imported by the first Ptolemy from Sinope on the Black Sea, who soon lost his own identity by assimilation with Osiris-Apis, the bull revered in Memphis. Far down into the Roman age the worship of Serapis persisted and flourished, and it was only when the Serapeum of Alexandria was razed to the ground by order of Theodosius the Great (A.D. 391) that the death-blow of the old Egyptian religion was struck.
Notes are here added on some divinities who have received inadequate or no attention in the preceding pages. For information as to Ammon, Anubis, Apis, Bes, Bubastis, Buto, Isis and Thoth, reference must be made to the special articles on these gods.
Arsaphes, in Egyptian Harshafe, “he who is upon his lake,” the ram-headed god of Heracleopolis Magna, gained an ephemeral importance during the IXth Dynasty, which arose from his town. Outwardly, he resembles Khnum. Little is known about him, and he is seldom mentioned. The burial-place of his priests in later times was in 1904 discovered at Abusir el Meleq.
Chons, “he who travels by boat,” perhaps originally a mere epithet of the moon-god Ioh or Thoth, is chiefly familiar as the third member of the Theban triad. As such he is represented as a youthful god, wearing a skull-cap surmounted by the moon. His cult was revived and became popular in Ptolemaic times. A curious story about the sending of his statue to Mesopotamia to heal a daughter of the king of Bakhtan is related upon a stele that purports to date from the Ramesside period: it has been proved to be a pious fraud invented by the priests not earlier than the Greek period.
Hathor, whose name means “house of Horus,” was at all times a very important deity. She is depicted as a cow, or with a broad human countenance, the cow’s ears just showing from under a massive wig. Probably at first a goddess of the sky, she is early mentioned in connexion with Re. Later she was often identified with Isis, and her name was used to designate foreign goddesses like those of Puoni and Byblus. Unlike most cosmic deities, she was worshipped in many localities, chief among which was Dendera, where her magnificent temple, of Ptolemaic date, still stands. “The seven Hathors” is a name given to certain fairies, who appeared shortly after the birth of an infant, and predicted his future.
Khnum or Khnoum, a ram-headed god, whose principal place of worship was the island of Elephantine (there associated with Satis and Anukis), but also revered elsewhere, e.g. together with Nebtu in Esna. He enjoyed great repute as a creator, and was supposed to use the potter’s wheel for the purpose. In this capacity he is sometimes accompanied by the frog-headed goddess Heket.
Month, a hawk-headed god of the Thebaid: in Thebes itself his cult was superseded by that of Ammon, but it persisted in Hermonthis. He was often given the solar attributes, and was credited as a great warrior.
Min, the god of Coptos and Panopolis (Akhmim), seems to have been early looked upon as a deity of the harvest and crops. His cult dates from the earliest times. Represented as ithyphallic, with two tall plumes on his head, the right arm upraised and bearing a scourge. In old times he is identified with Horus: later Ammon was confused with him, and depicted in his image.
Nechbet (Nekhbi, Nekhebi), the vulture-goddess of El Kab, called Eileithyia by the Greeks. She gained an ascendancy as patroness of the south at the time when the two kingdoms were striving for the mastery. It is as such, in opposition to Buto the goddess of the north, that she is most often named on the monuments.
Neith, the very ancient and important goddess of Sais, the Greek Athene. On the earliest monuments she is represented by a shield transfixed by arrows. Later she wears the crown of Lower Egypt, and carries in her hands a bow and arrows, a sign of her warlike character. In the XXVIth Dynasty, when a line of Pharaohs sprang from Sais, she regained a prominent position, and was given many cosmogonic attributes, including the title of mother of Re.
Nephthys, the sister of Osiris and wife of Seth, daughter of Keb and Nut, plays a considerable rôle in the Osiris story. She sided with Isis and aided her to bring Osiris back to life. Isis and Nephthys are often mentioned together as protectresses of the dead.
Onouris, Egyptian En-hūri, “sky-bearer,” the god of Thinis. Later identified with Shu (Show), who holds heaven and earth apart.
Ptah, the Hephaestus of the Greeks, a demiurgic and creative god, special patron of hand-workers and artisans. Worshipped in Memphis, he perhaps owed his importance more to the political prominence of that town than to anything else. He was early identified with an ancient but obscure god Tenen, and further with the sepulchral deity Sokaris. He is represented either as a closely enshrouded figure whose protruding hands grasp a composite sceptre, the whole standing on a pedestal within a shrine; or else as a misshapen dwarf.
Sakhmi, a lion-headed goddess of war and strife, whose name signifies the mighty. She was worshipped at Latopolis (Esna), but also at a late date as a member of the Memphite triad, with Ptah as husband and Nefertem (Iphthimis) as son: often, too, confounded with Ubasti.
Seth (Egyptian Sēt, Stḫ or Stš), by the Greeks called Typhon, was depicted as an animal
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that has been compared with the jerboa by some, and with the okapi by others, but which the Egyptians themselves occasionally conceived to be nothing but a badly drawn ass. In historic times his cult was celebrated at Tanis and Ombos. He regained a certain prestige as god of the Hyksos rulers, and two Pharaohs of the XIXth Dynasty derived their name Sethos (Seti) from him. But, generally speaking, he was abominated as a power of evil, and his figure was often obliterated on the monuments. He is named in similes as a great warrior, and as such and “son of Nut” he is identified with the Syrian Baal.
4. The Divine Cult.—In the midst of every town rose the temple of the local god, a stately building of stone, strongly contrasting with the mud and plaster houses in which even the wealthiest Egyptians dwelt. It was called the
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and in it the deity was supposed to reside, attended by his
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the priests. There was indeed a certain justification for this contention, even when a contrary theory assigned to the divinity a place in the sky, as in the case of the lunar divinity Thoth; for in the inmost sanctuary stood a statue of the god, which served as his representative for the purposes of the cult. Originally each temple was dedicated to one god only; but it early became usual to associate with him a mate of the opposite sex, besides a third deity who might be represented either as a second wife or as a child. As examples of such triads, as they are called, may be mentioned that of Thebes, consisting of Ammon, Mut and Chons, father, mother and child; and as typical of the other kind, where a god was accompanied by two goddesses, that of Elephantine, consisting of Khnum, Satis and Anukis. The needs of the god were much the same as those of mortals; no more than they could he dispense with food and drink, clothes for his apparel, ointment for his limbs, and music and dancing to rejoice his heart. The only difference was that the divine statue was half-consciously recognized as a lifeless thing that required carefully regulated rites and ceremonies to enable it to enjoy the good things offered to it. Early every morning the officiating priest proceeded to the holy of holies, after the preliminaries of purification had cleansed him from any miasma that might interfere with the efficacy of the rites. Then with the prescribed gestures, and reciting appropriate formulae all the while, he broke the seal upon the door of the shrine, loosed the bolts, and at last stood face to face with the
