Ancient Egyptian Gods and Goddesses
Egypt was considered one of the most ancient civilizations
in the world. The Ancient Egyptians
worshipped a large number of gods and goddesses, over 2,000 major and minor
deities. Many of the lessor
gods/goddesses were only worshipped in localized areas of Egypt or in
households, while the major gods/goddesses (national) were worshipped in the
major Temples, like Karnak, Luxor, Abu Simbel, by the pharaohs and high
priests. While some were human-like in
form, many were half human and half animal, with cats being a favorite animal
of the Egyptians. But in any case, the
body was always human, while the head could be that of a human or an animal or
bird. These gods and goddesses
represented aspects of the peoples natural and supernatural surroundings, and
the ancient Egyptians never wanted to do anything that would anger the
gods/goddesses.
Keeping track of all the gods and goddesses is no easy
task. As the dynasties changed over the
years, so did the gods/goddesses – they would shift, evolve and sometimes blend
together. Many of the deities had
several variations to the spelling of their names (e.g., Seth (god of chaos)
might also be spelled Set, Setekh, or Setesh).
Many of the gods/goddesses had several titles. For example, Horus, the sky god, was also
known as the god of the sun and the god of kingship. Many gods/goddess had the same titles. And trying to keep the relationships straight
between the gods is also confusing. Some
goddesses were both mother and wife of a god or sister and wife.
Description of Some of the Major Gods/Goddesses
1. Ra
Ra, shown as a man with a falcon head, was the most popular
and long-lasting of the Egyptian gods.
He was considered the Egyptian sun god and the father of the gods. The people believed that Ra traveled across
the sky each day (representing sunlight) and traversed through the underworld
at night. Later, at the beginning of the
New Kingdom, he merged with Amun to become Amun-Ra.
2. Amun
Amun (also Amon, Ammon, Amen) is the creator god. He is one
of the most important gods of ancient Egypt who rose to prominence at Thebes at
the beginning of the period of the New Kingdom (c. 1570-1069 BCE). He is usually depicted as a bearded man
wearing a headdress with a double plume or, after the New Kingdom, as a
ram-headed man or simply a ram.
3. Osiris
Osiris, the god of the underworld who symbolized death,
resurrection and the cycle of the Nile floods.
He was also considered the judge of the dead. He was one of the oldest of the gods and
initially was the god of fertility and life.
He was murdered by his brother Seth and his wife Isis then resurrected
him so that he and Isis would have a son, the god Horus.
4. Horus
One of the most important deities of ancient Egypt, Horus
was a sky god associated with war and hunting, described has a man with a
falcon’s head. Since the beginning of
Egyptian history, falcons were worshipped as a symbol of cosmic powers. Although many different falcon gods existed,
they all eventually morphed into the one Horus god. Horus was worshipped from prehistoric Egypt
up until the Ptolemaic Period.
As the first national god, he was assumed to be related to the ruling pharaoh who in time was regarded as the manifestation of Horus in life and Osiris in death. The son of Osiris and Iris, he was raised to avenge his father’s death at the hands of Seth, thought to be Osiris’s jealous brother. After Osiris’s
Although worshipped as the sky god, Horus was also
considered to be the patron god of Egypt and Egyptians believed that their
Pharaohs were the earthy embodiment of him.
As the god of war, one of his jobs was to protect Egyptian royalty, and
as such, he was praised before and after Egyptian rulers went into battle.
5. Isis
Isis, the goddess of fertility and motherhood, is unique in
that there is no mention of her in Ancient Egyptian literature. Originally only an obscure goddess, over time
she became one of the most important deities to the ancient Egyptians as the
devoted wife of Osiris and mother of Horus.
She embodied the traditional Egyptian virtues of a mother and wife. She was the daughter of the earth god Geb and
the sky goddess Nut and the sister to the deities Osiris, Seth, and
Nephthys. She was most often depicted as
a human woman wearing a throne-like hieroglyphic upon her head.
6. Seth
Seth, the god of chaos, violence, deserts, and storms, was
the murderer of Osiris and considered the villain of the gods. He is either shown as an animal or a human
with the head of an animal, although the specific type of animal is never
identified. A lot of people now believe
that Seth is some mythical creature.
7. Anubis
Anubis was the son of Seth and appears as a jackal-headed
man. He was associated with
mummification and as a protector of the dead, he conducted the deceased to the
hall of judgment where their heart is weighed against the Feather of
Truth. If the heart is heavier, the soul
of the deceased is sent into oblivion, but if it is equal or lighter, the soul
travels to Paradise or the afterlife. (See
my blog on the Egyptian Afterlife and Mummification for more information).
8. Geb
Geb was the god of Earth, from whose eggs, the sun was
hatched (according to Egyptian mythology).
As he was associated with geese (his sacred animal), he was given the
nickname “Great Cackler.” Pictured as a
human body with a goose on his head, Egyptians thought his laughter was what
caused earthquakes. Married to his
sister Nut, the goddess of the sky, they were the parents of Seth and Nephthys
and the two are sometimes portrayed together as encompassing earth and sky. He is sometimes portrayed as weighing the
human heart during the judgment of the dead in the afterlife.
9. Nephthys
Nephthys (Nebt-het), the daughter of Geb and Nut, sister of Osiris,
Isis, and Set, wife of Set, and the mother of Anubis, was the head of the
household of the gods. Portrayed as
either a falcon or a lady with falcon wings, she is also known as the goddess
of death.
10. Nut
Nut, the wife of Geb and the mother of Osiris, Isis, Seth,
and Nephthys, was the sky goddess and is shown supporting the sky with her
back. She was supposed to have a blue body completely covered with stars.
11. Shu
Shu was considered to be the god of air and sky who mated
with his sister Tefnut to conceive Nut and Geb. He is responsible for holding
the sky separate from the Earth. He is
generally shown as a man with an Ostrich feather.
12. Tefnut
Tefnut was known as the goddess of fertility and the goddess
of moisture or water. Married to Shu and
the mother of Geb and Nut, she was thought to have helped Shu hold up the
sky.
13. Bastet
Bastet, portrayed as either a woman with a cat’s head or
only as a cat, eventually became the goddess of pleasure. Associated with the town of Bubastis in the
western delta, her temple was the home to many cats, who upon their deaths were
mummified. They have recently unearthed
a large cemetery of mummified cats in this area.
14. Bes
Bes was unique from the other gods in that he was always
portrayed with a full face (vice a profile) and was a dwarf with his tongue
sticking out and had a bandy-leg. He was
generally associated with good times and entertainment, but was also a guardian
god of childbirth. He also protected
people from the demons of the night and dangerous animals.
15. Hathor
Hathor, the daughter of Ra (the sun god), was the goddess of
women, beauty, love, pleasure, and music. She was portrayed in three forms – a cow,
a woman with the ears of a cow, and a woman wearing the headdress of a cow’s
horns. She was also considered as the cow goddess and was a personification of
the Milky Way. The ancient Egyptians
believed that she protected women during childbirth. She was also called the “lady of the west,”
where her job was to welcome the setting of the sun every night, in much the
same way as the ancient people hoped to be welcomed into the afterlife.
16. Taweret
Taweret, associated with the hippopotamus, was a demon
turned goddess of fertility and childbirth. It was her job to watch over and protect women
in labor and new babies.
17. Thot
Thot, the god of writing and wisdom, was believed to be the
inventor of the hieroglyphics. His job
was to serve as a scribe and advisor to the gods. His physical appearance was portrayed in the
form of a baboon or as a man with the head of an ibis. Thot was said to have the knowledge of magic
and secrets that were unavailable to the other gods.
The Rise of Amun and Aten Gods and the Combination of Gods
Over time, the religious beliefs and culture of the
Egyptians developed and changed. New
gods were formed by combining the strengths and jobs of the ancient gods with
new ones. With the beginning of the New
Kingdom (1570-1070 BCE), Amun, once a minor, local god of sun and air, came to
prominence at Thebes (now Luxor). Before
the New Kingdom he was portrayed as a bearded man wearing a headdress, but
after the start of the New Kingdom, he is shown as a ram-headed man or simply a
ram, symbolizing fertility after merging with Min, the goddess of
fertility. During this time, he also
merged with Ra making him Amun-Ra, the national god of Egypt.
The worship of many gods ended during the reign of the
Pharaoh Akhenaten in 1349 when he established the sun god Aten as the only god
of Egypt. The people of Egypt had to
change their religion from a worship of many gods to a worship of only one
god. Akhenaten especially wanted to get
rid of the worship of Amun. Amun’s
Temple of Karnak in Thebes was closed, priests were forced to leave, and
statues of old gods were destroyed.
Following the death of Akhenaten in 1333 BCE, his young son
Tutankhamen (King Tut) assumed the throne. The powerful priests of Amun forced
Tutankhamen to change his name to Tutankhamun and return the capital of Egypt
to Thebes and restore the old worship of Amun as the chief god and open all the
old temples.
Amun is generally shown as a ram-headed sphinx. Along the road to the Temple of Amun in Thebes
are statues of the ram-headed lion sphinxes, each one guarding a statue of the
pharaoh between its front legs. There
were 900 such statues in Thebes.
Following Tutankhamun’s death, the new pharaoh, Horemheb,
removed all memory and aspects of Akhenaten’s reign from the historical records
and restored the former gods to their original importance. Although the memory of Aten was removed, its
powerful cult remained, and many Egyptians believe that Moses was a priest of
Aten who left Egypt with his followers to establish his religion based on one
god elsewhere.
Long after Horemheb’s reign, the worship of Amun continue to
grow and gain widespread acceptance.
During the Ramessid Period (c. 1186-1077 BCE), the Amun priests were as
powerful as the pharaohs, and in fact they ruled Upper Egypt from Thebes as
pharaohs. Even after Thebes was left in
ruins following the Assyrian invasion, the worship of Amun continued in that
area, and even spread to the Sudan region.
People continued to worship Amun until the 5th century CE,
when Christianity replaced not only him, but all the old gods.
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