The Ancient Pharaohs of Egypt
Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt
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History Prehistoric Egypt Pre Dynastic period Early Kingdom Ancient Kingdom First transitional period Middle Kingdom Second Transitional period New Kingdom Third transitional period Late period or Later Kingdom Ptolemaic period
Pharaohs Narmer Menes Khor Aha Jer Den Hasekhemui Djoser Snofru Khufu, Khuops Khafra Mikerin, Menkaura Sahura Piopi II Nitokris Mentuhotep II Amenemhat I Senusert I Senusert III Amenemhat III Nefrusobek Yahmose I Thutmose I Hatshepsut Thutmose III Amenhotep II Amenhotep III Akhenaten Tutankhamun Horemheb Aye Ramesses I Seti I Ramesses II Merneptah Setnakht Ramesses III Sheshonk I Piankhi Taharka Psammetikh I Necho II Amasis II Ptolemy I Soter Cleopatra
Gods Aker Amat Amaunet Amentet Amon Amset Anedjti Nemti Anubis Anuket Apis Apop Aton Atum Ash Ah Ba Banebjedet Bast Bata Bennu Bes Buhis Geb Gor Duamutef Imhotep Input Isdes Isis Iunit Ayhi Kaihos Kvebehsenuf Kuk Maat Mafdet Merimutef Meskhenet Meritseger Mnevis Min Montu Mut Naunet Nebedj Neftida Nekhbet Nehebkau Nun Nut Onuris Osiris Ptah Ra Rat Tawi Renenutet Satis Sobek Sebektet Sekhmet Selket Set Seshat Sia Sokar Sopdu Tatenen Taurt Tefnut Tot Ouajet Ouajit Unut Upuaut Hapi Hapi (son of Horus) Hathor Hauhet Heh Heka Hekat Hentiamenti Herishef Khnum Khonsu Hu Shai Shezmetet Shezmu Shu Yah
Religion Creation of the world The murder of Osiris The War of the gods The Eye of Horus The unification of the country The Destruction of humanity The cult of Aton The funeral cult of Duat Ka Temples of Ancient Egypt
Cosmogony of Heliopolis Cosmogony of Memphis cosmogony of Hermopolis cosmogony of Thebes cosmogony
Mythology Divine entities The earthly reign of Ra The journey of the Solar boat Isis and Osiris The birth and childhood of Hora The litigation of Set and Hora The Era of the reign of the Pharaohs Gods and Egyptians Sacred animals Death, travel along the Duat and the judgment of Osiris Customs of the ancient Egyptians Ancient texts
Archaeology Richard Pocock, who discovered Egypt Johann Burkhardt in Abu Simbel Giovanni Belzone in the Valley of the Kings Jean Francois Champollion and the mystery of Egyptian hieroglyphs Richard Wiese and the pyramids of the Seventy pyramids by Carl Lepsius The discoveries of Auguste Marietta "The texts of the pyramids" and "The lost Pharaohs" William Petrie, "sifted Egypt" The city of the heretic Pharaoh Howard Carter finds the tomb of Tutankhomon Necropolis in Saqqara and the pyramid Djosera Mohammed Zakaria Ghoneim and the mystery of the Pyramid of Sekhemkhet
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Isis
Isis (Isis) (Egypt. js. t, etc. - Greek .σσις, Lat. Isis) is one of the greatest goddesses of antiquity, who became a model for understanding the Egyptian ideal of femininity and motherhood.
She was revered as the sister and spouse of Osiris, the mother of Horus, and, accordingly, the Egyptian kings, who were originally considered the earthly incarnations of the sokol headed god.
Being very ancient, the cult of Isis probably originates from the Nile Delta.
Here was one of the oldest cult centers of the goddess, Hebet, called by the Greeks Iseion (modern Behbeit el Hagar), currently lying in ruins.
Probably, initially she was a local deity of the Sebennite, but already the "Pyramid Texts" of the V Dynasty indicate the key role of this goddess in the general Egyptian pantheon.
Initially associated with the god Horus, due to the rise of the popular cult of Osiris, Isis is already the sister and wife of Osiris, and the mother of Horus.
Its original features in the period of the New Kingdom are transferred to Hathor.
In the Heliopolitan theological system, Isis, the younger deity of the Ennead, was worshipped as the daughter of the god Heb and the goddess Nut, respectively, as the great granddaughter of Ra.
The symbol of Isis was the royal throne, the sign of which is often placed on the head of the goddess.
Since the era of the New Kingdom, the cult of the goddess has become closely intertwined with the cult of Hathor, as a result of which Isis sometimes has a headdress in the form of a solar disk framed by cow horns.
The sacred animal of Isis as the mother goddess was considered the " great white cow of Heliopolis — - the mother of the Memphis bull Apis.
One of the widespread symbols of the goddess is the amulet tet - "the knot of Isis", or "the blood of Isis", often made of red minerals carnelian and jasper.
Like Hathor, Isis commands gold, which was considered a model of incorruptibility; on the sign of this metal, she is often depicted kneeling.
The celestial manifestations of Isis are, first of all, the star Sopdet, or Sirius, the "lady of the stars", with the rising of which the Nile spreads from one tear of the goddess; as well as the formidable hippopotamus Isis Hesamut (Isis, the terrible mother) in the guise of the constellation Ursa Major, who keeps the leg of the dismembered Seth in the heavens with the help of her crocodile companions.
Also, Isis, together with Nephthys, can appear in the form of gazelles that keep the horizon of heaven; the emblem in the form of two gazelles of the goddesses was worn on the diadems of the younger spouses of the pharaoh in the era of the New Kingdom.
Another incarnation of Isis is the goddess Shentait, who appears in the form of a cow, the patroness of funeral veils and weaving, the mistress of the sacred sarcophagus, in which, according to the Osiric ritual of the mysteries, the body of Osiris killed by his brother is reborn.
The side of the world that the goddess commands is the west, her ritual objects are the sistrum and the sacred vessel for milk — the situla.
Together with Nephthys, Neith and Selket, Isis was the great patroness of the deceased, protected the western part of the sarcophagi with her divine wings, commanded the anthropomorphic spirit Imseti, one of the four "sons of Horus", the patrons of canopes.
The Myth of Osiris and Isis
In the myths, some of which have come down to our time only in the well known retelling of Plutarch ("About Isis and Osiris"), the goddess is well known as the faithful spouse of Osiris, whose body she found in long wanderings after the god was killed by his brother Seth.
After collecting the remains of Osiris cut into pieces, Isis, with the help of the god Anubis, made the first mummy out of them.
Isis fashioned a phallus out of clay (the only part of the body of Osiris that Isis could not find was the phallus: it was eaten by fish), consecrated it and attached it to the assembled body of Osiris.
Turning into a female vulture — the bird of Khat, Isis spread her wings over the mummy of Osiris, uttered magic words and became pregnant[1].
In the temple of Hathor in Dendera and the temple of Osiris in Abydos, relief compositions have been preserved, which show the secret act of conception of a son by the goddess in the image of a falcon stretched over the mummy of her husband.
In memory of this, Isis was often depicted in the form of a beautiful woman with bird wings, with which she protects Osiris, the king or simply the deceased.
Isis often appears on her knees, wearing a white afnet bandage, mourning each deceased person as she once mourned Osiris himself.
According to legend, Osiris became the ruler of the afterlife, while Isis gave birth to Horus in a reed nest in the swamps of Hemmis (Delta).
Numerous statues and reliefs depict the goddess breastfeeding her son, who took the form of a pharaoh.
Together with the goddesses Nut, Tefnut and Nephthys, Isis, who bears the epithet "Beautiful", is present at the birth of each pharaoh, helping the queen mother to be delivered from the burden.
Isis is "the great enchantress, the first among the gods", the mistress of spells and secret prayers; she is called in trouble, her name is pronounced to protect children and family.
According to legend, in order to acquire secret knowledge and gain magical power, the goddess fashioned a snake from the saliva of the aging god Ra and earth, which stung the solar deity.
In exchange for healing, Isis demanded that Ra tell her his secret name, the key to all the mysterious forces of the universe, and became "the lady of the gods, the one who knows Ra in his own name."
With her knowledge, Isis, one of the patron deities of medicine, healed the baby Horus, who was stung by scorpions in the swamps.
Since then, like the goddess Selket, she was sometimes revered as the great lady of the scorpions.
The goddess gave her secret powers to the Mountain, thereby arming it with great magical power.
With the help of cunning, Isis helped Horus to gain the upper hand over Set during the dispute over the throne and inheritance of Osiris and become the ruler of Egypt.
The Myth of Ra and Isis
Isis, having a reputation among people as a sorceress, decided to test her powers on the gods.
In order to become the mistress of heaven, she decided to find out the secret name of Ra.
She noticed that Ra had become old by that time, saliva dripped from the corners of his lips and fell to the ground.
She collected drops of Ra's saliva, mixed it with dust, made a snake out of it, pronounced her spells over it and put it on the road along which the sun god passed daily.
After a while, the snake bit Ra, he screamed terribly, and all the gods rushed to his aid.
Ra said that despite all his spells and his secret name, he was bitten by a snake.
Isis promised him that she would heal him, but he must tell his secret name.
The sun god said that he was Khepri in the morning, Ra at noon and Atum in the evening, but this did not satisfy Isis.
And then Ra said: "Let Isis search in me, and my name will pass from my body to hers."
After that, Ra disappeared from the sight of the gods on his boat, and the throne in the Boat of the Lord of Millions of Years became free.
Isis agreed with Horus that Ra should swear that he would part with his two Eyes (the Sun and the Moon).
When Ra agreed that his secret name should become the property of the sorceress, and his heart was taken out of his chest, Isis said: "Expiring, Poison, come out of Ra, Eye of Horus, come out of Ra and shine on his lips.
It is I who conjure, Isis, and it was I who caused the poison to fall to the ground.
Truly, the name of the great god is taken from him, Ra will live, and poison will die; if poison lives, Ra will die."
The Gnostic Hymn
Let there be no one who does not know me anywhere and never!
Take care s, donot be ignorant of me!
For I am the first and the last.
I am revered and despised.
I am a harlot and a saint.
I am a wife and a virgin.
I am a mother and daughter.
I am the members of my mother's body.
I am infertility, and there are many of her sons.
I am someone whose marriages are many, and I have not been married.
I am the one who facilitates childbirth and the one who did not give birth.
I am a consolation in my labor pains.
I am a newlywed and a newlywed.
And my husband is the one who gave birth to me.
I am my father's mother and my husband's sister, and he is my offspring.
The goddess was well known to the Greeks and Romans.
The wife of Osiris.
She was identified with Demeter.
She invented sails when she was looking for her son Harpocrates (Horus).
Identified with Io, the daughter of Inah, the Egyptians so called Io.
Some believe that she became the constellation of Virgo.
The fish that helped her became the constellation of the Southern Fish, and her sons became Pisces.
The famous work of the ancient author Apuleius "Metamorphoses" describes the initiation ceremonies into the servants of the goddess, although their full symbolic content remains a mystery.
The cult of Isis and the mysteries associated with it acquired a significant spread in the Greco Roman world, comparable to Christianity and Mithraism.
As the universal mother goddess, Isis enjoyed wide popularity during the Hellenistic era not only in Egypt, where her cult and sacraments flourished in Alexandria,but also throughout the Mediterranean.
Its temples (Latin Iseum) in Byblos, Athens, Rome are well known; the temple discovered in Pompeii is well preserved.
The alabaster statue of Isis of the III century BC, discovered in Ohrid, is depicted on a Macedonian banknote of 10 denars.
In the late Antique era, the sanctuaries and mysteries of Isis were widely distributed in other cities of the Roman Empire, among which the temple in Lutetia stood out (modern times).
Paris).
In Roman times, Isis far surpassed the cult of Osiris in its popularity and became a serious rival to the formation of early Christianity.
Caligula, Vespasian and Titus Flavius Vespasian made generous offerings to the sanctuary of Isis in Rome.
In one of the images on the triumphal arch of Trajan in Rome, the emperor is shown donating wine to Isis and the Mountain.
The Emperor Galerius considered Isis his patroness.
Some authors of the XIX XX centuries saw echoes of the cult of Isis in the veneration of "Black Madonnas" in Christian churches in medieval France and Germany.
There was also an opinion about the iconographic influence of the image of Isis with the infant Horus Harmachis on the image of the Virgin with the infant Jesus, as well as parallels between the motive of the flight of the Holy Family to Egypt from the persecution of Herod and the story of how Isis hid the young Horus in the reeds, fearing the wrath of Set.
The famous sanctuary of Isis, which existed until the disappearance of the ancient Egyptian civilization, is located on the island of Philae, near Aswan.
Here the goddess, revered in many other temples of Nubia, was worshipped until the VI century AD, at a time when the rest of Egypt was already Christianized.
The sanctuary of Isis and Osiris on Philae remained outside the scope of the edict of Emperor Theodosius I on the prohibition of pagan cults in 391 by virtue of an agreement reached by Diocletian with the rulers of Nobatia, who visited the temple in Philae as an oracle.
Finally, the Byzantine emperor Justinian I sent the military commander Narses to destroy the religious buildings on the island and deliver their relics to Constantinople.
Other centers of worship of the goddess were located throughout Egypt; the most famous of them is Koptos, where Isis was considered the consort of the god Min, the lord of the eastern desert; Dendera, where the sky goddess Nut gave birth to Isis, and, of course, Abydos, in whose sacred triad the goddess was included together with Osiris and Horus.
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