Gods and Goddesses
Ancient gods and goddesses partly looked like humans and behaved like us. Some had animal features like heads on top of human bodies. Because they were gods people were supposed to worship them. Throughout all Egyptian history different cities and pharaohs favored one set of gods more than the other. Anubis Anubis was a funerary god. His task became holding the scales of judgement. If the heart was lighter than a feather, the dead would be brought from Anubis to Osiris. Bast or Bastet Bast is usually shown with a feline head or ears on a woman's body or as a cat. The cat was her sacred animal. She was a daughter of Ra and she was a protective goddess. Another name for her was Ailuros and says she was originally a sun goddess who became associated with the moon after contact with Artemis, Greek goddess. Bes or Bisu Bes may have been an imported Egyptian god. Bes is seen as a dwarf sticking out his tongue. He was a protector who helped in childbirth and promoted fertility. He was also a guardian against snakes and misfortune. Geb or Keb Geb was god of the earth. He was an Egyptian fertility god who laid an egg from which the sun was hatched. He was also known as the Great Cackler because of his association with geese. It was Gebs sacred animal. He was mainly worshiped in Lower Egypt. Hathor Egyptian cow-goddess and personification of the Milky Way. She was the wife or daughter of Ra and mother of Horus in some traditions. Horus He was the the pharaohs protector and also patron of young men. Horus was the falcon god. Neith Egyptian goddess who is another mortuary god connected with the woven bandages of the mummy. Isis Egyptian goddess who was associated with life, the winds, the heavens, abundance, magic, and more. Isis is shown as wearing a sun disk. Nephthys Nephthys is the head of the household of the gods. Nephthys is sometimes represented as a falcon or as a woman with falcon wings. She was a death goddess as well as being a goddess of women and the house and a companion of Isis. Nut Nut is the Egyptian sky goddess shown as supporting the sky with her back, her body blue and covered with stars Religious Practice Ancient Egyptian religion was important in their everyday life (rich and poor), they built many great temples and kept shrines in their homes. The right term for Egyptian religion is Polytheism- the belief of many gods. Gods were forces of nature , the elements and the characteristics of certain roles. Egyptologists have organized the ancient Egyptian religion into two categories: State and Local/Household. The local or household were worshipped in the home. Egyptians would choose the most suitable deities and build a shrine for them. The state religion was practiced by the Pharaoh and the temple priests. The temples built to worship the state Gods were not open to the public. Priests had to worship and make offerings to the Gods to keep problems from happening. Much of these offerings came from the taxation of the working class. The Egyptians held daily services to attend the statues by washing, clothing and anointing it with perfumes. The statue was offered food and drinks placed at its feet. He/She takes "special nourishment" from. The leftovers were eaten by the people. Other than offerings, prayers were recited back to the statue Gods. The Egyptians believed that these services were necessary to sustain the Gods that in turn sustain the universe. http://www.experience-ancient-egypt.com/ancient-egyptian-religion.html http://ancienthistory.about.com/od/egyptmyth/tp/071507egyptiandeities.htm |
Nephthys
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Afterlife/Burial Egyptians believed that when the physical body died,a force called ka escaped. The ka was the persons personality separated from the body. Though ka had no physical presence, Egyptians believed it needed food and water to survive. They also believed it would shrivel and vanish if it decomposed. Egyptians buried their dead directly in the ground. Egypt's climate was and still is a very dry environment, a body would be very preserved in a sandy,dry spot. Usually the bodies would be buried in a fetal, curled up position and a few pots and other goods. Eventually, for those who could afford them, the Egyptians built mud-brick tombs called mastabas. It means bench in Arabic so these tombs look like benches. But these often created problems. Since it was no longer buried in sand, there was nothing to preserve it naturally. Family members would discover when visiting to honor their ancestors that the bodies had rottedin the cool- interior mastabas. The Egyptians then developed a procedure called 'mummification'to preserve their remains of the ancestors. Mummification Mummification was essential to one's afterlife. The mummified body provided a place for a person's spirit to return to the body after death. Early mummification consists of just a body, possibly dried up from the sun or natron salts. These wrappings were covered in plasters that have been molded to look like the person. Around the 4th dynasty, embalmers began to remove the internal organs.The process began with the removal of all external organs except the heart. The heart had to remain in place to give evidence for the deceased person in the afterlife. A sacrab or amulet would be placed over the heart to protect it in its travel through the Netherlands. The brain was also usually removed. A long, hooked tool was put into the brain through the nose,and swirled around to liquefy the brain. After,the head was tipped forward and all liquids of the skull poured out through the nose. It is not uncommon that the brain was left in place. It would just dry up and shrink during mummification. The next step was to dry out the body. The deceased body was laid out under a pile of natron salts, salts native to the area, and not unlike today's baking powder. Over a period of days, the salt absorbed all the moisture, the flesh shrank, and the skin darkened. Then wrapped in linen. Egyptians used resins, cassia, cedar oil, myrrh, cassia, and palm wine as drying in the preserving of the mummy. These, like the natron salts, helped to protect the body from decay. The lungs, stomach, intestines, and liver were dried out and each placed in a canopic jar. The jars came in sets of four, and each of the Four Sons of Horus were assigned the duy of protecting the contents of one of the vessels. The proliferation of tomb raidings led many ancient Egyptians to be concerned about the preservation of their internal organs in death. Canopic jars came to serve a symbolic purpose in one's burial, while a person's own mummified organs were placed inside the body during mummification. Mummification was so expensive that only the pharaohs, royal families and very wealthy individuals could afford to be preserved in this way. Ordinary people would just be buried in the sand in regular cemeteries, hopefully to be naturally mummified. http://www.egyptianmuseum.org/burialpracticesgallery |