Skip to main content

Religion in Ancient Egypt: gods, temples and mummies

Before being ruled by a pharaoh , the Ancient Egypt was a set of independent settlements, each with its own cult of the gods, which would later form part of the dynastic pantheon.The Egyptians were, above all, tolerant, their pantheon became formed by 2000 different divinities .

This was possible, to a large extent, because all the Egyptian gods resembled each other, at least in their concept.Unlike the Sumerian religion, I reserve a particular space for each deity, the Egyptian pantheon was never fully systematized, nor were the properties of each god determined.

Religion in Ancient Egypt: gods, temples and mummies

The importance of each god within the pantheon had a direct relationship with the politics that crossed the re In every moment, if the predominantly political city was, for example, Heliopolis, city of priests, then the solar god Ra was worshiped as the main divinity.During the first historical phases, when the capital of the Empire was Memphis (III and IV dynasty), the cult of Ptha predominated over others, and so on.

The decline of the monarchy, from the VI dynasty, caused other local gods to gain strength, such as the case of Osiris , associated with the resurrection.According to the myth, Osiris was killed by his brother Seth The goddess Isis , wife and sister of Osiris , managed to resuscitate him with the help of Thoth and Anubis , and was finally avenged by his son Horus.

During the Middle Kingdom the "official" god was Amon , originally from the city of Thebes in the Al to Egypt.Its character of solar divinity helped him identify with Ra , from Lower Egypt, thus achieving his acceptance of the entire kingdom.In the New Kingdom, the association between the two gods was such that simply the cult was imposed on Amon-Ra.

After the extinction of the New Empire, the cult of the local gods and the old traditions took center stage again. Amon ceased to be considered the national god and, instead, many other deities were venerated, such as Neith , the goddess of war, and Bast , The goddess of happiness.

The end of Egyptian religion would not come until the fourth century, when Christianity became the official religion of the Roman Empire, which had conquered Egypt during its expansion into the Mediterranean.

Religion in Ancient Egypt: gods, temples and mummies

The main Egyptian gods were:

  • Amon : The" hidden "God of creation and patron of Thebes.national since the 12th dynasty.
  • Anubis : God with jackal head, coming from Tinis.Patron of magic, protector of tombs and guide of the dead at death.
  • Apis : God-bull of Memphis.Regenerated since the 1st dynasty as a son of Ptah and as a symbol of strength and courage.
  • Bast : Cat-headed goddess, daughter of the solar god Ra.Adorada in Bubastis.Pattern of music and dance.
  • Isis : Wife of Osiris and mother of Horus.Personification of the Egyptian throne, and goddess of motherhood and medicine.
  • Khnum : God-ram of Elephantine and guardian of the sources of the Nile.Creator of all living beings.
  • Maat : Goddess of truth and justice.Daughter of Ra.The one in charge of weighing the soul of him you dead.
  • Osiris : God of the ultraworld, the resurrection, and nature.With centers of worship in Bubastis and Abydos.
  • Ptah : Memphis deity protective of artists and blacksmiths.Appears like a mummy with a shaved head.
  • Ra : The supreme god according to Heliopolis theology.represented with the head of a hawk and a solar disk.
  • Seth : Personifies the chaos within Egyptian mythology.represented as a zoomorphic warrior.

Sources:

  • Meuleau, M.: The Ancient World, The World and its History, Argos, Barcelona, ​​1968
  • Universal History: Pharaonic Egypt.Bs.As., AGEA, 2005
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Gerardo Rueda Biography

Gerardo Rueda (Madrid, 1926- id. , 1996) Spanish painter and one of the most prominent members of abstract art in our country.For his pictorial constructions he used a wide range of materials (cardboard, wood, cloth, etc.), with which he sought to create a game of radical contrasts of textures; As for color, he sometimes adopted monochrome ( Azul , 1972).He participated in the Hispano-American Biennial of Havana (1953) and in the Venice Biennial (1960).In 1963 he founded with F.Zóbel the Museum of Abstract Art of Cuenca.His works include Blanco, Rojo y Negro (1975), Alea (1978) and the stained glass windows of Cuenca Cathedral (1991).In 1989 he donated part of his graphic work to the National Library.
Post a Comment
Read more

Elio Donato Biography

Elio Donato (4th century AD) Latin grammarian.Preceptor of Saint Jerome, he wrote some Commentaries to the works of Terence and Virgil and a grammar considered one of the most complete works of its kind in Antiquity. Donato (right) with Terence and his commentators The famous grammarian Elio Donato was considered the" grammaticus urbis Romae "par excellence.Together with the rhetorician Victorino, through severe studies he tutored a whole generation of diligent disciples; Among them was Saint Jerome himself, who repeatedly quotes Elio Donato with the reverent title of "praeceptor meus", speaks of his unusual doctrine and places it at its peak in the year 353.His work must be understood as that of a master that he wrote for his school. From Donato we keep an Ars grammatica in two versions, both due to the same author: a "minor", of a catechetical nature, for initiates or "infants" and referring to the eight parts of speech; and anothe...
Post a Comment
Read more

John Dos Passos Biography

John Dos Passos (John Roderigo Dos Passos, Chicago, 1896-Baltimore, 1970) American storyteller, prominent member of the so-called "Lost Generation", a heterogeneous group of authors that usually include poets like Ezra Pound and novelists like Ernest Hemingway and F.Scott Fitzgerald.John Dos Passos became famous above all for Manhattan Transfer (1925), a work that, with its panoramic and objective vision of the city, spearheaded an important urban trend in the contemporary novel. John Dos Passos Grandson of a Portuguese shoemaker and illegitimate son of a lawyer, he was educated in the maternal home.In 1917 he graduated from Harvard University, where he met intellectuals linked to the group "Harvard aesthetes." During the First World War he was an ambulance driver on the French front, an experience that provided him with material for his novel The Initiation of a Man: 1917 (1920).This was followed by Three Soldiers (1921), with which he achieved critica...
Post a Comment
Read more

John baskerville Biography

John Baskerville (Wolverley, 1706-Birmingham, 1775) British printer.He was a teacher, but abandoned his profession to dedicate himself to typography, where he achieved notable fame for the aesthetic perfection of printing characters, which he personally cast and engraved.He was also the inventor of vellum.
Post a Comment
Read more

1492: The European Expansion

After the long period of crisis that characterized the end of the Middle Ages, Europe , from the mid-fifteenth century, manifested a remarkable dynamism.The population began to increase, the lands became again in tillage, trade routes experienced the heyday of yesteryear. Sailing always in search of expensive spices and gold, European navigators launched themselves farther and farther into the ocean.Two inventions dominated the progress of the technique: the printing press of Gutenberg, and the artillery. In relation to all this, economic wealth and discovery of the world, advent of a new humanism and artistic flourishing, the date of 1492 does not constitute All a surprise. However, the new islands that were found Cristobal Colon were to be revealed as the pr imera scale of an immense and unsuspected continent; and the Spaniards would carry their spirit of crusader evangelists and voracious conquerors to him. " Renaissance ", " 16th century revolu...
Post a Comment
Read more

Gustavo Adolfo Becquer Biography

Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer (Gustavo Adolfo Domínguez Bastida; Seville, 1836-Madrid, 1870) Spanish poet.Along with Rosalía de Castro, he is the highest representative of post-romantic poetry, a trend that had as distinctive features the intimate theme and an apparent expressive simplicity, far from the vehemence rhetoric of romanticism. Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer (detail of a portrait made by his brother Valeriano, c.1862) Bécquer's work exerted a strong He influenced later figures such as Rubén Darío, Antonio Machado, Juan Ramón Jiménez and the poets of the generation of '27, and critics judge him to be the initiator of contemporary Spanish poetry.But more than a great name in literary history, Bécquer is above all a living poet, popular in every sense of the word, whose verses, with a moving voice and winged beauty, have enjoyed and continue to enjoy the predilection of millions of readers.. Biography Son and brother of painters, he was orphaned at the age of ten and live...
Post a Comment
Read more

Gustav Kirchhoff Biography

Gustav Kirchhoff (Königsberg, Prussia, 1824-Berlin, 1887) German physicist.A close collaborator of chemist Robert Bunsen, he applied spectrographic analysis methods (based on the analysis of radiation emitted by an energetically excited body) to determine the composition of the Sun. Gustav Kirchhoff In 1845 he enunciated the so-called Kirchhoff laws, applicable to the calculation of voltages, intensities and resistances in the yes of an electrical mesh; understood as an extension of the law of conservation of energy, they were based on the theory of physicist Georg Simon Ohm, according to which the voltage that causes the passage of an electric current is proportional to the intensity of the current. In 1847 he served as a Privatdozent (non-salaried professor) at the University of Berlin, and after three years he accepted the post of professor of physics at the University of Breslau.In 1854 he was appointed professor at the University of Heidelberg, where he befriended Rober...
Post a Comment
Read more

James tissot Biography

James Tissot (Joseph Jacques Tissot; Nantes, 1836-Bouillon, 1902) French painter.A disciple of Lamotte and Flandrin, James Tissot had his first success in 1861 with the painting Faust and Margarita , which was acquired by the State. He participated in the war of 1870-1871, and after it he settled in London, where his work soon acquired prestige.At the same time he dedicated himself to engraving, working alongside Seymour Haden; also in this genre he would achieve recognition. Tranquility (c.1881), by James Tissot A radical change to him it would lead to illustrate the life of Jesus Christ.To do this he moved to Palestine, where he resided for ten years.The result was 350 watercolors inspired by the gospels, of great realism, that were exhibited in Paris and London. Later he shut himself up in the abbey of Nouillon to prepare a similar work on the Old Testament, but death prevented him from completing the project.Among his most important paintings are The appointment on t...
Post a Comment
Read more

Alberico da Barbiano Biography

Alberico da Barbiano (1344-1409) Italian condottier.He began the reign of the condottieri with the Company of Saint George, which he formed with Italian soldiers to displace foreign mercenaries.He was at the service of Popes Gregory XI and Urban VI.
Post a Comment
Read more

Jan Hus Biography

Jan Hus (Also called John or John Huss; Husinec, Bohemia, 1369-Constance, 1415) Promoter of the Czech ecclesiastical reform.He was born into a poor peasant family in southwestern Bohemia.However, he managed to study Theology and Arts at the University of Prague and ordained himself a priest (1400).In 1402 he was appointed rector of the University, supported by the Czech particularist sentiment against Germanic domination. Jan Hus Under the influence of the English heretic John Wycliffe, Hus began in 1405 to preach against the excessive wealth of the Church and the immorality of the clergy, demanding a return to the purity of the evangelical message, preaching in the Czech language that the people could understand, and communion under both species.Its influence was increased by the crisis in which the Church of Rome was plunged by the "Schism of the West", as well as by the Czech nationalist reaction against the German minority (started with the struggle for control of ...
Post a Comment
Read more