Symbolism of ancient Egypt

Ancient Egypt owes its highly developed culture to the Nile. Due to the cyclical floods in the country, a pronounced belief in the other world was formed, the model for which was the natural cycle of the emergence, disappearance and rebirth of life.

The ancient Egyptians were an extremely life-oriented people who largely tried to repress the idea of ​​age and death. Instead, the idea of ​​life in the other world and rebirth was put in the foreground.

The thinking of the ancient Egyptian people was not rational - logical, but figurative - symbolic. The magical principle operated that all perfect, great things are reflected in something small, outwardly inconspicuous - both above and below, the macrocosm is equal to the microcosm. On this basis, the scarab beetle became a symbol of the rising sun, and the sky could be depicted as a cow. In the same way, it was possible, through symbolic actions and drawings, to influence important processes occurring in the world of the Gods and in the other world. The symbols themselves were attributed an inherent inner power, something like an essence or soul.

The ancient Egyptian religion contained a huge number of deities with diverse forms of manifestation. The gods - as well as people - were supposed to have a large number of different character qualities, so that the same deity could be depicted in all sorts of incarnations.

Symbols of life in ancient Egypt

Ankh since ancient times it has been a symbol of eternal life in Egypt in this andotherworldly world.

It is so rooted in tradition that it was adopted by the Coptic Christians (an ethno-confessional group of Egyptian Arabs professing Christianity, descendants of the pre-Arab population of Egypt) as a cross.

In many images, the Gods hold the ankh in their hand or hand it over to people. Here we are talking about the breath of life that has become visible, so to speak, about the divine spark, thanks to which life can arise in general. In addition, the ankh represents the life-giving properties of the elements air and water. The origin of its form has not yet been explained. Perhaps we are talking about a magical knot, where sexual relations probably also play a role. It is possible to interpret the shape of the cross as a combination of the cross of Osiris in the shape of the letter T with the oval of Isis into a key that reveals the secrets of life.

The Ankh is one of the most important ancient Egyptian symbols with the meaning of “life” (“immortality”), also known as the “crux ansata”. The sign is very simple, but powerful.

It combines two symbols - a cross, as a symbol of life, and a circle, as a symbol of eternity. Their combination means immortality.

The Ankh can be interpreted as the rising sun, as the unity of the male and female principles (the oval of Isis and the cross of Osiris), and also as the key to esoteric knowledge and the immortal life of the spirit.

In hieroglyphic writing, this sign symbolized “life”; it was also part of the words “welfare” and “happiness”. The Egyptians believed that the image of the ankh prolongs life on earth. They were buried with the same amulet in order to be sure that life in another world awaited the deceased. This is exactly the shape, according to the ideas of the ancient world, that the key had, which could open the gates of death.

This symbol was also placed on the walls of water canals in the hope that it would protect against floods. Later, the ankh was used by witches in rituals, divination, fortune telling, healing and helping women in labor. During the hippie movement in the late 1960s, the ankh was a popular symbol of peace and truth.

It is impossible to list all the meanings of a symbol. A sign of happiness, prosperity, inexhaustible vitality, eternal wisdom.

like this loop of life often worn by common people as an amulet, in the form of a knot. Like the ankh, it signifies eternity and immortality.

Sign of Tet, which was also called the "blood of Isis", was often given to the deceased as an amulet. It looks like an ankh, the handles of which are down. In conjunction with the pillar of Djed on the walls of temples and in sarcophagi, it indicates the unification of opposing forces and at the same time an ever-renewing life force.

Shenu

And at the same time a hieroglyph denoting eternity. He is often depicted in wall paintings with divine animals.

This emblem in the form of an oval with a straight line at the end is often called a cartouche.Inside is a name written in hieroglyphs (for example,the name of the pharaoh), which the oval symbolically protects.

All Seeing Eye - Wadget

A painted image of an eye with a spiral line underneath is, as a rule, the emblem of the falcon-headed sky god Horus, a symbol of the all-seeing eye and the unity of the cosmos, the integrity of the universe. According to ancient Egyptian myth, the lunar eye of Horus was torn out by Set in the battle for supremacy among the gods, but after Horus's victory in this battle it grew again. This myth became the reason for the extreme popularity of the Eye of Horus as an amulet to ward off evil. The Eye was also often depicted or carved on Egyptian tombstones to help the dead in the afterlife. The spiral under the eye (resembling a galaxy) symbolizes energy and perpetual motion.

The Eye of Horus was also associated with healing, as ancient Egyptian physicians often viewed illness as analogous to the battle between Horus and Set.

In mathematics, the Eye had a curious function - it was used to represent fractions. According to one version of the myth, Seth cut the torn out eye of Horus into 64 parts, so its incomplete image symbolizes some fractional number: the pupil is 1/4, the eyebrow is 1/8, etc.

Scarab

The scarab is one of the most popular Egyptian symbols. It is known that dung beetles, which include the scarab, are able to skillfully sculpt balls from dung by rolling them in front of them. This habit, in the eyes of the ancient Egyptians, likened the scarab to the sun god Ra (the dung ball in this allegory is an analogue of the solar disk moving across the sky).

The scarab was considered a sacred creature in Ancient Egypt; figurines of this beetle, made of stone or glazed clay, served as seals, medals or talismans, signifying immortality. Such amulets were worn not only by the living, but also by the dead. In the latter case, the beetle was placed in a sarcophagus or inside a mummy - in place of the heart, while sacred texts were written on the reverse, smooth side of it (often the thirtieth chapter of the book of the dead, convincing the heart not to testify against the deceased at the afterlife court of Osiris). Scarab figurines often depicted only the upper part of a beetle, without legs, and the smooth oval base of the figurine was used to apply various kinds of inscriptions - from individual names and aphorisms of a moralizing nature to entire stories about outstanding events in the life of the pharaohs (hunting, marriage, etc.)

Winged solar disk

According to myth, Horus took this form during the battle with the evil god Set. On both sides of the disk there is an image of a snake, signifying the balance of opposing forces. The entire composition symbolizes protection and world balance.

This sign was often depicted above the entrance to the tomb of the pharaoh; in this case, the disk in the center symbolized Horus, the wings - Isis protecting him, and the snakes - Lower and Upper Egypt.

Sesen

Lotus flower, sign of the sun, creativity and rebirth. Due to the fact that at night the lotus flower closes and sinks under the water, and in the morning rises again to bloom on the surface, this association arose. One of the cosmogonic myths says that at the beginning of time, a giant lotus rose from the waters of chaos, from which the sun appeared on the first day of the world’s existence.

The lotus flower is also considered a symbol of Upper Egypt.

Feather Maat

The emblem symbolizes truth and harmony. Maat is the daughter and eye of Ra, the goddess of justice, truth and world order. Together with her father, she participated in the creation of the world from chaos. Like her Greek counterpart, Themis, Ma'at is depicted blindfolded. The goddess's head is decorated with an ostrich feather, which is her symbol and hieroglyph. According to the ideas of the ancient Egyptians, in the afterlife the heart of the deceased was placed on one scale and the figurine of Maat on the other. If both objects were balanced, then this meant that the deceased was worthy of bliss in the reed fields of Iaru (otherwise he would be devoured by a monster with the head of a crocodile and the body of a lion). The figurine of Maat on the chest was an invariable attribute of the judge.

Cat

For the Egyptians, the cat was the earthly embodiment of Bastet - the goddess of solar warmth, joy and fertility, protector of pregnant women and children, guardian of the hearth and harvest. Bastet, who personified such qualities as grace, beauty, dexterity and affection, is considered the Egyptian analogue of Aphrodite and Artemis. Her sculptures and paintings were used to protect the house from evil spirits.

Naturally, cats were treated with great respect in Ancient Egypt, and killing them was punishable by death. During life, this animal was an equal member of the family, and after death it was embalmed and placed in a sarcophagus, which was placed in a special necropolis.

Heron

The heron was considered a symbol of resurrection and eternal life (a prototype of the Phoenix bird) and personified Benu, one of the original, uncreated gods like Ra or Atum. According to the myth, at the beginning of creation, Benu appeared by himself on a stone that emerged from the watery chaos. This stone - Benben - was one of the fetishes of God.

Isis

The goddess of fertility, water, wind and family fidelity, Isis, reliever of birth pangs and protector of children, was one of the most important and ancient goddesses of the Egyptian pantheon. Her cult as a mother goddess was also reflected in Christianity.

Isis was depicted as a woman (often winged), crowned with the hieroglyph "throne", or a falcon. Sometimes - in the form of a woman with cow horns and a sun disk on her head.

Isis was the wife of Osiris and the mother of Horus. Identified with such Greek goddesses as Demeter, Persephone, Hera.

Ra

An analogue of the Greek Helios, the supreme deity of the ancient Egyptian pantheon, the father of the gods. The title of Son of Ra was also borne by all pharaohs. Ra's sacred animal was the falcon, in the form of which he was often depicted. Another option is a man with the head of a falcon, topped with a solar disk or double crown.

Ibis

The sacred ibis bird symbolized Thoth, the god of science and magic, inventor of astronomy, medicine and geometry, author of the Book of the Dead. He also served as a celestial chronicler and patron of the Moon (the calendar was compiled on the basis of the lunar phases). Depicted as an ibis or a man with the head of an ibis, crowned with a lunar disk. Roughly equivalent to the Greek Hermes.

The material was prepared based on information from the Internet

According to Plato's records, the ancient Egyptian priests indicated that the sacred line of pharaohs originated from Atlantis.

The first Egyptian pharaohs in the Predynastic (end of the 5th millennium - ca. 3100 BC) and Early Dynastic period (3120 to 2649 BC) history of Ancient Egypt, up to the 4th dynasty, the pharaohs are known only under the only Choir name, since the pharaoh was considered the earthly incarnation of the heavenly god Horus-Horus, whose symbol was the falcon. Horus is the god of the sky, royalty and sun. Horus from Vedic: Harshu - hṛṣu – Agni, fire; Sun;. According to early Egyptian myths The falcon brought soma from the sky - the sacred drink of the gods.

At the end of the Old Kingdom, the name of the pharaoh is associated with the myth of the god Osiris. The word pharaoh Pharaoh; Greek Φαραώ; glory Perun, from "Paro" - "descendant of the Sun" .)

The pharaohs of Ancient Egypt traced their lineage back to the gods; incest was considered an acceptable measure to preserve the sanctity of the royal family. Tutankhamun's pedigree is quite complex; there were incestuous marriages in his family.

Tutankhamun was born in 1341 BC and died in 1323 BC. at the age of 19.
His father was Amenhotep IV, who proclaimed monotheism in Egypt, the only god was the Sun, and himself his son, and took the name Akhenaten - “son of the Sun” (reign: 1351 and 1334 BC).

As shown by genetic analysis of the remains of Tutankhamun's mummy (mummy KV35YL), his mother was Akhenaten's sister. Tutankhamun was born a weak child, as his parents were brother and sister.

Tutankhamun's stepmother was white-skinned In 1348 BC Nefertiti and Akhenaten had a daughter Ankhesenamun- half-sister of Tutankhamun. At the age of ten, Tutankhamun married her, his half-sister.

Name Tutankhamun (Tutenkh-, -amen, -amon), in Egyptian: twt-nḫ-ı͗mn; belonged to the 18th dynasty of Egyptian kings, reigning from 1333 BC. -. 1324 BC This period of Egyptian history is called the "New Kingdom".
Tutankhamun means " living image of Amon" . Tutankhaten (Tutankhaten) means “living image of Aten” - the sun god.

Researchers have been able to identify a number of mummies from Tutankhamun's family tree. The research results are based on CT scans and two years of research DNA from 16 mummies, including Tutankhamun.
Pharaoh Amenhotep III (mummy KV35EL) may have been the grandfather of Tutankhamun.
Pharaoh Akhenaten (mummy KV55) father of Tutankhamun.

Teye - wife of Pharaoh Amenhotep III, mother of Akhenaten and grandmother of Tutankhamun.

Mummy KV35YL - mother of Tutankhamun, although her identity is still shrouded in mystery, DNA testing reveals that she was the daughter of Amenhotep III and Teii, and she was also dear sister of her husband Akhenaten, who ruled ancient Egypt from 1351-1334 BC.

Teje - wife of Pharaoh Amenhotep III, Mother of Akhenaten, grandmother of Tutankhamun

After the death of Akhenaten's father, Tutankhamun became pharaoh at the age of 10 in 1333 BC. , and reigned for only nine years until his death.
At the age of 12, Tutankhamun married his half-sister Ankhesenamun, the daughter of Akhenaten and Nefertiti, but the couple had no surviving children.

Tutankhamun was one of the last kings of Egypt of the 18th dynasty and ruled during a critical period in history, after the death of his father Akhenaten Egyptian priests and the priests regained their powers and, rejecting monotheism (monotheism) returned the cult of polytheism, worship of several deities of ancient Egypt.

Discovery of Tutankhamun's tomb in 1922 belongs to a British archaeologist Howard Carter. More than 5,000 unique exhibits were found in Tutankhamun's tomb.

In 2009 and 2010 in Zurich at the Center for DNA Genealogy (iGENEA) Swiss genetic scientists conducted extensive DNA research on the mummy of Tutankhamun and other members of his family. In February 2010, the results of Y-DNA research were only partially published; information about the Y-DNA results was closed.

It turned out that the Y-DNA of the mummy of Tutankhamun, his father Akhenaten and his grandfather Amenhotep III belongs to the Y-chromosomal haplogroup R1b1a2, widespread in Italy, the Iberian Peninsula and western England and Ireland.

Up to 70% of Spanish and British men belong to the same Y-chromosomal haplogroup R1b1a2 as the Egyptian pharaoh Tutankhamun. About 60% of French men belong to the R1b1a2 haplogroup.
About 50% of the male population in Western European countries belongs to the R1b1a2 haplogroup. This indicates that they have a common ancestor.

According to the results of a study by the Swiss Center for DNA Genealogy (iGENEA), among modern living in Egypt Of Egyptians, haplogroup R1b1a2 is less than 1%. Very few modern Egyptians are related to the ancient pharaohs.

Director of the iGENEA Center Roman Scholz said that Pharaoh Tutankhamun and members of the royal family who ruled Egypt more than 3,000 years ago belonged to the genetic haplogroup R1b1a2, common among modern Europeans, and which does not exist today among modern Egyptians.

Pharaoh Tutankhamun belongs to haplogroup R1b1a2, like more than 50% of all men in Western Europe, which means that Tutankhamun was a “white” - “Caucasian”, that is, a man of European appearance, and not a “Caucasian”, as some wise guys translate.

The ancient Egyptians used for embalming various synthetic resins that turned mummies black. This gave the false impression that the ancient Egyptians were Africans. Indeed, white-skinned pharaohs were considered the highest caste dominating the dark-skinned Egyptian population, consisting of different tribes. It is likely that the pharaohs' white skin also played a role in their deification 3,000 years ago. The lighter the skin color, the higher the person's status in society.

iGENEA researchers believe that the common ancestor of people carrying the genetic haplogroup R1b1a2 lived in the Caucasus approximately 9500 years ago. Haplogroup R1b1a2 comes from haplogroup R1b and R1a, whose representatives from the Black Sea region and the Caucasus came to Africa (Egypt) through Asia Minor during the Neolithic period (Neolithic population). Haplogroup R1a is Proto-Indo-Europeans and... and legendary Arias, according to the DNA of their modern descendants.

The earliest migrations of people with haplogroup R1b1a2, which arose in the Black Sea region around 9,500 years ago, spread throughout Europe with the spread of agriculture in 7,000 BC.

New tomb found in Egypt carved into desert rocks near the Egyptian city of Thebes, dated to approximately 1290 BC — time after the reign of Tutankhamun. Princesses of the ruling dynasties, including the daughters of Pharaoh Thutmose IV, are buried in the tomb. Buried in the same tomb police chief and his wife , which indicates the high status of this government position, ensuring peace and order in Egyptian society. Despite the fact that the “tomb of the princesses” was plundered in ancient times, archaeologists managed to excavate rooms where the robbers had not visited, and found unique ivory items, ritual vessels and jewelry, providing an opportunity to see the wealth and splendor of the pharaohs of Egypt.

On a bas-relief found in the Theban "tomb of the princesses" depicts the princesses of Egypt performing sacred purification rituals before Pharaoh Amenhotep III in honor of his anniversary. The bas-relief dates from around 1390-1352 BC

The time will come and the pharaohs will come to life. Just as we wanted

Johannes Krause, a paleogeneticist from the University of Tübingen, reported in the journal Nature Communications that of the 151 mummies the German researchers worked with, genome of three mummies managed to be restored completely, since they DNA is well preserved . They have survived to this day, as the scientist put it. Preserved despite the hot Egyptian climate, high humidity in the burial sites and the chemicals used for embalming.

Complete genome restoration three mummies promises - even in the distant future - restoration of their owners by cloning. This would suit the ancient Egyptians quite well, who hoped that somehow and someday rise from the dead, that's why they were mummified! They seemed to have foreseen that the remains of flesh and bones will be useful.

Attributes and symbols of Ancient Egypt

Ancient Egypt owes its highly developed culture to the Nile. Due to the cyclical floods in the country, a pronounced belief in the other world was formed, the model for which was the natural cycle of the emergence, disappearance and rebirth of life.

The ancient Egyptians were an extremely life-oriented people who largely tried to repress the idea of ​​age and death. Instead, the idea of ​​life in the other world and rebirth was put in the foreground.

The thinking of the ancient Egyptian people was not rational - logical, but figurative - symbolic. The magical principle operated that all perfect, great things are reflected in something small, outwardly inconspicuous - both above and below, the macrocosm is equal to the microcosm. On this basis, the scarab beetle became a symbol of the rising sun, and the sky could be depicted as a cow. In the same way, it was possible, through symbolic actions and drawings, to influence important processes occurring in the world of the Gods and in the other world. The symbols themselves were attributed an inherent inner power, something like an essence or soul.

The typology of symbolism in ancient Egyptian art is very extensive: it is the symbolism of shape and size, location and material, color and number, hieroglyphic meaning and gesture. Interpreting an often ambivalent symbol, trying to achieve the most accurate result, is a task of paramount importance and colossal complexity. Sometimes the graphic symbol has a living, anthropomorphic form: for example, the ankh, the symbol of life, which has arms, carries the sacred fan behind the king, and the djed pillar, personifying the god Osiris and carrying the meaning of stability and strength, is equipped with eyes and supports the disk of the sun in its palms.

Symbols of life in ancient Egypt

Since ancient times, the Ankh has been a symbol of eternal life in this and the other world in Egypt. It is so rooted in tradition that it was adopted by the Coptic Christians (an ethno-confessional group of Egyptian Arabs professing Christianity, descendants of the pre-Arab population of Egypt) as a cross. In many images, the Gods hold the ankh in their hand or hand it over to people. Here we are talking about the breath of life that has become visible, so to speak, about the divine spark, thanks to which life can arise in general. In addition, the ankh represents the life-giving properties of the elements air and water. The origin of its form has not yet been explained. Perhaps we are talking about a magical knot, where sexual relations probably also play a role. It is possible to interpret the shape of the cross as a combination of the cross of Osiris in the shape of the letter T with the oval of Isis into a key that reveals the secrets of life. The Ankh is one of the most important ancient Egyptian symbols with the meaning of “life” (“immortality”), also known as the “crux ansata”. The sign is very simple, but powerful. It combines two symbols - a cross, as a symbol of life, and a circle, as a symbol of eternity. Their combination means immortality. The Ankh can be interpreted as the rising sun, as the unity of the male and female principles (the oval of Isis and the cross of Osiris), and also as the key to esoteric knowledge and the immortal life of the spirit. In hieroglyphic writing, this sign symbolized “life”; it was also part of the words “welfare” and “happiness”. The Egyptians believed that the image of the ankh prolongs life on earth. They were buried with the same amulet in order to be sure that life in another world awaited the deceased. This is exactly the shape, according to the ideas of the ancient world, that the key had, which could open the gates of death. This symbol was also placed on the walls of water canals in the hope that it would protect against floods. Later, the ankh was used by witches in rituals, divination, fortune telling, healing and helping women in labor. During the hippie movement in the late 1960s, the ankh was a popular symbol of peace and truth. It is impossible to list all the meanings of a symbol. A sign of happiness, prosperity, inexhaustible vitality, eternal wisdom. Such a loop of life was often worn by common people as an amulet, in the form of a knot. Like the ankh, it signifies eternity and immortality.

The sign of Tet, also called the "blood of Isis", was often given to the deceased as an amulet. It looks like an ankh, the handles of which are down. In conjunction with the pillar of Djed on the walls of temples and in sarcophagi, it indicates the unification of opposing forces and at the same time an ever-renewing life force.

Shenu is the ring of Shen and at the same time a hieroglyph denoting eternity. He is often depicted in wall paintings with divine animals.

This emblem in the form of an oval with a straight line at the end is often called a cartouche. Inside there is a name written in hieroglyphs (for example, the name of the pharaoh), which the oval symbolically protects.

All-Seeing Eye - Wadget. A painted image of an eye with a spiral line underneath is, as a rule, the emblem of the falcon-headed sky god Horus, a symbol of the all-seeing eye and the unity of the cosmos, the integrity of the universe. According to ancient Egyptian myth, the lunar eye of Horus was torn out by Set in the battle for supremacy among the gods, but after Horus's victory in this battle it grew again. This myth became the reason for the extreme popularity of the Eye of Horus as an amulet to ward off evil. The Eye was also often depicted or carved on Egyptian tombstones - to help the dead in the afterlife. The spiral under the eye (resembling a galaxy) symbolizes energy and perpetual motion.

The Eye of Horus was also associated with healing, as ancient Egyptian physicians often viewed illness as analogous to the battle between Horus and Set. In mathematics, the Eye had a curious function - it was used to represent fractions. According to one version of the myth, Seth cut the torn out eye of Horus into 64 parts, so its incomplete image symbolizes some fractional number: the pupil is 1/4, the eyebrow is 1/8, etc.

The scarab is one of the most popular Egyptian symbols. It is known that dung beetles, which include the scarab, are able to skillfully sculpt balls from dung by rolling them in front of them. This habit, in the eyes of the ancient Egyptians, likened the scarab to the sun god Ra (the dung ball in this allegory is an analogue of the solar disk moving across the sky). The scarab was considered a sacred creature in Ancient Egypt; figurines of this beetle, made of stone or glazed clay, served as seals, medals or talismans, signifying immortality. Such amulets were worn not only by the living, but also by the dead. In the latter case, the beetle was placed in a sarcophagus or inside a mummy - in place of the heart, while sacred texts were written on the reverse, smooth side of it (often the thirtieth chapter of the book of the dead, convincing the heart not to testify against the deceased at the afterlife court of Osiris). Scarab figurines often depicted only the upper part of a beetle, without legs, and the smooth oval base of the figurine was used to apply various kinds of inscriptions - from individual names and aphorisms of a moralizing nature to entire stories about outstanding events in the life of the pharaohs (hunting, marriage, etc.)

Winged solar disk. According to myth, Horus took this form during the battle with the evil god Set. On both sides of the disk there is an image of a snake, signifying the balance of opposing forces. The entire composition symbolizes protection and world balance. This sign was often depicted above the entrance to the tomb of the pharaoh; in this case, the disk in the center symbolized Horus, the wings - Isis protecting him, and the snakes - Lower and Upper Egypt.

Sesen is a lotus flower, a sign of the sun, creativity and rebirth. Due to the fact that at night the lotus flower closes and sinks under the water, and in the morning rises again to bloom on the surface, this association arose. One of the cosmogonic myths says that at the beginning of time, a giant lotus rose from the waters of chaos, from which the sun appeared on the first day of the world’s existence. The lotus flower is also considered a symbol of Upper Egypt.

Feather of Maat. The emblem symbolizes truth and harmony. Maat is the daughter and eye of Ra, the goddess of justice, truth and world order. Together with her father, she participated in the creation of the world from chaos. Like her Greek counterpart, Themis, Ma'at is depicted blindfolded. The goddess's head is decorated with an ostrich feather, which is her symbol and hieroglyph. According to the ideas of the ancient Egyptians, in the afterlife the heart of the deceased was placed on one scale and the figurine of Maat on the other. If both objects were balanced, then this meant that the deceased was worthy of bliss in the reed fields of Iaru (otherwise he would be devoured by a monster with the head of a crocodile and the body of a lion). The figurine of Maat on the chest was an invariable attribute of the judge.

Cat. For the Egyptians, the cat was the earthly embodiment of Bastet - the goddess of solar warmth, joy and fertility, protector of pregnant women and children, guardian of the hearth and harvest. Bastet, who personified such qualities as grace, beauty, dexterity and affection, is considered the Egyptian analogue of Aphrodite and Artemis. Her sculptures and paintings were used to protect the house from evil spirits. Naturally, cats were treated with great respect in Ancient Egypt, and killing them was punishable by death. During life, this animal was an equal member of the family, and after death it was embalmed and placed in a sarcophagus, which was placed in a special necropolis.

Heron. The heron was considered a symbol of resurrection and eternal life (a prototype of the Phoenix bird) and personified Benu, one of the original, uncreated gods like Ra or Atum. According to the myth, at the beginning of creation, Benu appeared by himself on a stone that emerged from the watery chaos. This stone - Benben - was one of the fetishes of God.

Isis. The goddess of fertility, water, wind and family fidelity, Isis, reliever of birth pangs and protector of children, was one of the most important and ancient goddesses of the Egyptian pantheon. Her cult as a mother goddess was also reflected in Christianity. Isis was depicted as a woman (often winged), crowned with the hieroglyph "throne", or a falcon. Sometimes - in the form of a woman with cow horns and a sun disk on her head. Isis was the wife of Osiris and the mother of Horus. Identified with such Greek goddesses as Demeter, Persephone, Hera.

Ra. An analogue of the Greek Helios, the supreme deity of the ancient Egyptian pantheon, the father of the gods. The title of Son of Ra was also borne by all pharaohs. Ra's sacred animal was the falcon, in the form of which he was often depicted. Another option is a man with the head of a falcon, topped with a solar disk or double crown.

Ibis. The sacred ibis bird symbolized Thoth, the god of science and magic, inventor of astronomy, medicine and geometry, author of the Book of the Dead. He also served as a celestial chronicler and patron of the Moon (the calendar was compiled on the basis of the lunar phases). Depicted as an ibis or a man with the head of an ibis, crowned with a lunar disk. Roughly equivalent to the Greek Hermes.

Attributes of ancient Egypt

About Egyptian crowns:

The eagle on the Egyptian crown means that pharaoh, king, god - refers to Upper Egypt.

The snake on the Egyptian crown means pharaoh, king, god - refers to Lower Egypt.

If both a snake and an eagle are depicted on the crown, this means that the pharaoh, king, god - refers to Upper and Lower Egypt (Such a crown appeared when Upper and Lower Egypt merged into one).

The crown in the shape of a solar disk refers to the gods: Ra, Atum, Amon, Amon-Ra, Aah, Khonsu, Hathor.

Three crowns of Egypt: 1. White crown of Upper Egypt. 2. Red Crown of Lower Egypt. 3. Pschent, or double crown of the united kingdom.

About Egyptian attributes:

Heka (Hook): - is a scepter that was worn not only by gods and kings, but also by high officials. The earlier, sometimes human-sized, form of the staff was originally a shepherd's stick and became an attribute of the shepherd god Accepti; from here the well-known form, smaller in size and highly curved, developed. The sign-picture of this scepter served to represent the word “rule.” During the Middle Kingdom, a hook as a sign of Osiris was placed on the friezes of tombs.

Nehekh (Scourge): The so-called whip (in Egyptian "nehekh") consists of a short handle with two or three hanging strips or strings of pearls. It was interpreted as a shepherd's whip, which became a sign of power through the god Anezti, "Head of the Eastern Nomes." Another original meaning of the whip was a fan from flies. The whip is a constant attribute of the gods Osiris and Min. Already in the ancient kingdom, it was located on the backs of animals consecrated by the gods. The whip, as a symbol of power, also serves kings.

Uas (Scepter of Uas): Uas was in ancient times. the kind of fetish in which it was implied. contains the healing powers of an underground demon similar to a dog or jackal. Uas consists of a stick forked at the bottom, which ends at the top with the head of an animal (jackal). In the hands of the gods, it becomes a scepter of prosperity and a symbol of health and happiness. Before the Middle Kingdom, the deceased was given a wooden scepter with him to the grave so that he could use it to enjoy divine benefits. Later, friezes on the walls of tombs were decorated with this symbol. A popular motif at all times was the image of two scepters, which bordered the edges of the field of a picture or inscription and supported the ideogram “sky” with their heads. The wass scepter, decorated with the sky and a feather, was the sign of the Theban nome and bore the name wasset.

Colors of Ancient Egypt

The Egyptians mainly used: dark green, black, red, light blue, yellow (gold), white. If you think a little about why these colors played a certain role in Ancient Egypt, you can understand that each color means a small piece of nature, and what could be more beautiful than nature...

Ancient Egypt My first reaction was to go to Western Sahara myself and find the lost city. The excavations promised to be interesting. But, having contacted the official authorities, I received discouraging information: I was categorically not advised to go