The Egyptian Pantheon - 1. Pantheon Character Reference

The Egyptian Pantheon

As understood by Sasha Distan. The lives of deities are governed by their own polytheist pantheon of power and responsibility.

Osiris: Human elder god, head of the pantheon (after Ra), responsible for fertility and agriculture. Son of Nut (the sky) and Geb (the earth).

Isis: Osiris's wife and sister. Human goddess. Magical power and healing. “She of the Throne”.

Horus: Son of Isis and Osiris. Falcon headed god of sky, war and protection. Anubis’s sometime lover and friend in his trickster plots.

(Osiris, Isis and Horus are almost always represented as a family trio, representative of the passage of power through the dynasty and Pharaohs of Egypt. They are referred to as “First Family”)

Set: “Animal” headed, an amalgamation of shapes of head. God of storms. Major god and second in command to Osiris.

Bast: Lioness or cat goddess, Pharaoh’s protection. Her eyes at night are the sun.

Ptah: Creator and craftsman god. Thickly set and stocky man with fine jewellers hands.

Sekhmet: lioness headed goddess of war. Ptah’s wife.

Nefertem: “He of beauty” Arisen from the blue water lily. Son of Ptah and Sekhmet, a beautiful young man with lapis hair who wears a crown of blue water lilies. Object of general desire for both Horus and Anubis.

(Ptah, Sekhmet and Nefertem are shown as a family group and statues of the three together are common household talisman’s of love and nurture. In these Nefertem is often carved from a blue stone nestled within the white marble of his parents)

Thoth: Ibis headed god of the moon, drawing, writing, geometry, wisdom, medicine, music, astronomy, magic.

Hathor: Cow goddess with the disk of the sun in her horns. Goddess of love and music, also tangentially mother of the universe. Referred to as “The Golden Calf”. Anubis’s friend, tries and oft fails to control his wild and wicked ways.

Anubis: Jackal god of the underworld. Protects the tombs of the dead and transports souls into the underworld. Trickster, tease, and best friend of Horus.

(Thoth, Hathor and Anubis are also sometimes represented as a family group, as Father, mother and child respectively, though they are not actually related. Theirs is a troubled family and used as a warning against rising upstart children)

Sobek: Crocodile god of the Nile, easy going and relaxed and a great source of wisdom for the younger gods.

(Sobek, Anubis and Horus are a non-familial trio representative of friendship and kinship.)

Khepry: The scarab who pushes the sun out of bed at dawn.

Ma’at: Goddess of balance and justice, shown sitting holding a sceptre and an ankh. Fair and just if not always wise.

Khnum: God of the source of the Nile. Ram headed. Makes human children from the clay of the Nile and implants them into human women.

Satis: Goddess of the flooding Nile. Female with gazelle horns. Wife of Khnum.

Anuket: Daughter of Khnum and Satis. Gazelle headed goddess of the Nile waters.

(As a family trio, Khnum, Satis and Anuket are responsible for the Nile and fertility.)

Nebthet: falcon winged and sympathetic goddess of those left behind after death. The ‘good’ side to Anubis’s gleeful hoisting of the living into the underworld.

Ra: The sun. First and foremost of all gods, leader of gods and dispenser of justice and punishment. Apparent as a source of light too bright for even gods to look at. Generally absent and called upon in times of trouble. Lazy and needing to be pushed out of bed in the morning by a giant scarab beetle.