"The Falcon god"
ByDr. Zahi Hawass
The god Horus is one of the most famous gods of ancient Egypt. Egypt Air has taken Horus as its Logo because of it ancient symbolism, as a winged god of the Sky, Horus, was this and more. The name "HORUS" stems from the ancient Egyptian word hr (her) which in its simple form was the preposition "above", "upon" so Horus the falcon soars above all the land and its inhabitants, and was, the natural symbol of the King who reigns over all Egypt.
It is also the perfect symbol for Egypt Air which flies throughout Egypt and the World.
Every pharaoh was an incarnation of Horus, who according to legend conquered Seth the evil god of Upper Egypt. Seth was god of turmoil and confusion who murdered Osiris, Horus's father. Horus avenged his father's death and became the god of order and justice. Therefore the pharaoh in Ancient Egypt became Horus on earth, the ruler of the two lands (Upper and Lower Egypt).
Horus, represented by the hawk, was the god of the Sky, a symbol of divine Kingship, and protector of the ruling King.-
The name Horus also means the forsighted, where one eye represents the Sun and other represents the Moon. The Sun was Known as "Horakhty", or Horus in the Horizon., Horus was considered as the god of the east and the rising Sun. Horus has the Shape of a falcon or a hawk or can take a human Shape with a falcon.
Horus was the god of the Nile Delta (Lower Egypt) and Seth was the god of Upper Egypt, but Horus became the Symbol of Kingship and the King of Upper and Lower Egypt because it was he who united the two Kingdoms.
The Kings of the predynastic Egypt were known as the followers of Horus. In this period, Horus was known as the son of Isis and Osiris and inherited the throne of his father.
Horus also was connected with the goddess Hathor. She was the eye of the Sun god Re, the wife of the living King, and the mother of coming King. Her name was written with the hieroglyph of the Horus falcon inside a rectangle-mean "house" or "mansion" of Horus.
Horus, in the shape of a falcon was worshiped in Hierakonpolis in Upper Egypt (north of Edfu). Archaeologists found a golden head of a falcon inside the temple in Hierakonpolis, and the name of the city means "City of the Hawk". Another temple was built for Horus in the city of Behdet (now Damnhour in the Nile Delta), where Horus was represented in the shape of a winged Sun disk. The modern name Damnhour itself "town of Horus" derives from the ancient Egyptian dmi-Hor.
Horus took anew form in the late Period (747 B.C.), when he became a popular god and was represented as a naked child standing above a crocodile holding in his hands snakes, scorpions and lions.
Therefore Horus became known as a healer for the people with snake bites and scorpion stings.
One of the most famous scenes of Horus is the representation of the falcon (Horus) perched on a throne behind the head of King Khafre, the builder of the second pyramid at Giza.
The falcon embraces the King with its wings in order to fly with him to the Sky. Another scene shows Isis nursing Horus. She and Hathor nursed and raised him to take revenge on his uncle Seth, the evil King of Upper Egypt, who killed Osiris, Horus's father.
Ancient Egyptian literature relates great battles between Horus and Seth and how Horus conquered Seth and united the two lands of Egypt. Therefore he was also known as Horus the fighter.
BACK to The Plateau Homepage