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HORUS
The name Horus
is the Latinised form
of the Egyptian Hor, which seems to mean "face", and was applied
to the falcon -god of early invaders of the Nile Valley. The falcon
deity was at first a sky-god, the sun and moon being his eyes, and this might
explain the name Hor. From being the emblem of a conquering people, the falcon
came to symbolize a warrior-god and victorious leader. Consideration of
his pre-eminence in turn led to the belief that the king was his earthly
embodiment. This belief later hardened into dogma and the kings took the name of
Horus as their own. At the same time, the ruling kings were now followers of Ra,
so Horus became identified with the sun. Meanwhile, however, he became
identified in the popular mind (as opposed to the state religion) as the
son of Osiris.
The interaction
of those two identifications was the of the same name. Resolutions of the
confusion differed in the various cult centres, most fertile source of
myth-making for, though in many aspects the two Horuses were quite distinctive,
in later times the Egyptians confused the solar Horus and the Osirian god and so
at least fifteen important Horus gods can be distinguished. However confused,
these forms can be roughly divided into solar and Osirian according to the
parentage ascribed to Horus in the myth. Those in which Horus was the son of
Atum or of Ra or of Geb and Nut are solar; while those in which Horus is the son
of Isis are Osirian. We shall consider the first solar form of Horus
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