Egyptian Gods as Kings

Photo: Part of the Royal Canon of Turin,
a fragmentary papyrus, written in hieratic,
which preserved a list of gods, demi-gods,
spirits, mythical and human kings who
ruled Egypt from the time of creation.
19th Dynasty. Egyptian Museum.
Turin.

Egyptian mythology is dogmatic that the institution of kingship was coeval with the rule of the Egyptian gods. Thus, the king list preserved in the Royal Canon of Trin, which dates to the 19th dynasty, begins with a dynasty of 11 deities who ruled for over 7700 years. Through creation Re became the king of Egyptian gods and men and although he eventually tired and withdrew from the world he had made, he continued to hold sovereign power as god of the heavens. On earth, the rule of Ra led to a royal succession among the Egyptian gods themselves, and in the Canon the length of the reign of each god is given before the reigns of human kings. The text state that eventually Osiris became king of Egypt, and as the heir of Osiris, Horus next took over his father's kingship. However, his own rulership took on even wider, cosmic, proportions as it was fused with the rule of Ra and with that of the ancient falcon god Horus who was himself originally a cosmic deity. This level of kingship is made clear in the Coffin Texts:

"Horus... Has become lord of the (solar) barque and has inherited the sky...
It is this Horus, the son of Isis, who rules over all the heavens and the gods therein." - Coffin Texts VI 390

Horus, in turn, became the link with the living human king. Although, according to its primary expression in the Heliopolitan theology, this story may be understood as much as an affirmation of the king's descent from the Egyptian gods as a genealogy of divine kings, we must not lose sight of the fact that from an Egyptian perspective the myth links kingship to the Egyptian gods just as much as it establishes it by means of the gods.
Hymns to the gods often name them as "kings" - especially hymns of the later New Kingdom which also give deities many of the epithets used of kings such as "royal ruler" and "ruler of the Two Lands".
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