Sons of Horus | Egyptian Gods Groupings

Limestone canopic jars with the heads of
Duamutef, Qebesenuef, Imsety and Hapy.
Originally, jars depicting the sons of Horus were made with
human-headed stoppers but near the end of the 18th Dynasty
 they were given the characteristic forms seen here.
Egyptian Museum, Cairo.

The earliest reference to those four gods is found in the Pyramid Texts where they are said to be the children and also the "souls" of Horus. They are also called the "friends of the king" and assist the deceased monarch in ascending into the sky (PT 1278-79). The same gods were also known as the sons of Osiris and were later said to be members of the group called "the seven blessed ones" whose job was to protect the netherworld god's coffin. Their afterlife mythology led to important roles in the funerary assemblage, particularly in association with the containers now traditionally called canopic jars in which the internal organs of the deceased were preserved. At first the stoppers of these jars were often carved into the shape of human heads representing the head of the deceased, but from the 18th dynasty they were carved in the form of the hours sons of Horus who had become the patron deities of their contents. Each deity was in turn said to be guarded by one of the funerary goddesses, though there was some variation in this linkage. The group may have been based on the symbolic completeness of the number four alone, but they are often given geographic associations and hence became a kind of "regional" group.

Image: The four sons of Horus depicted as mummiform figures and as deities on a stylized mound.
The four deities became increasingly important in the Egyptian mortuary sphere.
Papyrus of Anhai, British Museum. Egyptian Gods.

Name - Appearance - Organ - Orientation - Tutelary Deity
Imsety - Human - Liver - South - Isis
Duamutef - Jackal - Stomach - East - Neith
Hapy - Baboon - Lungs - North - Nephthys
Qebesenuef - Falcon - Intenstines - West - Serket

The four gods were the human-headed Imesty who guarded the liver (and who was himself guarded by Isis); the baboon-headed Hapy who guarded the lungs (protected Nephthys); the jackal-headed Duamutef who guarded the stomach (often protected by Neith); and the falcon-headed Qebesenuef, guardian of the intestines (who was often protected by Serket). The four gods were sometimes depicted on the sides of the canopic chest and had specific symbolic orientations, with Imsety usually being aligned with the south, Hapy with the north, Duamutef with the east and Qebesenuef with the west. They were also depicted on the long sides of coffins and sarcophagi with Hapy and Qebesenuef being placed on the west side while Imsety and Duamutef were placed on the east. During the Third Intermediate Period embalming practices changed and the preserved organs were returned to the body cavity, each with an amulet of its respective son of Horus attached. Later similar figures of the four gods were also often stitched onto the outside of the wrapped mummy.

In the vignettes of the various funerary texts the four sons of Horus could be represented in differing ways. In the Book of the Dead they may be shown as diminutive figures standing on a lotus blossom before the throne of Osiris, and on the third funerary shrine of Tutankhamun they appear as heads fused with the body of a protective serpent. In late New Kingdom times the sons of Horus were also represented as star gods in the northern sky.

Images of the Sons of Hours

The four sons of Horus, tomb of Ay, western Valley of the Kings, Thebes.
This unique representation depicts the sons of Horus as seated mummiform figures wearing the White Crown of Upper
Egypt (at left, on the southern side) and the Red Crown of Lower Egypt (at right, on the northern side).
18th Dynasty. Egyptian Gods.

The goddess Neith lustrates the jackal-headed Duamutef. Each of
the four sons of Horus was protected by one of the four tutelary
goddesses, Isis, Nephthys, Neith and Serket. In this way the viscera
of the deceased received a double degreeof protection.
Decorated canopic chest. Third Intermediate Period.
Egyptian Museum. Cairo.

Leave a Comment on Egyptian Gods