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‡ A country located in Africa and the Middle East.
‡ Capital is Cairo.
‡ Arabic is the main language.
‡ Divided into two sections: the Upper Kingdom and the Lower Kingdom.
‡ Known for its vast history and various landmarks around the country
such as the sphinxes and pyramids.
‡ Also referred to as ¶the gift of the Nile·.
‡ In ancient times had a rich history which included great pharaohs,
kingdoms and a myriad of gods and goddesses.
‡ Has been invaded many times throughout history by either Persians,
Romans or Greeks.
‡ Main religion is now monotheistic, but in ancient times it was polytheistic.
   



‡ mhe creation myths are simply stories which explain how the world has
come about to be as it is know.
‡ mhere are two main legends and they focus on how the Upper Kingdom
and the Lower Kingdom were created.
‡ mhere are many variations of these stories, but all have the same jist to it.
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‡ At first there was only Nun, the primal ocean of chaos, that contained the beginnings
of everything to come.
‡ From these waters came Ra, who by himself, gave birth to Shu and mefnut.
‡ Shu, the god of air, and mefnut, the goddess of moisture gave birth to Geb and Nut,
the earth god and the sky goddess respectively. And so the physical universe was
created.
‡ Men were created from Ra's tears. mhey proved were ungrateful so Ra, and a council
of gods, decided they should be destroyed. Re created Sekhmet, the warrior goddess,
to do the job. She was very efficient and slaughtered all but a few humans, when Ra
relented and tricked her into stopping. mhis is how the world has now come to be.
‡ Against Ra's orders, Geb and Nut married. Ra was incensed and ordered Shu to
separate them, which he did. But Nut was already pregnant, although unable to give
birth as Ra had decreed she could not give birth in any month of any year. mhoth, the
god of learning, decided to help her and gambling with the moon for extra light, was
able to add five extra days to the 360-day calendar. On those five days Nut gave
birth to Osiris, Horus the Elder, Set, Isis, and Nephthys successively. Osiris became the
symbol of good, while Set became the symbol of evil. And so the two representations
of good and evil were created.
 
 



‡ Only the ocean existed at first.
‡ mhen Ra (the sun) came out of an egg that appeared on the surface of the water. Ra
brought forth four children, the gods Shu and Geb and the goddesses mefnut and Nut.
Shu and mefnut became the atmosphere. mhey stood on Geb, who became the earth,
and raised up Nut, who became the sky. Ra ruled over all.
‡ Geb and Nut later had two sons, Set and Osiris, and two daughters, Isis and Nephthys.
Osiris succeeded Ra as king of the earth, helped by Isis, his sister-wife. Set, however,
hated his brother and killed him. Isis then embalmed her husband's body with the help
of the god Anubis, who therefore became the god of embalming. mhe powerful
charms of Isis resurrected Osiris, who became king of the netherworld, the land of the
dead. Horus, who was the son of Osiris and Isis, later defeated Set in a great battle
and became king of the earth.
‡ Another version of a creation myth is this one:
http://www.ancientegypt.co.uk/gods/story/main.html
   
‡ Ancient Egyptian gods were an important part of ancient Egyptian
religion. mhey were the deities looked up upon by the people and used as
a guidance in life. mhis belief in the gods was so strong that pharaohs
throughout history have tried to make the public believe they had been
given the divine right to rule from the gods themselves.
‡ mhe Egyptians tried to understand their place in the universe and their
mythology centres around nature, the earth, sky, moon, sun, stars, and
the Nile River.
‡ For over three thousand years, Egypt was made composed of a very
complicated system of Egyptians gods and goddesses, that were related
to each other through one connection or the other. So, to make this less
puzzling, the gods were classified into two categories: the household gods
or the local, state or national gods.
‡ mhe most important god of all, however, was Ra.
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‡ mhere are over 2000 gods in ancient Egypt.
‡ mhe most important god is Ra, the sun god. With the appearance of a falcon with a
sun disk on his head or a man with the head of a falcon. He was thought to sail across
the heavens in a boat called the ´Barque of millions of yearsµ. Every day, Ra was
thought to die and sail on his night voyage through the underworld, leaving the Moon
to light the world above. mhe boat was to sail through twelve doors, representing the
twelve doors of night time. mhe next morning, he was born again.
‡ Hathor is the Goddess of the sun and the goddess of joy, motherhood and love. Like
Ra, she had a sun disk on her head, but unlike Ra, she has cow horns, cow ears, and
sometimes takes the appearance of a whole cow. Hathor had another side as well, as
Sekhmet, the Eye of Ra or the warrior goddess, the destructive sun goddess. mhe
Egyptians knew the sun can bring life, but they also knew that the sun can kill you.
‡ Ra and Hathor had a daughter called Bastet. She is the goddess of cats. She has the
head of a cat, and can also be called Bast. In the battles between her father, Ra, and
the snake Apep, Bastet would help her father in defeating the snake. Bastet was the
protectress of cats. mhe ancient Egyptians had high respect for cats because they
protected the crops and grains from mice and rats. Evacuations around Egypt has
shown mummified cats.
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‡ mefnut is the wife of Shu, and mother of Nut and Geb. She is the goddess of moisture
and has the appearance of a woman with the head of a lioness.
‡ Shu is the god of air and his job is to hold up Nut, so that the Earth and the Sky remain
separated. Shu has the appearance of a man with a feather headdress, and sometimes
a lion.
‡ Nut is the sky goddess, and Geb is the Earth god. Nut is believed to be the sky, arcing
from horizon to horizon. Geb is the Earth, lying beneath her. Nut was married to the
god of the sun, Ra, but she was in love with Geb. When Ra found out, he was angry
and said that Nut could not give birth to any children during the 360 days of the year.
Nut was unhappy and asked the God of Wisdom, mhoth, to help. At this time, the
Moon was as bright as the Sun. mhoth got some light from the Moon, so now the Moon
gets bigger and smaller each month. With this light, mhoth made five new days, so now
the year is 365 days long. Nut gave birth to her five children, on these five days. When
Osiris, the oldest, was born, a loud voice said "mhe lord of all the earth is born." Seth, his
brother, was born hating Osiris.
‡ Hapy was the god of inundation. He is shown with a man with a pot belly and often
with water plants. Hapy was especially important to the ancient Egyptians because he
brought the flood every year. mhe flood deposited rich silt on the banks of the Nile,
allowing the Egyptians to grow crops.
‡ mhere were thousands of other gods and here are a few of them: