Amun
Amun was one of the eight ancient Egyptian gods who formed the Ogdoad of Hermopolis. He was the god of the air and his consort was Ament (Amaunet).
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| Amun in hieroglyphs |
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In Egyptian mythology, Amun was a very powerful god. He was often combined with Ra to form the god Amun-Ra. At one point in Egyptian history, he was called the "King of the Gods".
Amun (also spelled Amon, Amoun, Amen, and sometimes Imen, Egyptian Yamanu) was the name of a deity, in Egyptian mythology, who became one of the most important deities in Ancient Egypt. In later years, bined with Horus into one god.
He began as a Theban wind and fertility god and ended up the supreme deity, with most of Egypt's vast wealth dedicated to his temple. Around the second millennium B.C.E., Thebes and its cult of Amun grew so powerful that it threatened worship of the sun god, Ra. The two deities merged. Amun-Ra was hailed as a national god, the creator of the universe, the pharaoh's personal protector, and the god of war.
Origin of name
Amun's name is first recorded as imn. That means "The hidden (one)". Vowels were not written in Egyptian hieroglyphics, but Egyptologists think the name survives into the Coptic language as Amoun.
Creator
It was thought that he had created himself and then created everything else while remaining distant from the rest of the world. In that sense, he was the original inscrutable and indivisible creator.
Amun was shown in human form, seated on a throne, wearing on his head a plain deep circlet from which rise two straight parallel plumes, maybe meant as had no father
When Amun had become more important than Menthu, the local war god of Thebes, Menthu was called the son of Amun. However, as Mut was infertile, it was believed that she, and thus Amun, had adopted Menthu instead.
The worship of Ammon as creator was introduced into Greece at an early period, probably through the medium of the Greek colony in Cyrene, which must have formed a connection with the great oracle of Ammon in the Oasis soon after its establishment. When Alexander the Great invaded Egypt in 332 BC, he was pronounced the metaphorical son of Amun at this oracle,[1] thus conquering Egypt without a fight. Henceforth, currency depicted him adorned with the horns of Ammon.[2] This tradition continued for centuries, with Alexander being referred to in the Qur'an as "Dhu al-Qarnayn" (The Two-Horned One), a reference to his depiction on Middle Eastern coins.[3]
Amun Media
Hieroglyphs on the backpillar of Amenhotep III's statue. There are two places where Akhenaten's agents erased the name Amun, later restored on a deeper surface. The British Museum, London
Ra and Amun, from the tomb of Ramses IV
This Third Intermediate Period amulet from the Walters Art Museum depicts Amun fused with the solar deity, Re, thereby making the supreme solar deity Amun-Re.
Depiction of Amun in a relief at Karnak (15th century BC)
Zeus-Ammon. Roman copy of a Greek original from the late 5th century BC. The Greeks of the lower Nile Delta and Cyrenaica combined features of supreme god Zeus with features of the Egyptian god Amun-Ra.
Amun (Post Amarna)[a]
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References
- ↑ Bosworth, A. B. (1988). Conquest and Empire: The Reign of Alexander the Great. New York: Cambridge University Press. pp. 71–74.
- ↑ Dahmen, Karsten (2007). The Legend of Alexander the Great on Greek and Roman Coins. Taylor & Francis. pp. 10–11. ISBN 978-0-415-39451-2.
- ↑ Recent Ancient Coin Acquisitions Focus on Alexander the Great
- David Klotz, Adoration of the Ram: five hymns to Amun-Re from Hibis Temple (New Haven, 2006therwebAnint gypt: th Myth Clasical Dictionary:
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