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« on: October 18, 2018, 11:11:33 pm »
Warning! Looong . . .
The general impression of Set as "Osiris' evil brother" is the result of the influence of Plutarch's Moralia, which represented the [local, latter-day] Osiris/Isis/Horus cult as characteristic of Egyptian religion generally. This was not the case; various areas (Nomes) of Egypt had their own triads of neteru.
No records of the ancient Priesthood of Set survived first the Osirian persecution and later the more general vandalism of the Christian/Islamic eras. We know of it only by its reflection, both in the character of Set as he was portrayed symbolically and mythologically and in the nature of Egyptian priesthoods in general.
Together with the Priesthood of Horus [the Elder], that of Set was the oldest of the Egyptian priesthoods. If we date it to the earliest predynastic images of Set found by archæologists, we can establish an origin of at least 3200 BCE. Working with the Egyptians’ own astronomically-based records (#2F), we may approximate 5000 BCE. If we are to assume the final eclipse of the Priesthood at the end of the XIX-XX [Setian] Dynasties ca. 1085 BCE, we are looking at an institution which existed at least two thousand and possibly as many as four thousand years. “In the early dynasties,” observes Budge:
Originally Posted By: Wallis Budge, The Book of the Dead
Set was a beneficent god, and one whose favor was sought after by the living and by the dead, and so late as the XIX Dynasty kings delighted to call themselves “Beloved of Set”. After the cult of Osiris was firmly established and this god was the “great god” of all Egypt, it became the fashion to regard Set as the origin of all evil, and his statues and images were so effectively destroyed that only a few which have escaped by accident have come down to us.
In The Dawn of Astronomy Sir Norman Lockyer suggests that “‘Set’ seems to have been a generic name applied to the northern (circumpolar) constellations, perhaps because Set = darkness, and these stars, being always visible in the night, may have in time typified it. Since the northern constellations were symbolized by the name of Set, the god of darkness, we should take Set-Horus to mean that the stars in the Dragon (Draco) were rising at sunrise.” To support his theory, Lockyer cites the following inscription from royal tombs in the Valley of the Kings:
Quote:
The constellation of the Thigh appears at the late rising. When this constellation is in the middle of the heavens, having come to the south where [the constellation Orion] lies, the other stars are proceeding to the western horizon. Regarding the Thigh: It is the Thigh of Set; while it is seen in the northern heavens, there is a band [constellation] to the two in the shape of a great bronze chain.
Lockyer concludes that the constellation Draco, and in particular the star at its head (Gamma Draconis), represented Set. If indeed a single star were so regarded, it was probably Alpha Draconis (or Thuban), the Polar Star at the beginning of the Egyptian civilization. Due to the Precession of the Equinoxes, Alpha Draconis will return to the celestial pole at approximately 24000 CE.
Center of the original Priesthood of Set was PaMat-et, capital of the ancient Egyptian XIX Uab Nome. It was called Oxyrhynchus by the Greeks. It is located in Upper Egypt at Latitude 28.5N, Longitude 30.8E. Other cities which were centers of the Setian Priesthood were Ombos at 24.5N, 32.9E and Tanis at 31N, 31.9E in Lower Egypt.
As a neter of darkness and night, Set was the complement to Horus (Hor - neter of the Sun and daylight) in predynastic times. So integral was this relationship that the heads of the two neteru were frequently shown on a single body (hieroglyphic name Hrwyfy “He with the Two Faces”). With regard to the annual cycle, Horus was thought to govern the waxing of the Sun from the South Solstice, while Set governed the waning of the Sun from the North Solstice.
Again according to conventional archæology, it was in the pre-dynastic Gerzean period (commencing about 3600 BCE) that the first communities of the future Egyptian nation came into existence. The great war of unification commenced in approximately 3400 BCE. After more than two centuries of intermittent conflict between Upper and Lower Egypt, the land was finally united under Menes (or Narmer), the first pharaoh of the I Dynasty.
Together the two primeval neteru - Horus and Set - then symbolized the unity and wholeness of the Egyptian nation: Horus as the neter of the north (Lower Egypt) and Set as the neter of the south (Upper Egypt). This union was represented on monuments by the ritual gesture of samtaui, showing Horus and Set binding the heraldic plants of Upper and Lower Egypt around the stem of an AnX, symbol of divine life.
The roles of Horus and Set as the original state neteru of Egypt were further emphasized by the pharaohs’ famous Double Crown (SeXet), being a composite of the Red Crown of Horus (Teser) and the White Crown of Set (Het/“Great One of Spells”). And the Tcham sceptre, with the head and forked tail of Set, became a symbol of power and authority for neteru and pharaohs alike.
Horus was later adopted into the Osirian mythos as the “son of Osiris and Isis”. Egyptologists generally distinguish the original and the corruption by the terms “Horus the Elder” and “Horus the Younger” respectively. HarWer is a form of Horus the Elder combined with Wer (“The Great God”), a transcendent neter of light. The Sun and the Moon were said to be the right and left eyes of HarWer, known as the Udjat (“Uræus” in Greek). At the same time the Udjat was also considered to partake of the essence of Set. Mounted both on the SeXet and on other national crowns and headgear, the Udjat became another symbol of the pharaoh.
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Michael A. Aquino
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