The Primitive God
The worship of the gods (neteru), which began far away back in pre-dynastic times, continued through the archaic and dynastic periods, and lasted until the IVth or Vth century of our era; it is tolerably certain that in respect of some of them the ideas of the Egyptians never changed, but, as regards others, their views did not remain as constant as some writers would have us imagine. In the earliest days every village community in Egypt had its local god, who shared the good or evil fortune of the community to which he belonged.
His emblem or symbol was carried out to war, and was, of course, present at all great public gatherings when matters connected with the welfare of his devotees were discussed. A special habitation was set apart for him, and its upkeep was provided for out of common funds. As the riches of the people of the village increased, the rank and dignity of their god kept pace with them, but his revenues suffered in times of scarcity, and defeat, and war; his emblem might even be carried off into captivity and burnt, or smashed, when, of course, the spirit which dwelt in his symbol was also destroyed.
The number of such early gods was legion, for many large communities possessed several gods, each of which was famed locally for some particular attribute. When a man left one village and settled in another he took his god or gods with him, but he would be obliged to acknowledge the god of the village or city in which he had made his new abode, and to contribute towards the maintenance of his house and its small compound.
The reduction in the number of the gods of Egypt began when man first realized that certain gods were mightier than others, for he ceased gradually to worship those who had, in his opinion, failed to justify his belief in them, and transferred his allegiance to the gods who were able to give him the most help. In process of time the god or goddess of a certain village or town would obtain a fame and reputation for power which would outrival those of the deities of the neighbouring cities, and the growth of the worship of such god or goddess would be accompanied by a corresponding decline in that of the gods in the towns round about.
The gods, in the first instance, grew by a process of selection out of the spirits who were well disposed towards man and were helpful to him, and the “great gods” of the Egyptians were evolved, practically, in a somewhat similar manner. It is at present hopeless to attempt to enumerate all the gods who were, from first to last, worshiped by the Egyptians, for it will not be possible to do this until every text extant has been published.
Meanwhile an examination of the earliest Egyptian religious literature known to us proves that a number of gods who were of some importance in the polytheistic system of the Early Empire dropped out from it long before the period of the New Empire, and thus it is very doubtful if we shall ever be able to collect the names of all the gods who have been worshiped in the Valley of the Nile between the Archaic and Roman periods, whilst to make a list of all the pre-dynastic gods is manifestly impossible.
Selection Of Gods
Future discoveries in Egypt may produce texts that will tell us which were the favorite gods in the archaic period and give us some idea as to the pronunciation of their names, for we have reason to think that during the greater part of that period the Egyptians were able to write. If ever such texts are brought to light we shall probably find that the gods who were worshiped during the archaic period were those who were popular in the pre-dynastic period, just as we find that the gods of the Egyptians of the Middle and New Empires were to all intents and purposes the same as those of the Egyptians of the Early Empire.
Speaking generally, it may be said that the Egyptians of the greater part of the dynastic period of their history invented few new gods, and that they were well content to worship such deities as were known to their ancestors ; we know that they admitted, at times, foreign gods into the assembly of the old Egyptian gods, but the religious texts prove that they were never allowed to usurp the functions of the indigenous gods.
Political and other reasons might secure for them a certain amount of recognition in the country generally, and the people of the cities where their emblems and statues found resting-places treated them with the easy toleration which is so marked a characteristic of many countries in the East; but as soon as such reasons disappeared the foreign gods were quietly ignored, and in a short time their worship was forgotten. This statement is not intended to apply to the gods who were introduced from one city or district of Egypt into another, for we know that the Egyptian priesthood and people of a given city were ready to show hospitality to almost any god of any town, or city, or district, provided that he belonged to the same company as that of which the chief local god was a member.
Gods Of The Earliest Dynasties
We have, unfortunately, no long connected religious texts in the forms in which they must have existed under the first four dynasties, and we cannot therefore say what gods were worshiped during that period. There is, as has been shown elsewhere, good reason for believing that some parts of the Book of the Dead were revised or edited during the early part of the period of the 1st Dynasty, and if this be so we may assume that the religious system of the Egyptians as revealed in the texts of a much later time closely resembled that which was in existence in the later part of the archaic period, i.e., during the first three dynasties.
Under the Vth and VIth Dynasties we touch firmer ground, and we find abundant, though not complete, materials for the study of the gods of Egypt and their attributes in the lengthy hieroglyphic texts which were inscribed inside the pyramid tombs of Unȧs, Tetȧ, Pepi I., Mer-en-Rā-Meḥti-em-sa-f, and Pepi II.
An examination of these texts reveals the existence of an established theological system in Egypt, and we find that even at that time the literature in which it was, more or less, expounded, contained innumerable layers of religious thought and expressions of belief which belonged to periods many of which must have been separated by long intervals of time. The gods are mentioned in such a way as to prove that the writers of the texts, or at least the copyists, assumed that the reader would be well acquainted with the subject matter of the compositions, and from first to last neither explanation nor gloss is to be found in them. The texts are, of course, sepulchral, and the greater number of the gods mentioned in them are referred to in their characters as gods who deal with the souls of the dead in the world beyond the grave.
The Sun-god Rā and the gods of his cycle, and Osiris, the god and judge of the dead, and the gods of his cycle, have definite positions and duties assigned to them, and it is very clear that both the texts which describe these and the ceremonies which were performed in connection with the words recited by the priests were, even under the Vth Dynasty, extremely ancient. Moreover, it is certain that the religious texts in use for funeral purposes under that dynasty are substantially those which were compiled several centuries before.
We may note in passing that the funeral books were edited by the priests of Annu or Anu, i.e., Heliopolis, and as a result they exhibit traces of the influence of the theological opinions of the great priestly college of that city ; but at bottom the views and beliefs which may be deduced from them, and the fundamental conceptions to which they give expression are the products of the minds of the pre-dynastic, indigenous Egyptians. To the consideration of the Heliopolitan religious system we shall return later, and we may therefore pass on to the enumeration of the principal gods who are made known to us by the Pyramid Texts at Ṣaḳḳâra.
Gods Of The Archaic Period
Among the great gods who were certainly worshiped in the early archaic period may be mentioned:—
Ptaḥ (Tetȧ 88)
|  |
Nu (Unȧs 199)
|  |
Net, or Neith (Unȧs 67)
|  |
Rā (passim)
|  |
Ḥet-Ḥeru (Hathor)
|  |
Ḥeru, or Horus (Mer-en-Rā 454)
|  |
Kheper } (Unȧs 444)
|  |
Kheprer } (Pepi II. 856)
|  |
Khnemu (Unȧs 556)
|  |
Sebek (Unȧs 565)
|  |
Of these gods Heru, or Horus, was the hawk-god, i.e., the spirit and personification of the “height” of heaven;
Kheper was the beetle-god ;
Khnemu the ram-god ;
and Sebek the crocodile-god ;
Net or Neith was originally a wood-spirit,
Rā and Ptah were two forms of the Sun-god,
and Nu was the watery mass of heaven in which he lived.
Kheper was the beetle-god ;
Khnemu the ram-god ;
and Sebek the crocodile-god ;
Net or Neith was originally a wood-spirit,
Rā and Ptah were two forms of the Sun-god,
and Nu was the watery mass of heaven in which he lived.
With Rā and Kheper the priests of Heliopolis associated the form of the Sun-god which was specially worshipped in their city, and thus we have mentioned the compound gods
- Rā-Tem
(Unȧs 216, 224, Mer-en-Rā 458), - and Tem-Kheprer
(Pepi II. 662).
In the text of Unȧs (line 626) Sebek is styled
“son of Net,”,
and he is also called
“lord of Baru,”(line 565);
but if the XVIIIth Dynasty texts be correct the name of this place is misspelt, andin any case it must be identical with the Bakhau, 
, or Mountain of the Sunrise of Chapter cviii. of the Book of the Dead.
, or Mountain of the Sunrise of Chapter cviii. of the Book of the Dead.Gods Of The Pyramid Texts
The following is a list of the other principal gods mentioned in the Pyramid Texts :—
| Aḥu (Pepi II. 850) |  |
| Aker (Unȧs 498, 614, Tetȧ 309) |  |
| Ȧpi (Unȧs 487) , |  |
| Ȧp-uat (Unȧs 187) |  |
| Ȧmen (Unȧs 557) |  |
| Ȧment (Unȧs 557) |  |
| Ȧm-ḥenth-f (Pepi I. 666) |  |
| Ȧm-sepa-f (Pepi I. 666) |  |
| Ȧmsu or Min (Unȧs 377) |  |
| Ȧmset (Tetȧ 60, 197) |  |
| Ȧnȧ (Unȧs 272, 275) |  |
| Ȧnpu (Unȧs 71, 207, 219) |  |
| Ȧn-mut-f (Pepi II. 772) |  |
| Ȧn-tcher-f (Pepi I. 651) |  |
| Ȧkhet-nen-thȧ (Tetȧ 307) |  |
| Ȧsȧr, Osiris (passim) |  |
| Ȧst, Isis (Unȧs 181) |  |
| Ȧsken (Pepi II. 1324) |  |
| Ȧṭer-ȧsfet (Pepi II. 980) |  |
| Ānkh (Pepi I. 672) |  |
| I-en-ḥer-pes (Unȧs 392) |  |
| Uahu (Tetȧ 333) |  |
| Ur-sheps-f (Pepi I. 671) |  |
| Urt (Unȧs 272) |  |
| Urt-hekau (Unȧs 269) |  |
| Usert (Unȧs 229) |  |
| Uthes (Pepi II. 976) |  |
| Ba (Mer-en-Rā 784) |  |
| Babȧ (Unȧs 532) |  |
| Babi (Unȧs 644, 647) |  |
| Baȧbu (Pepi I. 568) |  |
| Babuȧ (Pepi I. 604) |  |
| Bastet (Pepi I. 569) |  |
| Ba-āshem-f (Mer-en-Rā 784) |  |
| Pent (Unȧs 280) |  |
| Pesetchet (Unȧs 417) |  |
| Maat-Khnemu (Pepi 1.445) |  |
| Maāt (Unȧs 220) |  |
| Mut (Unȧs 181) |  The variants are: 1)  2)  |
| Ment (Pepi II. 849) |  |
| Menṭef (Pepi II. 1228) |  |
| Menth (Mer-en-Rā 784) |  |
| Meḥt-urt (Unȧs 427, 623) |  |
| Meḥt-urt (Unȧs 427, 623) |  |
| Em-khent-maati (Pepi I. 645) |  |
| Em-khent-maati (Pepi I. 645) |  |
| Meskha (Unȧs 567) |  |
| Meskhaat (Pepi I. 671) |  |
| Metchetȧt (Pepi II. 956) |  |
| Nȧu (Unȧs 557) |  |
| Nubt (Unȧs 479) |  |
| Nebt-ḥet (Unȧs 220) |  |
| Nefer-Tem (Unȧs 395) |  |
| Enen (Unȧs 557) } |  |
| Enenet (Unȧs 240) } |  |
| Nekhben (Unȧs 459) |  |
| Neḥebkau (Unȧs 559) |  |
| Nekhebet (Mer-en-Rā 762) |  |
| Neḥt (Unȧs 601) |  |
| Nesert (Unȧs 269) |  |
| Neṭi (Unȧs 279) |  |
| Netetthȧb (Unȧs 598) |  |
| Renenut (Unȧs 441) |  |
| Ruruthȧ (Pepi II. 976, 979) |  |
| Hepath (Pepi I. 636) |  |
| Henenȧ (Pepi I. 636) |  |
| Hetchhetch (Pepi I. 173) |  |
| Heṭṭenuut (Tetȧ, 332) |  |
| Ḥu (Unȧs 439) |  |
| Ḥep (Unȧs 187) |  |
| Ḥep-ur (Unȧs 431) |  |
| Ḥep (Tetȧ 60, 197) |  |
| Ḥem (Pepi I. 641) |  |
| Ḥemen (Pepi II. 850) |  |
| Ḥen-pesetchti (Tetȧ 309) |  |
| Ḥent (Unȧs 417) |  |
| Ḥunt (Tetȧ 357) |  |
| Ḥeru (passim) |  |
| Ḥeru-ȧāh (Tetȧ 365) |  |
| Ḥeru-ȧm-henu (Unȧs 211) |  |
| Ḥeru-khent-peru (Unȧs 202) |  |
| Ḥeru-khesbetch-maati(Unȧs369) |  |
| Ḥeru-khutthȧ (Unȧs 471) |  |
| Ḥeru-Sepṭ (Unȧs 465) |  |
| Ḥeru-ṭesher-maati (Unȧs 369) |  |
| Ḥeru-ṭat (Unȧs 218) |  |
| Ḥeru-kharṭ (Tetȧ 301) |  |
| Ḥrȧ-f-ḥa-f (Pepi I.) |  |
| Ḥer-ḥepes (Unȧs 226) |  |
| Ḥesat (Pepi II. 976) |  |
| Ḥesmennu (Mer-en-Rā 670) |  |
| Ḥet-Ḥert (Unȧs 575) |  |
| Ḥeka (Pepi I. 583) |  |
| Ḥeqet (Pepi I. 570) |  |
| Khāȧta (Unȧs 536) |  |
| Khebetch (Unȧs 434) |  |
| Khent-Ȧmenti (Unȧs 201) |  |
| Khent-maati (Unȧs 218) |  |
| Khnemu (Unȧs 556, Pepi I. 455) |  |
| Khensu (Unȧs 510) |  |
| Khensu-Sepṭ (Unȧs 588) |  |
| Sȧa (Unȧs 439) |  |
| Sathet (Pepi I. 297) |  |
| Seb (Unȧs 234) |  |
| Sephu-urt (Pepi II. 976) |  |
| Sepṭ (Unȧs 219) |  |
| Sma-ur (Unȧs 280) |  |
| Smentet (Tetȧ 355) |  |
| Sunth (Pepi II. 854) |  |
| Seref-ur (Tetȧ 309) |  |
| Serqet (Pepi I. 647) |  |
| Serqet-ḥetu (Tetȧ 207) |  |
| Sehepu (Pepi I. 685) |  |
| Sekhemf (Pepi II. 978) |  |
| Sekhen-ta-en-ur (Unȧs 281) |  |
| Sekhet (Unȧs 390) |  |
| Sȧsha (Pepi II. 975) |  |
| Seker (Pepi I. 641) |  |
| Seksen (Pepi I. 650) |  |
| Set (Unȧs 6) |  |
| Sethȧsethȧ (Pepi I. 265) |  |
| Seththa (Pepi I. 259) |  |
| Shu (Unȧs 185) |  |
| Shesmu (Unȧs 511) |  |
| Sheskhentet (Unȧs 390) |  |
| Ḳenur (Pepi II. 979) |  |
| Ḳasut (Pepi II. 975) |  |
| Qebḥusennuf (Tetȧ 60) |  |
| Tait (Tetȧ 376) |  |
| Tebȧ (Unȧs 428) |  |
| Tefen (Unȧs 453) |  |
| Tefnut (Unȧs 453) |  |
| Tem (Unȧs 207) |  |
| Tem-kheprer (Pepi II. 662) |  |
| Tatet (Unȧs 67) |  |
| Ṭuamutef (Tetȧ 60) |  |
| Ṭenānu (Pepi I. 269) |  |
| Ṭenṭen (Unȧs 280) |  |
| Teḥuti (Unȧs 228) |  |
| Tchenṭ (Mer-en-Rā 773) |  |
| Tchenṭeru (Tetȧ 198) |  |
| Tchenṭtchenṭer (Pepi I. 301) |  |
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