From The Alpha and the Omega - Volume III
by Jim A. Cornwell, Copyright © July 20, 2002, all rights reserved "Volume III - Gods/Goddesses of Ancient Egypt"

THOTH (Tehuti, Thuthi, Tahuti, Djhuty, Djehuty, Djehuti, Tehuty, Zehuti, Thot, Thout, Techi)

To return to the Leo Decan (Thoth was netjer of the first month Thoth, Thuthi, Thot, Techi, Coptic All, at the Ramesseum and Edfu: Teki), Denderah Decan Zero Or 37 - Grand Temple Decan 37 (Created the eight primordial deities - Ogdoad), Denderah Decan 1-Grand Temple Decan 20 (male figure with an Ibis bird head), Denderah Decan 8-Grand Temple Decan 13 (baboon of Thoth), Denderah Decan 9-Grand Temple Decan 12 (baboon of Thoth), Denderah Decan 22-Grand Temple Decan 35 (a serpent with an atef crown with the head of an Ibis bird), Denderah Decan 33-Grand Temple Decan 24 (male figure with an Ibis bird head wearing a Atef crown), Nut (Thoth made the five new days in a year so that Nut and Geb could bear children), Ra (was accompanied by his Vizier Thoth and his daughter Ma'at), or List of Netjeru.

    Thoth also called Djehuty, meaning "he of Djehut," a god who invented writing, the measuring of time, music, magic, art, medicine, mathematics and astronomy.
    Late Predynastics time depicted him on slate palettes as an ibis, but in the First Dynasty as a squatting baboon (See Denderah Decan 8/GrandTemple Decan 13 and Denderah Decan 9/GrandTemple Decan 12 regarding Papio Cynocephalis possibly a dog-headed baboon).
    The sound of his song was thought to have created four frog gods and snake goddesses who continued Thoth's song, helping the sun journey across the sky.    He took over the role of the eight creator gods of the Ogdoad.
    He was depicted either in baboon form or with the head of an ibis, and in both cases shown with the cresent moon surrounding the full moon above his head, thus called the lord of the moon or "Lord of Time" because he negotiated the five extra (epogomenal) days from the moon to make up the full 365 days of the year.    He was also called "Reckoner of Years," his attributes being a writing palette or a palm leaf.    He was protector of scribes, teachers, writers, mathematicians, in fact everyone having to do with the spreading and handling of knowledge.
    The hieroglyph for a baboon is and for Ibis is .
    The consort of Thoth is said to be alternatively Ma'at, the personified justice, balance and order, or Seshat, the Netjer of recordkeeping, measuring and building foundations.
    The "House of Life," Per Ankh, was all under the protection of Thoth, and was the scribe of the Ennead, and negotiator of disputes.
    He was worshipped at Khmun/Hermopolis/el-Ashmunein in Upper Egypt, where he was the creator god, in Ibis form, who laid the World Egg.
    He also records every soul that enters the Duat, the Underworld and stands by the scales supervising the weighing of the heart of the deceased.
    The Greeks called him Hermes as in the original Hermes Trismegistus ("thrice greatest Hermes"), the mystical figure behind many arcane schools of celestial philosophy, and the originator of the Four Laws of Magic.    To the Romans he was Mercury the god of merchants, whose sacred bird was the cock.    As can be seen on the Mercury Decan page the Coptic name is Thaut, meaning coming, or come.    Egyptian Thoth, as Thaut, may be Hermes as Pi-ermes.   Also see Taurus Constellation Names for more on Mercury.
    The first Egyptian month was named Thoth (Leo), Thuthi, Thot, Techi, whereas the Christian coptes called it All.
    The netjer of the month was Tehuti (Thoth), at the Ramesseum and Edfu: Teki or as mentioned above Techi.

    In the image above the crown on Denderah Decan 1 is not an Atef crown, but more like a (Hedjet) white crown of Upper Egypt with horns extended.    Although the male figure with two stars aligned vertically under his left hand, does have an Ibis bird head.    Also as seen in the Grand Temple Decan 24 and Grand Temple Decan 35 in the following images.
      As seen above on ESNE plate 87, upper section, first figure on the bottom right, is a male figure with an Ibis bird head, wearing the (Hedjet) white crown of Upper Egypt.    This is similar to Denderah Decan 1 showing a male figure with an Ibis bird head wearing the white crown of Upper Egypt.

    What other sources state about Thoth.
    The wisest of the Egyptian gods was Thoth, the baboon and ibis god of the moon.    Thoth was the god who overcame the curse of Ra, allowing Nut to give birth to her five children, with his skill at games.    It was he who helped Isis work the ritual to bring Osiris back from the dead, and who drove the magical poison of Set from her son, Horus with the power of his magic.    He was Horus' supporter during the young god's deadly battle with his uncle Set, helping Horus with his wisdom and magic.    It was Thoth who brought Tefnut, who left Egypt for Nubia in a sulk after an argument with her father, back to heaven to be reunited with Ra.
    Tefnut, the Eye of Ra, became estranged from her father and fled into Nubia, taking all of her precious water with her.    In this land, she transformed herself into a lioness.    She raged through the countryside, emitting flames from her eyes and nostrils.    Viciously, she drank the blood and fed on the flesh of both animals and humans.    As time went on, Ra missed his Eye, and longed to see her again - Egypt had dried, and the land was in chaos.    He summoned Shu to him, along with Thoth, who was the messenger of the gods and famous for his eloquence.    Ra issued the command that Shu and Thoth must go to Nubia and bring back his recalcitrant daughter.    Before they set off on their journey Shu and Thoth disguised themselves as baboons.    The baboon was an animal sacred to Thoth.    Eventually, Thoth and Shu found Tefnut in Begum.    Thoth began at once to try and persuade her to return to Egypt.    Tefnut, however, wasn't interested.    She liked hunting in the desert and was perfectly happy where she was.    Thoth would not give up though, and wove stories to depict to her how gloom had descended upon Egypt since she had left.    The people of Egypt would do anything for her if she'd just return home.    Ultimately, wooed by Thoth's promises, Tefnut relented and returned to Egypt accompanied by the two baboons.    All the way there, Thoth kept her entertained with stories.    Tefnut made a triumphant entry back into the homeland, accompanied by a host of Nubian musicians, dancers and baboons.    She went from city to city, bringing back moisture and water (the inundation), amid great rejoicing, until finally she was reunited with her father, and restored to her rightful position as his Eye.
    When Ra retired from the earth, he appointed Thoth and told him of his desire to create a Light-soul in the Duat and in the Land of the Caves, and it was over this region that the sun god appointed Thoth to rule, ordering him to keep a register of those who were there, and to mete out just punishments to them.    Thoth became the representation of Ra in the afterlife, seen at the judgement of the dead in the "Halls of the Double Ma'at."
    The magical powers of Thoth were so great, that the Egyptians had tales of a "Book of Thoth," which would allow a person who read the sacred book to become the most powerful magician in the world.    The Book which "the god of wisdom wrote with his own hand" was, though, a deadly book that brought nothing but pain and tragedy to those that read it, despite finding out about the "secrets of the gods themselves" and "all that is hidden in the stars."
    He was one of the earlier Egyptian gods, thought to be scribe to the gods, who kept a great library of scrolls, over which one of his wives, Seshat, the goddess of writing, was thought to be mistress.    The god born of this union was called Hornub.    He was associated by the Egyptians with speech, literature, arts, learning.    He, too, was a measurer and recorder of time, as was Seshat.    Believed to be the author of the spells in The Book of the Dead and a much later work, the Book of Breathings, he was a helper (and punisher) of the deceased as they try to enter the underworld.    In this role, his wife was Ma'at, the personification of order, who was weighed against the heart of the dead to see if they followed ma'at during their life.    At Khmunu (Hermopolis) he was wed to a goddess of protection called Nehmauit (Nahmauit, Nehmetaway), "She Who Uproots Evil," with whom he fathered the god Neferhor.
    Thoth was usually depicted as an ibis headed man or as a full ibis, or with the face of a dog-headed baboon and the body of a man or, again, as a full dog-headed baboon.    The ibis, it is thought, had a crescent shaped beak, linking the bird to the moon.    The dog-headed baboon, on the other hand, was a night animal that was seen by the Egyptians who would greet the sun with chattering noises each morning just as Thoth, the moon god, would greet Ra, the sun god, as he rose.    In keeping with his many attributes, he was depicted with a variety of symbols.    As a god of Egypt, he carried the ankh, the symbol of life, in one hand, and in the other he held a sceptre, the symbol of power.    In The Book of the Dead, he was shown holding a writing palette and reed pen to record the deeds of the dead.    As voice of the sun-god Ra, he carried the Wedjat (Eye of Horus or Ra) the symbol of Ra's ubiquitous power.    Thoth was variously depicted wearing a crescent moon on his headdress, or wearing the atef crown, or sometimes, the crown of Upper and Lower Egypt.
    Originally, Thoth was a god of creation, but was later thought to be the one who civilized men, teaching them civic and religious practices, writing, medicine, music and magic.    It was Thoth who was thought to have taught men the mode and pronunciation of his writing - prayers and magic spells could fail if not intoned correctly - and so he was the master of magic.    He took on many of the roles of Seshat, until she became a dual, female version of Thoth.
    The god of learning was also reputed to have been a god of measuring the passage of time, and thus the god of the Egyptian calendar.    He was also thought to be the god of the first month of the Egyptian calendar, known as Thuthi by Greek times.    It is interesting to note that although he is related to the solar calendar in myth (where he won five extra days a year from Khonsu, the moon god), but that as a moon god himself, he was very probably closely related to Egypt's original lunar calendar: "...Researchers of the ancient Egyptian calendar agree that the solar calendar of 360 + 5 days was not the first prehistoric calendar of that land.    This 'civil' or secular calendar was introduced only after the start of dynastic rule in Egypt, i.e., after 3100 B.C.; according to Richard A. Parker (The Calendars of the Ancient Egyptians) it took place circa 2800 B.C. 'probably for administrative and fiscal purposes.'    This civil calendar supplanted, or perhaps supplemented at first, the 'sacred' calendar of old.    In the words of the Encyclopaedia Brittanica, 'the ancient Egyptians originally employed a calendar based on the Moon.'    According to R. A. Parker (Ancient Egyptian Astronomy) that earlier calendar was, 'like that of all ancient peoples,' a calendar of twelve lunar months plus a thirteenth intercalary month that kept the seasons in place."
- When Time Began, Zecharia Sitchin
    He was the "One who Made Calculations Concerning the Heavens, the Stars and the Earth," the "Reckoner of Times and of Seasons," the one who "Measured out the Heavens and Planned the Earth."    He was "He who Balances," the "God of the Equilibrium" and "Master of the Balance," "The Lord of the Divine Body," "Scribe of the Company of the Gods," the "Voice of Ra" the "Author of Every Work on Every Branch of Knowledge, Both Human and Divine"" he who understood "all that is hidden under the heavenly vault."    Thoth was not just a scribe and friend to the gods, but central to order - ma'at - both in Egypt and in the Duat.    He was "He who Reckons the Heavens, the Counter of the Stars and the Measurer of the Earth."

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    This file was created on June 18, 2005 and updated on May 30, 2006.

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