Geb
Encyclopedia
Geb was the Egyptian
god
of the Earth
and a member of the Ennead
of Heliopolis
. It was believed in ancient Egypt that Geb's laughter was earthquakes and that he allowed crops to grow. The name was pronounced as such from the Greek period onward, (formerly erroneously read as Seb or as Keb). The original Egyptian was "Gebeb"/"Kebeb", meaning probably: 'weak one', perhaps:'lame one'. It was spelled with either initial -g- (all periods), or with -k-point (gj). The latter initial root consonant occurs once in the Middle Kingdom Coffin Texts, more often in 21st Dynasty mythological papyri as well as in a text from the Ptolemaic tomb of Petosiris at Tuna el-Gebel or was written with initial hard -k-, as e.g. in a 30th Dynasty papyrus text in the Brooklyn Museum dealing with descriptions of and remedies against snakes and their bites.
of the god, was as an anthropomorphic bearded being accompanied by his name, and dating from king Djoser
's reign, 3rd Dynasty, and was found in Heliopolis. In later times he could also be depicted as a ram, a bull
or a crocodile
(the latter in a vignet of the Book of the Dead-papyrus of the lady Heryweben in the Egyptian Museum, Cairo, depicted in G.Posener e.a., Dictionnaire de la civilisation égyptienne = Lexikon der ägyptischen Kultur (Wiesbaden, 1960),lemma 'Crocodile'/'Krokodil'). Frequently described mythologically as 'father' of snake
s (one of the names for snake was s3-t3 'son of the earth' and in a Coffin Texts-spell Geb was described as 'father' of the primeval snake Nehebkau, while his mother was in that case the goddess Neith) and therefore depicted sometimes (partly) as such. In mythology Geb also often occurs as a primeval divine king of Egypt
from whom his 'son' Osiris and his 'grand-son' Horus inherited the land after many contendings with the disruptive god Seth, brother and killer of Osiris. Geb could also be regarded as personified fertile earth and barren desert, the latter containing the dead or setting them free from their tombs, metaphorically described as ' Geb opening his jaws', or imprisoning those there not worthy to go to the fertile North-Eastern heavenly Field of Reeds. In the latter case, one of his otherworldly attributes was an ominous jackal-headed stave (called wsr.t) rising from the ground unto which enemies could be bound and punished.
In the Heliopolitan Ennead (a group of nine gods created in the beginning by the one god Atum
or Ra), Geb is the husband
of Nut
, the sky
or visible daytime and nightly firmament, the son of the earlier primordial element
s Tefnut
('orphaness', later also conceived of as moisture
[e.g.: 'tef']) and Shu
('emptiness' or perhaps 'raiser'[namely of the firmament as air]), and the 'father' to the four lesser gods of the system - Osiris
, Seth
, Isis
and Nephthys
. In this context, Geb was believed to have originally been engaged in eternal sex with Nut, and had to be separated from her by Shu, god of the air. Consequently, in mythological depictions, Geb was shown as a 'man' reclining, sometimes with his phallus still pointed towards the sky goddess
Nut.
As time progressed, the deity became more associated with the habitable land
of Egypt and also as one of its early godly rulers. As a chthonic
deity he (like Osiris and Min
) became naturally associated with the underworld
and with vegetation
-barley
being said to grow upon his ribs- and was depicted with plants and other green patches on his body
.
His association with vegetation, and sometimes with the underworld, and also with royalty brought Geb the occasional interpretation that he was the husband of Renenutet
, primarily a minor goddess of the harvest and also mythological caretaker (the meaning of her name is 'nursing snake') of the young king in the shape of a cobra
, who herself could also be regarded as the mother of Nehebkau
, a primeval snake god associated with the underworld, who, however, was on the same occasions said to be his son by her. He is also equated by classical authors as the Greek
Titan
Cronus
.
Some Egyptologists, (specifically Jan Bergman, Terence Duquesne or Richard H. Wilkinson) have stated that Geb was associated with a mythological divine creator goose
who had laid a cosmic egg
from which the sun
and/or the world
had sprung. This theory is assumed to be incorrect and to be a result of confusing the divine name "Geb" with that of a Whitefronted Goose (Anser albifrons), also called originally gb(b): 'lame one, stumbler'. This bird-sign is used only as a phonogram in order to spell the name of the god (H.te Velde, in: Lexikon der Aegyptologie II, lemma: Geb). An alternative ancient name for this goose species was trp meaning similarly 'walk like a drunk', 'stumbler.' The Whitefronted Goose is never found as a cultic symbol or holy bird of Geb. The mythological creator 'goose' referred to above, was called Ngg wr 'Great Honker' and always depicted as a Nilegoose/Foxgoose (Alopochen aegyptiacus) who ornitologically belongs to a separate genus and whose Egyptian name was smn, Coptic smon. A coloured vignet irrefutably depicts a Nile Goose with an opened beak (Ngg wr!) in a context of solar creation on a mythological papyrus dating from the 21st Dynasty. Similar images of this divine bird are to be found on temple
walls (Karnak, Deir el-Bahari), showing a scene of the king standing on a papyrus raft and ritually plucking papyrus for the Theban god Amun
-Re-Kamutef. The latter Theban creator god could be embodied in a Nilegoose, but never in a Whitefronted Goose. In Underworld Books a diacritic goose-sign (most probably denoting then an Anser albifrons) was sometimes depicted on top of the head of an standing anonymous male anthropomorphic deity, pointing to Geb's identity. Geb himself was never depicted as a Nile Goose, as later was Amun, called on some New Kingdom
stelae explicitly:'Amun, the beautiful smn-goose (Nile Goose). The only clear pictorial confusion between the hieroglyphs
of a Whitefronted Goose (in the normal hieroglyphic spelling of the name Geb, often followed by the additional -b-sign) and a Nile Goose in the spelling of the name Geb occurs in the rock
cut tomb of the provincial governor Sarenput II (12th Dynasty, Middle Kingdom) on the Qubba el-Hawa desert-ridge (opposite Aswan
), namely on the left (southern) wall near the open doorway, in the first line of the brightly painted funerary offering formula. This confusion is to be compared with the frequent hacking out by Ekhnaton's agents of the sign of the Pintail Duck (meaning 'son') in the royal title 'Son of Re', especially in Theban temples, where they confused the duck sign with that of a Nilegoose regarded as a form of the then forbidden god Amon.
Egyptian mythology
Ancient Egyptian religion was a complex system of polytheistic beliefs and rituals which were an integral part of ancient Egyptian society. It centered on the Egyptians' interaction with a multitude of deities who were believed to be present in, and in control of, the forces and elements of nature...
god
God (male deity)
A god, as a male deity, contrasts with female deities, or "goddesses". While the term 'goddess' specifically refers to a female deity, the plural 'gods' can be applied to all gods collectively, regardless of gender....
of the Earth
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...
and a member of the Ennead
Ennead
The Ennead was a group ofnine deities in Egyptian mythology. The Ennead were worshipped at Heliopolis and consisted of the god Atum, his children Shu and Tefnut, their children Geb and Nut and their children Osiris, Isis, Horus, Set and Nephthys.-Terminology:Egyptian mythology established multiple...
of Heliopolis
Heliopolis (ancient)
Heliopolis was one of the oldest cities of ancient Egypt, the capital of the 13th Lower Egyptian nome that was located five miles east of the Nile to the north of the apex of the Nile Delta...
. It was believed in ancient Egypt that Geb's laughter was earthquakes and that he allowed crops to grow. The name was pronounced as such from the Greek period onward, (formerly erroneously read as Seb or as Keb). The original Egyptian was "Gebeb"/"Kebeb", meaning probably: 'weak one', perhaps:'lame one'. It was spelled with either initial -g- (all periods), or with -k-point (gj). The latter initial root consonant occurs once in the Middle Kingdom Coffin Texts, more often in 21st Dynasty mythological papyri as well as in a text from the Ptolemaic tomb of Petosiris at Tuna el-Gebel or was written with initial hard -k-, as e.g. in a 30th Dynasty papyrus text in the Brooklyn Museum dealing with descriptions of and remedies against snakes and their bites.
Role and development
The oldest representation in a fragmentary reliefRelief
Relief is a sculptural technique. The term relief is from the Latin verb levo, to raise. To create a sculpture in relief is thus to give the impression that the sculpted material has been raised above the background plane...
of the god, was as an anthropomorphic bearded being accompanied by his name, and dating from king Djoser
Djoser
Netjerikhet or Djoser is the best-known pharaoh of the Third dynasty of Egypt. He commissioned his official, Imhotep, to build the first of the pyramids, a step pyramid for him at Saqqara...
's reign, 3rd Dynasty, and was found in Heliopolis. In later times he could also be depicted as a ram, a bull
Bull (mythology)
The worship of the Sacred Bull throughout the ancient world is most familiar to the Western world in the biblical episode of the idol of the Golden Calf. The Golden Calf after being made by the Hebrew people in the wilderness of Sinai, were rejected and destroyed by Moses and his tribe after his...
or a crocodile
Crocodile
A crocodile is any species belonging to the family Crocodylidae . The term can also be used more loosely to include all extant members of the order Crocodilia: i.e...
(the latter in a vignet of the Book of the Dead-papyrus of the lady Heryweben in the Egyptian Museum, Cairo, depicted in G.Posener e.a., Dictionnaire de la civilisation égyptienne = Lexikon der ägyptischen Kultur (Wiesbaden, 1960),lemma 'Crocodile'/'Krokodil'). Frequently described mythologically as 'father' of snake
Snake
Snakes are elongate, legless, carnivorous reptiles of the suborder Serpentes that can be distinguished from legless lizards by their lack of eyelids and external ears. Like all squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping scales...
s (one of the names for snake was s3-t3 'son of the earth' and in a Coffin Texts-spell Geb was described as 'father' of the primeval snake Nehebkau, while his mother was in that case the goddess Neith) and therefore depicted sometimes (partly) as such. In mythology Geb also often occurs as a primeval divine king of Egypt
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
from whom his 'son' Osiris and his 'grand-son' Horus inherited the land after many contendings with the disruptive god Seth, brother and killer of Osiris. Geb could also be regarded as personified fertile earth and barren desert, the latter containing the dead or setting them free from their tombs, metaphorically described as ' Geb opening his jaws', or imprisoning those there not worthy to go to the fertile North-Eastern heavenly Field of Reeds. In the latter case, one of his otherworldly attributes was an ominous jackal-headed stave (called wsr.t) rising from the ground unto which enemies could be bound and punished.
In the Heliopolitan Ennead (a group of nine gods created in the beginning by the one god Atum
Atum
Atum, sometimes rendered as Atem or Tem, is an important deity in Egyptian mythology.- Name :Atum's name is thought to be derived from the word 'tem' which means to complete or finish. Thus he has been interpreted as being the 'complete one' and also the finisher of the world, which he returns to...
or Ra), Geb is the husband
Husband
A husband is a male participant in a marriage. The rights and obligations of the husband regarding his spouse and others, and his status in the community and in law, vary between cultures and has varied over time...
of Nut
Nut (goddess)
In the Ennead of Egyptian mythology, Nut was the goddess of the sky.-Goddess of the sky:...
, the sky
Sky
The sky is the part of the atmosphere or outer space visible from the surface of any astronomical object. It is difficult to define precisely for several reasons. During daylight, the sky of Earth has the appearance of a pale blue surface because the air scatters the sunlight. The sky is sometimes...
or visible daytime and nightly firmament, the son of the earlier primordial element
Classical element
Many philosophies and worldviews have a set of classical elements believed to reflect the simplest essential parts and principles of which anything consists or upon which the constitution and fundamental powers of anything are based. Most frequently, classical elements refer to ancient beliefs...
s Tefnut
Tefnut
In Ancient Egyptian religion, Tefnut, transliterated tfnt is a goddess of moisture, moist air, dew and rain. She is the sister and consort of the air god Shu and the mother of Geb and Nut.- Etymology :...
('orphaness', later also conceived of as moisture
Moisture
Humidity is the amount of moisture the air can hold before it rains. Moisture refers to the presence of a liquid, especially water, often in trace amounts...
[e.g.: 'tef']) and Shu
Shu (Egyptian deity)
In Egyptian mythology, Shu is one of the primordial gods, a personification of air, one of the Ennead of Heliopolis. He was created by Atum, his father and Iusaaset, his mother in the city of Heliopolis. With his sister, Tefnut , he was the father of Nut and Geb...
('emptiness' or perhaps 'raiser'[namely of the firmament as air]), and the 'father' to the four lesser gods of the system - Osiris
Osiris
Osiris is an Egyptian god, usually identified as the god of the afterlife, the underworld and the dead. He is classically depicted as a green-skinned man with a pharaoh's beard, partially mummy-wrapped at the legs, wearing a distinctive crown with two large ostrich feathers at either side, and...
, Seth
Set (mythology)
Set was in Ancient Egyptian religion, a god of the desert, storms, and foreigners. In later myths he was also the god of darkness, and chaos...
, Isis
Isis
Isis or in original more likely Aset is a goddess in Ancient Egyptian religious beliefs, whose worship spread throughout the Greco-Roman world. She was worshipped as the ideal mother and wife as well as the matron of nature and magic...
and Nephthys
Nephthys
In Egyptian mythology, Nephthys is a member of the Great Ennead of Heliopolis, a daughter of Nut and Geb. Nephthys was typically paired with her sister Isis in funerary rites because of their role as protectors of the mummy and the god Osiris and as the sister-wife of Seth.Nephthys is regarded as...
. In this context, Geb was believed to have originally been engaged in eternal sex with Nut, and had to be separated from her by Shu, god of the air. Consequently, in mythological depictions, Geb was shown as a 'man' reclining, sometimes with his phallus still pointed towards the sky goddess
Goddess
A goddess is a female deity. In some cultures goddesses are associated with Earth, motherhood, love, and the household. In other cultures, goddesses also rule over war, death, and destruction as well as healing....
Nut.
As time progressed, the deity became more associated with the habitable land
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...
of Egypt and also as one of its early godly rulers. As a chthonic
Chthonic
Chthonic designates, or pertains to, deities or spirits of the underworld, especially in relation to Greek religion. The Greek word khthon is one of several for "earth"; it typically refers to the interior of the soil, rather than the living surface of the land or the land as territory...
deity he (like Osiris and Min
Min (god)
Min is an Ancient Egyptian god whose cult originated in predynastic times . He was represented in many different forms, but was often represented in male human form, shown with an erect penis which he holds in his left hand and an upheld right arm holding a flail...
) became naturally associated with the underworld
Underworld
The Underworld is a region which is thought to be under the surface of the earth in some religions and in mythologies. It could be a place where the souls of the recently departed go, and in some traditions it is identified with Hell or the realm of death...
and with vegetation
Vegetation
Vegetation is a general term for the plant life of a region; it refers to the ground cover provided by plants. It is a general term, without specific reference to particular taxa, life forms, structure, spatial extent, or any other specific botanical or geographic characteristics. It is broader...
-barley
Barley
Barley is a major cereal grain, a member of the grass family. It serves as a major animal fodder, as a base malt for beer and certain distilled beverages, and as a component of various health foods...
being said to grow upon his ribs- and was depicted with plants and other green patches on his body
Body
With regard to living things, a body is the physical body of an individual. "Body" often is used in connection with appearance, health issues and death...
.
His association with vegetation, and sometimes with the underworld, and also with royalty brought Geb the occasional interpretation that he was the husband of Renenutet
Renenutet
In Egyptian mythology, Renenutet was the anthropomorphic deification of the act of gaining a true name, an aspect of the soul, during birth. Her name simply meaning, gives Ren, with Ren being the Egyptian word for this true name...
, primarily a minor goddess of the harvest and also mythological caretaker (the meaning of her name is 'nursing snake') of the young king in the shape of a cobra
Cobra
Cobra is a venomous snake belonging to the family Elapidae. However, not all snakes commonly referred to as cobras are of the same genus, or even of the same family. The name is short for cobra capo or capa Snake, which is Portuguese for "snake with hood", or "hood-snake"...
, who herself could also be regarded as the mother of Nehebkau
Nehebkau
In Egyptian mythology, Nehebkau was originally the explanation of the cause of binding of Ka and Ba after death. Thus his name, which means brings together Ka...
, a primeval snake god associated with the underworld, who, however, was on the same occasions said to be his son by her. He is also equated by classical authors as the Greek
Greece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....
Titan
Titan (mythology)
In Greek mythology, the Titans were a race of powerful deities, descendants of Gaia and Uranus, that ruled during the legendary Golden Age....
Cronus
Cronus
In Greek mythology, Cronus or Kronos was the leader and the youngest of the first generation of Titans, divine descendants of Gaia, the earth, and Uranus, the sky...
.
Goose
Goose
The word goose is the English name for a group of waterfowl, belonging to the family Anatidae. This family also includes swans, most of which are larger than true geese, and ducks, which are smaller....
who had laid a cosmic egg
Cosmic Egg
Cosmic Egg is the second studio album by Australian rock band Wolfmother, released on 23 October 2009. It is the first album by the second lineup of the band, featuring vocalist, songwriter and lead guitarist Andrew Stockdale, bassist and keyboardist Ian Peres, rhythm guitarist Aidan Nemeth and...
from which the sun
Sun
The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is almost perfectly spherical and consists of hot plasma interwoven with magnetic fields...
and/or the world
World
World is a common name for the whole of human civilization, specifically human experience, history, or the human condition in general, worldwide, i.e. anywhere on Earth....
had sprung. This theory is assumed to be incorrect and to be a result of confusing the divine name "Geb" with that of a Whitefronted Goose (Anser albifrons), also called originally gb(b): 'lame one, stumbler'. This bird-sign is used only as a phonogram in order to spell the name of the god (H.te Velde, in: Lexikon der Aegyptologie II, lemma: Geb). An alternative ancient name for this goose species was trp meaning similarly 'walk like a drunk', 'stumbler.' The Whitefronted Goose is never found as a cultic symbol or holy bird of Geb. The mythological creator 'goose' referred to above, was called Ngg wr 'Great Honker' and always depicted as a Nilegoose/Foxgoose (Alopochen aegyptiacus) who ornitologically belongs to a separate genus and whose Egyptian name was smn, Coptic smon. A coloured vignet irrefutably depicts a Nile Goose with an opened beak (Ngg wr!) in a context of solar creation on a mythological papyrus dating from the 21st Dynasty. Similar images of this divine bird are to be found on temple
Egyptian temple
Egyptian temples were built for the official worship of the gods and commemoration of pharaohs in Ancient Egypt and in regions under Egyptian control. These temples were seen as houses for the gods or kings to whom they were dedicated...
walls (Karnak, Deir el-Bahari), showing a scene of the king standing on a papyrus raft and ritually plucking papyrus for the Theban god Amun
Amun
Amun, reconstructed Egyptian Yamānu , was a god in Egyptian mythology who in the form of Amun-Ra became the focus of the most complex system of theology in Ancient Egypt...
-Re-Kamutef. The latter Theban creator god could be embodied in a Nilegoose, but never in a Whitefronted Goose. In Underworld Books a diacritic goose-sign (most probably denoting then an Anser albifrons) was sometimes depicted on top of the head of an standing anonymous male anthropomorphic deity, pointing to Geb's identity. Geb himself was never depicted as a Nile Goose, as later was Amun, called on some New Kingdom
New Kingdom
The New Kingdom of Egypt, also referred to as the Egyptian Empire is the period in ancient Egyptian history between the 16th century BC and the 11th century BC, covering the Eighteenth, Nineteenth, and Twentieth Dynasties of Egypt....
stelae explicitly:'Amun, the beautiful smn-goose (Nile Goose). The only clear pictorial confusion between the hieroglyphs
Hieroglyphs
Hieroglyph or hieroglyphics may refer to:*Anatolian hieroglyphs*Chinese character*Cretan hieroglyphs*Cursive hieroglyphs*Dongba script*Egyptian hieroglyphs*Hieroglyphic Luwian*Mayan hieroglyphs...
of a Whitefronted Goose (in the normal hieroglyphic spelling of the name Geb, often followed by the additional -b-sign) and a Nile Goose in the spelling of the name Geb occurs in the rock
Rock (geology)
In geology, rock or stone is a naturally occurring solid aggregate of minerals and/or mineraloids.The Earth's outer solid layer, the lithosphere, is made of rock. In general rocks are of three types, namely, igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic...
cut tomb of the provincial governor Sarenput II (12th Dynasty, Middle Kingdom) on the Qubba el-Hawa desert-ridge (opposite Aswan
Aswan
Aswan , formerly spelled Assuan, is a city in the south of Egypt, the capital of the Aswan Governorate.It stands on the east bank of the Nile at the first cataract and is a busy market and tourist centre...
), namely on the left (southern) wall near the open doorway, in the first line of the brightly painted funerary offering formula. This confusion is to be compared with the frequent hacking out by Ekhnaton's agents of the sign of the Pintail Duck (meaning 'son') in the royal title 'Son of Re', especially in Theban temples, where they confused the duck sign with that of a Nilegoose regarded as a form of the then forbidden god Amon.
External Links
- Geb at Egyptian Gods