Anubis, Ancient Egyptian God

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Anubis (jnpw)

Bastet (b3stt)

Hathor (ht-hrw)

Horus (hrw)

Khnum (khnwm)

Sekhmet (skhmt)

Set (sth)

Sobek (sbk)

Thoth (djhwty)

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anpu, jnpwOther Egyptian Gods

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Anubis is one of the very old, Old Gods of Egypt. He was god of the dead until that position was usurped by Osiris in the early years of the Old Kingdom. This Gerzean (Naqada II) slate palette from about 3500 BCE was carved into the figure of a jackal. It probably represents Anubis, making it one of the first appearances of an Egyptian god as an animal. The eyes of the jackal figure were originally inlaid, so this was a prestige object not representing just any old dog.

Anubis' parentage is ambiguous, as myths from different times called for varying relations in the pantheon. His parents were either Re and Nephthys, or Re and Isis, or Set and Nephthys, or Osiris and Nephthys. Since Anubis seems to be an older god than Osiris, it is ironic that the later versions of the mythology make Osiris his father. In the fully developed Osirian mythology, Nephthys seduces Osiris to spite her husband Seth. The infant Anubis was abandoned by Nephthys and adopted by her sister Isis (who is also Osiris' wife, so this is an unpleasant domestic drama). Even after Osiris took over as god of the dead and lord of the underworld, Anubis remained important as the guide of the dead and perhaps still ruled part of the underworld. Anubis invented mummification to preserve human bodies, and presided over the funeral rituals.

Anubis is considered to have invented embalming, and priests apparently wore Anubis masks during embalming or interment ceremonies. We long thought that the idea of masks was just a supposition based on images from tomb paintings and scrolls, which could show Anubis as a purely symbolic reference. But we finally saw a picture of an ancient Anubis mask and had to reconsider that opinion. A kind correspondent then referred us to the work of Prof. Wolinski who has literally written the book on Ceremonial Masks of Ancient Egypt. Eventually we even found a credited picture of a surviving Anubis mask, shown here on the right. It's a Late Period piece of unknown provenance, now in the collection of the Hildeshiem Pelizaeus-Museum. It's about 20 inches tall, made of clay and weighs almost 20 pounds! If anybody actually wore this mask in a ceremony, we don't think he leaned over very far.

Anubis guides the newly dead to the realms of the underworld, and he stands as Upuauat or Wepwawet ("Opener of the Ways") at the gateway to the Realm of the Dead. Wepwawet had been a separate canine funerary deity whose identity was largely subsumed into Anubis. Anpu also lays the heart of the deceased on the scales of Ma'at to be judged at the seat of Osiris. You can't get to your afterlife without Anubis, so he is really, really important. Anubis does the weighing, and Thoth records the result, and Ammit the Devourer waits hopefully for bad results.

Of course, in the tomb paintings the heart always balances the feather and Ammit always goes hungry. After all, the tomb owner or his family are paying the artist.

Since he is the guide to the afterlife, Anubis appears frequently in tomb paintings. Sometimes he is seen at his task of preparing the body for burial; sometimes he is seen in the company of other gods. Often he is shown personally welcoming the deceased at some stage of their journey through the Duat. In the tomb of Nefertari, Anubis seems to be quite the ladies' man ... er, god. On one of the columns of the main chamber, Anubis greets Nefertari with a very proprietary hand on her shoulder. Both of us were especially impressed by this picture, and Warren has worked to make our Anubis plush doll look more like this particular representation of Anpu. [Actually, "impressed" is not the right word. "Crying joyously, witness to eternity realized," perhaps. The tomb of Nefertari quite exceeds my powers of description. It is a place of surprising power and beauty, and the paintings speak to you.] On another wall Anubis casually cozies up to Hathor in a sort of receiving-line of gods as Nefertari is presented.

Although Anubis is generally associated with the jackal, it's not completely clear what kind of dog he is. Fans of other canids have suggested he could be a basenji, but I've lived with a basenji and would never trust it to guide me anywhere. It doesn't take a great stretch to see associations between a god of the dead and jackals, so why look elsewhere?

Real jackals are not black so Anubis' black color must be symbolic. You can find a lot of speculation about why Anubis is black. The most common assertion seems to be that he is black because mummified bodies are black. Could be, but modern mummification experiments produce brown, not black mummies. Even the pigment mumia derived from ground-up mummies is brown -- not that ancient Egyptians would have seen the color of ground-up mummies. Other writers say he is black because he is associated with the Black Land, which is the fertile farmland of Egypt along the Nile. Whatever the reason, it was so compelling that for thousands of years Anubis was always painted black and so obvious that nobody commented on it. Possibly he was black because he was ruler of the underworld and the underworld is dark (or black). Sounds sensible except that in tomb paintings the underworld is not represented as being dark. So I don't think we know why Anubis is black.

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Bibliography of Egyptology references used in these Stuffe & Nonsense Lore Pages.

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Anubis Figurines and Artefacts from Stuffe & Nonsense

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