Egyptian Hunter Holding God Khnum Lord Of The Cool Waters

Description

Hunter

Hardly any other ancient people honored the animals they hunted more than the ancient Egyptians. Like the Native Americans the ancients Egyptian hunters prayed to god and goddess images of the animals they quarried to ensure their safety and the success of the hunt. Hunting in ancient Egypt not only provided a variety of fish, fowl and meat, but became a symbol of courage and mastery over many of the animal forces the Egyptians believed they needed to conquer.

A balanced relationship between people and beasts was seen by the ancient Egyptians as one element in the eternal globe and cosmic order, Hunters knew their animals well—their mating habits, diet, diseases and their "personal" characteristics. Out of this respect came great success in hunting.

Predynastic Egypt had been a paradise for hunters. Agriculture had not yet infringed on some of the wild lands of the fertile alluvium. The land was a virtual wet jungle of trees and thickets of reed and papyrus. All kinds of animals--elephants, giraffe, lions, rhinoceros, wild boar, antelopes, gazelles, and numerous varieties of deer, ibex, and countless numbers of birds, fish, crocodiles and hippopotami--thrived in this area. There’s a famous hunting scene that comes from the period of Egypt’s original unification, showing a hunting party out for lions, gazelles, stags and ostrich.

Then cultivation and stockbreeding began to take hold along the Nile during the first three dynasties. When the farmers drained the marshes and extended the region of agriculture, the larger game left the valley. During the Old Kingdom there is evidence that hunting took place mainly on the plains beyond the pyramid burials. But there was still a lot of game—hyenas, lions and leopards—all of which required a greater degree of skill to hunt, and were pursued for their skins as well as their meat.

God Khnum Lord Of The Cool Waters

A very ancient deity. As a water god he was closely associated with the annual flooding of the Nile. His name means to create. He was the creator of all things that are and all things that shall be. He created the gods and he fashioned mankind on a potter's wheel. He is being representative as a ram headed man.   Khnum. The ram headed god, whose strong association with the Nile inundation and the fertile soil contributed to his role as a potter-god. The creative symbolism of moulding pottery, the potency of the ram, and the fact that the Ancient Egyptian word for ram was "ba" meant that Khnum was also one of the principle creator gods. Sometimes Khnum was shown modeling the "ka" on his potter's wheel whilst forming the bodies of humanity. Khnum's principal cult centre was on the island of Elephantine at Aswan, where he was possibly worshipped from the Early Dynastic Period.

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