Editing Horus (section)

=== Conflict between Horus and Set ===
[[File:Abydos_Tempelrelief_Sethos_I._36.JPG|alt=Relief of a man wearing a tall crown lying on a bier as a bird hovers over his phallus. A falcon-headed man stands at the foot of the bier and a woman with a headdress like a tall chair stands at the head.|right|thumb|300x300px|Isis, in the form of a bird, copulates with the deceased Osiris. At either side are Horus, although he is as yet unborn, and Isis in human form.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Meeks|first1=Dimitri|last2=Favard-Meeks|first2=Christine |translator-first=G. M. |translator-last=Goshgarian |title=Daily Life of the Egyptian Gods |publisher=Cornell University Press |year=1996 |orig-year=French edition 1993 |isbn=978-0-8014-8248-9 |page=37}}</ref>]]
Horus was told by his mother, Isis, to protect the people of Egypt from [[Set (deity)|Set]], the god of the desert, who had killed Horus' father, Osiris.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.mnsu.edu/emuseum/prehistory/egypt/religion/godslist.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100604111722/https://www.mnsu.edu/emuseum/prehistory/egypt/religion/godslist.html |archive-date=4 June 2010 |title=The Goddesses and Gods of Ancient Egypt }}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.egyptianmyths.net/horus.htm|title=Ancient Egypt: the Mythology – Horus|website=egyptianmyths.net|access-date=2007-08-25|archive-date=2019-11-29|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191129234140/http://www.egyptianmyths.net/horus.htm|url-status=live}}</ref> Horus had many battles with Set, not only to avenge his father but to choose the rightful ruler of Egypt. In these battles, Horus came to be associated with Lower Egypt and became its patron.
[[File:Edfu47.JPG|left|thumb|Horus spears Set, who appears in the form of a hippopotamus, as Isis looks on]]
According to ''The Contendings of Horus and Seth'', Set is depicted as trying to prove his dominance by seducing Horus and then having [[sexual intercourse]] with him. However, Horus places his hand between his thighs and catches Set's [[semen]], then subsequently throws it in the river so that he may not be said to have been inseminated by Set. Horus (or Isis herself in some versions) then deliberately spreads his semen on some [[lettuce]], which was Set's favourite food. After Set had eaten the lettuce, they went to the gods to try to settle the argument over the rule of Egypt. The gods first listened to Set's claim of dominance over Horus, and call his semen forth, but it answered from the river, invalidating his claim. Then, the gods listened to Horus' claim of having dominated Set, and call his semen forth, and it answered from inside Set.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.theologywebsite.com/etext/egypt/horus.shtml|title=Theology WebSite: Etext Index: Egyptian Myth: The 80 Years of Contention Between Horus and Seth|author=Scott David Foutz|website=theologywebsite.com|access-date=18 January 2015|archive-date=11 May 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170511103316/http://www.theologywebsite.com/etext/egypt/horus.shtml|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>Fleming, Fergus, and Alan Lothian. ''The Way to Eternity: Egyptian Myth''. Duncan Baird Publishers, 1997. pp.&nbsp;80–81</ref>
[[File:Tomb_TT3_of_Pashedu_(Kairoinfo4u).jpg|right|thumb|A personified Eye of Horus offers incense to the enthroned god [[Osiris]] in a painting from the tomb of [[Pashedu]], thirteenth century BC{{sfn|Wilkinson|1992|pp=42–43}}]]
However, Set still refused to relent, and the other gods were getting tired from over eighty years of fighting and challenges. Horus and Set challenged each other to a boat race, where they each raced in a boat made of stone. Horus and Set agreed, and the race started. But Horus had an edge: his boat was made of wood painted to resemble stone, rather than true stone. Set's boat, being made of heavy stone, sank, but Horus' did not. Horus then won the race, and Set stepped down and officially gave Horus the throne of Egypt.<ref name="ReferenceA">Mythology, published by DBP, Chapter: Egypt's divine kingship.</ref> Upon becoming king after Set's defeat, Horus gives offerings to his deceased father Osiris, thus reviving and sustaining him in the afterlife. After the New Kingdom, Set was still considered the lord of the desert and its oases.<ref>{{cite book|last=te Velde |first=Herman |year=1967 |title=Seth, God of Confusion: A Study of His Role in Egyptian Mythology and Religion |edition=2nd |series=Probleme der Ägyptologie 6 |location=Leiden |publisher=[[Brill Publishers|E. J. Brill]] |isbn=978-90-04-05402-8 |translator-first=G. E.|translator-last=van Baaren-Pape }}</ref>
In many versions of the story, Horus and Set divide the realm between them. This division can be equated with any of several fundamental dualities that the Egyptians saw in their world. Horus may receive the fertile lands around the Nile, the core of Egyptian civilization, in which case Set takes the barren desert or the foreign lands that are associated with it; Horus may rule the earth while Set dwells in the sky; and each god may take one of the two traditional halves of the country, Upper and Lower Egypt, in which case either god may be connected with either region. Yet in the [[Memphite Theology]], [[Geb]], as judge, first apportions the realm between the claimants and then reverses himself, awarding sole control to Horus. In this peaceable union, Horus and Set are reconciled, and the dualities that they represent have been resolved into a united whole. Through this resolution, the order is restored after the tumultuous conflict.{{sfn|te Velde|1967|pages=59–63}}[[File:Seth + horus.jpg|thumb|Horus and Set binding together [[Upper Egypt|upper]] and [[lower Egypt]]]]Egyptologists have often tried to connect the conflict between the two gods with political events early in Egypt's history or prehistory. The cases in which the combatants divide the kingdom, and the frequent association of the paired Horus and Set with the union of Upper and Lower Egypt, suggest that the two deities represent some kind of division within the country. Egyptian tradition and archaeological evidence indicate that Egypt was united at the beginning of its history when an Upper Egyptian kingdom, in the south, conquered Lower Egypt in the north. The Upper Egyptian rulers called themselves "followers of Horus", and Horus became the tutelary deity of the unified polity and its kings. Yet Horus and Set cannot be easily equated with the two halves of the country. Both deities had several cult centers in each region, and Horus is often associated with Lower Egypt and Set with Upper Egypt. Other events may have also affected the myth. Before even Upper Egypt had a single ruler, two of its major cities were [[Nekhen]], in the far south, and [[Nagada]], many miles to the north. The rulers of Nekhen, where Horus was the patron deity, are generally believed to have unified Upper Egypt, including Nagada, under their sway. Set was associated with Nagada, so it is possible that the divine conflict dimly reflects an enmity between the cities in the distant past. Much later, at the end of the [[Second Dynasty of Egypt|Second Dynasty]] ({{Circa|2890–2686 BCE}}), Pharaoh [[Seth-Peribsen]] used the [[Set animal]] to write his [[serekh]] name in place of the falcon hieroglyph representing Horus. His successor [[Khasekhemwy]] used both Horus and Set in the writing of his serekh. This evidence has prompted conjecture that the Second Dynasty saw a clash between the followers of the Horus king and the worshippers of Set led by Seth-Peribsen. Khasekhemwy's use of the two animal symbols would then represent the reconciliation of the two factions, as does the resolution of the myth.<ref>Meltzer in Redford, pp. 165–166</ref>