Duamutef

About Duamutef

Duamutef is one of the Four Sons of Horus, the protective deities of the canopic jars that held the mummified internal organs of the deceased. Duamutef is the jackal-headed son, who protects the stomach of the dead person; he is paired with the protective goddess Neith and associated with the east among the four cardinal directions. His name means 'one who praises his mother' (or 'he who worships his mother'), and he belongs, with his three brothers, to the company of beings born of or associated with the falcon-god Horus who guard the dead and assist in their resurrection.

The Four Sons of Horus — Imsety, Hapy, Duamutef, and Qebehsenuef — form a tightly organized group, each protecting one of the four organs removed during mummification and each associated with a particular animal head, a protective goddess, and a cardinal direction. Imsety, the human-headed son, protects the liver and is paired with Isis; Hapy, the baboon-headed son, protects the lungs and is paired with Nephthys; Duamutef, the jackal-headed son, protects the stomach and is paired with Neith; and Qebehsenuef, the falcon-headed son, protects the intestines and is paired with the scorpion-goddess Selket. The four together guard the viscera of the deceased, which were removed during embalming, mummified separately, and stored in the four canopic jars, whose lids in the developed tradition bore the heads of the Four Sons.

Duamutef's jackal head can resemble that of the god Anubis, the jackal-god of embalming, and the two are distinguished by context: Duamutef appears in the company of the Four Sons of Horus and on canopic-jar lids, while Anubis appears with his own distinctive iconography and in his own roles. The jackal-head of Duamutef should not be taken to identify him with Anubis; he is a distinct deity, one of the four protectors of the canopic organs.

The Four Sons of Horus are attested from the Pyramid Texts of the Old Kingdom, where they appear as protective beings associated with the king's resurrection, and they figure throughout the Coffin Texts and the Book of the Dead. The heads on the canopic-jar lids developed over time: in the Middle Kingdom the lids bore human heads, and only from the New Kingdom did the distinctive animal heads of the Four Sons — including the jackal head of Duamutef — become standard. George Reisner's Canopics (1967) is the standard typological study of the canopic equipment, and the Four Sons of Horus are treated in the broader literature on Egyptian mortuary religion. Duamutef, the jackal-headed guardian of the stomach, is one of the four indispensable protectors of the dead, ensuring the preservation and resurrection of the bodily components on which eternal life depended. As one of the Four Sons of Horus, Duamutef belongs to a group whose protection of the viscera was an essential part of the mummification on which the Egyptian hope of eternal life rested, and his jackal head, his association with the east, and his pairing with the goddess Neith mark his particular place in the ordered system of fourfold mortuary protection.

The Story

Duamutef has no extended myth of his own but figures, with his three brothers, throughout the drama of Egyptian mummification and resurrection, in which the body of the deceased is preserved, its organs protected, and the dead person assembled for eternal life. The role of Duamutef and the Four Sons of Horus is to guard the internal organs removed during embalming and to assist in the resurrection of the dead.

In the process of mummification, the embalmers removed the internal organs of the deceased — the liver, lungs, stomach, and intestines — which would otherwise decay and destroy the body. The heart was left in place, as the seat of the person's identity and the organ weighed in the judgment, and the brain was discarded; but the four major viscera were removed, dehydrated, treated, wrapped, and stored separately in the four canopic jars. Duamutef's charge was the stomach, which he protected as its guardian among the Four Sons.

The Four Sons of Horus were assigned to the four organs, the four cardinal directions, and four protective goddesses, forming a complete system of protection for the viscera of the dead. Duamutef, the jackal-headed son, protected the stomach, was associated with the east, and was paired with the goddess Neith, who guarded him as he guarded the stomach. Imsety guarded the liver with Isis, Hapy the lungs with Nephthys, and Qebehsenuef the intestines with Selket. The four sons and the four goddesses together secured the organs, each god protecting an organ and each goddess protecting a god, in a doubled system of mortuary protection.

The canopic jars bearing the Four Sons were placed in a canopic chest, often within a shrine, and stored in the tomb near the mummy. The jars' lids, in the developed tradition, bore the heads of the Four Sons — the human head of Imsety, the baboon head of Hapy, the jackal head of Duamutef, and the falcon head of Qebehsenuef — identifying each jar with its guardian and the organ it held. The inscriptions on the jars and the canopic chest invoked the protection of the Four Sons and the goddesses, calling on them to guard the organs and to assist in the resurrection of the dead.

The Four Sons of Horus also figured in the broader mortuary theology of resurrection. As beings associated with Horus, they participated in the restoration of the dead modeled on the resurrection of Osiris, whom Horus and his allies restored. The Pyramid Texts associate the Four Sons with the king's ascent and resurrection, and they appear in the Book of the Dead among the protective deities who assist the deceased. The four sons were sometimes said to stand at the four corners of the bier or the tomb, guarding the dead from the four directions, and they appear in the iconography of the afterlife as protectors of the deceased.

Duamutef's particular role, as the jackal-headed guardian of the stomach paired with Neith and associated with the east, was part of this complete system of mortuary protection. His name, 'one who praises his mother,' reflects the filial and protective character of the Four Sons, beings devoted to the protection and restoration of the dead. The narrative of Duamutef is thus the story of the protection of the body's organs in the service of resurrection — the careful preservation of the stomach, guarded by the jackal-headed son and his goddess, as one of the indispensable components of the dead person assembled for eternal life. The drama of mummification, in which the body was preserved against decay and the organs protected against dissolution, depended on the Four Sons of Horus, and Duamutef's guardianship of the stomach was one essential part of the system that secured the integrity of the dead for the afterlife. The protection offered by Duamutef and his brothers was both physical and theological: physical, in that the organs were preserved against decay in the canopic jars, and theological, in that the gods guarded the organs and assisted in the resurrection of the dead modeled on the restoration of Osiris. The careful preservation of the stomach under the protection of the jackal-headed son, paired with the goddess Neith and facing the east, was thus part of the larger work of assembling the complete and incorruptible body required for eternal life, the mortuary effort on which the entire Egyptian afterlife depended. Duamutef's name, meaning 'one who praises his mother,' expresses the filial devotion of the Four Sons, beings whose role was to guard and restore the dead, and his guardianship of the stomach, performed in concert with his three brothers and the four protective goddesses, secured one part of the body for the resurrection that the mummification and the canopic protection together made possible. In the ordered system of the Four Sons, each son guarded one organ, faced one direction, and was protected by one goddess, and Duamutef's place in that system, as the jackal-headed guardian of the stomach facing the east under the protection of Neith, was an indispensable element of the complete fourfold protection that secured the integrity of the dead body for eternal life.

Symbolism

Duamutef and the Four Sons of Horus are dense with the symbolism of mortuary protection, the preservation of the body, the four cardinal directions, and the resurrection of the dead.

The jackal head of Duamutef carries symbolism associated with the jackal in Egyptian mortuary religion. The jackal, a scavenger of the desert necropolis, was paradoxically made the guardian of the dead — the animal that might threaten the body transformed into its protector. The jackal-god Anubis, the master of embalming, embodies this transformation, and Duamutef's jackal head associates him with the protective and funerary power of the jackal. The desert canid, prowler of the burial grounds, becomes the guardian of the organs of the dead.

The assignment of Duamutef to the stomach, the east, and the goddess Neith reflects the systematic symbolism of the Four Sons. Each son protects one organ, faces one direction, and is paired with one goddess, forming a complete and ordered system of protection. The fourfold structure — four sons, four organs, four directions, four goddesses — symbolizes completeness and the protection of the dead from all sides, the four guardians securing the body's components in a comprehensive system. The number four, associated with the cardinal directions and with cosmic completeness, structures the symbolism of the Four Sons as the complete protection of the dead.

The protection of the internal organs symbolizes the preservation of the body required for eternal life. The viscera, removed during mummification to prevent decay, had to be preserved and protected, since the integrity of the body was a precondition of the afterlife. The Four Sons, guarding the four organs, symbolize the preservation of the body's components and the assembly of the complete person for resurrection. The careful storage of the organs in the canopic jars, under the protection of the Four Sons, expresses the Egyptian conviction that eternal life required the preservation of the whole body, including the organs removed during embalming.

The pairing of Duamutef with the goddess Neith symbolizes the doubled protection of the dead. Each son is guarded by a goddess, so that the protector is himself protected, in a system that secures the organs through a chain of guardianship. The four protective goddesses — Isis, Nephthys, Neith, and Selket — were the great mortuary protectresses, and their pairing with the Four Sons extended their protection to the organs of the dead. The doubled protection symbolizes the thoroughness of the mortuary effort, the dead guarded by gods who are themselves guarded by goddesses.

The association of the Four Sons with Horus and with the resurrection symbolism of Osiris connects Duamutef to the central drama of Egyptian mortuary religion. As beings associated with Horus, the Four Sons participate in the restoration of the dead modeled on the resurrection of Osiris. Their guardianship of the organs is part of the assembly and restoration of the dead person, the reconstitution of the body for eternal life. The Four Sons thus symbolize not only the protection of the organs but the resurrection of the dead, the restoration of the body modeled on the resurrection of Osiris by Horus and his allies.

The name of Duamutef, 'one who praises his mother,' carries the symbolism of filial devotion and protection. The Four Sons are devoted protectors, beings whose role is to guard and restore the dead, and Duamutef's name expresses the filial and protective character of these guardians of the body. The name symbolizes the devotion of the Four Sons to the protection of the dead, the loyal guardianship on which the preservation and resurrection of the body depended.

Cultural Context

Duamutef and the Four Sons of Horus belong to the mortuary religion that lay at the heart of Egyptian civilization, and they served as the protective deities of the canopic equipment that preserved the internal organs of the dead across the whole span of pharaonic history.

The practice of removing and separately preserving the internal organs developed early in Egyptian mummification. The viscera — the liver, lungs, stomach, and intestines — would, if left in the body, decay and destroy it, and so they were removed during embalming, dehydrated, treated, wrapped, and stored separately. The heart was left in place as the seat of identity and the organ of judgment, and the brain was discarded as without value; but the four major viscera were preserved in the canopic jars, under the protection of the Four Sons of Horus. The system of canopic preservation reflects the Egyptian conviction that eternal life required the preservation of the whole body, including the organs removed during mummification.

The Four Sons of Horus are attested from the Pyramid Texts of the late Old Kingdom (c. 2400-2300 BCE), where they appear as protective beings associated with the king's resurrection and ascent. They figure throughout the Coffin Texts and the Book of the Dead, and they became standard features of the canopic equipment and the mortuary iconography. The development of the canopic-jar lids shows the elaboration of the system over time: in the Middle Kingdom the lids bore human heads, and only from the New Kingdom did the distinctive animal heads of the Four Sons — the human Imsety, the baboon Hapy, the jackal Duamutef, and the falcon Qebehsenuef — become standard, identifying each jar with its guardian.

The systematic organization of the Four Sons — each protecting one organ, facing one direction, and paired with one goddess — reflects the Egyptian love of order and completeness in mortuary religion. The fourfold structure secured the dead from all sides, the four guardians protecting the body's components in a comprehensive system. Duamutef, the jackal-headed son, protected the stomach, faced the east, and was paired with the goddess Neith, one of the four great mortuary protectresses. The pairing of the Four Sons with the four goddesses — Isis, Nephthys, Neith, and Selket — extended the protection of these powerful goddesses to the organs of the dead.

The Four Sons were integrated into the broader mortuary theology of resurrection modeled on Osiris. As beings associated with Horus, they participated in the restoration of the dead, the reconstitution of the body for eternal life modeled on the resurrection of Osiris by Horus and his allies. The Pyramid Texts associate the Four Sons with the king's resurrection, and they appear in the Book of the Dead among the protective deities of the afterlife. The Four Sons thus belonged to the central drama of Egyptian mortuary religion, the resurrection of the dead modeled on the Osirian myth.

The potential confusion of Duamutef's jackal head with the jackal-god Anubis reflects the importance of context in Egyptian iconography. The jackal head was associated with the funerary and protective power of the jackal, embodied above all in Anubis, the master of embalming; but Duamutef is a distinct deity, one of the Four Sons of Horus, distinguished from Anubis by his appearance in the company of the Four Sons and on the canopic-jar lids. The shared jackal head reflects the common association of the jackal with mortuary protection, not an identity between the two gods.

George Reisner's Canopics (1967) is the standard typological study of the canopic equipment, tracing the development of the jars and their lids across Egyptian history. The Four Sons of Horus are treated in the broader literature on Egyptian mummification and mortuary religion, and Duamutef, the jackal-headed guardian of the stomach, takes his place among the four indispensable protectors of the dead in the canopic system that preserved the organs on which eternal life depended.

Cross-Tradition Parallels

Duamutef and the Four Sons of Horus belong to a structural archetype that appears wherever traditions commit to preserving the body as the precondition of afterlife: the guardian assigned to protect a specific organ or portion of the physical self. The Egyptian fourfold system is unusually precise — each son protects a specific organ, faces a specific direction, and is paired with a specific goddess — and comparing it to other traditions that assign guardians to the body reveals what the Egyptian system's precision was designed to achieve.

Hindu — The Kshetrapala and the Guardians of the Field-of-the-Body (Tantric tradition, c. 6th–12th century CE)

Tantric Hindu tradition develops the concept of the body as a field (kshetra) with specific presiding deities governing its regions and portals. The ten openings of the body — eyes, ears, nostrils, mouth, navel, genitals, anus — have guardian deities associated with them, invoked for purification and protection. The structural parallel with the Four Sons of Horus is in the mapping of divine protection onto specific anatomical sites. But the Tantric tradition assigns guardians to the portals of the living body; the Four Sons protect the organs of the dead body against the decay that has already begun. Egyptian organ-guardianship is mortuary; Tantric body-guardianship is vital. Both systems understand the body as sacred geography requiring divine oversight, but one protects the living body from without, the other protects the dead body's organs within their canopic vessels.

Tibetan — The Five Dhyani Buddhas and the Purification of the Skandhas (Bardo Thodol, c. 8th century CE)

The Tibetan Book of the Dead describes the consciousness of the dead encountering the five Dhyani Buddhas, each associated with one of the five aggregates (skandhas) that constitute the person — form, sensation, perception, mental formations, consciousness. Each Buddha offers a luminous path that corresponds to the purification of a particular skandha, and the unenlightened consciousness mistakes the pure light for a peaceful or wrathful deity. The structural parallel with the Four Sons is in the systematic association of divine figures with specific components of the person: each deity corresponds to one element of the human composite. But the Tibetan system is directed at liberation through non-attachment — recognizing the lights and releasing — while the Egyptian system is directed at preservation through attachment. The Four Sons of Horus want the organs held together; the Dhyani Buddhas want the skandhas seen through and released.

Mesopotamian — Udug and the Demons of Individual Organs (Maqlu series, c. 8th–7th century BCE)

The Babylonian Maqlu incantation series identifies specific demons associated with specific organs — demons of the head, the ear, the eye, the limbs — that must be expelled through ritual. The apotropaic logic inverts the canopic logic: where the Egyptian Four Sons place divine guardians around the organs to protect them from decay, the Mesopotamian tradition treats the organs as sites where malevolent forces have lodged and must be driven out. Egyptian organ-guardianship assumes benevolent divine custody; Mesopotamian organ-demonology assumes hostile supernatural assault. Both traditions map divine attention onto specific bodily sites, but one installs protective presences and the other exorcises invasive ones — the body as temple requiring guardians versus the body as field requiring clearing.

Chinese — The Five Viscera and Their Ruling Shen (Huangdi Neijing, c. 200 BCE–100 CE)

The classical Chinese medical tradition, codified in the Huangdi Neijing (Yellow Emperor's Classic of Internal Medicine, c. 200 BCE–100 CE), associates each of the five major viscera with a ruling spirit (shen), a color, a season, and a direction. The liver rules anger and belongs to Wood and the east; the heart rules joy and belongs to Fire and the south. This five-fold organ cosmology is structurally parallel to the Four Sons' assignment of each son to an organ, a direction, and a protective goddess. Both systems transform the internal organs into a cosmological map. But the Chinese system maps the living body's correspondence to the cosmos, used for diagnosis and treatment; the Egyptian system maps the dead body's custody, used for preservation. The organs are cosmologically significant in both traditions, but one applies that significance to sustaining life and the other to enabling resurrection.

Modern Influence

Duamutef and the Four Sons of Horus have influenced the modern world through the study and display of canopic jars, which are among the most recognizable products of Egyptian mortuary culture, and through the broader modern fascination with Egyptian mummification and the afterlife.

In the academic study of Egyptian mortuary religion, the Four Sons of Horus and the canopic equipment they protected have been studied as central features of the mummification process and the mortuary cult. George Reisner's Canopics (1967) established the standard typology of the canopic jars and their development, and the Four Sons figure in virtually every account of Egyptian mummification and afterlife belief. The systematic organization of the Four Sons — each protecting one organ, direction, and goddess — has been analyzed as an instance of the Egyptian love of order and completeness in mortuary religion.

Canopic jars, with their distinctive lids bearing the heads of the Four Sons — including the jackal head of Duamutef — are among the most recognizable objects in museum collections of Egyptian antiquities. The jars appear in major museums around the world and feature prominently in exhibitions of Egyptian mortuary culture, where they illustrate the process of mummification and the Egyptian concern with the preservation of the body. The image of the four jars with their animal-headed lids has become a familiar symbol of Egyptian mummification.

In popular culture, canopic jars and the Four Sons of Horus appear wherever Egyptian mummification is depicted — in film, television, fiction, and games evoking the Egyptian afterlife. The jars, with their animal-headed lids, are a standard element of the popular image of the Egyptian tomb and the mummification process, and they feature in the modern fascination with mummies and the Egyptian afterlife. The Four Sons of Horus, as the guardians of the canopic organs, have entered the popular vocabulary of Egyptian mortuary religion.

The study of the canopic equipment has contributed to the modern scientific understanding of Egyptian mummification. The analysis of the organs preserved in canopic jars, and of the embalming techniques used to treat them, has provided evidence for the practice of mummification and for the health and diet of the ancient Egyptians. The canopic jars, as the containers of the preserved organs, have been a source of biological and medical information about the ancient population.

The distinction between Duamutef and the jackal-god Anubis, who share the jackal head, has been a point of attention in the study of Egyptian iconography, illustrating the importance of context in identifying Egyptian deities. The shared jackal head, reflecting the common association of the jackal with mortuary protection, has been used to discuss the iconographic conventions of Egyptian religious art and the principles by which deities were distinguished.

Though Duamutef has not entered popular culture as an individually named figure as widely as the major gods, the Four Sons of Horus as a group, and the canopic jars they protect, are among the most recognizable features of Egyptian mortuary culture, and they continue to interest scholars of Egyptian religion, students of mummification, and those drawn to the Egyptian afterlife. Duamutef, the jackal-headed guardian of the stomach, takes his place among the four protectors of the dead whose image on the canopic jars has become a familiar symbol of the Egyptian concern with the preservation of the body for eternal life.

Primary Sources

Duamutef and the Four Sons of Horus are attested from the Pyramid Texts of the late Old Kingdom through the Greco-Roman period, appearing consistently in the funerary literature and the mortuary equipment as the guardians of the canopic organs.

The Pyramid Texts (c. 2400–2300 BCE) provide the earliest attestations of the Four Sons of Horus as a defined group of protective deities associated with the king's resurrection. Utterances 458 and 552 invoke them collectively as guardians of the deceased; Utterance 552 names Imsety, Hapy, Duamutef, and Qebehsenuef in association with the four sides of the bier. The standard edition is R.O. Faulkner, The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts (Oxford University Press, 1969); James P. Allen, The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts (SBL Writings from the Ancient World 23, Society of Biblical Literature, 2005), provides commentary on the protective function of the Four Sons within Old Kingdom royal theology.

The Coffin Texts of the Middle Kingdom (c. 2055–1650 BCE) elaborate the role of the Four Sons extensively. Spell 157 associates the sons with the four cardinal directions; Spells 104 and 148 name each son individually in connection with the organs they protect and the goddesses who guard them. R.O. Faulkner, The Ancient Egyptian Coffin Texts, 3 vols. (Aris & Phillips, 1973–78), is the standard translation. The Book of the Dead (New Kingdom onward) contains Spell 151, which includes vignettes depicting the mummiform figures of the Four Sons at the four corners of the bier or the tomb, each paired with his goddess; Spell 17 and Spell 125 also invoke them. R.O. Faulkner, The Ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead (British Museum Press, 1985, ed. Carol Andrews), is the standard translation, and the vignettes for Spell 151 illustrate the fully developed four-son canopic iconography, including the jackal head of Duamutef.

The inscriptions on canopic jars and canopic chests invoke the Four Sons directly, the standard formulae addressing each son and his paired goddess. The texts read on Duamutef's jar typically invoke him and Neith to guard the stomach of the deceased. The standard typological study of the canopic equipment, tracing the development from uninscribed early examples through the New Kingdom animal-headed lids to the Late Period, is George A. Reisner, Canopics (Catalogue Général des Antiquités Égyptiennes du Musée du Caire 62, Institut Français d'Archéologie Orientale, Cairo, 1967), though later scholarship, including material in Richard H. Wilkinson, The Complete Gods and Goddesses of Ancient Egypt (Thames & Hudson, 2003), pp. 88–90, provides more accessible coverage of the Four Sons' iconography and theological roles. Plutarch, De Iside et Osiride 17–19 (Moralia V; Loeb Classical Library, trans. F.C. Babbitt, 1936) describes the recovery and arrangement of Osiris's body by Isis, which provides the Greek-period narrative context for the Osirian dimension of the canopic protection system.

Significance

Duamutef is one of the Four Sons of Horus, the protective deities of the canopic jars, and his study is part of the understanding of Egyptian mummification, the preservation of the body, and the mortuary religion that lay at the heart of Egyptian civilization. As the jackal-headed guardian of the stomach, paired with the goddess Neith and associated with the east, Duamutef takes his place in the complete system of canopic protection that secured the organs of the dead for eternal life.

The significance of Duamutef and the Four Sons lies first in what they reveal about Egyptian mummification and the preservation of the body. The removal and separate preservation of the internal organs reflects the Egyptian conviction that eternal life required the preservation of the whole body, and the Four Sons, guarding the four organs, embody the religious dimension of this preservation. The canopic system, under the protection of the Four Sons, was an essential part of the mummification on which the Egyptian hope of eternal life depended.

The systematic organization of the Four Sons — each protecting one organ, facing one direction, and paired with one goddess — illustrates the Egyptian love of order and completeness in mortuary religion. The fourfold structure secured the dead from all sides, the four guardians protecting the body's components in a comprehensive and ordered system. Duamutef's place in this system, as the jackal-headed guardian of the stomach, the east, and the goddess Neith, exemplifies the careful organization of the Egyptian mortuary effort.

The pairing of the Four Sons with the four great mortuary goddesses — Isis, Nephthys, Neith, and Selket — connects the canopic protection to the broader theology of the protective goddesses and to the Osirian myth. The doubled protection, the sons guarded by the goddesses as they guard the organs, expresses the thoroughness of the mortuary effort and integrates the canopic system into the wider mortuary religion centered on the resurrection of Osiris.

The association of the Four Sons with Horus and with the resurrection of Osiris places Duamutef within the central drama of Egyptian mortuary religion. As beings associated with Horus, the Four Sons participate in the restoration of the dead modeled on the resurrection of Osiris, and their guardianship of the organs is part of the assembly and restoration of the dead person for eternal life. Duamutef's role in the preservation of the stomach is thus part of the larger work of resurrection on which Egyptian mortuary religion was founded.

For the modern study of Egyptian mortuary culture, the canopic jars bearing the heads of the Four Sons — including the jackal head of Duamutef — are among the most recognizable and informative products of Egyptian civilization. The jars illustrate the process of mummification, the Egyptian concern with the preservation of the body, and the religious framework within which the organs of the dead were protected. Duamutef, the jackal-headed guardian of the stomach, stands among the four protectors of the dead whose image on the canopic jars has become a familiar symbol of the Egyptian vision of eternal life through the preservation of the body.

Connections

The Sons of Horus in the mythology section cover the group of four protective deities to which Duamutef belongs — Imsety, Hapy, Duamutef, and Qebehsenuef — who guard the canopic jars and the organs of the dead. The group-entry and the Duamutef-entry are companion treatments, the one covering the four sons together and the other the individual jackal-headed guardian of the stomach.

The Canopic Jars in the mythology section cover the four ritual jars that held the mummified internal organs of the deceased, each protected by one of the Four Sons of Horus and bearing his head on its lid. Duamutef's jar held the stomach, and its lid bore his jackal head.

Horus in the deities section covers the falcon-god from whom the Four Sons take their name and with whom they are associated in the restoration of the dead modeled on the resurrection of Osiris.

Neith in the deities section covers the goddess paired with Duamutef, the protective goddess who guards him as he guards the stomach, one of the four great mortuary protectresses. Isis and Nephthys in the deities section cover two more of the four mortuary goddesses, paired with Imsety and Hapy.

Anubis in the deities section covers the jackal-god of embalming, who shares the jackal head with Duamutef and who presided over the mummification in which the organs guarded by the Four Sons were removed and preserved. The two are distinguished by context, the shared jackal head reflecting the common association of the jackal with mortuary protection.

Osiris in the deities section covers the god of the dead whose resurrection provides the model for the restoration of the dead in which the Four Sons participate, and whom the deceased becomes through the mortuary process.

The Mummification in the mythology section covers the process in which the internal organs were removed and preserved in the canopic jars under the protection of the Four Sons. The Weighing of the Heart in the mythology section covers the judgment of the dead in which the heart, left in the body rather than removed to a canopic jar, was weighed against the feather of Maat — the one major organ not placed under the protection of the Four Sons.

The scorpion-goddess Selket, paired with Qebehsenuef, and the goddess Neith, paired with Duamutef, are two of the four great mortuary protectresses who guarded the Four Sons of Horus and, through them, the organs of the dead, extending the protection of these powerful goddesses to the viscera preserved in the canopic jars.

The Field of Reeds in the mythology section covers the paradise of the afterlife that the deceased, preserved and protected by the Four Sons and reassembled for eternal life, hoped to reach.

Further Reading