Egypt was a land of plenty - the Nile’s yearly inundation allowed for a wealth of food, making enough food so everyone in the country could be fed for a year and still have more left over.
Surprisingly, most Egyptians were basicaly vegetarian. Meat was expensive and it didn’t last without refrigeration, so those in the middle and lower class couldn’t have it often. It led the majority into a vegetarian diet consisting of bread, beer, chickpeas, lentils, onions, garlic, sesame, corn, barley, papyrus, flax, lettuce, and at Thebes during the New Kingdom, opium poppy.
When meat was eaten, there was a variety of choices. These included cattle, goats, lambs, sheeps, poultry, and for those who hunted it, antelope. Fish was a viable option, but it wasn’t commonly eaten as a specific specie of fish was considered taboo to eat. In the Osiris myth, when Set sent Osiris’ body parts down the river, a fish ate Osiris’ penis and consequently became a bad omen. However this explanation is only according to Plutarch - not an Egyptian source.
Honey was something past just food.
It was used in near everything, by both lower and higher class, leading to the belief that it was mass-produced. The sweet drink was used in sweetening food, of course, but also in wounds to heal and prevent infection.
The idea of mass-production is backed up by several facts, first being the sheer amount needed to fuel all of Egypt. Beekeepers are mentioned on stelas, even a royal beekeeper. Man-made hives are also mentioned, made of mud or clay from the Nile and usually shaped as a pipe. These hives were moved up and down the Nile all year long so the bees could pollinate in every month. The last piece of proof is the fact that people today are still doing that, this time with better transportation than a wooden boat.
Jars of honey are also mentioned in divorce forms, of all things. A contract found said, “I take thee to wife… and promise to deliver to thee yearly twelve jars of honey.” This gives honey a high status, acting as a form of currency along with the wheat staple and gold rings.
Phoenician depiction of a sphinx made of ivory. Depictions of them were not solely restricted to Egypt. From Fort Shalmaneser in northern Iraq, circa 900-700 B.C. Now in the British Museum.
The eyes symbolize duality, the left eye is solar- sensitive to the negative, the right eye is lunar- sensitive to the positive and affirmative, they cross the information to produce the correct mental image of space. They symbolize the experimentation of consciousness in a universe of contrasts and to find the truth by comparison of the opposite sides. The eyes react to the active light of the sun, producing in our mind the true light, the luminous vital energy, an invisible light that makes possible the intelligence and the understanding of reality.
For the ancient Egyptians the Eye is the meaning of the Sun, the source of life, it acts and perceives its light and color-vibrations and transmits it to our mind the intensity and strength of the fire. The eyes are the nerve-endings that sense the divine will, the intensity of the light, the strength of God that the Egyptians called Phi (divine power). The force that condenses the spirit into matter, giving it a place to the universe, the place of experimentation from consciousness and awareness. The eyes are the only nerves that come out to the surface of our body and so we can observe the function of life through them. The eyes are flourishing within spheres filled with a white crystalline liquid.
Egyptian Bronze Triad (Osiris, Isis, Horus) c. Late Period, 664-30 BC
This triad represents the Osiris myth which is the most elaborate and influential story in ancient Egyptian mythology. It concerns the murder of the god Osiris, a primeval king of Egypt, and its consequences. Osiris’ murderer, his brother Set, usurps his throne. Meanwhile, Osiris’ wife Isis restores her husband’s body, allowing him to posthumously conceive a son with her. The remainder of the story focuses on Horus, the product of Isis and Osiris’ union, who is first a vulnerable child protected by his mother and then becomes Set’s rival for the throne. Their often violent conflict ends with Horus’ triumph, which restores order to Egypt after Set’s unrighteous reign and completes the process of Osiris’ resurrection. The myth, with its complex symbolism, is integral to the Egyptian conceptions of kingship and succession, conflict between order and disorder and, especially, death and the afterlife. It also expresses the essential character of each of the four deities at its center, and many elements of their worship in ancient Egyptian religion were derived from the myth.
The figure depicts Osiris, wearing the atef crown flanked by Horus the child, wearing the double crown with a sidelock and on the other side, Isis, surmounted by the sun disc with horns, shown standing on a hollow plinth, the front cast in relief with the child god squatting, flanked by Isis and Thoth in adoration, a panel on either side with falcon headed soul of Pe and jackal headed soul of Nekhen, the reverse of the plinth has panels with a lotus on stand and a human male figure, probably the deceased in jubilation posture, next to the square opening, an inscription giving the donor’s identity: ‘May Isis give life to Wedja-hor son of Pa-di-hor’, the short sides of the plinth with further souls of Pe and Nekhen.
