Learn to recognise the figures on a temple or tomb wall.
Amun, Mut and Khonsu form the Theban triad (a group of three deities worshipped together), central to Karnak and the Opet Festival. In funerary scenes you will also meet Osiris, Isis, Anubis, Hathor and solar deities. Crowns, attributes and inscriptions help identify them, but forms overlap and change. Use each profile as a guide to recognition, not a rule that every figure must follow.
The hidden god of Thebes, who became king of the gods and the state god of an empire.
Amun often wears a crown with two tall feathers and may appear as a man or in ram-related forms. These are useful clues, but other gods can share attributes: inscriptions and the surrounding scene help confirm an identification.
Amun’s consort and the mother of the Theban triad — a queen among goddesses.
Mut often appears as a woman with a vulture headdress and the double crown. She can also take a lioness form. These attributes guide recognition, but inscriptions and the scene’s context are needed when deities share features.
The moon god, and the child of the Theban triad.
Khonsu commonly has a youthful sidelock, a wrapped body and a lunar disc with a crescent. He may also be falcon-headed. The lunar crown is a useful clue; read the accompanying name when it survives.
Ruler of the dead, associated with restoration and renewal.
Osiris often appears wrapped as a mummy, holding a crook and flail. His atef crown has a tall central element flanked by feathers. The djed is a pillar-shaped symbol with stacked crossbars, associated with stability. Use these clues together with the inscription.
The wife who put Osiris back together and the mother who hid Horus — protector of the dead.
The reliable sign is a small stepped throne worn on her head — a seat drawn in profile, which is literally how her name is written. From the New Kingdom on she also wears cow’s horns with a sun disc between them, and that is exactly Hathor’s crown, so the two become genuinely hard to separate: if there is a throne, it is Isis; if there is only horns-and-disc, read the caption or the context, and remember that in a tomb the two goddesses flanking a coffin are usually Isis and her sister Nephthys. The other giveaway is the pose. In funerary painting Isis very often kneels at one end of a shrine, a coffin or a scene with her arms stretched out and long feathered wings hanging from them, mirrored by Nephthys at the other end.
The black jackal of the cemetery, who does the embalming and guards the burial.
Anubis commonly appears as a black canid or a man with a canid head, associated with embalming and protection of the dead. Black has symbolic significance here; use captions and context to distinguish him from other canid deities.
The sun — and the night journey that every royal tomb in the valley is a map of.
By day: a man with a falcon’s head carrying a plain sun disc on top, almost always with a cobra coiled at the front of it. Falcon head plus disc is Re or Re-Horakhty; falcon head with a crown but no disc is far more likely to be Horus, and that is the distinction worth holding on to. At night, in the tombs, he changes: inside the boat, in a shrine, stands a man with a ram’s head, often labelled as the flesh or body of Re — a ram-headed figure in a boat on a tomb wall is the night sun, not Amun. In the morning he is a scarab beetle pushing the disc up in front of it, and on many burial-chamber ceilings the scarab and the ram-headed figure appear at the two ends of the same journey.
The falcon of kingship — the living king is Horus, and says so in his own titles.
A falcon or falcon-headed figure may represent Horus, but several deities use falcon imagery. Crown, accompanying text and the action in the scene provide the more reliable identification.
Goddess of love, music and the western mountain — the one who receives the dead.
Cow horns around a sun disc can point to Hathor. A sistrum is a hand-held ritual rattle; a menat is a beaded necklace with a counterweight at the back. Both are associated with her worship. Isis and other deities can share attributes, so check the inscription too.
The craftsman god of Memphis, who made the world by thinking it and saying it.
Ptah commonly appears wrapped in a close-fitting garment, with a skullcap and a staff combining familiar divine symbols. Compare the headgear and staff together, and use the inscription to confirm the name.
The lioness — plague and healing held in the same goddess.
A lioness-headed woman with a sun disc is a useful starting clue for Sekhmet, not an exclusive identifier. Other lioness goddesses share features; read the caption where it survives.