~click on pics for larger views~
Sunday, after running 5 miles in Dreamland, I became entranced in exploring some Egyptian symbolism.
The falcon perched upon the angel obelisk (middle) suggested to me the legend of Horus. His name means "he who is above" and "he who is distant". The falcon had been worshipped from earliest times as a cosmic deity whose body represents the heavens and whose eyes represent the sun and the moon. The pic is somewhat grainy since it was taken at 'quite a distance' from the 50 ft. tall obelisk. (Another, fuller view and history of the obelisk is here.)
Atop, is the back window of a mausoleum of pure dynastic design. Though Anubis, the jackal god, was considered the Egyptian deity of the dead, the entity here depicted seems too humanlike to be so considered. Perhaps having jackals running around a cemetery is just too outrageous for Dreamland?
At bottom is the front-top plate of the same mausoleum depicting a winged solar disk. This is a form that the god Horus Behudety (Horus of Edfu) takes in his battles with Seth. The god Thoth used his magic to turn Horus into a sun-disk with splendid outstretched wings. The goddesses Nekhbet and Uazet in the form of uraeus snakes joined him at his side. However, if you look at the right wing of the solar disk, there has appeared, through mere weathering I'd suppose, yet another Horus-falcon depiction fading in. An otherworld manifestation?! (For those interested in the origins of such symbols, this site offers an interesting explanation claiming an association between the Horus sun-disk and the bennu-bird (mythical phoenix) and linking both to the total eclipse of the sun!)
(By the way, I got so absorbed in taking pics that I barely emerged from the cemetery before the gates swung shut for the night.)



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