An archaeologist and a biologist have found evidence of birds being sacrificed to the goddess Isis in the excavated ruins of the Temple of Isis in Pompeii. In their study, reported in the International Journal of Osteoarchaeology, Chiara Assunta Corbino and Beatrice Demarchi studied frescos found at the ancient site revealing the role birds played in ritual banquets. (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/oa.3224)
The goddess Isis was first worshiped by people in ancient Egypt. Myths from the time suggest she resurrected her husband and slain brother and thus came to be known as a goddess who helped the dead enter the afterlife. Worship of Isis spread to ancient Greece, where the name meant “great mother,” and eventually to Italy and the rest of the Roman Empire.
During this latter time, belief in Isis became a cult-like obsession in which she was worshiped as part of ritual celebrations. Corbino and Demarchi suggest that such rituals were likely performed by priests. They believe they have found evidence of such rituals in frescos on the walls of the Temple of Isis in Pompeii.
Prior research has found that the Temple of Isis was mostly destroyed during an earthquake sometime around A.D. 62. Imagery in the frescos suggest they were added after the earthquake as part of renovations. The researchers found depictions of rituals involving birds. Thus far, they have found evidence of geese, turtle doves, chickens and ibises, along with pigs and various sea creatures. This new finding, the researchers suggest, adds more evidence to theories that birds were used in Isis worship rituals in other places.
The researchers note that the find is significant because such rituals were conducted in private; thus, little evidence of them have been found. The Isis frescos are the first to have been found in Italy. The researchers also note that the birds were charred, suggesting that the people conducting the rituals had eaten them—likely as part of a banquet similar to some of those shown in the frescos.
Many centuries before the Roman empire, Akhenaten—1373-1337 BCE—made history as Egypt’s “heretic Pharaoh.” Along with his wife, co-ruler, Nefertiti, Akhenaten completely changed most aspects of Egyptian religion, abandoning traditional polytheism and introducing the world’s first monotheism. Under his direction, workmen created a new city, ‘Amarna,’ from scratch. Akhenaten also introduced a new art style upsetting the traditional artistic conventions that he had inherited.
In much of Amarna art, the king and his family, as well as their staff, were depicted in a strange exaggerated physical form bordering on androgyny and even femininity. Features included: elongated head, almond-shaped eyes, protruding jaw, fleshy lips, serpentine neck, narrow shoulders, enlarged breasts, protruding belly and buttocks, wide hips, spindly arms and legs with bulging upper thighs, flat feet, spider-like fingers and toes, knee-joints that bend the opposite way, and even the rare absence of genitalia.
A virtually infinite array of explanations have been proposed for these bizarre features, but which, remain unsatisfactorily explained. Interpretations run the gamut from purely physical to purely symbolic. But writer Jonathon Perrin believes Akhenaten’s strange appearance, may have had nothing to do with his actual physical appearance, and more to do with birds.
In an article for Atlantis Rising Magazine, Perrin explains that Akhenaten had a great fondness for birds, having them painted all over his city in scenes of bucolic marshland bliss, and even keeping them in special areas of his city, primarily in the lush garden palaces. Besides being a common motif in quixotic Amarna art, where they, along with oxen, wine and flowers, were a daily sacrifice to the sungod Aten.
Birds, says Perrin, formed a key part of Akhenaten’s new religious ideology. During the first few years of his rule, Akhenaten worshipped all the gods of Egypt, but favored Ra-Horakhty, the syncretistic solar deity of Ra and Horus.
An ancient symbol, going back to the Old Kingdom, the akh bird was also very important to the king. The northern bald ibis was used in hieroglyphs to depict the akh, which was the highest form of soul a person could attain in the afterlife, a shining immortal spirit.
The case can be made that when he changed his name to Akhenaten, the king had taken on the very spirit of the Akh bird, and that he wished to imbue himself with the essence of the northern bald ibis bird (who symbolized “effectiveness”, “righteousness”, and “radiance”). If the akh was depicted as a bird, it makes sense that the king may have been adopting the physical attributes of the bird itself, to greater glorify his father and signify his own immortality.
Another bird important to Akhenaten was the immortal Bennu Bird of Heliopolis. Researcher Andrew Collins has noted that the akh shining spirit was bound up with the Heliopolitan creation myth of the bennu bird, or grey heron. When Ra first appeared over the formless void of Nun, he cast his light upon the primeval mound that emerged from the waters. This mound was called the benben stone, and on it landed the bennu bird, which was the “soul”, or Ba, of Ra. The bennu bird was immortal, and formed the template for the later Greek Phoenix bird of resurrection.
AR #128
The Bird King
by Jonathon Perrin
