InEgyptian mythology, Heryshaf, or Hershef (Ancient Egyptian: ḥrjšf "He who is on His Lake"),[2] transcribed in GreekasHarsaphesorArsaphes (Koinē Greek: Ἁρσαφής) was an ancient ram deity whose cult was centered in ancient Heracleopolis Magna. He was identified with Ra and Osirisinancient Egyptian religion,[2] as well as Dionysus[3]orHeracles in the interpretatio graeca. The identification with Heracles may be related to the fact that in later times his name was sometimes reanalysed as ḥrj-šf.t "He who is over strength". One of his titles was "Ruler of the Riverbanks". Heryshaf was a creator and fertility god who was born from the primordial waters. He was pictured as a ram or a man with a ram's head.
The site goes back to the Early Dynastic Period or the Old Kingdom of Egypt. The precise founding date of Herakleopolis is not known, but an entry on the Palermo Stone reporting king Den's visit to the sacred lake of Heryshef at Nenj-neswt, suggests that the town had already been founded by the 1st Dynasty. The site was called nn-nswtinDemotic which was pronounced ǝhnesinCoptic, Heracleopolis (Magna) during the Hellenistic period and the Roman Empire and Ihnasiyya in Egyptian Arabic.[4]
No remains of the Old Kingdom temple survive. Flinders Petrie found remains of a temple at the site dating to the Twelfth Dynasty. The Twelfth Dynasty temple was rebuilt during the Eighteenth Dynasty and later refurbished during the Nineteenth Dynasty.[5] During the reign of Ramesses II, a pronaos was added to the temple. The sixteen palm columns used were taken from existing temples, possibly those of Djedkare IsesiorSahure. Yasuoka speculates that Ramesses II's fourth son, Prince Khaemweset, may have been the official who directed this project.[6]
Nedjemankh, whose coffin was looted from Egypt in 2011 and sold to the Metropolitan Museum of Art before being returned to Egypt in 2019,[8] is also believed to have been a priest of Heryshaf.[9]
^Reviewed Work: Ihnasya el-Medina (Herakleopolis Magna): Its Importance and Its Role in Pharaonic History by Mohamed Gamal el-Din Mokhtar, Review by: Hans Goedicke, Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt, Vol. 20 (1983), p. 119; via JSTOR
^Koichiro Wada, "Provincial Society and Cemetery Organization in the New Kingdom", Studien zur Altägyptischen Kultur, Bd. 36 (2007), pp. 347–389
^Yoshifumi Yasuoka, "Some remarks on the palm columns from the pronaos of Heracleopolis Magna", The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology, Vol. 97 (2011), pp. 31–60
^Morris L. Bierbrier, Historical Dictionary of Ancient Egypt, Scarecrow Press, August 14, 2008, p. 170
Hart, George (2005). "Heryshaf". The Routledge dictionary of Egyptian gods and goddesses (2nd ed.). London, New York: Routledge. pp. 68–69. ISBN978-0-415-36116-3. OCLC57281093. Retrieved 16 December 2009.
Media related to Heryshaf at Wikimedia Commons
