Papyrus Bookmark - Chnum

Chnum
Chnum, a creator god who formed humans and all things on the potter's wheel. Guardian and giver of the Nile spring at Elephantine. Chnum was also generally the lord of water, the Nile, its floods, lakes and cataracts. He is depicted in human form with a ram's head and double-turned horns. He was worshipped in Elephantine and Esna.

Chnum was probably a supra-regional god and therefore belongs to the family of gods of the 1st Dynasty. The number of his cult sites can hardly be counted. His functions as a fertility god and the meaningful significance of his cult have encouraged the creation of legends about his abilities as a potter.

Chnum was the lord of the 1st cataract in Upper Egypt. From there he turned south to Nubia and north to Lower Egypt. His houses were numerous and the veneration he received was great. He created human beings because his father had given him the order to do so. Together with Satet and Anuket, he made sure that every year the Nile floods overflowed the banks and wetted the fields without causing any damage.

His father had assigned him the task of shaping people on his potter's wheel like the gods and also forming their ka. Thus Chnum bent daily to the Nile and gathered from its banks the mud which he moulded on his wheel, before depositing them in the womb of their mothers, where they grew up to be born, cared for by his indefatigable wife Heket. Thus he became the "father of fathers" and the "mother of mothers" and was praised in all places as the "giver of fertility and maker of gods, men, animals and plants".