HORUS, the name of an Egyptian god, if not of several dis tinct gods. To all forms of Horus (Egyptian Heir), the falcon was sacred; the name Hor, written with a standing figure of that bird, is connected with a root signifying "upper," and ably means "the high-flyer." The tame sacred falcon on its perch the commonest symbol of divinity in early hiero glyphic writing; the commonest title of the king in the earliest dynasties, and his first title later, was that which named him Horus. Hawk gods were the presiding deities of Poi (Pe) and Nekhen, which had been the royal quarters in the capitals of the two primeval kingdoms of Upper and Lower Egypt, at Buto and opposite El Kab. A principal festival in very early times was the "worship of Horus," and the kings of the prehistoric dynasties were afterwards called "the worshippers of Horus." The Northern Kingdom in particular was under the patronage of Horus. He was a solar divinity, but appears very early in the Osiris cycle of deities, as son of Isis and probably of Osiris, and opponent of Seth.
As a sun-god Horus not only worsted the hostile darkness and avenged his father, but also daily renewed himself. He was thus identical with his own father from one point of view. In the mythology, especially that of the New Kingdom, or of quite late times, we find the following standing epithets applied to more or less distinct forms or phases: Harendotes (Har-ent-yotf), i.e., "HOr, avenger of his father (Osiris)"; Harpokhrates (Har-p khrat), i.e., "HOr the child," with finger in mouth, sometimes seated on a lotus-flower; Harsiesis (Har-si-Esi), i.e., "HOr, son of Isis," as a child; Har-en-khebi, "Hor in Chemmis," a child nursed by Isis in the papyrus marshes; Haroeris (Har-uer), i.e., "the elder HOr," at Ombos, etc., human-headed or falcon-headed; Harsemteus (Har-sem-teu), i.e., "HOr, uniter of the two lands," and others.
See EGYPT: Religion; Meyer, art. "Horos" in Roscher, Lexicon der Griech. and Rom. Mythologie.