Disclaimer: my egyptian knowledge is corrupt and not broad-enough-based, like many users on this board... So please don't quote me. However, I do think I have something to contribute on this topic below.

I don't like this connection of Osiris with Orion. Horus is fine. I think I've seen a stellar picture of a Falcon-headed Horus, in the past.

Orion is sometimes called Oreius in Greek. Horus is sometimes called Orus in Greek. It doesn't seem like a stretch that Orus=Oreius to me, or that somebody in the past made this connection. Especially with Egyptian writing missing vowels.

As for Osiris, Newton connects him to the star Sirius. There is a book on Canopus that connects him to that star instead.

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"It is thus an open question as to how the anceint Egyptians percieved the stars in that region, and what associations they made regarding them, and in what manner they illustrated them."
-- Yes, but... this topic has been studied in the past. I have previously posted on this topic. If you are willing to buy a book (which I was not willing to buy)... this book seems like a good buy on Egyptian Astronomy:

[www.culturediff.org]
"First part : The very first stellar clocks

From the First Intermediate Period and the Middle Kingdom (2200 - 1800 before our era) come twenty or so wooden sarcophagi on the interior lid of which were painted diagrams whose study reveals that they were indeed star clocks then used to tell the hours of the night. These clocks worked on the basis of the sighting of the successive risings of stars which we today term as decanal since their heliacal risings, that is to say, their reappearances above the eastern horizon after they had disappeared from the night sky for about seventy days, occurred at ten-days interval each. The study of their stellar arrangements, of the celestial imagery developed, of the content of the offering formula, of the historical context, leads to establish the chronology of their creation, consequently, to recount their evolution."

Second part : New Kingdom astronomical ceilings and water clocks

As well as the stellar clocks decorating the interior lid of wooden sarcophagi dating from the First Intermediate Period and the Middle Kingdom, the New Kingdom astronomical ceilings and water clocks (1545 - 1080 before our era) let appear a clear distinction between the northern and southern skies : a North-South differentiation which the superposition of two or three parallel strips of hieroglyphic inscriptions from now on illustrates. One of these strips lists, in the order of their risings in the eastern sky, the decanal stars and the five planets visible with the naked eye. A second one refers to the northern sky and the constellations filling it, on both sides of which were mentioned the names of the lunar deities, sometimes those of the lunar months as well. Although the celestial imagery is much more developed on the ceiling of New Kingdom tombs than on the interior lid of Middle Kingdom sarcophagi, the continuation is self-evident, as the comparative table of the decanal star lists testifies.

Third part : The decanal stars cycle

On the ceiling of the sepulchral chamber of the cenotaph of Seti I at Abydos and the tomb of Ramses IV at Western Thebes were written down two kinds of star lists : a first one based upon the risings of the decans ; a second one, upon their transits in the southern meridian. This funerary composition known as the Book of Nut however not only mentions the decanal stars. It also tells us in great details about their cycle, that is to say, their successive risings, transits and settings in the sky of ancient Egypt. More generally, those funerary texts invite us to better understand the vision which the ancient Egyptians had of the succession of the stars and planets in their sky."


FIRST PART : THE VERY FIRST STELLAR CLOCKS
1. The different parts of a stellar clock
1.1. The celestial imagery drawn on the vertical strip
1.2. The stellar diagram
1.3. The horizontal strip
2. The first starlists
3. The content of the twenty stellar clocks
3.1. Stellar clock n°1 (Meshet, Asyût)
3.2. Stellar clock n°2 (It-ib, Asyût)
3.3. Stellar clock n°3 (Khou en Seker, Asyût)
3.4. Stellar clock n°4 (Idy, Asyût)
3.5. Stellar clock n°5 (Maât, Asyût)
3.6. Stellar clock n°6
3.7. Stellar clock n°7 (Asyût)
3.8. Stellar clock n°8 (Ashyt, Thebes)
3.9. Stellar clock n°9 (Iker, Gebelein)
3.10. Stellar clock n°10 (Hekat, Aswan)
3.11. Stellar clock n°11
3.12. Stellar clock n°12 (Khou en Seker, Asyût)
3.13. Stellar clock n°13 (Djaouaou, Asyût)
3.14. Stellar clock n°14 (Djaouaou, Asyût)
3.15. Stellar clock n°15 (Asyût)
3.16. Stellar clock n°16 (Asyût)
3.17. Stellar clock n°17 (Asyût)
3.18. Stellar clock n°19 (Shemes, Asyût)
3.19. Stellar clock n°20 (Merenptah, Abydos)
4. Dating the stellar clocks
4.1. Stellar arrangements
4.2. Meaning of the hieroglyphic names of the decans
4.3. Grouping the stellar clocks
4.4. The historical context
4.5. The wandering of the Egyptian civil year
4.6. From stellar clocks to astronomical ceilings


SECOND PART : NEW KINGDOM ASTRONOMICAL CEILINGS AND WATER CLOCKS
1. Introduction
2. The astronomical ceiling of the tomb of Senenmut
3. The Karnak water clock
4. The astronomical ceiling of the tomb of Seti I
5. The astronomical ceiling of the Ramasseum
6. The North-South differentiation
7. The imagery related to the northern sky
7.1. The northern constellations
7.2. The months list
7.3. The gods of the northern sky
8. The imagery related to the southern sky
8.1. The decanal star lists
8.2. The deification of the decans
8.3. The five planets visible with the naked eye
8.4. The epagomenal decans

THIRD PART : THE DECANAL STARS CYCLE
1. The Book of Nut
2. The Carlsberg Papyrus I
3. The decanal stars cycle
4. The decanal star lists
5. Dating the Book of Nut
6. Dating the decanal star lists
7. Several mythological data




Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 08/03/2007 09:15PM by rich.