Osiris (Greek language, also Usiris; the Egyptian
language name is variously transliterated Asar,
Aser, Ausar, Wesir, or Ausare) is the Egyptian
god of life, death, and fertility. He is one of the
oldest Gods for whom records have survived and
first appears in the pyramid texts around 2400
BC, when his cult is already well established. He
was widely worshipped until the forceable
suppression of paganism in the Christian
era.[1][2] Osiris was not only the redeemer and
merciful judge of the dead in the afterlife, but
also the underworld agency that granted all life,
including sprouting vegetation and the fertile
flooding of the Nile River. The Kings of Egypt
were associated with Osiris in death such that as
Osiris rose from the dead so would they, in
union with him, inherit eternal life through a
process of imitative magic. By the New Kingdom
all men, not just pharaohs, were believed to be
associated with Osiris at death if they incurred
the costs of the assimilation rituals.[3]
Osiris is the oldest son of the Earth god, Geb,
and the sky goddess, Nut as well as being
brother and husband of Isis, with Horus being
considered his posthumously begotten son. He is
usually depicted as a green-skinned pharaoh
wearing the Atef crown, a form of the white
crown of upper Egypt with a plume of feathers to
either side. Typically he is also depicted holding
the crook and flail which signify divine authority
in Egyptian kings, but which were originally
unique to Osiris and his own origin-gods (see
below), and his feet and lower body are wrapped,
as though already partly mummified. The
information we have on the myths of Osiris is
derived from allusions contained in the pyramid
texts, and, much later, in narrative style from the
writings of Plutarch[4] and Diodorus
- (LO.1368)
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