God Ptah | the God of Creation and Craftsmen

• 16 / 5 / 2023

Ptah was the high priest of his temple at Memphis and also the god of Crafts. He was one of the Triad of Memphis with his wife Sekhmet (one of the oldest and most powerful deities. represented as a lioness, the daughter of the sun god Amun Ra, and is known as the goddess of sun and war)and Nefertum (he represents the sunrise, and it is said that he created mankind from his tears).

Ptah also held an important ritual called (Opening of the Mouth), a funerary ritual to ensure that the deceased person would be able to eat and drink in the afterlife.

In the Old Kingdom, he was already identified with Sokar, the god of the necropolis of Memphis: Ptah and Sokar thus unified the city of the living with the city of the dead. A further identification, which moves from Osiris as the god of the dead, leads to the formation of Ptah-Sokar-Osiris, as a transcendent divinity in Memphis and, by now. Starting from the New Kingdom he regains his individuality, he is the husband of the goddess Sekhmet and the father of the god Nefertum.

Path

• Lord of Ankh Tawy 'The Life of the Two Lands' refers to the unification of Upper and Lower Egypt.
• Nefer Her "Ptah with a beautiful face" refers to the belief that his flesh was made of gold.
• Ptah-Sokar-Osiris : At the end of the period (737–332 BC), the combined traits of the gods gained popularity, and this composite deity assisted the deceased in his trip to the afterlife.  A carved wooden statue of the composite god was among the funeral items placed inside the tomb containing the deceased.
• Ptah-Sokar-Atoum's affiliation with the deity of the dead, Sokar, and the creator god of Heliopolis, Atoum, shares many characteristics with Osiris.

Ptah is depicted as a man with green skin, sheathed in a very tight-fitting shroud and capped with a simple blue cap; he holds vertically in both hands a composite scepter bringing together: the sceptre Ouas, the cross ânkh and the pillar Djed, the emblems of life, stability and omnipotence. Unlike the other gods, he wears the straight beard of the pharaohs. Around the neck it has a wide collar held in place by a counterweight on the back. Sometimes, it rests on a pedestal (base of the throne) which has the shape of a hieroglyph and whose meaning is also a symbol for Maât ("world order").

Present the architectural wonders dedicated to Ptah:

The great temple of Ptah in Memphis: A complex that radiated power and divinity, becoming the beating heart of the worship of Ptah.

Other curiosities: The minor temples and altars scattered across Egypt reveal the extent of his adoration.
Beautiful decorations and artwork that honoured Ptah's strength and inventiveness were found inside the temples.

Memphis, where a huge temple, the Hout-ka-Ptah (Ht-ka-Ptah "The castle of the ka of Ptah") was erected. We know the arrangement of the temple thanks to Herodotus (Greek Historian, v.484-v.425) who visited the site at the time of the first Persian invasion (XXVIIth dynasty, 525-401). 

Abydos where he owned a chapel like five other deities in the temple of Sethi I (1294-1279). This temple with atypical architecture is better known as the great temple of Abydos. Ptah was worshipped there under the name of Ptah-Sokar. 

In the neighbourhood of Deir el-Medina, there were sixteen to eighteen chapels. The largest were dedicated to Hathor, Ptah, and Rameses II. The workers seem to have honored a particular form of the God under the name of Ptah-Reshep as protector of the artisans.