Akhet (hieroglyph)

This article is about the hieroglyph. For other uses, see Akhet (disambiguation).
N27
Akhet (horizon)
in hieroglyphs

Akhet (Ancient Egyptian: Ꜣḫt; Gardiner: N27) is an Egyptian hieroglyph that represents the sun rising over a mountain. It is translated as "horizon" or "the place in the sky where the sun rises".[1] Betrò describes it as "Mountain with the Rising Sun" (The hieroglyph for "mountain" is 𓈋) and an ideogram for "horizon".[2]

Akhet appears in the Egyptian name for the Great Pyramid of Giza (Akhet Khufu),[3] and in the assumed name of Akhetaten, the city founded by pharaoh Akhenaten.[4] It also appears in the name of the syncretized form of Ra and Horus, Ra-Horakhty (Rꜥ Ḥr Ꜣḫty, "Ra–Horus of the Horizons").[5]

Hieroglyphic for the horizon guarded by Aker.

In ancient Egyptian architecture, the pylon mirrored the hieroglyph.[6][7] The symbol is sometimes connected with the astrological sign of Libra[8] and the Egyptian deity Aker, who guards the eastern and western horizons.

  1. ^ Gardiner, Alan H. (1957). Egyptian grammar : being an introduction to the study of hieroglyphs. 1969 printing (3rd ed.). London: Published on behalf of the Griffith Institute, Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, by Oxford University Press. p. 489. ISBN 9780900416354. OCLC 229894.
  2. ^ Betrò (1995), p. 161.
  3. ^ Verner 2001, p. 189.
  4. ^ David 1998, p. 125.
  5. ^ Watterson 2013, p. 59, Stroud, Gloucestershire.
  6. ^ Wilkinson 2005, p. 195.
  7. ^ Krupp 1993, p. 308-310.
  8. ^ Nozedar, Adele (2010). The illustrated signs & symbols sourcebook : an A to Z compendium of over 1000 designs. Sterling Publishing Company, Incorporated. ISBN 978-1-4351-6181-8. OCLC 960951107.