Khenti-heh-f
one of the twenty-nine gods given a boat at the Osiris festival
Identified
Group: the twenty-nine gods dedicated a boat in the Osiris ceremonies at the great sanctuaries — Budge cites Dendera — where "thirty-four papyrus boats were employed, and these were lit up with 365 lights, or lamps" [budge-1904].
The gods of Mendes with Anubis occupied one boat; Isis, Nephthys, Horus and Thoth had one each; the remaining twenty-nine were dedicated to:
Mestha · Hapi · Tuamutef · Qebh-sennuf · Sah-heq · Armauai · Maa-tef-f · Ar-ren-f-tchesef · Am-Tet · Nefer-hat · Ast-sen-ari-tcher · Sem · Her-a-f · Sent · Ari-maat-f-tchesef · Sebakhsen · Heqes · Neter-bah · Qetet · Khenti-heh-f · An-qer-am-unnut-f · Netcheh-netcheh · Asbu · Per-em-khet-khet · Erta-nef-nebt · Tesher-maati · Khent-het-Anes · Maa-em-qerh · An-f-em-hru-seksek
Thirty-four boats and three hundred and sixty-five lamps. One light for every day of the year, on a flotilla of paper boats, for a god who is buried and replaced annually.
The festival around it
The same passage sets out the calendar, and it is unusually concrete:
On the sixteenth day, the Festival of Osiris Khent Amenti. On the twenty-fourth, "the model of the god of the preceding year was taken out from its place and buried suitably, and the new Osiris was embalmed in the sanctuary." On the last day of the month the Tet was set up at Tettu, "because on this day the divine members of Osiris were brought" [budge-1904].
And the detail that explains the delay:
The new Osiris remained without burial for seven days because of the tradition which declared that the god had remained for seven days in the womb of his mother Nut when she was with child. [budge-1904]
The interval between making the god and burying him is the length of his gestation. The ritual is timed to a pregnancy.
Under the companies rule (C246) this is a pointer rather than an entry. Found by locating the name and reading the ceremony whole (C393).
The record
Every claim above traces to a row here. Source, exact place in that source, and what it actually supports.
| Source | Locus | Attests |
|---|---|---|
[budge-1904] | *Gods of the Egyptians* II, on the setting up of the Tet, pp. 128–130 | **Khenti-heh-f** among the **twenty-nine gods dedicated a boat**; **thirty-four papyrus boats lit with 365 lamps**; the boats of Mendes-with-Anubis, Isis, Nephthys, Horus and Thoth |
[budge-1904] | *ibid.* | the festival calendar — the old Osiris buried and the new one embalmed on the 24th; the **Tet** set up at **Tettu**; **seven days unburied, matching the seven days in Nut's womb** |
[budge-1904] | *ibid.*, Budge's conclusion | that these Ptolemaic-period views of Osiris "were substantially the same as those which were in vogue in the times when the **Pyramid Texts** were [written]" |
Sources
[budge-1904]— Budge, The Gods of the Egyptians (1904), vol. II. Public domain, archived. He cites Brugsch, Recueil i. 15–16; Dümichen, Resultate iv. 1–27; Mariette, Denderah iv, pll. 35–39 — none of them archived here, so the roster reaches this corpus at second hand.
Open questions
- Get Mariette's Denderah, plates 35–39. The boat list and the festival calendar both come from there via Budge. Mariette's Sérapéum is already archived; the Denderah volumes would put this passage on a first-hand footing.
- Twenty-nine boats, and four gods with one each, and one shared. Establish whether the number 34 or the number 365 is the organising one — a lamp per day is a strong claim and Budge states it without comment.
- Most of the twenty-nine are not in the census (C397). Several are describable compound names — An-f-em-hru-seksek, Per-em-khet-khet, Erta-nef-nebt — and none has an entry.
- The seven days in Nut's womb. A gestation of seven days for Osiris is not the usual figure and Budge gives it as tradition without a source. Find the text.
- Is this the same Tet ceremony as the Djed-pillar raising? Budge's heading is "SETTING UP TET." If so, this passage dates and locates one of the best-known Egyptian rituals.
Cite this entry
Research grade: ⇄duplicate — A second spelling or roster listing of a name entered elsewhere.
"Khenti-heh-f", The Egyptian God Corpus,
graded duplicate, retrieved 2026-08-10.