Thoth Creation Myth

The Egyptians had many stories about the creation of the universe, the oldest of which originating from Heliopolis (Shafer 1991: 91-92). This myth involves a being named Atum manifesting out from a primeval darkness (or waters) to generate more beings through means of either spit or ejaculate. Most of what scholars know about this myth comes from portions of the Pyramid Texts (David 2002: 84). Also from the Old Kingdom (though still later than this Heliopolitan myth) is another creation myth stemming from Hermopolis, Thoth cultic center (David 2002: 83). This myth speaks of the occurrences that supposedly happened prior to Atum’s manifestation. A group of eight gods, called the Ogdoad, represent the four “elements of pre-creation”, a male and
In CT76, the Ogdoad is invoked, though here they are referred to as “Chaos-gods” (or Ḥeḥ gods) most likely due to being gods who existed prior to the creation of ma’at (divine order and justice) (Faulkner 1977:1: 77-78; Shafer 1991: 94-85). However, Thoth nor any of his epithets are mentioned. Should the correlations to Thoth have been stronger, then surely his would have been mentioned. Additionally, there may be evidence that the Ogdoad’s association to Hermopolis preceded Thoth’s (despite him having been quite prominent in the Old Kingdom) (Wilkinson 2003: 213). The Egyptian name for Hermopolis was Khenmu, or Ḫmnw, meaning “Eight Town” (Pinch 2002: 175; Shafer 1991: 94). (In hieroglyphs, the city’s name is rendered with eight counting strokes followed by the town determinative, sometimes with a phonetic indicator in the middle (Faulkner 1991: 191; Budge 1969: 98).) It is my belief that this city was named after the Ogdoad and its creation myth. This is not to say that Thoth was not the primarily attributed to the Ogdoad. The Egyptians upheld this belief to at least the Late Period (as evidenced by a bronze statue of Thoth overseeing them while seated at a throne) (Shafer 1991: 35). However, it would seem that the Ogdoad could very well have been conceived as existing independently (as evidenced visually in the Book of Fayum) (Pinch 2002: 175). I believe the connection was established perhaps as a way to reconcile a major deity with the pre-existing myth that existed in the same time and space without much issue of one needing to overpower another. To go further with this would be to argue that the link functioned to bolster Thoth’s mythological authority over the city after the Ogdoad-myth was