Khonsu

Khonsu (also spelled Chonsu, Khensu, Khons, or Chons; in Coptic, Shons) was the ancient Egyptian god of the Moon. His name means "traveller," a reference to the Moon’s nightly path across the sky. Together with Thoth, he helped measure time, and he was linked to baboons. Khonsu also played a key role in bringing new life to all living beings. In Thebes, he was part of a divine family known as the Theban Triad, alongside his mother Mut and father Amun.

In art, Khonsu usually appears as a mummy with a sidelock of hair—a symbol of childhood—and wears the menat necklace while holding a crook and flail. He is closely tied to other divine children like Horus and Shu. He could also be shown with a falcon’s head, and like Horus, he was seen as a protector and healer, often wearing a moon disk and crescent. Khonsu appears in the Pyramid Texts and Coffin Texts, where he has a fierce character, but he became more prominent in the New Kingdom, when he was called the "Greatest God of the Great Gods." Most of the Karnak temple complex was built around him during the Ramesside period. The Temple of Khonsu at Karnak is still well preserved; one of its walls shows a creation myth where Khonsu is a great snake that fertilizes the Cosmic Egg to create the world.

Khonsu’s reputation as a healer spread beyond Egypt. The Bentresh stela tells how a princess of Bekhten was instantly cured when an image of Khonsu arrived. King Ptolemy IV, after recovering from an illness, called himself "Beloved of Khonsu Who Protects His Majesty and Drives Away Evil Spirits." His cult centers included Memphis, Hibis, and Edfu.

Khonsu’s name, "traveller," reflects the Moon’s journey across the night sky (the Moon itself was called Iah in Egyptian). He was also known as Embracer, Pathfinder, Defender, and Healer, and was thought to watch over night travelers. As a god of light in darkness, people called on him for protection from wild animals and for healing. It was said that when Khonsu made the crescent moon shine, women conceived, cattle became fertile, and every nostril and throat filled with fresh air.

The earliest mention of Khonsu is in the Cannibal Hymn of the Pyramid Texts. There, he acts as a butcher of other gods, removing their entrails and offering them to the dead king so the king could absorb their magic and gain immortality and vitality. In the Cannibal Hymn of Unas’s pyramid, Khonsu is part of a group of five bloodthirsty helpers, including three unknown deities named "The Seizer of Heads," "The One with his head raised," and "The One Above the Redness," along with the god Shezmu. These figures were placed in the sky, likely as constellations, and were seen as messengers of death sent by the deceased. From the Old Kingdom to the Middle Kingdom, tomb inscriptions call Khonsu a Wepwety (messenger), a term for underworld spirits that brought death and punished the dead.

Further connections appear in Coffin Texts Spell 310, where Khonsu is the son of the goddess Shezmetet and burns hearts with his fiery wrath. Spell 311 helps the deceased transform into Khonsu to steal gods’ magical powers and fight off enemies; here he is called "Khonsu who lives on hearts." In the New Kingdom, the goddess Ammit took over the role of devourer of hearts.

Khonsu’s link to the moon comes from the crescent moon’s resemblance to an ancient Egyptian sickle sword, which he embodies as a tool of justice, earning him the title "Khonsu the sharp." Early signs of his lunar nature appear in Coffin Texts Spells 197 and 195, where the deceased meets Khonsu returning from Punt—a land that symbolized the east and the place where the sun and moon rise. In the New Kingdom, the lunar cycle was tied to life’s stages. The crescent moon was also compared to a bull’s horns and became a male symbol of fertility. A Ptolemaic inscription from the Khonsu Temple in Thebes describes Khonsu and the sun god as bulls crossing the sky and meeting in the east as "the two illuminators of the heavens." This meeting may refer to the full moon or to the sun and moon being in the sky at the same time. The crescent moon is shown as a young bull; Khonsu ages into an old, castrated bull during the full moon before renewing himself at the start of the next cycle. Depictions of Khonsu as a child or young bull mark the beginning of the lunar cycle and the month’s renewal. A rarer image of him as a two-faced child represents the time when the moon is invisible at night. His aging from child to old man also applied to the yearly cycle, making Khonsu in his youthful form (Khonsu-pa-khered) the bringer of spring and fertility. Inscriptions in his Karnak temple call him "the first great [son] of Amun, the beautiful youth; who maketh himself young in Thebes in the form of Ra, the son of the goddess Nubit. A child in the morning, an old man in the evening, a youth at the beginning of the year."