Osiris

In the canonical Egyptian mythic cycle, Osiris is a son of Geb (Earth) and Nut (Sky), brother and spouse of Isis, and brother of Set and Nephthys; he is also father, in mythic terms, of Horus the Younger. In the central Osiris myth, Set murders and dismembers Osiris to usurp the throne. Isis (with assistance from Nephthys) searches for and recovers his scattered parts — collecting all but one (classically reported as Osiris's genitalia) — and through assembling and wrapping his body enables his return to life. This death-and-recovery sequence establishes Osiris as the resurrected lord of the dead and the model for royal and mortuary regeneration.

Osiris is commonly depicted in mummiform as a pharaonic figure: partially wrapped from the chest downward, wearing the Atef crown (the White Crown of Upper Egypt flanked by ostrich feathers), carrying the crook and flail, and bearing a pharaonic beard. His skin is typically rendered green (a symbol of rebirth) or black (alluding to the fertility of Nile silt).

Osiris rules the underworld and the realm of the dead (epitomized by the epithet Khenti-Amentiu, 'Foremost of the Westerners,' and titles such as 'Lord of Silence'), provides the pattern and promise of postmortem resurrection, and is intimately connected to fertility cycles of vegetation and the annual Nile inundation. Through myth and ritual, deceased kings and others are imagined to be integrated with Osiris to inherit eternal life via imitative funerary technologies (mummification, offerings, mortuary formulae). In some contexts he is syncretized with lunar deity aspects (e.g., with Iah), producing lunar associations in later or syncretic attestations.