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childbirth, religion and magic.

Contraception

The Egyptians had their own ways and means of get-

ting around the fact that sex produced children. They

had both contraceptives and abortions, mostly these

were prescriptions that were filled with unpleasant

ingredients such as crocodile dung. Here is one of the

nicer ones:

Prescription to make a woman cease

to become pregnant for one, two or

three years: Grind together finely a

measure of acacia dates with some

honey. Moisten seed-wool with the

mixture and insert it in the vagina.

Ebers Medical Papyrus

-- Tyldesley, J.A. 1995,

Daughters of

Isis: Women of Ancient Egypt

, p. 62

Incest

From the close family relationships in Egyptian my-

thology and the fact that Egyptians seemed to have

no taboo against incest, many have concluded that

incest was rife in ancient Egypt.

There were probably some brother and sister marriag-

es, but more likely than not, the siblings in question

would have been half-brothers and half-sisters. The

problem arises from the limited Egyptian terms of kin-

ship, which are very confusing. A ‘father’ could refer to

the actual father, the grandfather or male ancestors,

while ‘mother’ could be the same, but for the females

of the family. ‘Sister’ could mean a lover, a wife, a

mistress or concubine, niece or aunt!

The royal family, on the other hand, did have more

incestuous marriages. One theory is that the royal

blood ran through the females, not the males, and

so to become pharaoh a man had to marry a royal

princess (who would be his sister or half-sister). This

is known as the Heiress Princess theory, which is now

largely discredited.

Another explanation for these marriages is that:

The prevalence of brother-sister mar-

riages within the New Kingdom royal

family, a custom in obvious contrast

to contemporary non-royal marriage

patterns, appears to have been an

attempt to reinforce the links between

the royal family and the gods who

themselves frequently indulged in

brother-sister unions.

-- Tyldesley, J.A. 1995,

Daughters of

Isis: Women of Ancient Egypt

, p. 62

Even the gods had sex in ancient Egypt. Ra (in the

form of Atem) masturbated his children Shu and Tef-

nut into existence!

Atem is he who masturbated in Iunu

(On, Heliopolis). He took his

phallus in his grasp that he

might create orgasm by means

of it, and so were born the twins

Shu and Tefnut.

Ancient Egyptian Worldview

Expressions

Hathor and Ra

Baba a predynastic baboon god,

taunted Ra who stood for Set becoming

ruler rather than Horus, “Your shrine is