Deity · Egyptian · c. 1550 BCE
The Four Sons of Horus
Also called Imsety, Hapi, Duamutef, Qebehsenuef
Four gods, four jars, four organs: liver, lungs, stomach and intestines, each with its own guardian and its own compass direction.
Well sourced
Imsety, Hapy, Duamutef and Qebehsenuef, one to each of the organs removed in embalming, and each with a goddess assigned to guard him in turn — a protective scheme with two layers, applied to the parts of a person rather than to the person. The Pyramid Texts name the four as children of Horus who help the king ascend, before the jars they are now known from take their familiar form. That order matters: the figures are older than the containers, and the canopic lids carved with their heads are a later fitting-out of a set that already existed.
Identity
Where does the name come from?
Where it was actually worshipped
None. They exist as the four canopic jars and on the coffin, not as a cult.
A figure with temples and a figure that only ever existed on a page are different kinds of thing, and the difference is easy to lose once both are entries in a list.
At a glance
Vitals
Vitals
Also known as
- First attested
- The Pyramid Texts · c. 2350–2100 BCE
- Named there as
- The children of Horus
- Rank
- Guardians of the Viscera
- Pantheon
- Egyptian
- Order
- Egyptian pantheon
- Base of operations
- None. They exist as the four canopic jars and on the coffin, not as a cult.
- Era
- c. 1550 BCE
- Traditions
- Egyptian
- Placed in
- The Great Gods of Egypt
Traits
- Domain
- Protection of the organs removed in embalming
- Traditional form
- Four canopic jar heads — human, baboon, jackal and falcon
2 attributed
What is it said to do?
Where these powers cluster
The 2 offices attributed to The Four Sons of Horus, grouped by kind. Segment width is the share of powers falling in each category.
A bar dominated by one colour means a specialist; an even spread means a figure the sources credit with almost anything.
- martial1
- transformation1
2 texts
Which texts say so?
When these texts were written
Each dot is one of the 2 texts that names The Four Sons of Horus, placed at that text's approximate date.
A wide spread means the figure was carried across many centuries and traditions; a tight cluster means a single period produced the whole record.
2 texts spanning roughly 800 years
Named as a body — the children of Horus, whom Horus is made to count, and who help the king ascend — rather than individually: Mercer's translation does not give Imsety, Hapy, Duamutef and Qebehsenuef by name, and the corpus records the text's own wording instead. The set exists here before the canopic jars it later stands on, which is the point; the jar lids and the organ assignments are the innovation.
Imsety keeps the liver, Hapi the lungs, Duamutef the stomach and Qebehsenuef the intestines; each is tied to a cardinal direction and a protective goddess.
Connections
What is it connected to?
Placement
Where does it sit in the hierarchies?
Answered from the sources
Common questions
Which texts mention The Four Sons of Horus?
What rank is The Four Sons of Horus?
How else is The Four Sons of Horus spelled?
What is The Four Sons of Horus said to do?
How old is The Four Sons of Horus?
Nearest in the corpus
If The Four Sons of Horus is what you came for, these are next
Chosen by proximity rather than by popularity: the same pantheon first, then the same rank, then the same kind of figure.
Khepri
The Morning Sun · Egyptian
The sun at dawn, in the form of a scarab beetle rolling it up over the horizon — one of the three daily aspects of the sun, and a pun on the word for coming into being.
Anubis
Guide of the Dead · Egyptian
Embalmer and psychopomp, who leads the dead to the scales — the office Western tradition eventually gives to Michael and to Azrael.
Horus
Falcon King · Egyptian
Son of Osiris, who contends eighty years with Set for the throne. Every living pharaoh was understood to be his incarnation.
Isis
Great of Magic · Egyptian
The great magician who reassembles Osiris and tricks Ra into surrendering his secret name. Her cult eventually reached as far as Roman Britain.
Nephthys
Lady of the House · Egyptian
Set's wife who sides with her sister Isis against him, and mourns Osiris at the head of the bier.
Osiris
Lord of the Dead · Egyptian
Murdered by Set, reassembled by Isis, and installed as judge of the dead. He is the earliest fully developed dying-and-rising sovereign we have.
The books behind The Four Sons of Horus
Every claim on this profile is attributed to one of these. They are public domain, listed oldest first, and each links to a full text where one is freely available.
The Pyramid Texts
Anonymous; carved for the kings and queens of the Fifth and Sixth Dynasties · c. 2350–2100 BCE · Old Egyptian
Read The Pyramid Texts in full ↗The Egyptian Book of the Dead
Anonymous; tr. E. A. Wallis Budge · c. 1550 BCE onward · Egyptian
Read The Egyptian Book of the Dead in full ↗Cover: Public domain · Hunefer · Wikimedia file page
Corpus last revised 29 August 2026. A reference site’s credibility rests on being maintained, so this is the date the sourced records last changed — not the date the page was rebuilt.