"Alexandria Triad" Abstract

22 July 2011

There is no doubt that after the Macedonian conquest, Egypt became a Hellenistic Kingdom in both structure and traits under the Ptolemaic Dynasty. After the Macedonian Conquest, thousands of Greeks came to Egypt in the form of soldiers, artists, poets and scientists. There is no doubt that the Ptolemaic kings were keen to find common elements between the diverse multi-spectra in the emerging kingdom. The most important of these elements was religion, which led the first of the Ptolemaic kings, Ptolemy I Soter, to unify the two social elements in Egypt under a new religious triad that encompassed a distinguished mix of deep-rooted Egyptian deities that were worshiped by the Egyptians over thousands of years, and the traits distinguishing the Greek religion. To do this, Soter employed a religious committee that included the Egyptian priest “Manetho” and the Greek priest “Timotheos”. The new triad emerged with Alexandria, capital of Ptolemaic Egypt, as its base. At the head of the triad was the god “Serapis”; representing one of the most important Egyptian deities, “Osiris”, who was worshiped by all ancient Egyptian people being the god of the underworld. It was not difficult afterwards to convince the Greeks that this is their “Dionysus” or even “Zeus”. The new deity came in two forms; an animal form familiar to the ancient Egyptians in their deities, and a human form familiar to the Greeks. The other two parts of the triad were the ancient “Isis”, representing Mother-goddess; and the child “Horus”, the Egyptian deity who was represented in a new Greek form under the name of “Harpocrates”. Through this new triad, the Ptolemaic kings were able to unify Egyptian and Greek beliefs and thus guaranteed political loyalty and a boost in production.