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TheEnnead orGreat Ennead was a group of ninedeities inEgyptian mythology worshipped atHeliopolis: thesun godAtum; his childrenShu andTefnut; their childrenGeb andNut; and their childrenOsiris,Isis,Set, andNephthys.[2] The Ennead sometimes includesHorus the Elder; an ancient form of the falcon god, not the son of Osiris and Isis.
The Great Ennead was only one of several such groupings of nine deities in ancient Egypt. Claims to preeminence made by its Heliopolitan priests were not respected throughout Egypt, as eachnome typically had its own local deities, whose priests insisted stood above all others;[3] even in the nearby city ofMemphis, which along with Heliopolis is contained within the limits of modernCairo, the priests ofPtah celebrated him as singularly superior to the Nine — In addition to Memphis having its own creation myth, the contemporaneous city ofHermopolis had another creation story, theOgdoad, that accounted for the physical creation of the universe by eight (different) primordial gods.[3]
The English nameennead is a borrowing viaLatin of theGreek nameenneás (ἐννεάς), meaning "the nine".[4] The term was acalque of the Egyptian name, writtenpsḏt and also meaning "the Nine". Its original pronunciation is uncertain, since hieroglyphs do not record vowels, but may have been/piˈsiːcʼat/ inOld Egyptian,/piˈsiːtʼaʔ/ inMiddle Egyptian, and/pəˈsiːtʼə/ inLate Egyptian.Egyptologists conventionally transcribe it asPesedjet.
Theancient Egyptians created several enneads as theirunification underDynasty I brought numerous local cults into contact with one another. The ancient Egyptian mythology often had many different explanations for the same phenomenon. This concept is especially unique because no single story was more accurate than another, but rather the truth was a mix of them all.[2] ThePyramid Texts ofDynasties V andVI mention the "Great Ennead", the "Lesser Ennead", the "Dual Ennead", and the "Seven Enneads". Somepharaohs established enneads thatincorporated themselves as gods. The most notable case isSeti I ofDynasty XIX, whosemortuary temple at Redesiyah celebrated an ennead of six major gods and three deified forms of himself. Theennead mentioned in theEgyptian calendar of lucky and unlucky days,[5][full citation needed] may reference thePleiades.[6]
The most important was the "Great" or "Heliopolitan Ennead" of Awanu (Ancient Egyptian:I͗wnw), known under theGreeks andRomans asHeliopolis. It celebrated the family of thesun godAtum (sometimes referred to asAtum-re[3]) and thrived from theOld Kingdom to thePtolemaic period.
Its development remains uncertain, although it appears to have first appeared whenRa's cult – supreme underDynasty V – declined in importance underDynasty VI.Egyptologists have traditionally theorized that the Heliopolitan priesthood established it to establish the preeminence of Atum over the others, incorporating some major gods in lesser positions and omitting others entirely. The most prominent of such deities wasOsiris,god of vegetation and theafterlife, who was incorporated into the ennead as Atum's great-grandson. However, in the 20th century, some Egyptologists[who?] question the whole scenario. After the Great Ennead was well established, the cult of Ra –identified with Atum – recovered much of its importance until superseded by the cult ofHorus. The two were then combined asRa-Horus of the Horizons.
According to thecreation story of the Heliopolitan priests, the world originally consisted of the primordial waters of precreation personified asNun.[2] From it arose a mound on the First Occasion.[2] Upon the mound sat the self-begotten godAtum, who was equated with thesun godRa. Atum evolved from Nun through self-creation.[2] Atum either spat or masturbated, producingair personified asShu andmoisture personified asTefnut. The siblings Shu and Tefnut mated to produce the earth personified asGeb and the nighttime sky personified asNut.
Geb and Nut were the parents ofOsiris andIsis and ofSet andNephthys, who became respective couples in turn. Osiris and Isis represent fertility and order, while Set and Nephthys represent chaos to balance out Osiris and Isis.[3]Horus, the son of Osiris and Isis, is often included in this creation tradition.[2] Due to the duality of Ancient Egyptian myths, this is only one ofmany creation stories.[3] The Egyptians believed no specific myth was more correct than the other, rather that some combination of these myths was correct.[2] This creation story, the Heliopolitan tradition, is one of physiological creation.[3] The other major creation traditions are theMemphite Theology andHermopolitianOgdoad creation myth.[3]
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 Geb |  Nut | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 Osiris |  Isis |  Set |  Nephthys | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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A dual Ennead (Psḏty) was written
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InJoJo's Bizarre Adventure:Stardust Crusaders, nine ofDio Brando's minions have Stands named after the Ennead.
Most of the Ennead are portrayed inGods of Egypt (2016 movie); the main focus of the movie is the conflict between the protagonist god Horus versus the antagonist god Set.
In the first episode of the 2022Marvel Cinematic Universe television miniseriesMoon Knight,Steven Grant points out a problem with some of the museum's marketing material that seems to refer to the Ennead as a pantheon consisting of seven, rather than nine, gods. Yet in episode 3 they nameHathor as part of the Ennead, pointing out a deviation with the series' interpretation of the mythology.
TheInfernal Relics expansion to the cooperative, superhero card-gameSentinels of the Multiverse introduced a group of supervillains collectively called the Ennead. Each of its members wield an ancient artifact that grant them the powers and appearance of a member of the mythological Ennead; in the game's universe, most of the ancient Egyptian religion originated from stories about the original wielders of these artifacts.
