Aani
Aani
Ancient Egyptian deity
In ancient Egyptian religion, Aani or Aana is the dog-headed ape sacred to the Egyptian god Thoth.[1][2] "One of the Egyptian names of the Cynocephalus Baboon, which was sacred to the god Thoth."[3]
The Egyptian hieroglyphic word for "baboon" is jꜥnꜥ in the German style of transliteration. Attested roughly forty times in extant literature, this word refers to the animal itself.[4] Many Egyptian gods can manifest in a baboon aspect or have other associations with the animal, including
- Hapy, a god who protects the canopic jar containing the lungs after embalming.[5]
- Khonsu, a god known as “eater of hearts” in the Pyramid Texts.[6]
- Thoth, a god of reason and writing: “And so the Baboon of Thoth came into being,” says one 18th Dynasty text.[7]
Animal iconography does not imply the Egyptians identified the animals concerned as deities themselves. Rather, the animal was an icon, or a large hieroglyph, representing a god.[8]