Editing Djed (section)

==Origin and development==
[[Image:Seal ring Ptah the one with durable favours N2080 mp3h8731.jpg|thumb|200px|Seal ring featuring the inscription ''ptḥ ḏd ḥzwt'' "Ptah, the one with durable favors"
Hieroglyphs (read from right, top): [the creator god] Ptah (''ptḥ'') [gives] enduring (''djed'') favors (i.e. libation offerings, expressed with the biliteral ''ḥz'' depicted triply for plural).
]]
The ''djed'' may originally have been a fertility cult-related pillar made from reeds or sheaves<ref name="clio">{{cite book |last=Pinch |first=Geraldine |title=Handbook of Egyptian mythology. |year=2002 |publisher=ABC-CLIO |location=Santa Barbara, Calif. |isbn=978-1-57607-242-4 |page=127 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=N-mTqRTrimgC&pg=PA128 |access-date=2012-07-17}}</ref> or a [[totem]] from which sheaves of grain were suspended<ref name="myth">{{cite book |last=Remler |first=Pat |title=Egyptian mythology, A to Z |year=2010 |publisher=Chelsea House |location=New York |isbn=978-1-60413-926-6 |pages=51–52 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wLUjtPDyu-IC&pg=PT67 |access-date=2012-07-17 |edition=3rd}}</ref> or grain was piled around.<ref name="talis">{{cite book |last=Nelson |first=Felicitas H. |title=Talismans & amulets |year=2008 |publisher=Sterling |location=New York |isbn=978-1-4027-4625-3 |page=25 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=So7ph2SS8aYC&pg=PA25 |access-date=2012-07-17}}</ref> [[Erich Neumann (psychologist)|Erich Neumann]] remarks that the ''djed'' pillar is a tree [[Fetishism|fetish]], which is significant considering that Egypt was primarily treeless. He indicates that the myth may represent the importance of the importation of trees by Egypt from Syria.<ref>{{cite book |last=Neumann |first=Erich |title=The origins and history of consciousness |year=1999 |publisher=Routledge |location=London |isbn=978-0-415-20944-1 |page=70}}</ref> The ''djed'' came to be associated with [[Sokar|Seker]], the falcon god of the [[Memphite Necropolis]], then with Ptah, the [[Memphis, Egypt|Memphite]] patron god of craftsmen.<ref name="naj">{{cite book |last=Najovits |first=Simson |title=Egypt, trunk of the tree : a modern survey of an ancient land |year=2004 |publisher=Algora Pub. |location=New York |isbn=978-0-87586-256-9 |page=[https://archive.org/details/egypttrunkoftree0001najo/page/18 18] |url=https://archive.org/details/egypttrunkoftree0001najo/page/18 }}</ref> Ptah was often referred to as "the noble ''djed''", and carried a scepter that was a combination of the ''djed'' symbol and the [[ankh]], the symbol of life.<ref name="clio" /> Ptah gradually came to be assimilated into Osiris. By the time of the [[New Kingdom of Egypt|New Kingdom]], the ''djed'' was firmly associated with Osiris.<ref name="clio" />

In their 2004 book ''The Quick and the Dead: Biomedical Theory in Ancient Egypt'',<ref>{{cite book|last1=Gordon|first1=Andrew Hunt|last2=Schwabe|first2=Calvin W|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1LbGCVlFtA4C|title=The Quick and the Dead: Biomedical Theory in Ancient Egypt First Edition|publisher=Brill/Styx|date=2004|isbn=90-04-12391-1}}</ref> Andrew Hunt Gordon and Calvin W. Schwabe speculated that the ankh, djed, and [[Was (sceptre)|was]] symbols have a biological basis derived from ancient cattle culture (linked to the Egyptian belief that [[semen]] was created in the spine), thus:
* the ''[[ankh]]'', symbol of life, [[thorax|thoracic]] [[vertebra]] of a bull (seen in [[cross section (geometry)|cross section]])
* the ''djed'', symbol of stability, based on [[sacrum]] of a bull's spine
* the [[Was-sceptre|''was''-sceptre]], symbol of power and dominion, a staff featuring the head and tail of the god Set, "great of strength"