AKHU: the Venerated Ancestors of Ancient Egypt is a groundbreaking enquiry which brings together the author's competence in linguistics, mythology and ethnology as a rich and meaningful investigation of Ancient Egypt. The work includes the support and cultural participation of North African Berber scholars. The book brings out the archaic terminology of earliest hieroglyphic Pyramid texts which the later Greco-Roman vocabulary guiding European scholarship has often masked. Helene Hagan's background in Mediterranean history and mythology and her knowledge of North African Amazigh (Berber) culture guided her in this remarkable journey. This book seriously contributes to Egyptology and the study of Ancient History.
The prologue sets the tone for the ensuing study, demonstrating the very certain need to examine the close links between ancient Egyptian civilization and the Berber cultures of North Africa and the Sahara. The introduction indicates the need to begin this investigation with the archaeology of the early days of habitation on the west bank of the Nile, the western region of the Delta, that of the Fayum and of the oases, a northwest territorial area important to the development of all Egyptian civilization.
A first chapter examines the origins of these diverse settlements and their relationship with Libyan and North African groups. This chapter is followed by a study of the beliefs and customs of the Pillar peoples ("Intui") who worshipped their ancestors and had a very great influence on the totality of Egyptian civilization of all times. Ancestor worship as well as several other major aspects of their mythology such as astrolatry relate them to the Imazighen (Berbers) of North Africa.
The Sacred Sovereigns, or First Princes of Egypt, who preceded the first dynasties of kings, were Libyan Chiefs. They commanded the various groups of tribes known collectively as "Rekhyt", and instituted the various cults of primordial deities, most of which had their origins in North Africa, such as the Solar Ram, the great goddess of Sais Neith, the primordial God Amun, the great desert god "Her with the Mighty Arm", the goddess immensely worshipped over the centuries Hat-Hor, the Sacred Cow, and the Warrior Bull God Gurzil of the oases, worshipped by the Berbers of North Africa.
In the chapter on the God Tehuti, Time and the Stars, the creation of calendars according to cosmological data and the entire Egyptian astronomy are attributed to notions whose roots and parallels still existing in some Amazigh beliefs of North Africa are irrefutable. The final chapter of this essay completes the funerary journey through the earthly geography and the stellar universe of a Du-at populated by Resplendent Ancestors, Blessed Beings or "AKHU".
