page_title: Djed
section_title: Ceremonial usage
hierarchical_section_title: Djed / Ceremonial usage
context_page_description: The djed is one of the more ancient and commonly found symbols in ancient Egyptian religion. It is a pillar-like symbol in Egyptian hieroglyphs representing stability. It is associated with the creator god Ptah and Osiris, the Egyptian god of the afterlife, the underworld, and the dead. It is commonly understood to represent his spine.
context_section_description: The djed was an important part of the ceremony called "raising the djed", which was a part of the celebrations of the Sed festival, the Egyptian jubilee celebration. The act of raising the djed has been explained as representing Osiris's triumph over Seth. Ceremonies in Memphis are described where the pharaoh, with the help of the priests, raised a wooden djed column using ropes. The ceremony took place during the period when fields were sown and the year's agricultural season would begin, corresponding to the month of Koiak, the fourth month of the Season of the Inundation. This ceremony was a part of one of the more popular holidays and celebrations of the time, a larger festival dedicated to Osiris conducted from the 13th to 30th day of the Koiak. Celebrated as it was at that time of the year when the soil and climate were most suitable for agriculture, the festival and its ceremonies can be seen as an appeal to Osiris, who was the God of vegetation, to favor the growth of the seeds sown, paralleling his own resurrection and renewal after his murder by Seth.
  
  Further celebrations surrounding the raising of the djed are described in a relief in Amenhotep III's Luxor Temple. In the tomb in the temple, the scene shows the raising of the djed pillar taking place in the morning of Amenhotep III's third Sed festival, which took place in his thirty-seventh regnal year. The scene is described by Sigrid Hodel-Hoenes: 
  The anthropomorphized pillar stands at the middle left, in a shrine. It has taken the shape of a human body with the djed-pillar as its head; the eyes are udjat-eyes. The hands hold the crook and flail, the usual insignia of Osiris, the god of the dead. On its head is the tall feather crown with the solar disk. The pillar is on a high base reminiscent of the platforms visible today in many temples, on which the cult barks once stood. In front of and behind it are lotus and papyrus blossoms. Beneath the large slab of the base are two tall offering stands – one bears a libation vessel, while flowers have been laid on the other. To the right is the king himself, presenting a generously laid table. Fowl, cucumbers, blossoms, breads, and heads and ribs of beef are all lying on the upper mat, while a cow and an antelope can be seen on the lower one. Beneath these mats are four tall vessels containing unguents and oil, with bundles of lettuce sticking out among them. The vulture goddess, Wadjyt, the Mistress of the Per-nu shrine, has spread her protective wings above the sovereign, with the blue crown on his head.
  — Sigrid Hodel-Hoenes, Life and death in ancient Egypt : scenes from private tombs in new kingdom Thebes, p. 222
  There is also a scene depicted in the tomb to the right of the above scene which has not been well preserved. Hodel-Hoenes explains that it once showed the pharaoh, accompanied by his queen, using a rope to raise the djed pillar. Three men, probably priests of the temple of Memphis, help him in the process. A fourth priest was seen supporting the pillar. Various offerings were presented before the pillar below the ropes. The pharaoh and his queen are each accompanied by four pairs of young women resembling those of the sed-festival. Each of these women is rattling a Hathor sistrum, a musical instrument for percussion with a U-shaped handle and frame seen as resembling the face and horns of the cow goddess Hathor, while holding a menat, a protective amulet associated with Hathor, in the other hand. A line of hieroglyphs running just above the girls' heads in each row of women says, "Children of the king praising (or charming) the noble djed pillar." Hodel-Hoenes interprets this as identifying the girls as the daughters of Amenhotep III.
  There are three additional reliefs below these two reliefs. They depict further ceremonies that accompany the erection of the djed pillar, especially games and dances. In one, food-bearers carrying edibles weave between men dancing with heavy steps. A line of singers on the far left seems to sing a short hymn to Ptah, the text of which is written alongside the line. S
caption: Djed constructed of gilded inlay on wood with red, blue, and green glass.[12] Walters Art Museum.
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