Khonsu

The Traveller of the Moon

Domain: Moon, Time & Healing
Alignment: Neutral Good
Element: Air
Relics of Power: Crescent Lunar Disk

Speak with Khonsu

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5 sections of this entry are open to everyone: the summary, the people, the symbols, the lineage and the sources. The other 9 (Name and epithets, In the ancient sources, The myths, Worship and archaeology, How the god was depicted, What scholars debate, After antiquity, Did you know?, Codex relic) are part of the full Codex: PRO opens the whole study of all 500 deities, and without a subscription you can read one full entry a day, just like in the app.

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The People

People

Ancient Egyptians

Region

Nile Valley, Egypt

Period

c. 3100 BC – 400 AD

The Egyptian gods were worshipped for over three millennia along the banks of the Nile, with monumental temples at Karnak, Luxor, and Heliopolis. The pharaohs were held to be divine, and life revolved around cosmic order (Maat) and preparation for the afterlife. The cult endured until the rise of Christianity in Roman Egypt.

At the Opet festival, Amun's sacred barque sailed from Karnak to Luxor amid celebrating crowds. In the temples, priests woke, dressed, and fed the god's statue every day, and the Beautiful Festival of the Valley carried the deities to visit the shore of the dead.

At a glance

Khonsu (Khensu in older spellings) is the lunar god of Thebes and the third member of the Theban triad: son of Amun-Ra and Mut, according to Budge. His name is tied to the Egyptian verb for travelling, and the tradition shows him as a messenger, a traveller of the night sky and a master of spirits that sicken people. The oldest sources place him in the Cannibal Hymn of the Pyramid Texts, where he cuts the throats of gods for King Unas. The longest account is the Bentresh Stela (Louvre C 284), carved centuries after the time of Ramesses II that it describes: an image of Khonsu travels to a distant land, heals a princess and returns to Thebes. The graffiti on the roof of his temple at Karnak add the devotion of the sanctuary's own personnel.

11 min read · Reviewed on October 14, 2026 · How we research

Sacred symbols

Lunar disk and crescent, the staff, the flail and the youth's side-lock

Family

Parents

Amun Mut

Khonsu

Genealogy according to Budge, The Gods of the Egyptians II, p. 33 (filho de Amon-Rá e Mut); I, pp. 447-448

Sources and further reading

Primary sources

Anonymous, Stela of Bentresh (Bakhtan), Louvre C 284. translation: J. H. Breasted, Ancient Records of Egypt III, §§ 429–447; notes by M. Lichtheim, Ancient Egyptian Literature III. read
Anonymous, Stela of Bakhtan, object record C 284. read
Anonymous, Pyramid Texts, Cannibal Hymn (Unas, line 510), in Budge's interlinear translation. translation: E. A. Wallis Budge, The Gods of the Egyptians I, pp. 48-49, 88. read
Anonymous, Dispute of a man with his ba (Berlin papyrus). translation: Adolf Erman, The Literature of the Ancient Egyptians, pp. 86-87. read

Studies

E. A. Wallis Budge, The Gods of the Egyptians, vol. 2 (chapter on Khensu, pp. 33-38). 1904. open
Helen Jacquet-Gordon, The Graffiti on the Khonsu Temple Roof at Karnak: A Manifestation of Personal Piety (Temple of Khonsu, vol. 3). Oriental Institute, University of Chicago, 2003. open

Name and epithets

The name appears in Budge's editions as Khensu and is now usually written Khonsu (transliterated ḫnsw). Budge, summarising Brugsch, links the name to the root tchens, 'to travel, to move about, to run', and mentions Lan…

In the ancient sources

Pyramid Texts, Cannibal Hymn (pyramid of Unas), Old Kingdom, Fifth Dynasty (about 2350 BCE, conventional dating).

The myths

Khonsu in the Cannibal Hymn of Unas. In the Pyramid Texts hymn, the dead king Unas hunts and devours the gods to absorb their powers.

Worship and archaeology

The core of the cult was Thebes. Budge, following Brugsch, writes that Ramesses III built the 'House of Khonsu in Thebes', the great temple that in the Karnak precinct is still called the Temple of Khonsu, and that the…

How the god was depicted

The Louvre describes the Bentresh Stela, in sandstone, 227 cm high, in sunk relief: the king standing, with a blue crown and short kilt, offers incense; on the left, a divine barque with a falcon head and a lunar disk,…

What scholars debate

Whether the Khonsu of the Cannibal Hymn is the same god. Budge identifies the 'slaughterer' of line 510 with the future lunar god of Thebes and supposes that his origin predates the dynastic era.

After antiquity

Khonsu's fame as a healing god comes largely from a single source, the Bentresh Stela, and what it shows is the fame of a Theban image: a god whose statue travels, acts on foreign soil, is coveted by a prince and is fin…

Did you know?

In the stela, the expelled spirit does not flee: it recognises the god as lord, declares itself his servant and demands a feast in his honour before leaving.

Codex relic

Crescent Lunar Disk. A lunar disk that measures time, guides night travelers, and drives out evil spirits.

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