Isis and Pharaonic Thought in the Imperial Roman Context. Some Reflections

This paper aims at shedding light on some aspects of the impact of Pharaonic Egypt on Rome at the end of the 1st cent. and beginning of the 2nd cent. CE. The assessment of the presence of Egyptian culture and of cults of Egyptian origin must take into account the developments in the country's own tradition, particularly the distinction drawn between official worship, characterized by royal and dynastic features, and personal piety. The ears-stelae, attested from the New Kingdom to the Roman Period, provide us with a relevant case study regarding those developments. The overlapping of the image of the god-father and the god-son, Osiris and the divine child Horus, which developed during the Roman period and which is well expressed in Hadrian's Gate in Philae, is another one. Furthermore the pharaonic tradition regarding the Nile River, royalty and its legitimacy, assumed by the Imperial power, enabled important original elaborations, as attested to by the new god Antinous, drowned in the Nile. Finally, particular features of Hadrian's monuments are analyzed.