Thybos
Thybos is the traditional capital of Khemit’s Middle Kingdom and the current royal capital. It has been the royal capital since the 37th Dynasty, as well as other times throughout the history of the country. It is a huge, sprawling city that is sometimes referred to as the City of a Hundred Gates, and is built on the west side of the Stygian River where it makes a curve to the east. Many pharaohs have lavished their wealth on it, building plazas, shrines, civic buildings, a major university, and temples to its patron deities. The Royal University (founded during the 11th Dynasty) has the pharaoh as its special patron. Even when the royal capital is in a different city, graduates of this university are often selected for good positions in the civil service and for serving directly in the pharaoh’s court.
The primary deity of Thybos is Amun, the ram-headed god of the sky and sun. He is depicted as having blue skin and being crowned with two ostrich feathers. Thybos holds the high seat of the temple of Amun, as well as the high seats of the temples of Mût, consort of Amun, and of Chons, their son, the hawk-headed god of the silver moon and knowledge. This trinity of deities has been venerated in Thybos for millennia. The worship of the Thyban Triad has been so strong throughout Khemit that at times the priests of Amun have rivaled the pharaohs in wealth and influence. This has caused tension when the royal capital was in other locations in the country. When the royal capital is in Thybos and the pharaoh can keep a personal eye on the priests, their influence is not so disruptive.
Mût is the great mother goddess and queen of the gods, and she is usually depicted as holding an ankh of life and wearing the triple crown of Khemit. Her temple lies in the curve of a specially-built lake shaped like a crescent moon, and the annual Festival of Mût includes placing one of her statues on a boat and navigating around the lake while celebrations take place. (Although priests can be involved in temple administration and may be oracles, all rituals in the temples of Mût are handled by priestesses only, with the duty of chief priestess belonging to the queen of Khemit or her eldest daughter.) Another important ceremony takes place during the festival of the New Year, when the great statue of Amun is carried in a procession through the long line of guardian sphinx statues to visit the statue of Mût in her temple, thereby ensuring fertility for the city and country for the coming year.
The city of Thybos is also the high seat of the temple of Tuart, goddess of fertility and protection. She is represented as having the head and body of a pregnant hippopotamus, standing upright, with the legs of a lioness and the tail of a river crocodile. Tuart provides the fierce protection of the deadly mother hippopotamus combined with the features of other dangerous predators. As a riverine goddess, she is also linked to fertility (of crops as well as people) and plays a role in the annual inundation of the Stygian. Her image is carved on household items (especially furniture) and is worn by mothers and children on protective amulets.
The massive Necropolis of Thybos is outside the city to the northwest. It includes large private cemeteries, royal cemeteries (which hold the tombs not just of pharaohs but also royal families and high advisors), and other buildings erected for funerary purposes. Numerous pharaohs have built mortuary temples here and dedicated them to various gods of death in the hopes that their own afterlives would be easier. Khemit has at least 10 deities who oversee some aspect of death or guard the dead, and temples to all of them can be found in this necropolis. Many people who work in the necropolis in some way, or serve in the temples, live in the city of Inhy as that is actually closer for most than Thybos itself.
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