Iconography

Khonsu is usually depicted in anthropomorphic form - most often as a young man enveloped in mummy bandages or a tightly fitting garment, though his arms may be partially or completely unrestrained. He frequently wears his lunar symbol consisting of the full lunar disk resting in a crescent new moon upon his head; in his role as divine child of Amun and Mut he commonly wears the sidelock of youth, though he may also wear the curved beard of the gods. The god was often depicted holding the crook and flail associated with Osiris and Horus, and a ivas or djed-headed staff (see illustration below).

Black and red granite statue of Khonsu mth the features of Tutankhamun. The sidelock of youth and the curved divine beard are both characteristic of the god’s iconography. Egyptian Museum, Cairo.

Khonsu in his falcon-headed form ivith the characteristic attributes of disk and crescent moon. 20th dynasty. Tomb of Montuherkhepeshef Valley of the Kings, western Thebes.

But his most distinctive attribute is usually the necklace he wears with its crescent-shaped pectoral element resting on his chest and its heavy counterpoise on his back. This counterpoise is usually depicted in an inverted ‘keyhole’ shape and can be used to differentiate the god from representations of the god Ptah whose necklace counterpoise is of a different shape. As a sky deity Khonsu can also be depicted with the head of a falcon - usually differentiated from Morus and Re by the lunar disk and crescent. As a lunar deity one of his symbols was the Cynocephalus baboon, though Khonsu himself does not appear in this form as frequently as does

The god Thoth. Small amulets representing Khonsu in human form are known from the later dynasties, as are plaques depicting the god in fully human or falcon-headed form, sometimes with his divine parents Amun and Mut, or like Homs, standing on the back of a crocodile on the healing plaques known as cippi (see p. 132).