If we were to combine all of the known ancient Kemetic calendars together it becomes quickly apparent that festivals occur on a regular basis - sometimes half a dozen a day. Some deities have more than others (thinking Hathor in particular) and some have none. How do we deal with spreading the load? What did the ancients do and why?
Iāve picked a few of what I feel from my favourite deities and so far have around 40 festival dates, most of which are a day long, but a few are 10-20 days! A lot going on in some months and in others nothing. Its interesting for sure.
My next major festival is in a couple of weeks at the first new moon in March. Its calked Pakhons which is a festival for the Kahdi mounds of creation and a continuation of the festival of the ten dead deities of Dendra around mid winter, again a part creation festival. All of them consist of lots of food and drink offerings three times a day for ten days each.
For Pakhons is usually when i do my first cut of my hazel trees after winter.
I use a festival app, and set it to alert me when the Gods Iām interested in are in festival.
The app is still in beta, but soon youāll be able to set your own Wep Ronpet date, making it suitable for everyone. (Currently using the app is a $5 Patreon perk, but once itās out of beta it will be in app stores.)
I think the ancients probably had an easier time of it because so many of the festivals would have been local, or perhaps not relevant to layfolk. They probably didnāt have to deal with as many festivals as we feel like they would have.
Interesting. Iām a dev and might get around to doing one. Unfortunately there are a few calendars out there, some overlap, some are contradictory, and many calculate the dates differently. In fact even the ancients couldnāt agree sometimes. For example the temples of Edfu and Dendera had the same festivals but on different dates. They might have had processions to one another because of it, but they did differ on the rites and traditions for a number of similar festivals.
Yes, Iām sure the nones really only cared about the local festivals for their own, and maybe a few of the other more important ones. Of course the big temple festivals were really state level events and the public might not have been involved too much to care.
Now as you say, we tend to pick and choose to suit, I canāt see a problem with that. I just fit in what I can and really focus on the ones I really care which are luckily few.
I am old school. As I learn and grow, I add to my handwritten (read- scribbled) list of festivals for the year. then I stick to the ones I have really felt an affinity for, and the ābigā ones eg vigil of Osiris.
still, when the app is in app stores it might be good to have just to learn even more! Let us know when it gets released please.
LOL will be a while yet. So much ahead of it in the queue at the moment.
As of a few days ago, all festival data entry is complete for the entire year! Thatās the huge job done. All thatās left before the 1.0 public release is āa few programming features and polishā. So hopefully it will be out soon!
You can see the planned features and keep an eye on progress here. Theyāre not planning on adding Chronokraters for 1.0 as thatās basically a whole other calendar to add.