Why are there so many different spellings of the gods and goddesses names?
The Egyptian language has no written vowels, much as written Hebrew does not. Therefore, when an Egyptologist attempts to translate an Egyptian word he comes across various difficulties. For example, if English had no vowels and you came across the word: BT. How would you translate it? BAT, BUT, ABOUT, BIT, BOAT? Fortunately for those who do translate hieroglyphics, the Egyptians would include what is known as a “determinative”. This is a hieroglyphic that is strictly visual and helps the reader to decide among various choices as to what a series of symbols means. Therefore the translator can generally pick out the meaning of the word. This is good for those words that have an English counterpart. For words, such as names, that have no such equivalent the spelling (and pronunciation) is limited by the translator’s own creativity. One example is Sir E. A. Wallis Budge who translated the earth god Geb’s name as “Seb”, “Keb” and “Qeb”. It is generally agreed that none of these is correct.
