Hello and welcome to a history of Egypt podcast mini-episode.

Banquet festivities.

This is part five in our 12-month account of the Egyptian religious year, its festivals, its events, and its gods.

Parts one to four are available now, and can be found with titles varying on the name festivities.

Now then, on with the show.

The fifth month of the Egyptian civil calendar was called Ta Abet.

It began in December and was the start of a new season.

From here, things were all about moving forward, and raising up the gods and the crops.

Tar Abet translates in English to The Banquet Offering. In later times, it came to be called TB, but Tar Abet is what I'm going with.

That was the conventional name during the New Kingdom, where our podcast narrative currently sits.

The month of Tar Abet was the first month in the Egyptian growing season.

The season of Aket was now over, having lasted four months.

With the new month, the season of Peret had begun.

Peret, or coming forth, was the time when farmers were back in the fields and hard at work,

cultivating the grains and cereals that would be their primary harvest. Emmer wheat and barley,

the staple of the Egyptian diet, were now growing strong.

Since it was these grains, manufactured into bread and beer, that were the base of Egyptian religious offerings, the first month of growing came to be associated with the offerings

themselves. So, Ta Abet, the banquet offering.

The month itself was relatively quiet in the scheme of major festivals,

but there were a few interesting beings among the gods of this month.

The first festival of the month was called the Festival of Neheb Ka'u.

It was dedicated to a god called Neheb Ka'u, or Neheb Kao, whose name translates as the one who unites the spirits. I haven't introduced Neheb Kao

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