However, the comparison with humans stops there as Osiris’s suppurating pus has creative potential: Together with the god’s blood he creates a holy site in the form of a lake. Similarly, the blood dripping from the God Seth’s nose brings life to the fields, and the earth god Geb spawns vegetation from his blood or his vomit. Like humans, the gods also mourn and cry tears, with the difference that these create new life or even bring the dead back to life. The emotional world of the gods of Ancient Egypt reflects that of humans, whereby their rage, for example, can have destructive traits – in particular if the Godhead in his fury assumes the form of a poisonous animal and thus also possesses the latter’s venom and is therefore equipped, for example, with the deadly breath of a spitting cobra or a scorpion’s poison. That said, the gods not only adopt secretions from the animal world but also characteristic behavioural patterns of the animals they embody and in this way attest not only to the strong bond to nature in Ancient Egyptian religion but also to the very detailed manner in which Ancient Egyptians observed nature. Depending on the god in which it originated, the seed of an inimical creature could spell potential danger for a god or goddess but could at the same time create new gods. Even if these and other bodily fluids imbue the Ancient Egyptian gods with a touch of humanness, the divinities nevertheless always remain superior to mere mortals and with their excretions gift all of Egypt life.

Dr Schmidt has identified and analysed a total of 15 secretions. In doing so she has compiled the first overall reference work on the bodily fluids and excretions of the Ancient Egyptian gods along with the relevant terminology. In it, she characterizes each secretion by function and elaborates on the sacred interpretations, assessments, and the divine, local, cultic and architectural relationships involved. She submitted her findings as a doctoral thesis to the Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen and it has since appeared in two volumes issued by Harrassowitz Publishers and entitled “Körperflüssigkeiten und -ausscheidungen der Götter des Alten Ägypten”.