Buto

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Buto

This article is about the Egyptian city Buto. For other uses, see Buto (disambiguation).

Buto or Butos or Butosos (Greek: Βοῦτος, Herod. ii. 59, 63, 155; Βουτώ, Steph. B. s. v.), was an ancient city located 95 km east of Alexandria in Egypt's Nile Delta. Buto stood on the Sebennytic arm of the Nile, near its mouth, and on the southern shore of the Butic Lake. (Βουτικὴ λίμνη, Strabo xvii. p. 802.) It is the modern Kem Kasir.

Buto was originally two cities, Pe and Dep merged into one the Greeks called Buto, and the Egyptians named Per-Wadjet. The goddess Wadjet was originally the local goddess and patron of an oracle in the city. In Ptolemaic Egypt, it was the capital town, or according to Herodian, merely the principal village of the Nile Delta, which Herodotus (l. c.) calls the Chemmite nome; Ptolemy, the Phthenothite nome (Φθενότης, iv. 5. § 48) and Pliny the Elder (v. 9. s. 11), Ptenetha.

Buto was an important site in the Predynastic era of Ancient Egypt. Archaeological evidence show that Upper Egyptian culture replaced the Buto-culture when Upper and Lower Egypt were unified, and is considered important evidence for the unification itself.

The town was celebrated for its monolithite temple (Herod. ii. 155) and oracle of the goddess Buto (Aelian. V. Hist. ii. 41), whom the Greeks identified with Leto or Latona. A yearly feast was held there in honour of the goddess. At Buto there was also a sanctuary of Horus (associated by the ancient Greeks with Apollo) and of Bastet (associated with Artemis). (Champollion, l'Egypte, vol. ii. p. 227.) The name Buto of the Greeks is nearly allied to that of Muth or Maut, which is one of the appellations of Isis, as Mother of the World. (Plut. Is. et Osir. 18, 38.) The shrewmouse was worshipped at Buto. (Herod. ii. 67.)