Geb and Nut bore five children during the epagomenal days won by Thoth: Osiris, Horus the Elder, Set, Isis, and Nephthys, who became the central figures of Egyptian mythology.
Nephthys disguised herself as Isis and lay with Osiris, conceiving Anubis — a secret tryst betrayed only by a garland of clover left behind.
⚠ Plutarch (De Iside 14) gives this account; earlier Pyramid Texts and Coffin Texts variously name Anubis as son of Ra or Hesat, with the Osiris-Nephthys parentage likely a Late Period synthesis.
Anubis is the son of Nephthys and Set in earlier Egyptian texts, placing the jackal god within the Ennead through his father's lineage.
⚠ The dominant later tradition, recorded by Plutarch, names Osiris as Anubis's father through Nephthys's deception. The Set-parentage appears in earlier texts before this narrative became standard.
In the Westcar Papyrus, Ra sends Isis, Nephthys, Meskhenet, and Heket to attend the birth of the future Fifth Dynasty kings, with Heket hastening each delivery while Isis receives the child.
Isis, Nephthys, Neith, and Serket stood at the four corners of Osiris's bier during his resurrection, each goddess shielding one side from the forces of chaos, a vigil repeated for every pharaoh's passage into the afterlife.
Thoth provided Isis and Nephthys with magical knowledge and sacred spells to resurrect Osiris from the dead.
Nephthys aided Isis in raising and protecting the infant Horus, supporting his claim to the throne despite being Set's wife.
Isis and Nephthys searched together for the dismembered body of Osiris and jointly mourned over him, their lamentations becoming a model for Egyptian funerary ritual.
Nephthys guards the canopic jar of Hapy, the baboon-headed Son of Horus who protects the lungs of the deceased in Egyptian funerary rites.
Isis and Nephthys stand as mourning kites at the head and foot of Osiris's bier, spreading their wings over his body to protect and revive him with the breath of life.
Despite being Set's wife, Nephthys bore Anubis through a union with Osiris and ultimately sided with Isis against Set in the aftermath of Osiris's murder.
The Great Ennead of Heliopolis comprises Atum and his eight descendants — Shu, Tefnut, Geb, Nut, Osiris, Isis, Set, and Nephthys — forming the principal divine family of Egyptian theology.
Anubis and Nephthys worked together to gather, embalm, and wrap the dismembered body of Osiris, with Nephthys mourning while Anubis performed the sacred rites.
Nephthys stands alongside Isis aboard Ra's solar barque in the Duat, the two sisters flanking the sun god as divine protectors during his perilous nightly journey through the underworld.
Nephthys is present in the Hall of Two Truths during the judgment of the dead, standing alongside Isis as a protective witness for the deceased before Osiris's tribunal.
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