The information on these pages has come from too many sources to list, most of them online. I do not promise this information is correct, I am not an Egyptologist, I am just using my best judgement to try and provide the best information I can about the history and origins of the deity known as Horus.
Who is Horus?
Falcons appear in Egyptian history as far back as we have evidence, but whether they are Horus or not is another matter. The vast majority of what we know about Egyptian religion comes from the New Kingdom and later when Egypt was ruled over by Greece (the Ptolomies and Cleopatra). Also kings and Gods had many names in ancient Egypt, partly because knowledge of something's true name was believed to give you power over that thing, so the real name was rarely used.
The Egyptian word "hr", from which the god's name is derived, means "the one on high", or "the distant one", probably in reference to the soaring flight of the hunting falcon. Mythologically, the god was imagined as a falcon, whose right eye was the sun and left eye was the moon. Birds also represented the soul of a person which flew away at death.
Horus (Hr) was the patron of the Nekhen (Hierakonpolis) monarchy that grew into the historical pharaonic state and hence, the first known national god. Hr is ruler of the heavens and protects the kings of Upper Egypt. Hr was the first Pre-Dynastic god to rule "the two lands" and achieve nation-wide recognition. The official emblem of the ruling kings of the First and Second Dynasty, the serekh, always shows Hr, and kings were called Hr - for example, Hr Narmer, Hr Djer, Hr Aha. Across the river on the east bank from Nekhen was Nekheb ruled over by vulture goddess Nekhebet ("Lady of Nekheb"). Hr was worshipped through the entirety of Egyptian history from Pre-Dynastic times to the New Kingdom and by both the ruling classes and the common people.
The main locations of Upper Egyptian ancient Horus worship are Hierakonopolis and Edfu as seen on the map to the right. This area was inhabited and prosperous during the Pre-Dynastic period. However Horus proper (Horus the Elder) most likely originated in the delta cities of Damanhur and Letopolis as the winged solar disc. The Hierakonopolis version of Horus was originally called Nekhen. However evidence from Nile cities is few and far between due to flooding prior to the building of the Aswan dam. So we have two main falcon gods, one from upper egypt and one from lower egypt, merged into one in the pre-dynastic and/or early old kingdom period. The Horus of kingship from the south and the solar Horus from the north.
Read more about the cities associated with Horus.
During the 2nd dynasty (2925-2790 BCE) Seth replaced Horus and instead of a Horus name kings had a Seth name. To the right is an example from King Peribsen, he was buried at Umm el-Ka'ab (Abydos). The King who followed him, Kha'sekhemui (The Two Powers Arise), had both on his serekh (see left) indicating that he resolved whatever issue had started the Seth-name stuff. He was the final king of the 2nd dynasty.Seth had a temple in Naqada (Nubt/Ombos) in Upper Egypt dated around 1500 BCE (New Kingdom, 18th Dynasty) and he is referred to in the Pyramid texts as Set of Nubet. The earliest depiction of Seth comes from the Naqada III period (Dynasty 00) in the Gebel Tjauty graffiti, found in the Desert west of Thebes (not very far from Naqada). The grafitti appears to relate a victory over the town of Naqada by King Scorpion of Abydos. Seth animals are also seen among the standards of his followers on his macehead found at Nekhen (also falcons, a jackal, and the god Min).
There is a mythic history of conflict between Horus and Seth but the origins of the myth are hard to find. Seth became villified during the 2nd intermediate period (15th dynasty, c1600 BCE) when the Hyksos invaded Egypt from western Asia and adopted Seth.
Ra of Heliopolis
Heliopolis (Iunu) in Lower Egypt had a solar hawk god called Ra who was known also as "RA HOR AKHT Y" ("RA, the HOR, or king, of the Two Horizons"). Ra and Horus appear very si