Alright, so last night I went from Hindu and Shinto, to "Demonic" Christian like religions, to Egyptian/Mithraic stuff. So I am going to get more into Egypt now, and since I was talking about religions crossing, I am going to talk about Greek Egyptian relations. Then go further back than Egypt.
Firstly, when the Greeks came to Egypt, they named it Aegyptos, that is why we call it Egypt. The "Egyptians" called it "Kemet" which means "The Black Land". Also when the Greeks saw Egypt, they thought that Egypt was where their Gods came from. They automatically went through the Kemetic pantheon and identified their Gods with the Kemetic Gods. Thoth is Hermes AKA the Planet Mercury, Horus is Zeus AKA the Planet Jupiter, if you did not know the planets were Gods, just look up "The Ogdoad".
The way we view Kemet now is based heavily on the Greek interpretation. The still call the Kemetic leader "Pharaoh" but in Kemet Pharaoh was not even a person, "Par'Oh" was the palace the Kemetic king lived in, with the Apis Cow and other holy animals and people.
But even though the Greeks thought the Egyptians were the oldest civilization, there was still an older one according to the Kemetic people. Most historians will say that Sumeria is where the oldest civilization is found, but the Kemetic people knew different and so do some historians today. If you have ever heard of "Phrygia" it is a place in turkey that has existed for at least 5,000 years, so since 3,000 BC. This is the place the Santa hat was invented, it is called a "Phrygian cap". The Phrygian people were Phoenician, the Phoenician people invented the first ever clear glass, boats that could sail in the ocean and languages like Arabic, German & Greek. The Kemetic Pharaoh wanted to know who's culture was older, so around 1000 BC they took 2 kids and locked them in a room to be raised with no human contact, only to be fed. Then after a set amount of time they let them out to see what language a person speaks when they have never had human contact, because they assumed this would tell them which language was the oldest. And the children said "Bekos" which is Phrygian for "Bread".
And if you study ancient Kemet, you find that just like how the Greeks saw Egypt and thought their Gods came from there, if you read Kemetic mythology and historical records, there is a place called "The Land of Punt" aka "The Land of the Gods". We know it actually exists because we have found Gold from Punt and supplies from Punt in Egypt, but no one has found Punt.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_of_Punt
Most people think Punt is in Somalia or Eritrea or around there because they have found Ebony from Punt in Egypt, so they assume the place Punt is located must have Ebony. But if you look at Egyptian Records, the people of Punt live in stilt houses, meaning little hut type things that stood on 4 legs to avoid swamp water or flood water. And if you look into Archaeology, you will find that Stilt houses were VERY popular in Switzerland and around Europe, not in Africa.
Then if you look at the Phrygian culture, which the Egyptians said were older than them, they are Phoenician and live in Turkey. Europe itself is named after a Phoenician woman, Europa was apparently a half mythical woman who ruled Europe and was of Phoenician decent.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europa_(mythology)
Then there are the People of Hannibal Barca. The Carthaginian kingdom was a Phoenician one, started by the Queen "Dido". And within that Kingdom were a group of people known as "Punics", who trace their lineage back all the way to Phoenician settlers, which means they came from somewhere else. The Punic people were actually the specific Phoenicians who invented clear glass and they were basically the heart of the Carthaginian empire. And Carthage is thought of as "African" but they ruled Sicily and they could have been all over the place as far as we know, before the Romans came and destroyed as many traces of them as they could. And if you have ever heard of the Etruscans, they are the culture that taught Rome to be "better" than the other Greeks, but they did not keep many of their own records, so we don't really know who they were. Again, I think Phoenician/Punic history might be able to explain these things for us if people were actually looking for missing puzzle pieces.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Etruscan_civilization
Again, no one has ever found Punt, but I think that the location of Punt could be found if we discovered more about the history of the Punics.
