Ring with gem intaglio of Osiris of Canopus in headcloth and atef crown

Osiris-Canopus was named after the ancient Egyptian coastal city Canopus where Osiris was worshipped in the form of a jar with a human head. The jar might signify the abundance brought by Nile water or may have been dervied from a reliquary form.

Imagery of the god appears on Alexandrian coins in the 1st century AD and thrived in the 2nd century AD in Egypt and beyond. Indeed the Roman emperor Hadrian had visited and enjoyed Canopus and replicated aspects of the city, including an image of Osiris-Canopis, at his estate Tivoli near Rome.

Due to early misunderstandings in the field of Egyptology, the viscera jars used by pharaonic Egyptians were assimilated to Osiris Canopus, so that the viscera jars became known as canopic jars.