When we list the symbols (and it’s quite a list) that relate to Lower and Upper Egypt, we find that there are actually two different divides submerged in this one concept.

*) From the color of these crowns, the colors white and red became associated with Upper and Lower Egypt, respectively. Hence "the Red House" as name of the Lower Egyptian treasury, and "the White House" as its Upper Egyptian counterpart. This may at times be a bit confusing, because in other contexts, Egypt is referred to as the Black Land, in contrast to the surrounding deserts which are then called the Red Land (both based on the appearance of their respective soils).

**) This allocation of Seth and Horus to Upper and Lower Egypt is not as consistently applied as that of Nekhbet and Wadjet. It is e.g. not uncommon to find Osiris representing Lower Egypt (against Seth for Upper Egypt), or Thoth as god of Upper Egypt (with Horus for Lower Egypt).

***) Why the king, in his capacity as king of Lower Egypt, is here referred to as "He of the bee" is unknown.

Of these eight pairs, the first six differ fundamentally from the last two. The first six relate to two prehistoric kingdoms, merged into one. They are about kings, temples, crowns, gods and goddesses. The latter two refer to two lands, united as one. They are about plants, rooted in the earth.

So the concept of Tawy had two dimensions: a historic one (the Two Kingdoms), and a geographic one (the Two Lands). The Egyptians however did not distinguish explicitly between the two: they referred to both as Tawy. This lack of preciseness need not surprise us: history and geography both held an important symbolic component, and they were regularly mixed into multifaceted cocktails. (And whenever deemed necessary, the facts of both could be “adjusted” a little, to make them agree better with the context).

We will now take a closer look at both constituent parts of Tawy: first the Two Kingdoms, then the Two Lands.