Khemenu (Ḫmnw), the Egyptian language name of the city,[5] means "Eight-Town", after the Ogdoad, a group of eight "primordial" deities whose cult was situated there.

A little to south of the city was the castle of Hermopolis, at which point rivercraft from the Thebaid paid tolls (Ἑρμοπολιτάνη φυλακή,[7] the Bahr Yussef in Arabic).

In 1949 the titular see was suppressed, having had the following incumbents, all of the fitting Episcopal (lowest) rank : Hermopolis comparatively escaped the frequent wars which, in the decline both of the Pharaonic and Roman eras, devastated the Heptanomis; but, on the other hand, its structures have undergone severe changes under its Muslim rulers, who have burned its stones for lime or carried them away for building materials.

[11] The collection of Arabic papyri in the John Rylands Library, Manchester, contains many documents referring to Hermopolis (Ushmun); they date from the 8th to 11th centuries CE.

[12] The Ibis-headed god Thoth was, with his accompanying emblems, the Ibis and the Cynocephalus monkey, the most conspicuous among the sculptures upon the great portico of the temple of Hermopolis.

This portico was a work of the Pharaonic era, but the erections of the Ptolemies at Hermopolis were on a scale of great extent and magnificence and, although raised by Greek monarchs, are essentially Egyptian in their conception and execution.

Instead of being formed of large masses placed horizontally above each other, they are composed of irregular pieces, so artfully adjusted that it is difficult to detect the lines of junction.

The bases of these columns represent the lower leaves of the lotus; next come a number of concentric rings, like the hoops of a cask; and above these the pillars appear like bunches of reeds held together by horizontal bonds.

[14] Currently there is a small open-air museum in which stand two massive statues of Thoth as a baboon worshipping the sun, and a few carved blocks of masonry.