Anubis
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Anubis was a partially Ascended Goa'uld who was once exiled by the System Lords, but later returned to lead them.
History
Originally one of the System Lords under the rule of Ra, Anubis was at some point in history exiled by the other Goa'uld because his deeds were deemed "unspeakable". Despite this, a member of Ra's personal guard often wore the helmet of a Jackal Guard, perhaps symbolic of Ra's victory and supremacy over the exiled Goa'uld. (SG1: "Summit"; Stargate)
Following his exile, Anubis deceived the Ascended being Oma Desala into helping him Ascend. Though he was prevented from Ascending fully by the Ancients, he was left in a half-Ascended state between the planes of existence as a way to punish Oma Desala for her interference with the lower planes. (SG1: "Threads")
After the deaths of Ra, Apophis, and Cronus, Anubis began to orchestrate his return to the System Lords. He began a quiet campaign of sowing dissent and paranoia among the other System Lords, eventually manipulating them into welcoming him back into the High Council of System Lords, with Osiris serving as his proxy. Using the knowledge and perspective gained through his partial Ascension, his plans focused on technical superiority, making attempts to acquire technology from advanced races like the Tollans and Asgard, as well as using Ancient technology to develop an army of Kull Warrior supersoldiers. Perhaps the crowning achievement was the Anubis Mothership, a superweapon capable of destroying a planet. While some of the System Lords were eventually convinced to turn against them, Anubis managed to maintain his hold on power, up until his defeat at the hands of the Tau'ri during the Battle of Antarctica. (SG1: "Between Two Fires", "Summit", "Last Stand", "Revelations", "Fallen", "Homecoming", "Evolution, Part 1", "Evolution, Part 2", "Lost City, Part 1", "Lost City, Part 2")
Despite the destruction of his fleet, Anubis' part-Ascended nature allowed him to survive, and covertly he continued to manipulate the United Alliance of the System Lords — by then led by Ba'al — during their war with the Replicators. His final defeat came at the hands of Oma Desala: while Anubis could not be destroyed, she could use her own powers to overwhelm his indefinitely, locking the two in an eternal battle of yin and yang. (SG1: "Lockdown", "Revelations, Part 1", "Revelations, Part 2", "Threads")
Even after his defeat, Anubis' influence continued to outlive him. On P3X-584, SG-1 and SG-5 discovered Khalek, the prototype of an engineered Human-Goa'uld Hybrid that Anubis hoped would be able to Ascend and defeat — or at least weaken — the Ancients who were preventing his full Ascension. When the Ori attacked P3X-367 — a planet on which Nirrti had conducted experiments with Ancient technology to engineer a Hok'tar — the survivors speculated that destroying the Ancient outpost and thus preventing Earth from creating similar soldiers to use against the Ori, may have been the objective. (SG1: "Prototype", "Metamorphosis"; SGR: "The Arrow")
Mythology
In the mythology of Ancient Egypt, Anubis (or Anpu) was a funerary deity as well as a psychopomp: a god that guided souls to the afterlife. He is particularly well known as the deity who weighs the hearts of mortals upon death, judging purity of their souls, and feeding them to the beast Ammit should they be found wanting. These hearts were weighed against an ostrich feather provided by Ma'at, the consort of Thoth — a Goa'uld seen in Anubis' service.
His consort was Anput, or sometimes Nephthys. With Anput, his daughter was Kebechet, a serpent goddess linked with embalming, purification, and "cooling water". His parentage varies from source to source: sometimes he is the son of Ra, sometimes of Osiris, and sometimes of Set. Rather than a familial connection, these may represent the System Lords he was once in service to. As the child of Set and Nephthys, however, he has a brother: Wepwawet (or Ophois), a wolf-headed deity associated with war and death, sometimes portrayed as Ra's scout aboard his solar barque. This may be reflective of the fact that the Goa'uld Ra often had a Jackal Guard in his service.
In Ancient Greece, he was sometimes equated with either Hermes, another psychopomp; or Hades, a god of death. He was sometimes portrayed as "Hermanubis", merging the traits of Hermes and Anubis into a single deity. In other instances he was associated with mythical canines like Sirius and Cerberus; the Greeks called his cult centers Lycopolis ("city of wolves") and Cynopolis ("city of dogs").
Behind the Scenes
Anubis was portrayed by David Palffy in 8 episodes of Stargate SG-1, by George Dzundza in "Threads", and by Gavin Hood, Dean Aylesworth, Rik Kiviaho, and several other actors who were briefly possessed.
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