In ancient Egypt, the educated priests had sundials and divided the day into hours, but, for the average person, such fine distinctions were unnecessary.  They divided their day in obvious periods of morning, midday, evening and night.  The sun was different during each of these periods and the Egyptians had different symbols for each.  
    The morning sun is frail compared to the midday sun, so was often depicted as a baby or child emerging from a lotus flower.  It was also known as Kheper and depicted as a scarab.
    The evening sun was a weakening sun that the Egyptians felt was drawing light back into itself.  This sun was depicted as a man with the head of a ram.  
    The midday sun was the strongest sun and was Ra.  Ra was depicted in many forms, but a common one was a man with the head of a falcon and a sun disk over his head.  
     One symbol that showed the full life of the sun was a circle, or solar disk, with a scarab and a man with a ram's head in it.  This symbol is said to show that the Egyptians recognized that the spiritual sun was at work behind the physical sun and was responsible for it's movements.