In the Memphite theology, Ptah is the primal creator, the first of all the gods, creator of the world and all that is in it. He is not created, but simply is. In some stories he is the personification of the primal matter, Ta-Tenen, which rose out of Nun, the fundamental seas. His wife is said to be Bast (or Sakhmet) and their children are Nefertem, Mahes, and Imhotep.
Ptah’s importance may be discerned when one learns that “Egypt” is a Greek corruption of the phrase “Het-Ka-Ptah,” or “House of the Spirit of Ptah.”