Pakhet
Encyclopedia
In Egyptian mythology
, Pakhet, Egyptian
Pḫ.t , meaning she who scratches (also spelt Pachet, Pehkhet, Phastet, and Pasht) is considered a synthesis of Bast
and Sekhmet
, ancient deities in the two Egypts who were similar lion
ess war deities, one for Upper Egypt
and the other for Lower Egypt
. The range of the two cults met at the border between north and south, near al Minya
(now known as Beni Hasan
), and here the similarity of the goddess
es led to a new form arising in the merged cultures.
, near water at the boundary of the desert. Another title is She Who Opens the Ways of the Stormy Rains, which probably relates to the flash floods in the narrow valley, that occur from storms in the area. By the time Pakhet appeared in the Egyptian pantheon
, during the Middle Kingdom
, Bast came to be considered less as a fierce lion
ess, becoming more gentle, as a domesticated cat could be. Consequently, Pakhet's character lay somewhere between the later gentleness of Bast and the ferocity of Sekhmet. Her strength was considered an inner, rather than outer, quality, while retaining all the potential capabilities of the war goddess, if needed. As with Bast and Sekhmet, she also is associated with Hathor
and thereby, is a sun deity as well, wearing the solar disk as part of her crown.
It became said that rather than a simple domestic protector against vermin and venomous creatures, or a fierce warrior
, she was a huntress
, perhaps as a caracal
, who wandered the desert alone at night looking for prey, gaining the title, Night huntress with sharp eye and pointed claw. While this desert
aspect led to her being associated with desert storms, as was Sekhmet. She also was said to be a protector of motherhood, as was Bast.
In art
, she was depicted as a feline
-headed woman, or as a feline, often depicted killing snake
s with her sharp claws. The exact nature of the feline varied between a desert wildcat, which was more similar to Bast, or a caracal, resembling Sekhmet.
near al Minya
, among thirty-nine ancient tombs of Middle Kingdom
monarchs of the Oryx
nome
, who governed from Hebenu
, in an area where many quarries exist. This is in the middle of Egypt, on the east bank of the Nile
. A location on the east bank is not traditional for tombs, the west was, but the terrain to the west was most difficult. A more ancient temple to this goddess at the location is known, but has not survived. Hatshepsut is known to have restored temples in this region that had been damaged by the Hyksos
invaders.
Its remarkable catacombs have been excavated. Great numbers of mummified
cats have been found buried there. Many are thought to have been brought great distances to be buried ceremonially during rituals at the cult center. Some references associate this goddess as, Pakhet-Weret-Hekau, (Weret Hekau meaning she who has great magic), implying the association with a goddess such as Hathor or Isis. Another title is, Horus Pakht, the presence of many mumified hawks at the site would further the association with Hathor who was the mother of Horus
, the hawk, the pharaoh, and the sun.
Her hunting nature led to the Greeks
, who later occupied Egypt for three hundred years, identifying Pakhet with Artemis
. Consequently, this underground temple became known to them as, Speos Artemidos
, the Cave of Artemis, a name that persists even though Artermis is not an Egyptian goddess. The Greeks attempted to align the Egyptian deities with their own, while retaining the traditions of the Egyptian religion. Later, Egypt was conquered by the Romans, just after 30 AD, and they retained many of the Greek place names. Christians and other religious sects occupied some parts of the site during the Roman period. Arabic place names were established after the 600s.
Hatshepsut and her daughter Neferure
have been identified as the builders of a smaller temple dedicated to Pakhet nearby, which was defaced by subsequent pharaohs. It was completed during the reign of Alexander II
and is now called, Speos Batn el-Bakarah.
, Spell 470 reads,
Egyptian mythology
Ancient Egyptian religion was a complex system of polytheistic beliefs and rituals which were an integral part of ancient Egyptian society. It centered on the Egyptians' interaction with a multitude of deities who were believed to be present in, and in control of, the forces and elements of nature...
, Pakhet, Egyptian
Egyptian language
Egyptian is the oldest known indigenous language of Egypt and a branch of the Afroasiatic language family. Written records of the Egyptian language have been dated from about 3400 BC, making it one of the oldest recorded languages known. Egyptian was spoken until the late 17th century AD in the...
Pḫ.t , meaning she who scratches (also spelt Pachet, Pehkhet, Phastet, and Pasht) is considered a synthesis of Bast
Bast (goddess)
Bastet is the name commonly used by scholars today to refer to a feline goddess of ancient Egyptian religion who was worshipped at least since the Second Dynasty...
and Sekhmet
Sekhmet
In Egyptian mythology, Sekhmet , was originally the warrior goddess as well as goddess of healing for Upper Egypt. She is depicted as a lioness, the fiercest hunter known to the Egyptians. It was said that her breath created the desert...
, ancient deities in the two Egypts who were similar lion
Lion
The lion is one of the four big cats in the genus Panthera, and a member of the family Felidae. With some males exceeding 250 kg in weight, it is the second-largest living cat after the tiger...
ess war deities, one for Upper Egypt
Upper Egypt
Upper Egypt is the strip of land, on both sides of the Nile valley, that extends from the cataract boundaries of modern-day Aswan north to the area between El-Ayait and Zawyet Dahshur . The northern section of Upper Egypt, between El-Ayait and Sohag is sometimes known as Middle Egypt...
and the other for Lower Egypt
Lower Egypt
Lower Egypt is the northern-most section of Egypt. It refers to the fertile Nile Delta region, which stretches from the area between El-Aiyat and Zawyet Dahshur, south of modern-day Cairo, and the Mediterranean Sea....
. The range of the two cults met at the border between north and south, near al Minya
Minya, Egypt
Minya is the capital of Minya Governorate in Upper Egypt. It is located approximately south of Cairo on the western bank of the Nile River, which flows north through the city...
(now known as Beni Hasan
Beni Hasan
Beni Hasan is an Ancient Egyptian cemetery site. It is located approximately 20 kilometers to the south of modern-day Minya in the region known as Middle Egypt, the area between Asyut and Memphis.While there are some Old Kingdom burials at the site, it was primarily used during the Middle...
), and here the similarity of the goddess
Goddess
A goddess is a female deity. In some cultures goddesses are associated with Earth, motherhood, love, and the household. In other cultures, goddesses also rule over war, death, and destruction as well as healing....
es led to a new form arising in the merged cultures.
Origin and mythology
Pakhet is likely to be a more ancient regional lioness deity, Goddess of the Mouth of the Wadi, related to those that hunted in the wadiWadi
Wadi is the Arabic term traditionally referring to a valley. In some cases, it may refer to a dry riverbed that contains water only during times of heavy rain or simply an intermittent stream.-Variant names:...
, near water at the boundary of the desert. Another title is She Who Opens the Ways of the Stormy Rains, which probably relates to the flash floods in the narrow valley, that occur from storms in the area. By the time Pakhet appeared in the Egyptian pantheon
Egyptian pantheon
The Egyptian pantheon consisted of the many gods worshipped by the Ancient Egyptians. A number of major deities are addressed as the creator of the cosmos. These include Atum, Ra, Amun and Ptah amongst others, as well as composite forms of these gods such as Amun-Ra. This was not seen as...
, during the Middle Kingdom
Middle Kingdom of Egypt
The Middle Kingdom of Egypt is the period in the history of ancient Egypt stretching from the establishment of the Eleventh Dynasty to the end of the Fourteenth Dynasty, between 2055 BC and 1650 BC, although some writers include the Thirteenth and Fourteenth dynasties in the Second Intermediate...
, Bast came to be considered less as a fierce lion
Lion
The lion is one of the four big cats in the genus Panthera, and a member of the family Felidae. With some males exceeding 250 kg in weight, it is the second-largest living cat after the tiger...
ess, becoming more gentle, as a domesticated cat could be. Consequently, Pakhet's character lay somewhere between the later gentleness of Bast and the ferocity of Sekhmet. Her strength was considered an inner, rather than outer, quality, while retaining all the potential capabilities of the war goddess, if needed. As with Bast and Sekhmet, she also is associated with Hathor
Hathor
Hathor , is an Ancient Egyptian goddess who personified the principles of love, beauty, music, motherhood and joy. She was one of the most important and popular deities throughout the history of Ancient Egypt...
and thereby, is a sun deity as well, wearing the solar disk as part of her crown.
It became said that rather than a simple domestic protector against vermin and venomous creatures, or a fierce warrior
Warrior
A warrior is a person skilled in combat or warfare, especially within the context of a tribal or clan-based society that recognizes a separate warrior class.-Warrior classes in tribal culture:...
, she was a huntress
Hunting
Hunting is the practice of pursuing any living thing, usually wildlife, for food, recreation, or trade. In present-day use, the term refers to lawful hunting, as distinguished from poaching, which is the killing, trapping or capture of the hunted species contrary to applicable law...
, perhaps as a caracal
Caracal
The caracal is a fiercely territorial medium-sized cat ranging over Western Asia, South Asia and Africa.The word caracal comes from the Turkish word "karakulak", meaning "black ear". In North India and Pakistan, the caracal is locally known as syahgosh or shyahgosh, which is a Persian term...
, who wandered the desert alone at night looking for prey, gaining the title, Night huntress with sharp eye and pointed claw. While this desert
Desert
A desert is a landscape or region that receives an extremely low amount of precipitation, less than enough to support growth of most plants. Most deserts have an average annual precipitation of less than...
aspect led to her being associated with desert storms, as was Sekhmet. She also was said to be a protector of motherhood, as was Bast.
In art
Art
Art is the product or process of deliberately arranging items in a way that influences and affects one or more of the senses, emotions, and intellect....
, she was depicted as a feline
Felidae
Felidae is the biological family of the cats; a member of this family is called a felid. Felids are the strictest carnivores of the thirteen terrestrial families in the order Carnivora, although the three families of marine mammals comprising the superfamily pinnipedia are as carnivorous as the...
-headed woman, or as a feline, often depicted killing snake
Snake
Snakes are elongate, legless, carnivorous reptiles of the suborder Serpentes that can be distinguished from legless lizards by their lack of eyelids and external ears. Like all squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping scales...
s with her sharp claws. The exact nature of the feline varied between a desert wildcat, which was more similar to Bast, or a caracal, resembling Sekhmet.
Temples near al Minya
The most famous temple of Pakhet was an underground, cavernous shrine that was built by HatshepsutHatshepsut
Hatshepsut also Hatchepsut; meaning Foremost of Noble Ladies;1508–1458 BC) was the fifth pharaoh of the eighteenth dynasty of Ancient Egypt...
near al Minya
Minya, Egypt
Minya is the capital of Minya Governorate in Upper Egypt. It is located approximately south of Cairo on the western bank of the Nile River, which flows north through the city...
, among thirty-nine ancient tombs of Middle Kingdom
Middle Kingdom of Egypt
The Middle Kingdom of Egypt is the period in the history of ancient Egypt stretching from the establishment of the Eleventh Dynasty to the end of the Fourteenth Dynasty, between 2055 BC and 1650 BC, although some writers include the Thirteenth and Fourteenth dynasties in the Second Intermediate...
monarchs of the Oryx
Oryx
Oryx is one of four large antelope species of the genus Oryx. Three of the species are native to arid parts of Africa, with a fourth native to the Arabian Peninsula. Their pelage is pale with contrasing dark markings in the face and on the legs, and their long horns are almost straight...
nome
Nome (Egypt)
A nome was a subnational administrative division of ancient Egypt. Today's use of the Greek nome rather than the Egyptian term sepat came about during the Ptolemaic period. Fascinated with Egypt, Greeks created many historical records about the country...
, who governed from Hebenu
Hebenu
Hebenu is an Ancient Egyptian city. It was the early capital of the 16th Upper Egyptian Nome. The modern village of Kom el Ahmar is built on the site where the ancient city stood....
, in an area where many quarries exist. This is in the middle of Egypt, on the east bank of the Nile
Nile
The Nile is a major north-flowing river in North Africa, generally regarded as the longest river in the world. It is long. It runs through the ten countries of Sudan, South Sudan, Burundi, Rwanda, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Tanzania, Kenya, Ethiopia, Uganda and Egypt.The Nile has two major...
. A location on the east bank is not traditional for tombs, the west was, but the terrain to the west was most difficult. A more ancient temple to this goddess at the location is known, but has not survived. Hatshepsut is known to have restored temples in this region that had been damaged by the Hyksos
Hyksos
The Hyksos were an Asiatic people who took over the eastern Nile Delta during the twelfth dynasty, initiating the Second Intermediate Period of ancient Egypt....
invaders.
Its remarkable catacombs have been excavated. Great numbers of mummified
Mummy
A mummy is a body, human or animal, whose skin and organs have been preserved by either intentional or incidental exposure to chemicals, extreme coldness , very low humidity, or lack of air when bodies are submerged in bogs, so that the recovered body will not decay further if kept in cool and dry...
cats have been found buried there. Many are thought to have been brought great distances to be buried ceremonially during rituals at the cult center. Some references associate this goddess as, Pakhet-Weret-Hekau, (Weret Hekau meaning she who has great magic), implying the association with a goddess such as Hathor or Isis. Another title is, Horus Pakht, the presence of many mumified hawks at the site would further the association with Hathor who was the mother of Horus
Horus
Horus is one of the oldest and most significant deities in the Ancient Egyptian religion, who was worshipped from at least the late Predynastic period through to Greco-Roman times. Different forms of Horus are recorded in history and these are treated as distinct gods by Egyptologists...
, the hawk, the pharaoh, and the sun.
Her hunting nature led to the Greeks
Ancient Greece
Ancient Greece is a civilization belonging to a period of Greek history that lasted from the Archaic period of the 8th to 6th centuries BC to the end of antiquity. Immediately following this period was the beginning of the Early Middle Ages and the Byzantine era. Included in Ancient Greece is the...
, who later occupied Egypt for three hundred years, identifying Pakhet with Artemis
Artemis
Artemis was one of the most widely venerated of the Ancient Greek deities. Her Roman equivalent is Diana. Some scholars believe that the name and indeed the goddess herself was originally pre-Greek. Homer refers to her as Artemis Agrotera, Potnia Theron: "Artemis of the wildland, Mistress of Animals"...
. Consequently, this underground temple became known to them as, Speos Artemidos
Speos Artemidos
The Speos Artemidos is an archaeological site in Egypt. It is located about 2 km south of the Middle Kingdom tombs at Beni Hasan, and about 28 km south of Al Minya. Today, the site is a small village known as Istabl Antar....
, the Cave of Artemis, a name that persists even though Artermis is not an Egyptian goddess. The Greeks attempted to align the Egyptian deities with their own, while retaining the traditions of the Egyptian religion. Later, Egypt was conquered by the Romans, just after 30 AD, and they retained many of the Greek place names. Christians and other religious sects occupied some parts of the site during the Roman period. Arabic place names were established after the 600s.
Hatshepsut and her daughter Neferure
Neferure
Neferure was an Egyptian princess of the eighteenth dynasty. She was the daughter of two pharaohs, Hatshepsut and Thutmose II. She served in high offices in the government and the religious administration of Ancient Egypt.-Family:...
have been identified as the builders of a smaller temple dedicated to Pakhet nearby, which was defaced by subsequent pharaohs. It was completed during the reign of Alexander II
Alexander II of Macedon
Alexander II was king of Macedon from 371 – 369 BC, following the death of his father Amyntas VI. He was the eldest of the three sons of Amyntas and Eurydice....
and is now called, Speos Batn el-Bakarah.
Coffin text incantation
The Faulkner translation of Ancient Egyptian Coffin TextsCoffin Texts
The Coffin Texts are a collection of ancient Egyptian funerary spells written on coffins beginning in the First Intermediate Period. The texts are derived in part from the earlier pyramid texts, reserved for royal use only, but they contain substantial new material related to everyday desires that...
, Spell 470 reads,
- O You of the dawn who wake and sleep,
- O You who are in limpness, dwelling aforetime in Nedit,
- I have appeared as Pakhet the Great,
- whose eyes are keen and whose claws are sharp,
- the lioness who sees and catches by night....