Origin: Egyptian mythology
Type: goddess
Hathor is a goddess sometimes depicted either with a cow head or a woman’s head with a cow’s ears and horns. As a Great Mother, she manifests as a lover, mother, avenger and comforter of the dead. Descriptions of her vary, but in later myths her characteristics mix with those of Isis. The connections to cows stem from the human reproductive anatomy: the triangle cow head and two horns resemble the shape of the uterus.
Origin: Egyptian mythology
Thoth could be considered one of the most important gods in the Egyptian pantheon, representing wisdom and divine intellect. He has numerous forms which conveys a different aspect of his being.
As the scribe of all gods, he is credited with authorship of science, religion, philosophy and knowledge. One of his forms, a man with the head of a bird, he is the lord of time who measures the days and seasons. He is believed to have invented the calendar, and without his words the gods themselves would not exist.
Origin: Egyptian mythology
He is often depicted with the head of a ram. The wave-like pattern of the ram’s horns resemble the waters of the Nile, which he was believed to be the source of. One horn feeds water to the North; the other to the South. Sometimes he is shown holding a jar that spills the Nile’s water.
Khnum’s job is to assist Hapi in making sure the right amount of silt is released into the water. From the dirt and silt he forms the bodies and souls of children, placing them into a mother’s womb.
Origin: Egyptian mythology
Type: creation goddess
Neith has several manifestations, and is related to the goddess Isis. Sobek, the crocodile god, is her son. It is also said that when she spat into the water, the serpent demon Apophis was born.
As the goddess of the hunt, she either wears or holds a set of crossed arrows. In the annual Festival of the Lamps, she wears the shuttle of a loom on her head, carries the ankh, and weaves mummy clothes for the dead.
Origin: Egyptian mythology
Type: frog goddess
Heket protects all those involved in childbirth-mothers, midwives, and babies. Usually she appears as a woman with the head of a frog, but in some amulets she is in animal form. It is said that she molds the child and its soul from clay, like a potter.
She is associated with Isis and Osiris, said to have breathed life into the body of Horus at his birth.
Origin: Egyptian mythology
Type: goddess
Selket usually appears as a woman with a scorpion on her head, but other times she is a scorpion with a woman’s head. It was believed that she had power over all poisonous snakes, reptiles and animals.
She helped in the rebirth of the newly deceased person into their new existence in the Underworld by giving them the breath of life. In burial tombs, Selket was a protector of the canopic jar, that held the intestines of the corpse.
Origin: Egyptian mythology
Type: Goddess
Also known as Bast, Bastet appears as a woman with a cat’s head, usually surrounded by kittens as a sign of her motherly nature. She is a goddess fertility, love and sensuality. In some images, she holds a sistrum as an emblem of festivals and intoxication.
Origin: Egyptian mythology
Type: Goddess
Sekhmet is the warrior goddess, as well as the goddess of healing in Upper Egypt. Dressed in red, she is depicted with the head of a lioness with a sun disc and cobra hood. She is linked with the sun.
Ra discovered that the humans were plotting against him, and sent his divine eye, Sekhmet, to destroy them. After she had killed many people, Ra had a change of heart and wished to stop her. He had his priests pour red beer onto the ground. Sekhmet, mistaking it for blood, lapped it up and became too drunk to kill the rest of mankind.
Origin: Egyptian mythology
Type: Crocodile god
Sobek appears as a man with a crocodile head, holding an Ankh. Worship of Sobek may have started as a way to appease the crocodiles, as they were common and deeply feared. He was worshiped mostly in the city of Arsinoe, where the Greeks would rename to Crocodopolis. There, crocodiles were kept in sacred pools adorned with jewels and hand fed meat. Over time, Sobek would be associated with fertility brought to the land by annual Nile floods.
Origin: Egyptian mythology
Type: Heron
The Bennu is pictured as a long legged heron with a two feathered crest. Sometimes it is depicted wearing the headdress of Osiris, who dies and is reborn. The Bennu is thought to be the soul of Ra„ and was linked to the rising and setting of the Sun, the yearly Nile flooding and they cycle of birth, death, and resurrection.