Bat (Egyptian mythology)
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Bat is an ancient Egyptian local goddess of the capital Hu-sixem in the seventh Upper Egyptian Gau ("Gau of the female soul") , documented as early as the early dynastic period . The name corresponds to the feminine form of the word Ba (soul) . In the pyramid texts she is referred to as the "Bat with the two faces".
meaning
Bat is iconographically similar to the goddess Hathor . She was worshiped as the fertility goddess who could help childless women conceive. Strangely enough, Bat is not directly mentioned in the period from the New Kingdom to the Late Period , which may be due to her temporary merger with Hathor. From the 26th dynasty and especially in the Greco-Roman period , however, the old Bat cult revived.
presentation
In the Gauliste of Sesostris I in the Karnak Temple , Bat is represented as a representative of the seventh Upper Egyptian Gau as a fetish on a standard . Bat has been equated with Hathor since the 11th Dynasty and can be found on many sistras and pillars. Even in the early days, the symbol of the bat was sometimes surrounded by stars, which could indicate a cosmic meaning.
Bat is shown with a human face, cow ears and cow horns. One of the earliest records of Bat is the Narmer palette from the predynastic period . There it forms the upper end of the palette on the front and back . A group representation from the 4th Dynasty ( Old Kingdom ) shows King Mykerinos , framed by Hathor and Bat as a goddess with a Bat fetish on his head.
See also
literature
- RO Faulkner : The ancient Egyptian pyramid texts, translated into English by RO Faulkner. Clarendon Press, Oxford 1969, ISBN 0-19-815437-2 , p. 181.
- Henry G. Fischer : Bat. In: Lexicon of Egyptology. Volume I, Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 1975, ISBN 3-447-01670-1 , Sp. 630-632.
- Henry G. Fischer: The Cult and Nome of the Goddes Bat. In: Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt. Volume 1, 1962, pp. 7-23 and Volume 2, 1963, pp. 50f.
- Christian Leitz u. a .: Lexicon of the Egyptian gods and names of gods . Peeters, Leuven 2002, ISBN 90-429-1147-6 , p. 735.
Web links
- brief overview of Bat
- like
- Name declaration ( Memento from April 27, 2012 in the Internet Archive )
Individual evidence
- ↑ Kurt Sethe : The ancient Egyptian pyramid texts. Volume II, Reprint, Hildesheim 1968, p. 109, Spruch 506, Pyr. 1096.