#ancient egyptian goddess

New art of Bat, a very ancient Egyptian Goddess of cows and the starry sky. That’s probably Her on the Narmer Palette, and that may also be Her on the Gerzeh Palette, which shows a stylized cow’s head with stars at the tips of the ears and horns, with another on the forehead. The ancient Egyptians linked cows with the night sky, perhaps either because the spotted coats reminded them of the stars (leopards were associated with the starry sky as well in Egyptian thought), or because cows have a star-like whorl of hair on their foreheads.

She was the Goddess of the sixth nome (administrative district) of Upper Egypt; in time Her worship was absorbed into Hathor’s (Who was the Goddess of the neighboring seventh nome). She looks to have been patterned after a different type of cow, though, as Bat’s horns curve inward, unlike Hathor’s.

Her name comes from one of the types of soul in Egyptian thought, the ba, with the feminine ending -t.

Digital art, made to look like an old Art Deco lithographed poster; as that art movement was heavily influenced by ancient Egyptian art in the first place (Tutankhamun’s tomb causing quite a sensation when it was discovered in 1922) it seemed appropriate. The color scheme is a version of the familiar one of ancient Egyptian jewelry: dark blue (lapis lazuli), red (carnelian) and gold. I looked at both the Narmer Palette and Hathor columns for the shape of the face.

I’ve put it up on both prints (through deviantArt) and cards (through Zazzle).