Mesopotamia turned Egyptian deities

[xuchilpaba]

i'm making this thread to discuss all the Mesopotamian deities that ended up being inherited in ancient Egypt.

So far, i have found one of the most popular of these deities is the Canaanite Anat.


According to Tour Egypt:

"
Her cult became established in Egypt by the end of the Middle Kingdom, even before the Hyksos (Asiatics probably from Syria) invasion of Egypt, so her presence certainly attests to the slow immigration (or perhaps more often, enslavement as the spoils of war) of the Hyksos prior to their ultimate rule of Egypt. However, she attained prominence, particularly in the north (the Delta) during the Second Intermediate Period rule of the Hyksos, who appear to have promoted her cult in Egypt. She was represented at Memphis like all but the most local of deities, and sanctuaries were dedicated to her at the Hyksos capital of Tanis (Egypt) and Beth-Shan (Palistine).

Yet, while the rulers of Egypt's New Kingdom took every step to denounce the Hyksos dynasty, her prestige reached its height in Egypt under Ramesses II who adopted Anat as his personal guardian in battle. Even Ramesses II's dog, shown rushing onto a vanquished Libyan in a carving in Beit el Wali temple, has the name "Anat in vigor". He also named his daughter (whom he later married) Bint-Anat, which means Daughter of Anat. He rebuilt Tanis and enlarged the sanctuary of Anat there. The Elephantine papyri dating from the late sixth century BC indicate that Anat was one of the two goddesses worshiped at the Temple of Yahu (Yahweh) by the Jews on the island of Elephantine in the Nile.

[..........]


Anat was considered by the Egyptians to be similar to Neith/Net, an ancient goddess from the Nile delta, with whom they identified Her. Neith is a skilled weaver and guardian of domestic life, as well as a goddess of war, whose symbols include crossed arrows on an animal skin or shield and a weaver's shuttle. `Anat is interpreted as being depicted with a spindle as well as Her spear, and as the Canaanites/ Phoenicians were famed for their weaving, She may well have been a patroness of that skill, perhaps also of the famed dye, later known as Tyrian purple, which could also be a blood red color. In some descriptions, `Anat adorns Herself with something translated by some as murex, the snail from which the purple dye comes.

Several epithets are known from Egyptian inscriptions. From Aramaic inscriptions of the Hyksos period (c.1700 BC): "Anat-her", Anat agrees or Agreeable Anat, and "Herit-Anta", Terror of Anat. From inscriptions at Memphis dating to the 15th to the 12th centuries BC, we find her referred to as "Bin-Ptah", Daughter of Ptah. And from Elephantine "Beth-El", House of El or House of God.

In Phoenician iconography Anat is usually depicted nude with exaggerated sexual organs and a coiffure similar to Hathor. She is sometimes depicted with bow and arrow, and with the lion, her sacred animal. Otherwise she may be armed with a spear and shield, or a spear and a spindle."


Egyptian:


Canaanite:


(Notice in the Canaanite version it looks similar to depictions of the angels Seraphims)




A similar goddess, I found in a list of Egyptian deities in my books, was Ishtar. But it was never elaborated on when i looked for more info on the Egyptian adaption.

Then we have Qedesh (holiness). The great site Ancient Egypt Online reports:
Qadesh (Qedesh, Kadesh, Qetesh, Qudshu) originally a Semitic deity whose worship was imported into Egypt during the New Kingdom. She was a goddess of nature, beauty and sexual pleasure. Originally her husband was the god Reshep, a Syrian deity whose worship was introduced to Egypt during the Middle Kingdom. When her worship spread to Egypt she was associated with the fertility god Min. Min and Reshep were worshipped as a triad with Qadesh in which she was either the wife of both gods or the wife of Reshpu and the mother of Min.

Qadesh was originally depicted as a naked woman standing on the back of a lion (outside Egypt it is sometimes a horse) with a crescent moon on her head. After her adoption into the Egyption pantheon she was more commonly depicted wearing the headdress of Hathor or a pair of cows horns and a sun disc (also linked with Hathor and the "Eye or Ra") and a tight-fitting sheath dress. She was often shown holding snakes (thought to represent male genetalia) or a papyrus plant (representing Reshep) in her right hand and lotus flowers (representing either female genetalia or Min) in her left hand. Like Bes and Hathor, she is always pictured facing forward rather than in profile.

Her name is possibly related to the hebrew word "qedesh". The meaning of the word is problematic. It is often translated as "holy woman" and (according to some) refers to the sacred prostitutes of the cult of Asherah known as Quedeshot (the Semitic nature goddess who was associated with Hathor in Egypt). In fact, Qadesh is sometimes thought of as an aspect of Asherah rather than a distinct goddess. However, other scholars have suggested that she was a distinct goddess and that the connection with prostitution is due to early mistranslations of biblical texts. They suggest that actually the word related to temple staff, and held no sexual association.

Egypt:



(Couldn't find a Canaanite version of her pic, sorry. )


More to come!

[muska]

Ningal and possibly Ishum (as Itum) are mentioned in Egyptian incantation (Papyrus Leiden UI)
books.google.ru/books?id=vgMVAAAAIAAJ&lpg=PA99&vq=ningal&dq=papyrus%20Leiden%20I%20spells%20Ningal&pg=PA99#v=snippet&q=ningal&f=false
It is unclear for me was it Mesopotamian Ningal or Canaanite Nikkal. Besides, the concept of poison of Ningal is interesting. Ishum is well-known as a force summoned against demons in Mesopotamian tradition, but Ningal is not such figure, as I know.

[asakku]

Egypt was under the Reign of Assyria, does Assyria assimilated a form of Sobek-deity? Did crodocdiles live in the euphrat and tigris back in time?

[Salmu]

As this subject is part my current research, I feel it is necessary to comment on the transferability of deities in the ancient Near East.

Context

Before tackling the individual gods, it is important to be aware that of the regions we are discussing ("Egypt, the Levant and Mesopotamia"), these titles subsume an organic system of states, city states, districts and religious practices. Social entities which we give definitions to with convenient epithets, but time and cultural interaction make fluid. Egypt, for example, while ostensibly the most easily defined as a concrete cultural and religious system, was composed of a series of districts which each favoured their own specific deities. Thus there was potential for deities to gain and lose popularity over the passage of time and political change.

Then there is the issue of chronology. For the benefit of this discussion, I am dealing with a fragment of the chronology for the entire region. The second millennium before the common era, specifically the second half, so the Late Bronze Age (1550-1200 BCE), where cult practices do appear to have been exchanged and assimilated between all regions as a direct response to the heightened political interaction of the period.

However, with regard to religious practice, gods were more likely to be equated (or translated) within the local indigenous pantheon, rather than necessarily "moving house" into a foreign culture. A good example of this would be a LBA text equating the city gods Astarte and Rešpu from Ugarit with the respective gods Ištar and Nergal in northern Syria. Technically nobody divine moved into the adjoining state, rather parallels were drawn between the functions and attributes of the existing gods (drawing broad parallels is a characteristic trap that we also are prone to fall into when applying Classical or monotheistic models to early cultures (like Ishtar ('must') = Aphrodite).

The issue of the Levantine goddesses Anat and Qudšu being adopted into Egyptian cult practice, as discussed previously in this feed, is particularly problematic to scholarship at present. The reason is the enormous gap in textual correlations from sites in the Levant. Levantine and Syrian gods are simply not necessarily conveniently labelled in the archaeological record. We have the mythological texts from Ugarit and the correspondences between the kings of the LBA, but we do not have neat identification tags on the multitude of religious artefacts and figurines. Therefore, the many images and plaques of goddesses are not easily identified, and sadly, where we can make identifications the textual evidence may be silent.

Qudshu-Qadesh

This particularly applies to the goddess Qudšu (“qdš”, Qadeš or the Egyptian vocalisation “kdš”). This name is a Semitic noun which translates as "holy". The epithet is NOT attested in any Levantine texts, except as an adjective to describe the goddess Ašerah (“´trt”), rather, it is only extant on some New Kingdom Egyptian stele and inscriptions. The complete absence of this name in Levantine texts has fuelled debate as to whether in Egypt this goddess was a fusion of two or three Levantine goddesses, a separate entity or a title associated with one goddess. The jury is still out, she may even have been an Egyptian interpretation (hypostasis of an elementary force) of a Levantine divinity.

Her cult appears to have been popular with the broader populace (albeit those who could afford to pay for stele) in New Kingdom Egypt. I am unaware of any scholar actively promoting the idea of the introduction of her worship by the installation of the Hyksos rulers of Egypt in the Second Intermediate period, ca. 1700-1550 (Perhaps I need to read more). That group of foreign rulers favoured the Egyptian chaos god Seth (brother of the underworld god Osiris), who has been equated with the west Semitic weather god Baal. Perhaps the increase in social interaction in the period may have facilitated adoption (or invention). What is more likely, though, is that the Egyptian world view changed in this period and with their expansion into the Levant, their active military campaigning and the introduction of foreign princesses into elite palaces and there was an opportunity for foreign cults to weave into the social fabric. Particularly since the adopted deities appear to be associated directly with martial activities and new technical innovations such as the horse and chariot.

Iconography of Qudshu

In iconography from Egypt Qudšu is a naked goddess. She is depicted facing frontally, with the Egyptian Hathoric naos headdress and voluted wig. She stands on the back of a lion and holds snakes and lotuses. A comparable naked goddess/mistress of animals figure, with clearly defined genitalia does occur in varied forms on artefacts from the Levant and Syria and has variously been equated with the goddesses Astarte, Anath, Ašerah, Belet-ekallim and Ištar (again due to lack of named inscriptions). In the Egyptian representations, Qudšu is often shown placed between the Egyptian fertility god Min and the Levantine underworld, war and pestilence god Rešpu (“ršp”, Rešef). On the basis of her attributes she has been described as a goddess of fertility, which is a glib scholarly hangover from a time when all goddesses were assumed to be concerned with fertility. It would however be more appropriate to describe her as, like the goddess Hathor who she tends to be conflated with, a goddess of regeneration, solar energy, power over chaos and sexuality. Her assimilation into the Egyptian pantheon is reflected in her titles. She was called “Lady of Heaven”, “Mistress of all the Gods”, “Mistress of the Two Lands”, “Beloved of Re” and “Eye of Re”, which incidentally were all titles of the Egyptian goddesses who protected the sun god: Hathor/Sekhmet/Wadjet/Weret Hekau. As "eye of Re" she would play a role in protecting the royal family as well.

Anat

With the Levantine war and hunt goddess Anat (“`nt”) there is a bit more evidence. She is attested in Ugaritic mythological texts as the daughter of the supreme god El and sister (and lover? This is contested) of Baal, and was also equally popular in New Kingdom Egyptian cult, both for the royal and non-royal spheres. In Egyptian representation she was depicted in standard Egyptian iconographic idiom clothed in a sheath dress, wearing the atef or white crown and bearing arms, such as spear and shield or a battle axe. Her animal in much of this iconography was the horse.

However, in the absence of inscription, the presence of horse, military paraphernalia and crown does not exclude that the goddess is Astarte, who shared these attributes, but was usually naked. Anat’s Egyptian epithets were: “Lady of Heaven”, “Mistress of all the Gods”, “Mistress of the Two Lands” and “Mistress of all Lands”. Her martial cult was particularly popular with the 19th Dynasty Ramesside kings and a temple complex dedicated to her cult is attested from the Palace site of Ramesses II and III. In addition, the gods Baal and Astarte are believed to have temples in Memphis.

It is with the gods of war Astarte and Rešpu (who conflates with Baal in much literature) that this comes to a close. Both of these deities were merged with the Mesopotamian gods Nergal and Ištar in foreign correspondences from the LBA for the entire region from Hattuša to Thebes, particularly in the usage of the Akkadian ideograms for same. Therefore identifying artefacts and separating individual cults and divine attributes again becomes somewhat problematic. Astarte was the wife of the chaos god Seth in the Egyptian pantheon and daughter of the sun god Ra or of Ptah. She bore the titles “Lady of Heaven”, “Foremost of Memphis” and “Mistress of the Two Lands”.




A basic bibliography for this material:

Cornelius, I. 1994. The Iconography of the Canaanite Gods Reshef and Ba’al. Orbis Biblicus et Orientalis 140, Freiburg: Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht.

Cornelius, I. 2004. The Many Faces of the Goddess: The Iconography of the Syro-Palestinian Goddesses Anat, Astarte, Qedeshet and Asherah, c. 1500-1000 BCE, Orbis Biblicus et Orientalis 204. Freiburg: Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht.

Cornelius, I. 2009. “The Mistress of Animals”. In The Iconography of Demons and Deities. http:www.religionswissenschaft.unizh.ch/idd.

Day, P.L. 1992. “Anat: Ugarit’s ‘Mistress of the Animals’”. Journal of Near Eastern
Studies 51:181-190.

Maier, W.A. III, 1986. `Ašerah: Extrabiblical Evidence. Atlanta: Scholars.

Marinatos, N. 2000. The Goddess and the Warrior: The Naked Goddess and Mistress of Animals in Early Greek Religion. London: Routledge.

Stuckey, J.H. 2003. “The Great Goddesses of the Levant”. Journal of the Society for the Study of Egyptian Antiquities 30:127-57.


For the record, the images above are incorrect:

The Egyptian illustration above naming 'Anath' in the earlier discussion is the pharaoh Ramesses II as the male slar god, Horus the Child (or Harpocrates).

The other winged figure appears to be a 'later', probably modern interpretation of an “Astarte” figure.

Anat


Qudšu

[us4-he2-gal2]

Andrea:



Thanks very much for this input - while I am definitely a prejudiced Mesopotamian reader, also one who is typically unexcited by goddesses, I take two things from you comments, which stated loosely are:

a) Modern identifications between Levantine/Egyptian deities may be based on outmoded convention or on ancient syncretism.

b) Ancient syncretism may be little more than an agreement upon the equivalencies of two gods rather then a genuine transfer of identity.


In any case, sounds bewildering - think I'll stick to Mesopotamia.