| ||
| wꜣḏyt in hieroglyphs |
|---|
| ||
| cobra+Sun in hieroglyphs IS THIS EGG PROTECTED BY THE SNAKE = Eyes of HORUS The Green One Cosmic Egg protector |
|---|
| ||
| ḏt "cobra" in hieroglyphs |
|---|
Wadjet (/ˈwɑːdˌdʒɛt/ or /ˈwædˌdʒɛt/; Egyptian wꜣḏyt, "green one"),[1] known to the Greek world as Uto /ˈjuːtoʊ/ or Buto /ˈbjuːtoʊ/ among other names, was originally the ancient local goddess of the city of Dep (Buto),[2] which became part of the city that the Egyptians named Per-Wadjet, House of Wadjet, and the Greeks called Buto (Desouknow),[3] a city that was an important site in the Predynastic era of Ancient Egypt and the cultural developments of the Paleolithic. She was said to be the patron and protector of Lower Egypt and upon unification with Upper Egypt, the joint protector and patron of all of Egypt with the "goddess" of Upper Egypt. The image of Wadjet with the sun disk is called the uraeus, and it was the emblem on the crown of the rulers of Lower Egypt. She was also the protector of kings and of women in childbirth.
As the patron goddess, she was associated with the land and depicted as a snake-headed woman or a snake—usually an Egyptian cobra, a venomous snake common to the region; sometimes she was depicted as a woman with two snake heads and, at other times, a snake with a woman's head. Her oracle was in the renowned temple inPer-Wadjet that was dedicated to her worship and gave the city its name. This oracle may have been the source for the oracular tradition that spread to Greece from Egypt.[4]
The Going Forth of Wadjet was celebrated on December 25 with chants and songs. An annual festival held in the city celebrated Wadjet on April 21. Other important dates for special worship of her were June 21, the Summer Solstice, and March 14. She also was assigned the fifth hour of the fifth day of the moon.
Wadjet was closely associated in the Egyptian pantheon with Bast, the fierce goddess depicted as a lioness warrior and protector, as the sun goddess whose eye later became the eye of Horus, the eye of Ra, and as the Lady of Flame. The hieroglyph for her eye is shown below; sometimes two are shown in the sky of religious images. Per-Wadjet also contained a sanctuary of Horus, the child of the sun deity who would be interpreted to represent the pharaoh. Much later, Wadjet became associated with Isis as well as with many other deities.
In the relief shown to the right, which is on the wall of the Hatshepsut Temple at Luxor, there are two images of Wadjet: one of her as the uraeus sun disk with her head through an ankh and another where she precedes a Horus hawk wearing the double crown of united Egypt, representing the pharaoh whom she protects.
Etymology[edit]
The name Wadjet[5] is derived from the term for the symbol of her domain, Lower Egypt, the papyrus.[6]
Her name means "papyrus-colored one",[7][8] as wadj is the ancient Egyptian word for the color green (in reference to the color of the papyrus plant) and the et is an indication of her gender. Its hieroglyphs differ from those of the Green Crown (Red Crown) of Lower Egypt only by the determinative, which in the case of the crown was a picture of the Green Crown[9] and, in the case of the goddess, a rearing cobra.
Protector of country, pharaohs, and other deities[edit]
| ||||||||||||
| Uraeus – Uraeus on Basket Ntr + Cobra in hieroglyphs |
|---|
| ||
| Wedjat - Eye of Horus in hieroglyphs |
|---|
Eventually, Wadjet was claimed as the patron goddess and protector of the whole of Lower Egypt and became associated with Nekhbet, depicted as awhite vulture, who held unified Egypt. After the unification the image of Nekhbet joined Wadjet on the crown, thereafter shown as part of the uraeus.
The ancient Egyptian word Wedjat signifies blue and green. It is also the name for the well known Eye of the Moon.[10] Indeed, in later times, she was often depicted simply as a woman with a snake's head, or as a woman wearing the uraeus. The uraeus originally had been her body alone, which wrapped around or was coiled upon the head of the pharaoh or another deity
Wadjet was depicted as a cobra. As patron and protector, later Wadjet often was shown coiled upon the head of Ra; in order to act as his protection, this image of her became the uraeus symbol used on the royal crowns as well.
Her image also rears up from the staff of the "flag" poles that are used to indicate deities, as seen in the hieroglyph for uraeus above and for goddess in other places.
Associations with other deities[edit]
COSMIC EGG- WORLD EGG--
An interpretation of the Milky Way was that it was the primal snake, Wadjet, the protector of Egypt. In this interpretation she was closely associated withHathor and other early deities among the various aspects of the great mother goddess, including Mut and Naunet. The association with Hathor brought her son Horus into association also. The cult of Ra absorbed most of Horus's traits and included the protective eye of Wadjet that had shown her association with Hathor.
When identified as the protector of Ra, who was also a sun deity associated with heat and fire, she was sometimes said to be able to send fire onto those who might attack, just as the cobra spits poison into the eyes of its enemies.[11] In this role she was called the Lady of Flame.
She later became identified with the war goddess of Lower Egypt, Bast, who acted as another figure symbolic of the nation, consequently becoming Wadjet-Bast. In this role, since Bast was a lioness, Wadjet-Bast was often depicted with a lioness head.
After Lower Egypt had been conquered by Upper Egypt and they were unified, the lioness goddess of Upper Egypt, Sekhmet, was seen as the more powerful of the two warrior goddesses. It was Sekhmet who was seen as the Avenger of Wrongs, and the Scarlet Lady, a reference to blood, as the one with bloodlust. She is depicted with the solar disk and Wadjet, however.
Eventually, Wadjet's position as patron led to her being identified as the more powerful goddess Mut, whose cult had come to the fore in conjunction with rise of the cult of Amun, and eventually being absorbed into her as the Mut-Wadjet-Bast triad.
When the pairing of deities occurred in later Egyptian myths, since she was linked to the land, after the unification of Lower and Upper Egypt she came to be thought of as the wife of Hapy, a deity of the Nile, which flowed through the land.[12]
Wadjet, as the goddess of Lower Egypt, had a big temple at the ancient Imet (now Tell Nebesha) in the Nile Delta. She was worshipped in the area as the 'Lady of Imet'. Later she was joined by Min and Horus to form a triad of deities. This was based on an Osiriac model identified elsewhere in Egypt.[13]
Wadjet is not to be confused with the Egyptian demon Apep, who is also represented as a snake in Egyptian mythology.
The Eye of Horus is an ancient Egyptian symbol of protection, royal power and good health. The eye is personified in the goddess Wadjet (also written asWedjat,[1][2][3] or "Udjat",[4] Uadjet, Wedjoyet, Edjo or Uto[5]). It is also known as ''The Eye of Ra''.[6]
The name Wadjet is derived from "wadj" meaning "green", hence "the green one", and was known to the Greeks and Romans as "uraeus" from the Egyptian "iaret" meaning "risen one" from the image of a cobra rising up in protection.[7] Wadjet was one of the earliest of Egyptian deities who later became associated with other goddesses such as Bast, Sekhmet, Mut, and Hathor. She was the tutelary deity of Lower Egypt and the major Delta shrine the "per-nu" was under her protection.[7] Hathor is also depicted with this eye.[8]
Funerary amulets were often made in the shape of the Eye of Horus. The Wadjet or Eye of Horus is "the central element" of seven "gold, faience,carnelian and lapis lazuli" bracelets found on the mummy of Shoshenq II.[3] The Wedjat "was intended to protect the pharaoh [here] in the afterlife"[3] and to ward off evil. Ancient Egyptian and Near Eastern sailors would frequently paint the symbol on the bow of their vessel to ensure safe sea travel.[9]
Contents
[hide]Horus[edit]
Horus was the ancient Egyptian sky god who was usually depicted as a falcon, most likely a lanner or peregrine falcon.[10] His right eye was associated with the sun god, Ra. The eye symbol represents the marking around the eye of the falcon, including the "teardrop" marking sometimes found below the eye. The mirror image, or left eye, sometimes represented the moon and the god Djehuti (Thoth).[11]
| ||
| wedjet – Eye of Horus in hieroglyphs |
|---|
In one myth, when Set and Horus were fighting for the throne after Osiris's death, Set gouged out Horus's left eye. The majority of the eye was restored by eitherHathor or Thoth (with the last portion possibly being supplied magically). When Horus's eye was recovered, he offered it to his father, Osiris, in hopes of restoring his life. Hence, the eye of Horus was often used to symbolise sacrifice, healing, restoration, and protection.[12]
As hieroglyph and symbol[edit]
There are seven different hieroglyphs used to represent the eye, most commonly "ir.t" in Egyptian, which also has the meaning "to make or do" or "one who does".[5]In Egyptian myth the eye was not the passive organ of sight but more an agent of action, protection or wrath.
Mathematics[edit]
Further information: Egyptian fraction and 1/2 + 1/4 + 1/8 + 1/16 + · · ·
In Ancient Egyptian most fractions were written as the sum of two or more unit fractions (a fraction with 1 as the numerator), with scribes possessing tables of answers (see Rhind Mathematical Papyrus 2/n table).[13] Thus instead of 3/4, one would write 1/2 + 1/4.
Different parts of the Eye of Horus were thought to be used by the ancient Egyptians to represent one divided by the first six powers of two:[14]
- The right side of the eye = 1/2
- The pupil = 1/4
- The eyebrow = 1/8
- The left side of the eye = 1/16
- The curved tail = 1/32
- The teardrop = 1/64
The Rhind Mathematical Papyrus contains tables of 'Horus Eye Fractions'.[15]
Studies from the 1970s to this day in Egyptian mathematics have clearly shown this theory was fallacious and Jim Ritter definitely showed it to be false in 2003.[16]The evolution of the symbols used in mathematics, although similar to the different parts of the Eye of Horus, is now known to be distinct.
