Goddess Hathor – goddess of love in ancient Egypt 

In ancient Egypt history, there were gods of war, gods of the afterlife, and gods of love, dance, and music, which indicates that Egypt includes every form of life with its sadness and happiness.

Here, we are going to explore the myth behind the goddess Hathor, who she is, what she looks like, and whether the Egyptians worship her or hate her. Let’s find out together who the goddess Hathor is.

 

Who was Goddess Hathor?

Hathor Goddess: A Divine Presence

She was a very important goddess of ancient Egypt; she was also very popular as she was the goddess of love, beauty, music, singing, kindness, pleasure, Motherhood, and fertility. It’s believed that she helped mothers give birth and protected the God Ra.

While she was the protector of women, men worshiped her too; she had a temple with the usual priests in it, but it was unusual that she had priestesses as well.

 

What is the meaning of Hathor?

Deciphering the Meaning of Hathor

Hathor means “the house of god Horus.” In other sayings, it means “estate of Horus”; she was identified as the mother of the kings and the wife of the god Horus.

There are some claims that she was the daughter of the sun god “Re,” and she was also known as “the guardian Of Re.”

 

Origin of Goddess Hathor

racing the Origin of Goddess Hathor

The Egyptians worshiped Hathor at Dendera; Hathor’s worship was in the early dynastic times (probably about three thousand years BCE, the predynastic era)

 

Titles and Epithets of Goddess Hathor

Exploring Hathor’s Many Titles

• Goddess Hathor was given many nicknames and titles, which indicates that she was a very important goddess and able to do a lot of things; some of her nicknames are:

➢ Lady of stars

➢ Lady of the West

➢ Lady of the holy country

➢ The distant god

➢ Hand of god 

➢ Hathor, the mistress of heaven 

➢ Hathor, the mistress of the desert

 

Hathor: Lady of sycamore

Hathor: The Lady of the Sycamore Tree

Goddess Hathor was called ” Nbt-Nht” at Memphis, which means “lady of sycamore.” the relationship between goddess Hathor and the sycamore tree because the tree had a milky liquid in it. In ancient Egypt, the goddess Hathor was the goddess of milk (among her other functions..as I said, she was a very important goddess).

Hathor: Goddess of maternity

Hathor: Goddess of Maternity and Nurturing

When Horus’s mother, “Isis,” was absent and out searching for her husband, the father of Horus, “Osiris,” Hathor suckled Horus the divine milk, and that’s why she was called the protector and the nurse of the kings. 

 

The Symbolism of Goddess Hathor

Unveiling the Symbolism of Goddess Hathor

• Goddess Hathor was represented in three forms :

✓ As a cow with the sun disk between her horns.

✓ As a lady with the sun disk between her two horns.

✓ The body of a lady and the head of a cow with the sun disk between her two horns over her head.

 

The Cult of Goddess Hathor

The Enduring Cult of Goddess Hathor

Goddess Hathor was very famous in Egypt and beyond Egypt; her cult was everywhere, and she was the patroness of foreign lands.

During the late period, women in Egypt were hoping they would end up with the goddess Hathor in the afterlife, while men aspired to be Osiris; Hathor was identified by the Greeks when they entered Egypt in 332  BCidentified her with their goddess of love and beauty goddess Aphrodite.

 

Temple of Hathor at Dendera

Exploring the Temple of Hathor at Dendera

The temple of Dendera in upper Egypt is THE temple of Hathor; it dates back to the fourth dynasty(at least); after the fall of the old kingdom, it became the most important temple; through the times, many monarchs added to the temple, the most recent version of the temple was constructed in the time of the greek-roman period, the temple is now one of the most well-preserved temples in Egypt.

 

Priests of Goddess Hathor

The Devoted Priests of Goddess Hathor

In the old kingdom, most of the priests of Hathor were women; they were from the royal family. In the Middle Kingdom, women were not able to be in the high positions of priests, but the queens were still more associated with the Hathor religion.

Women who were not from the royal family were excluded from the position of priest. Therefore, they participated in Hathor’s religion by singing and playing music in her temples.

 

The myth of the destruction of humanity

The Legend of Hathor and the Destruction of Mankind

Like the rest of the Egypt gods and goddesses, Hathor was a part of several legends, one of them being the legend of the destruction of humanity. This legend is a sad one and a tricky one as well.

 

When God Ra, the sun god, became old, his appearance became very bad, and people rejected him and started laughing at him; he had flashes like gold, his bones were like silver, and his hair was like lapis lazuli; people didn’t show any respect to him.

 

The sun god Ra became very angry at this behavior. He asks goddess Hathor to punish the people and kill them, but because she is a kind goddess, she refuses to do that. God tricked her and made her transform into the goddess Sekhmet, and then she agreed to destroy and kill people.

 

Goddess Sekhmet started to kill people, and god Ra, after that massacre, felt it was not fair to kill all the humans; he asked her to stop killing people, but she refused, and he realized he didn’t have control over her anymore.

 

He thought of a way to convert her again into goddess Hathor; he made a lake full of red wine, made it look like red wine, and invited her to it; when she arrived at the lake, she thought it was blood and started to drink it. After she became drunk, he converted her again to the goddess Hathor.

 

After that, she realized what she had done and became very sad and angry at herself and God Re. She left him and went to the Dendara temple. To honor her, god Re followed goddess Hathor and put his sun disk between her two horns. That’s the legend behind the sun disk between goddess hathor horns.

Interesting facts 

• Goddess Hathor was called nbt-nhtat Memphis 

• She was called Lady of Turquoise in Sinai

• At deir-elbahari, she was considered the lady of the west 

• Due to her funny character, she was called the woman of delights 

In Conclusion

Goddess Hathor, one of the most important and powerful deities in ancient Egypt, had a very loving personality, which is why she was worshiped in Egypt and loved by many Egyptians.