HATHOR

Love, music, fertility

Hathor is one of the most ancient and best-loved goddesses of ancient Egypt, the African civilisation of the Nile valley. Goddess of the sky, of love, of music, of dance and of fecundity, she embodies joy and beauty. Daughter of the solar god Ra, whose eye she also is, and associated with Horus — her name means dwelling of Horus — she is represented as a celestial cow, as a woman crowned with cow horns framing the solar disc, or as a woman with bovine ears. The sistrum and the menat, sacred musical instruments, are consecrated to her and accompany her cult. Hathor protects women, presides over births and watches over love and feminine beauty. She is also the mistress of the West who welcomes the dead into the afterlife, and the lady of turquoise honoured as far as the mines of Sinai. Her great temple, remarkably preserved, stands at Dendera, in Upper Egypt, home of joyful festivals such as that of the beautiful reunion, which celebrated her union with Horus of Edfu. The myth of the distant goddess tells how, in the guise of the raging lioness Sekhmet, she nearly annihilated humanity before being appeased and returned to her benevolent form — an illustration of the double nature of the great Egyptian solar goddesses.