Mythology

The cobra goddess Wadjet was associated with the Nile Delta region from early times and became the tutelary deity of Lower Egypt in juxtaposition to her counterpart, the vulture goddess Nekhbet of Upper Egypt. Her name means ‘the green one’ which may refer to the natural colour of the serpent or perhaps to the verdant Delta region which she inhabited. Perhaps because she was associated more with the world of the living, the goddess does not play an important role in the Pyramid Texts, though references to the crown as a goddess do give her the epithet ‘great of magic’ (lU.' 194, 196). She was certainly closely linked to the king, both in the

Classic hieroglyphic form of the goddess Wadjet as a serpent on a basket, along ivith the vidtiire of the goddess Nekhbet, representing the ‘Tivo Ladies’ name of the king which symbolized the titulary position of these goddesses over Upper and Lower Egypt 12th dynasty. Chapel of Senwosretl, Karnak.

Wadjet as a serpent-headed vidture, in iconographic parallelism with her Upper Egyptian counterpart, the vulture goddess Nekhbet. Detail from the roof of the fourth gilt shrine of Tutankhamun. 18th dynasty. Egyptian Museum, Cairo.

‘two ladies’ or ‘two goddesses’ title of his royal protocol and as a protective deity in the form of the royal uraeus worn on the monarch’s crown or headdress. In later texts she is called the ‘mistress of awe’ and ‘mistress of fear’, as mythologically the royal serpent spat flames in defense of the king; and military inscriptions (such of those of Harnesses II regarding the great Battle of Kadesh) describe her as slaying the monarch’s enemies with her fiery breath. In the cycle of myths relating to Horus as represented in the temple of Hathor at Dendera, VVadjet acts as the young god’s nurse when he is raised in the Delta site of Khemnis, giving her an association with Isis who usually took this role. Wadjet was also associated with a number of leonine goddesses as an ‘Eye of Re’, and like them she is sometimes said to be the mother of the god N'efertem.