Satet, Satit or Satjet, Satjit in Ancient Egyptian ( or ', ."Pourer" or "Shooter"),

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

: Satis, also known by numerous related names, was an

Upper Egypt Upper Egypt ( ', shortened to , , locally: ) is the southern portion of Egypt and is composed of the Nile River valley south of the delta and the 30th parallel North. It thus consists of the entire Nile River valley from Cairo south to Lake N ...

ian

goddess A goddess is a female deity. In some faiths, a sacred female figure holds a central place in religious prayer and worship. For example, Shaktism (one of the three major Hinduism, Hindu sects), holds that the ultimate deity, the source of all re ...

who, along with

Khnum Khnum, also romanised Khnemu (; , ), was one of the earliest-known Egyptian deities in Upper Egypt, originally associated with the Nile cataract. He held the responsibility of regulating the annual inundation of the river, emanating from the ca ...

and

Anuket Anuket was the ancient Egyptian goddess of the cataracts of the Nile and Lower Nubia in general, worshipped especially at Elephantine near the First Cataract. Etymology In ancient Egyptian, she was known as Anuket, Anaka, or Anqet. Her name ...

, formed part of the

Elephantine Elephantine ( ; ; ; ''Elephantíne''; , ) is an island on the Nile, forming part of the city of Aswan in Upper Egypt. The archaeological site, archaeological digs on the island became a World Heritage Site in 1979, along with other examples of ...

Triad. A protective deity of Egypt's southern border with

Nubia Nubia (, Nobiin language, Nobiin: , ) is a region along the Nile river encompassing the area between the confluence of the Blue Nile, Blue and White Nile, White Niles (in Khartoum in central Sudan), and the Cataracts of the Nile, first cataract ...

, she came to personify the former annual flooding of the

Nile The Nile (also known as the Nile River or River Nile) is a major north-flowing river in northeastern Africa. It flows into the Mediterranean Sea. The Nile is the longest river in Africa. It has historically been considered the List of river sy ...

and to serve as a

war War is an armed conflict between the armed forces of states, or between governmental forces and armed groups that are organized under a certain command structure and have the capacity to sustain military operations, or between such organi ...

hunting Hunting is the Human activity, human practice of seeking, pursuing, capturing, and killing wildlife or feral animals. The most common reasons for humans to hunt are to obtain the animal's body for meat and useful animal products (fur/hide (sk ...

, and

fertility goddess A fertility deity is a god or goddess associated with fertility, sex, pregnancy, childbirth, and crops. In some cases these deities are directly associated with these experiences; in others they are more abstract symbols. Fertility rites may a ...

. She was sometimes conflated with

Isis Isis was a major goddess in ancient Egyptian religion whose worship spread throughout the Greco-Roman world. Isis was first mentioned in the Old Kingdom () as one of the main characters of the Osiris myth, in which she resurrects her sla ...

and

Sopdet Sopdet is the ancient Egyptian name of the star Sirius and its personification as an Egyptian goddess. Known to the Greeks as Sothis, she was conflated with Isis as a goddess and Anubis as a god. Names The exact pronunciation of ancien ...

, goddess of the bright star

Sirius Sirius is the brightest star in the night sky. Its name is derived from the Greek word (Latin script: ), meaning 'glowing' or 'scorching'. The star is designated Canis Majoris, Latinized to Alpha Canis Majoris, and abbr ...

, which the Egyptians connected with the onset of the Nile flooding. Under the ''

interpretatio graeca , or "interpretation by means of Greek odels, refers to the tendency of the ancient Greeks to identify foreign deities with their own gods. It is a discourse used to interpret or attempt to understand the mythology and religion of other cult ...

'', she was conflated with

Hera In ancient Greek religion, Hera (; ; in Ionic Greek, Ionic and Homeric Greek) is the goddess of marriage, women, and family, and the protector of women during childbirth. In Greek mythology, she is queen of the twelve Olympians and Mount Oly ...

and

Juno Juno commonly refers to: *Juno (mythology), the Roman goddess of marriage and queen of the gods * ''Juno'' (film), the 2007 film Juno may also refer to: Arts, entertainment and media Fictional characters *Juno, a character in the book ''Juno of ...

Names

The exact pronunciation of

Egyptian ''Egyptian'' describes something of, from, or related to Egypt. Egyptian or Egyptians may refer to: Nations and ethnic groups * Egyptians, a national group in North Africa ** Egyptian culture, a complex and stable culture with thousands of year ...

is often uncertain since vowels were not recorded until a very late period. In transcription, the goddess's name also appears as Setis, Sati, Setet, Satet, Satit, and Sathit.. Derived from ', meaning "eject", "shoot", "pour", or "throw", her name can be variously translated as "She who Shoots" or "She who Pours" depending on which of her roles is being emphasized. Her name was originally written with the

hieroglyph Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs ( ) were the formal writing system used in Ancient Egypt for writing the Egyptian language. Hieroglyphs combined ideographic, logographic, syllabic and alphabetic elements, with more than 1,000 distinct characters. ...

for a linen garment's shoulder knot ( S29); this was later replaced by

's animal hide pierced by an arrow ( F29). She was also known by epithets, such as "Mistress of Elephantine" and "She Who Runs Like an Arrow", thought to refer to the flowing river current.

History

A goddess of the

ians, her cult is first attested on jars beneath the

Step Pyramid A step pyramid or stepped pyramid is an architectural structure that uses flat platforms, or steps, receding from the ground up, to achieve a completed shape similar to a geometric pyramid. Step pyramids – typically large and made of several la ...

Saqqara Saqqara ( : saqqāra ), also spelled Sakkara or Saccara in English , is an Egyptian village in the markaz (county) of Badrashin in the Giza Governorate, that contains ancient burial grounds of Egyptian royalty, serving as the necropolis for ...

( Dynasty III). She appears in the

Pyramid Texts The Pyramid Texts are the oldest ancient Egyptian funerary texts, dating to the late Old Kingdom. They are the earliest known corpus of ancient Egyptian religious texts. Written in Old Egyptian, the pyramid texts were carved onto the subterranea ...

( Dynasty VI) purifying a deceased pharaoh's body with four jars of water from

. Her principal center of worship was at Abu (

), an island in

Aswan Aswan (, also ; ) is a city in Southern Egypt, and is the capital of the Aswan Governorate. Aswan is a busy market and tourist centre located just north of the Aswan Dam on the east bank of the Nile at the first cataract. The modern city ha ...

on the southern edge of Egypt. Her temple there occupied an early

predynastic Prehistoric Egypt and Predynastic Egypt was the period of time starting at the first human settlement and ending at the First Dynasty of Egypt around 3100 BC. At the end of prehistory, "Predynastic Egypt" is traditionally defined as the period ...

site shown by Wells to be aligned with the star

. Other centers include Swenet (

proper) and Setet (

Sehel Island Sehel Island () is located in the Nile, about southwest of Aswan in southern Egypt. It is a large island, and is roughly halfway between the city and the upstream Aswan Low Dam. Geography Sehel Island, spanning 3/4 the width of the Nile, is th ...

nearby). She was particularly associated with the upper reaches of the Nile, which the Egyptians sometimes considered to have its source near Aswan. She is invoked in Aramaic as ''Sati'' on a divorce document in the

Elephantine papyri The Elephantine Papyri and Ostraca consist of thousands of documents from the Egyptian border fortresses of Elephantine and Aswan, which yielded hundreds of papyri and ostraca in hieratic and demotic Egyptian, Aramaic, Koine Greek, Latin and Cop ...

Myths

As a war goddess, Satis protected Egypt's southern

n frontier by killing the enemies of the pharaoh with her sharp arrows. As a fertility goddess, she was thought to grant the wishes of those who sought love. She seems to have originally been paired with the Theban god

Montu Montu was a falcon-god of war in the ancient Egyptian religion, an embodiment of the conquering vitality of the pharaoh.Hart, George, ''A Dictionary of Egyptian Gods and Goddesses'', Routledge, 1986, . p. 126. He was particularly worshipped in ...

but later replaced Heket as the consort of

, guardian of the

source of the Nile The Nile (also known as the Nile River or River Nile) is a major north-flowing river in northeastern Africa. It flows into the Mediterranean Sea. The Nile is the longest river in Africa. It has historically been considered the longest river i ...

. By Khnum, her child was

, goddess of the

. After Khnum was conflated with Ra, she sometimes became an

Eye of Ra The Eye of Ra or Eye of Re, usually depicted as sun disk or right ''wedjat''-eye (paired with the Eye of Horus, left ''wedjat''-eye), is an entity in ancient Egyptian mythology that functions as an extension of the sun god Ra's power, equate ...

in place of

Hathor Hathor (, , , Meroitic language, Meroitic: ') was a major ancient Egyptian deities, goddess in ancient Egyptian religion who played a wide variety of roles. As a sky deity, she was the mother or consort of the sky god Horus and the sun god R ...

.Pinch, Geraldine (2004) ''Egyptian Mythology: A Guide to the Gods, Goddesses, and Traditions of Ancient Egypt''. Oxford University Press. pp. 186–187 Together

, and Satis formed the Elephantine Triad.

Representation

Satis was usually pictured as a woman in a

sheath dress In fashion, a sheath dress is a fitted, straight cut dress, often nipped at the waistline with no waist seam. When constructing the dress, the bodice and skirt are joined together by combining the skirt darts into one dart: this aligns the skirt ...

wearing the

hedjet Hedjet () is the White Crown of pharaonic Upper Egypt. After the unification of Upper and Lower Egypt, it was combined with the Deshret, the Red Crown of Lower Egypt, to form the Pschent, the double crown of Egypt. The symbol sometimes used for ...

, the conical

crown A crown is a traditional form of head adornment, or hat, worn by monarchs as a symbol of their power and dignity. A crown is often, by extension, a symbol of the monarch's government or items endorsed by it. The word itself is used, parti ...

, with

antelope The term antelope refers to numerous extant or recently extinct species of the ruminant artiodactyl family Bovidae that are indigenous to most of Africa, India, the Middle East, Central Asia, and a small area of Eastern Europe. Antelopes do ...

horns. She is sometimes depicted with bow and

arrow An arrow is a fin-stabilized projectile launched by a bow. A typical arrow usually consists of a long, stiff, straight shaft with a weighty (and usually sharp and pointed) arrowhead attached to the front end, multiple fin-like stabilizers c ...

s; holding an

ankh The ankh or key of life is an ancient Egyptian hieroglyphic symbol used to represent the word for "life" and, by extension, as a symbol of life itself. The ankh has a T-shape topped by a droplet-shaped loop. It was used in writing as a tri ...

scepter A sceptre (or scepter in American English) is a staff or wand held in the hand by a ruling monarch as an item of royal or imperial insignia, signifying sovereign authority. Antiquity Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia The '' Was'' and other ...

; or offering jars of purifying water. She also appears in the form of an

. Her symbols were the arrow and the running river.

Notes

References

Citations

Bibliography

* . * .

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Satis (Goddess) Egyptian goddesses Hunting goddesses Elephantine Fertility goddesses Nubian goddesses Sea and river goddesses War goddesses Personifications of rivers