Wednesday, March 11, 2009

Egyptian Cobra


Art
Goal for the week 16hrs
Today
Lunacon do the forms so that I can mail it out
find a new con for April
work on the guy with the Anubis mask

Animal
Mythology 
In ancient Egyptian mythology the Egyptian cobra (Naja Haje) plays a nearly opposite role then the horned viper. Probably the best known association in Egyptian mythology with the cobra is that with the goddess Wadjet, who represents lower Egypt, she is generally depicted with Nekhbet the the vulture goddess of upper Egypt or alone on the king's headress as the uraeus. She is also depicted as the eye of Horus, or the Wadjet eye, and she was combined with Bast and Mut on occasion (in the later periods when they were sticking gods together). The cobra was also associated with the goddess Renenutet who was often depicted as a cobra with a woman head or a goddess with an entire cobra as a head. Renenutet was believed to bring the Ren part of the soul "the true name" to a new born during the first day of their life. She also had associations with fertility. It is also likely the case that this  cobra would have been the snake Cleopatra killed herself with rather then an asp, as we would think of one as this snake was also called an asp during that period.


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