Bast The Goddess of The One and The Many

She originated in the Nile delta, but by 930 B.C., the power of Bast was acknowledged by all Egyptians, even those a thousand miles south of her original home. At first she was a lion-goddess of sunset, symbolizing the fertilizing force of the sun's rays. Later her image grew tamer: she became a cat carrying the sun, or a cat-headed woman who bore on her breast plate the lion of her former self. Egyptian Goddess Bast, ruled pleasure and dancing, music and joy. At the city of Bubastis ("house of Bast"), the center of her worship, great celebrations were held. Boatloads of worshipers--hundreds of thousands of them, Herodotus said--were greeted by pleasant flute melodies as they debarked for a worship service combined with a vast trade fair. Bast's followers believed that in return for this reverent celebration Bast bestowed both mental and physical health. As part of Bast's worship, Egyptians honored live cats. Domesticated (if cats can ever be truly said to be domesticated) during the early period of agriculture, cats were useful to keep down the rodent population and therefore to assure a stable diet for humans. Egyptians cherished their cats, often decking them with golden earrings or other jewelry. When they died, the cats were mummified and buried in the vast cat cemetary at Bubastis. The Goddess of The One and The Many Bast (Bastet, Pasch, Ubasti, Ba en Aset) - Daughter of the sun god Ra, wife of Ptah, and mother of Mihos, Bast is an ancient Egyptian goddess who is still greatly revered by many today. Her worship began around the year 3200 BCE during the second dynasty in northern Egypt and her city is Bubastis. There, and in many other ancient cities, Egyptians celebrated Basts feast day, October 31st, with great joy and enthusiasm honouring their goddess, their protectress. Related to Neith, the Night Goddess, Bast symbolized the moon in its function of making a woman fruitful, with swelling womb. She was also the Egyptian Goddess of pleasure, music, dancing and joy, and associated with the Eye of Ra, acting as the instrument of the Sun God's vengeance. Bast is the Sacred Cat and her name means devouring lady. She is depicted as having the body of a woman and the head of a domestic cat. She holds the sacred rattle, Sistrum, and she possesses Utchat, the divine, all-seeing eye of Ra. Indeed, the people of ancient Egypt turned to Bast for protection and for blessing, as she was a renowned and beloved goddess. She was the protectress of women, children, and domestic cats. She was the goddess of sunrise, music, dance, and pleasure as well as family, fertility, and birth. Cats were very sacred animals to the ancient Egyptians. They held a high, honoured position in many households and were more important even than humans. Cats were demigods in ancient Egypt. Anyone caught harming or killing a cat, even by accident, was punished by death, for cats guarded the royal granaries keeping them relatively free from vermin which threatened the food supplies.

The famous Temple Ruins of Bast at Bubastis (Per-Bast in Tameran, today TellBasta). The sacred enclosure consisted of a grove of tall trees (the only one to be found in an Egyptian temple) holding the shrine of the goddess within. The temple was full of cats who were carried around in baskets and ritually fed. "Other temples are greater and more costly, but none more pleasing to the eye than this." - Herodotus, Histories Book II, Chap. 137 Though the cat-headed goddess Bast was revered and loved throughout Egypt from the earliest of times (her worship was formalized at the end of the First or beginning of the Second Dynasties), there were several cities sacred to her cult and which hosted several large, important and influential temples. Among the more well-known cities were Memphis (Mennefer), Heliopolis (Iunu) and Herakleopolis (Henen-nesut); among the dozen or so cities important to the Bast Cult, none was more important or holy than Bubastis. Located in the Eighteenth ("Prince of the South") Nome of Lower Egypt, in the southeastern portion of the Delta, the city the Greeks called Bubastis was originally known simply as Bast; early in its long history it became known as Pwr-Bast or PwrBastet. The Egyptian word "pwr," commonly rendered as "per," can be translated either as "house" or "realm," so the city would have been known as the House of Bast. Exactly why this city, relatively unimportant in Egypt's larger history until the advent of the Twenty-second Dynasty in the Tenth Century BCE, should be so important to the Cat Cult, or become so identified with the goddess Bast, is one of the many mysteries of Egypt lost in the proverbial mists of time, unlikely to leave physical traces in the archaeological record. During the Bubastite period (22nd dynasty), cat cemeteries became popular, and a huge profusion of cat amulets were being made. Cats were mummified and ritually buried. In 640 AD Bubastis was still alive and people were still worshipping cats there. Once per year, a great festival was held in Bubastis to honour Bast, attracting devotees from all over the country. According to Herodotus, the original accidental tourist, upwards of 700,000 people attended, most traveling by barges to the sound of flutes and percussion instruments. Though this was a religious festival, gaiety was rampant along the riverbanks and through all the avenues of the city, and in character it could easily be compared to Mardi Gras. One aspect of the festival, however, was quite moving, and came on the last night - in a town of silence, a town of darkness, a single light is lit in the Temple of Bast, and from there the light spreads through the town, carried by devotees; and prayers rise into the night, accompanied by music and incense. All things come to an end, and so it came to Bubastis, destroyed by the Persians in 350 BCE. Today, only ruins remain of Bubastis, and the once-proud temple is nothing but tumbled blocks. One of few sights to see these days is the famous cat cemetery, where so many beloved pets journeyed to the Other Realm.