18/11/2021
Set, also known as Seth and Suetekh, was the Egyptian god of war, chaos and storms, brother of Osiris, Isis, and Horus the Elder, uncle to Horus the Younger, and brother-husband to Nephthys. His other consort was the goddess Tawaret, a hippo-headed deity who presided over fertility and childbirth. He is one of the first five gods created by the union of Geb (earth) and Nut (sky) after the creation of the world. His name is usually translated as "instigator of confusion" and "destroyer" and he was associated with disorder, foreign lands and people, and the color red.
He is sometimes depicted as a red-haired beast with a forked tail and cloven hooves or a shaggy red dog-like beast known as a sha (or, to modern-day scholars, as the Set Animal) which some scholars claim was modeled on the Saluki breed while others maintain was a purely mythological creature imagined specifically to represent Set whose other symbols were the griffin, hippopotamus, crocodile, and tortoise (though he was primarily associated with the serpent). His epithets include "Lord of the Desert" and "Ruler of the South" as he was originally a god of Upper Egypt (the south) and the barren lands beyond Egypt's borders.
In the Early Dynastic Period of Egypt (c. 3150 - c. 2613 BCE) he was an important - and benevolent - god of Upper Egypt whose name was invoked for love spells and inscribed on amulets which served as love charms. He was also the deity who saved the sun god Ra from the serpent Apophis, an evil creature who tried to stop the sun god's journey through the night sky toward dawn. Egyptologist Richard H. Wilkinson comments on this myth and Set's role as hero, writing:
"It was said that each night Apophis hypnotized Ra and the entourage who sail with him except for the god Seth who resisted the serpent's deadly stare and repulsed him with the thrust of a great spear. (221) "