Egyptian Gods

Heqet was an Egyptian Goddess of Childbirth, Creation and Fertility. Her name Heqet also spelled as Hekit, Heqat, Heket, Hegit or Heget.

Her appearance portrayed as woman with the head of a frog or as a frog itself. This appearance symbolized fruitfulness and new life. Frog was the symbol of life and fertility, which betraying Heqet connection with water and become associated with the final stages of childbirth. She was given the title “She who hastens the birth” and midwives often called themselves the “Servants of Heqet” and that her priestesses were trained in midwifery.

She often referred to as the wife of Khnum, the God of the Nile who moulds men out of mud from the Nile on a potter’s wheel and Heqet gave the breath of life for the child before placing it in the mother’s womb. As the bringer of to the newborn, she also referred to as the wife Shu, the god of air who the father of Nut and Geb.

According to Legend of Osiris, Heqet is who breathed life for Horus, as she was the goddess of the final stages of birth. As the birth of Horus became more intimately associated with the resurrection of Osiris, thus Heqet’s role became one more closely associated with the resurrection of the deceased.

Amulets of Heqet were worn by women to protect them during childbirth and ritual ivory knives with her name and image were kept as protection for inside the house.

There was no centre cult of Heqet found but there was a temple Ptolemaic temple to Heqet at Qus, but only one pylon remains and there was also text to a temple at Her-wer in a tomb at Tuna el-Gebel.