A early (probably First Dynasty, 3000-2800BC) goddess associated with cats, and usually depicted as a woman with the head (and sometimes skin) of a cheetah or panther, her hair braided and ending in scorpion tails. Sometimes she wears a snake headdress. Her attributes include protection against snakes, scorpions and other dangerous animals, and healing those afflicted by such bites and stings. Her name means ‘runner’, presumably to describe her swiftness in attacking threats to those she protects: these appear to have included the pharaoh, whose harpoon, weapon of choice for the journey through the underworld, is decorated with Mafdet’s claws. She also appears to represent justice and judicial authority, certainly by the time of the new Kingdom. She has a link with the dwarf god BES. In the New Kingdom her parents are AMON and MUT. Her worship and attributes were gradually subsumed by those of the cat goddess BAST
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