THE SHORT-HAIRED DOMESTIC CAT. The domestic cat in history and legend. Part 3.

    The animal symbol associated with Sekhmet, the Egyptian goddess of war, was the lion, and from each of the newly conquered territories Egypt's armies would send back a likeness of the lion to their homeland. These were placed in temples and throughout the land as a representation of the goddess, an object of worship and a source of her protection. In the Temple of the sun at Heliopolis the great god Ra was warshipped in the form of a cat. There, too, Sekhmet, the terrible Big Cat, was worshipped alongside Bast, the kindly little cat. Bast, at first also lion-headed, was later visualised as a cat-headed woman.