Other attributes
In ancient Egyptian religion, Seshat (Sesha, Sesheta, or Safekh-Aubi) was the goddess of writing, record keeping, arithmetic, and architecture. The meaning of Seshat's name is "female scribe." It was believed that Seshat was responsible for recording regnal years and maintaining the House of Life, an archive of sacred books. She is associated with her counterpart god, Thoth, and was seen as either Thoth's female aspect, his daughter, or his wife.
Fragment found at the Pyramid Temple of Senwosret believed to be copied from a relief carved at least 300 years earlier for ruler Pepy I
According to Egyptian myth, Seshat and Thoth had a child called Hornub, whose name means "gold Horus." Because of this, Seshat was sometimes associated with Isis. She was the scribe of the pharaoh, tasked with recording his achievements. She was also thought to record the actions of all people on the leaves of the sacred Persea tree.
Seshat was known by the epithet “Mistress of the House of Books” because she looked after the library of the gods and was the patron of all earthly libraries. She was also patron of all forms of writing, including accounting, auditing, and census taking. According to one myth, it was Seshat who invented writing, but it was her husband, Thoth, who taught the people to write. Seshat was also given the epithet “Mistress of the House of Architects,” although she never had a temple dedicated to her.
Seshat is the only female deity who was depicted in the act of writing. Several other prominent female myth figures were depicted holding the scribe’s palette and brush, indicating that they had the ability to write, but they were never shown actively engaged in writing. Seshat was also attributed responsibility for the written works produced by the temples she "helped" create and which were housed in its House of Life. Furthermore, she was to gather these works into her eternal library in the gods' realm. Some deities in Egyptian mythology played seemingly overlapping roles, but they were marked by specificity. For instance, though the gift of writing was given to man by Thoth, his consort Seshat collected the works, took care of them in the libraries on earth, and preserved them on her shelves in the heavens for eternity.
Seshat was believed to be occupied with sighting the stars and planets. There are also records of her providing assistance to the pharaoh in the ritual of a ritual known as pedj shes (“stretching the cord”), associated with astronomical and astrological measurements used in the construction of temples, palaces, tombs, and forts. The “cord” refers to the mason’s line, which was used to measure the dimensions of the building. Buildings' floor plans were laid out during the "stretching the cord" ceremony after an appropriate area of land had been selected.
A relief depicting the goddess Seshat on the back of the throne of a seated statue of King Ramesses II, located in the Luxor Temple
In the ritual, Seshat acted as keeper of ground plans and charts. She was also tasked with recording the pharaoh’s jubilees, such as in the Sed Festival, cattle counts, and the pharaoh’s campaigns. Reliefs found in temples of the Old Kingdom (c. 2575–c. 2130 BCE) and Middle Kingdom (c. 1938–c. 1630 BCE) portray her as the recorder of numbers of captives and spoils following military campaigns.
In the case of temples, the ritual involved determining their orientation through astronomical observation and measurement. This was usually achieved by sighting the stars of a northern circumpolar constellation with a merkhet, a notched wooden instrument. The determined north-south orientation was frequently used for the temple's short axis. According to some texts, the king was assisted in this ritual by Seshat.
Seshat was portrayed as a female figure wearing a headband with horns and a star with her name inscribed on it. These representations showed her dressed in a plain sheath covered by a long panther skin, its tail reaching down to her feet. She was often depicted with a notched palm rib to represent the passing of time.
Academic research has pointed to a discernable similarity in the design, symmetry, and characteristics of Seshat's symbolic headdress to the shadows cast by the vertical gnomon. It is possible to create a geometric drawing using observation and measurements by applying a specific solar method of locating the cardinal points, which is almost identical to the symbol portrayed over Seshat's head. In the sign of Seshat can be seen the gnomon (stem), the directions radiating from the center (rosette) in which the shadows of the gnomon can be oriented within a year at the latitude of Egypt, north of the Tropic of Cancer, and the curve (arc with two feathers or horns situated over the rosette) representing limits in which the shadows can move in connection with the apparent path of the sun in the sky during solstices or equinoxes.
