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Anket, Anuket, Anjet, Anukis

As you see in all of the pics here, Anqet is depicted as a woman wearing a tall headdress made either of reeds or of ostrich feathers. In other depictions she is often holding a sceptre and/or the ankh symbol. Some say the headdress was probably of Nubian origin.

She was occasionally, shown in the form of a gazelle and is a water goddess. She is also known as a huntress, probably thought to be quick and agile like the gazelle. Scholars believe she originated from Sudan, though she is not an imported goddess. They say Anqet was a goddess of the whole Aswan area, of the islands in the Nile and of the First Cataract and also a goddess of Nubia, the land to the south of Egypt. She was a goddess of the waters of the Nile, a goddess of fertility worshipped as a protective deity during childbirth, and was thought to embrace the river. Her name means ''She Who Embraces". As ''She Who Embraces'' she represents the banks of the Nile and the islands in the Aswan area. Her specific islands were Setet Island (Sehel island) and Abu (Elephantine) island. It could be that the word "embrace" may have originally referred to the "embrace" of the waters of the inundation. She was a protective deity, one who gave life to the pharaoh and the whole land of Egypt itself.

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It is said that she originally was the daughter Ra,of Satet and Khnemu. Together, the three deities formed the Triad of Elephantine, the principal deities of that city. Satet was believed to pour out the water into the Nile that caused the inundation each year. The inundation itself was known as the Night of the Teardrop. Every year, Isis would shed a single tear, which would be caught by Satet in her jars, then poured into the Nile. Khnemu was originally a water or river god of the Nile-flood. He formed all of the world on his potters wheel. These three water deities protected the Nile cataracts and the area the Egyptians believed to be the source of the Nile.

She is also linked to Ra, as well as her mother, Satet. In fact both these goddesses were closely associated with the "Eye of Ra" along with Sekhmet , Bast and Hathor, amongst others. Similarly, both Anuket and Satet were linked to the Ureas. In later times she was identified with Nephthys at the temple "Per-Mer" due to Satet's links with the goddess Isis and Khnum´s link with Osiris. Satet and Anqet are also closely linked to Isis, who took on the attributes of the fertile waters of the Nile.

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It is to be noted that she was also worshiped throughout northern Nubia, and was not a goddess confined to Egypt itself. Because of this, she was given the title of "Mistress of Nubia". Some say that in southern Nubia, Khnum merged with the ram-headed Amun and so Anuket and Satet (Satis) in some places also appear as wives of Amun.

She was called the "Lady of Sahal" (Nebt Satet). Anqet's temple at Sahal was called Amen-heri-ab. which means "Amen's Heart is Content''. Her temple on Iat-Rek (Philae) island was called "Per-Mer" when translated means "House of Love", where she was identified with Nephthys.I believe this is where people get the notion that she became a goddess of lust, whose attributes and cult were obscene during later periods. In this form, she gained association with cowrie shells, which resemble the vagina.

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From China
Shang and Zhou dynasty, 16th-8th century BC

The earliest money in China

The cowrie shell has been used as money in many parts of the world, including China, Africa and Arabia. In China, inscriptions which talk of 'gifts of cowries', 'cowries in the treasury', 'seizure of cowries', 'use of cowries' and 'rewards of cowries' are found on bones and on bronze vessels of the Shang (sixteenth-eleventh centuries BC) and Zhou (eleventh century - 221 BC) dynasties.

Archaeologists have found that the distribution of cowrie finds coincides with the gradual acquisition of territories by the Zhou dynasty and noble lords. The natural supply of cowrie shells from the coastal regions could not meet the growing demand inland. People began to make imitation cowries out of bone, horn, shell, stone, clay, lead, bronze, gold and silver. However, not all the cowries and imitation cowries were used as money. Cowrie shells were also used as decoration, for example on clothes. Some cowries and imitation cowries have been found in tombs as money for the dead.

Source:

the British Museum

crystal

The Festival of Anuket was held when the innundation began. People threw coins, gold, jewelry, and precious gifts into the Nile to please the goddess. From another source I found this; Anqet "The Clasper"; water goddessof the Nile Cataracts. Her symbol was the cowrie shell. Khnemu's second wife, she had a special dwelling place on the island of Seheil. Also worshipped at Elephantine with Khnemu. Pictured as a woman wearing a tall plumed crown. Sometimes she was pictured as having four arms which represented the union of male and female principles. She was self-begotten and self-produced. Producer and giver of life, water." Huh? Everyone is entitled to their beliefs.

She was also a nourisher not only of the land, but of the pharaoh as well. She has been shown suckling a young Ramesses, while being described as the 'Giver of Live, and of All Power, and of All Health, and of All Joy of the Heart'.

There is an ostracon, a fragmented piece of pottery, on which she is depicted in the form of a gazelle and called 'Lady of Heaven' and 'Mistress of the Gods'.

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