Forums » Smalltalk » Cat Gods?

I know this is rather off topic, but does anyone know of a male cat god? I noticed egypt has cat goddesses, however they are female and not male.

Anyone know of any male cat gods?

Aker - Lion god, Egypt
Heru-neb-mesen - Lion god, Egypt
Ketuit-ten-ba - Cat-headed god, Egypt
Mahes - Lion-headed son of Bast, Egypt
Miuty - Cat-headed god, Egypt
Shehberi - Lion-headed winged god, Egypt
Tutu - human headed sphinx/lion-headed man god, Egypt

These are the male feline gods found from my first Google search result on 'male cat gods'.

Yes I found a few as well, but what I noticed most about them is they are mostly Lion cat gods, and not house cat gods like female cat gods as said to be. I just found that a little bit odd.

A large number of female cat gods are also lionesses or lioness-headed, so I don't find it odd that the male gods are mainly lions too. Furthermore, housecats are smaller and more delicate, graceful and quick, so I can imagine they're more commonly associated with females and lions, the big brute cats, are more commonly associated with males. That's just purely speculation on my behalf, but not an uncommon theme in history.

True, but why lions is my question. What happened to panthers and other big cats? Perhaps Egypt is the wrong place ot look for such things, then again they speak of lions....soo I'm not sure.

Because lions used to roam in Egypt. Egypt is a country in Africa after all, where lions are native. Other big cats are from different continents, like Asia, and therefore they're not involved in the Egyptian culture.

Hunting lions was something only brave men did a long, long time ago and someone who did that and survived was respected. From there on the culture began to worship the big cats over time.

There are a lot more elaborate stories on Google, but this is a quick summary to answer your question.

Thanks for the help Sanne^^ Very interesting indeed