Ugarith), on the North Eastern coast of the Mediterrenean:
Anath’s soul was exuberant,
As she plunged knee-deep in the soldiers’ blood,
Up to her thighs in the warriors’ gore … (Coogan 1978:91).
In this poem she is called The Queen of Heaven, which makes her, though only a daughter of the Mother Goddess, overlapping the title and function of Ishtar, the main Middle Eastern Goddess of War and Fertility. It may be noted that in her involvement with the battle between Baal and Mot, Anath is helped by the Canaanite Sun goddess.
H. Sun goddess is one title of the Egyptian goddess Sekhmet (s. link below), who is in charge of war, retribution and disease, but also of the cure of diseases. The Egyptian sun, like the Canaanite one in summer, is known for its harshness and cruelty; on the other hand, the sun is an important component of the idea of fertility. A counterpart to Sekhmet is the North African Neith (s. above, and link below) who, beside being a War goddess, was also in charge of creation and of water. Water parallels the sun as a factor of fertility, while creation in Egypt is particularly connected with the emerging of the land from the flooding of the Nile in spring – that river is the only source of fertility in that country. Thus the two Egyptian goddesses of War form the two aspects of one deity of fertility: the harshness and deathlike Sun goddess and the comforting life giving Water goddess. Here we find again the connection between war and fertility, which would be hard to explain except on the ground of the seasonal war.
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I. War goddesses who are also Great Mothers in charge of Fertility appear not only in the East