looking at a 20th dynasty tomb and either the artists drew bastet and sekhmet the wrong way around or the scribes wrote the captions the wrong way around either way it is very funny
but if it’s any consolation to the long dead artisans involved i’m probably the only person who noticed
Bobhotep: “Who’s got the round ears and who’s got the pointy ears? I forget.”
Marymeryt: “Well, shoot, I don’t remember either. But it’s 50/50 and probably no one will notice.”
<approximately 3150 years later>
somecunttookmyurl: <notices>
oh even better this is the point where they’re both still leonine so it’s
“wait who has the red dress and who has the white dress”
“does it matter?”
“s'pose not”
alright i finally got on the laptop so i can explain myself now
in the tomb of prince mentuherkhepshef (KV19) there is a corridor with 7 scenes on each wall of the prince making offerings to different deities
this is apparently Bastet. the little caption in front of her face says her name. it says Bastet.
whatever weirdass shit is going on with her face aside (if i had nightmares, that would haunt them) she’s… wearing a red dress. and the prince is… offering her red linen.
one of Sekhmet’s titles is “mistress of red linen”. Bastet doesn’t wear red. Sekhmet wears red. Bastet also doesn’t really have any use for a gift of red linen why would you give her that when the mistress of red linen is, like, over there? c’mon buddy.
(see: TT178 or this relief of Seti I where the paint is faded a bit but you can still see it was red. here she is in a red dress in papyrus harris. you get the point)
on the other wall, this is apparently Sekhmet. her name is written a little… weirdly (and may or may not be a pun) but it does say sxm.t.
‘cept, uh, she’s wearing white. now, the number of depictions of either goddess in which the paint still survives is comparatively pretty small (most were either never painted, or the paint has worn off) but i haven’t come across something which is definitely verifiably sekhmet in which she is wearing white. everything that still has colour is red.
i actually can’t find any other depictions of bastet in leonine form that still have paint (which is a shame) to be like AHA SEE SHE WEARS WHITE but like i’m just saying if you’re going to give one a red dress and one a white dress, it’s going to be the mistress of red linen wearing the red one isn’t it. come on now.
The prince is also offering libation (pouring one out) which would be a bit of a weird thing to do for the gal called mistress of fear all things considered, especially when Bastet (associated with life/rebirth and called the lady of the breath of life for duat’s sake) is right there on the other wall.
Somebody fucked up here.