Earlier this year I visited the temple of the goddess Hathor at
Dendera on the west bank of the Nile in Egypt. Dating from perhaps the
first century BC, the temple is decorated with a relief depicting
Cleopatra, paramour of Julius Caesar and Mark Antony, and Egypt’s final
pharaoh. Few images of Cleopatra survive – a haggish profile stamped on a
bronze coin suggests that she looked nothing like Elizabeth Taylor in
Joseph L Mankiewicz’s epic film of 1963 – so the relief at Dendera is
tantalising and important.
Yet my eye was drawn to another figure
altogether who was considerably more ugly than pointy-chinned Cleopatra.
This frightening character appears in several places around the site,
but he is especially prominent in a relief carved onto a fragmentary
limestone pillar that once supported a smaller building known as the
‘birth house’ near the temple.
With the squat, stocky body of a
bandy-legged dwarf, he faces outwards, arms akimbo. His grotesque head
has a leering, lewd expression, as his thick tongue lolls towards his
chin, while the strands of his beard end in flickering spirals. A tail
dangles suggestively between his legs. This, I learned, was the ancient
Egyptian deity Bes – who was beloved for centuries not only in Egypt but
also across the Mediterranean, and ultimately helped to shape the
appearance of the Christian Devil.
Although he never had a
state-sanctioned cult, Bes was tremendously popular in ancient Egypt. He
was worshipped in ordinary homes, where he was associated with many of
the good things in life: sex, drinking, music, and merriment. He also
had an important protective function, and was often invoked during
childbirth (hence his appearance in the divine birth house at Dendera).
In other words, although to modern eyes he may appear frightening, he
was actually decent. Friend to beer-swilling carousers and expectant
mothers alike, he warded off noxious spirits like a gargoyle on a
medieval church.
Wine, women and song
According
to the Iranian archaeologist Kamyar Abdi, “The Bes-image was used in
ancient Egypt to decorate a large number of personal belongings and
furniture. [He] was carved on beds or headrests, mirrors and spoon
handles, amulets, and cosmetic containers.” As a result, museums around
the world contain thousands of artefacts (including ‘magical’ wands and
knives) adorned with the hypnotically repulsive face of Bes, who often
wears a distinctive plumed headdress, and shakes a rattle. The Egyptian
Museum in Berlin, for instance, contains a colourful vase decorated with
his mask-like features and mane-like hair.
The origins of Bes
remain obscure. Perhaps he is a composite of up to 10 separate deities.
From an art historical point of view, he is certainly a curiosity:
unlike most Egyptian gods, who usually appear in profile, Bes is brazen
and frontal, as well as comical. Some scholars suggest that he emerged
in sub-Saharan Africa. It is possible that he began life as a lion or
cat rearing on its hind paws.
Ultimately Bes was celebrated
because he was never official or exclusive. Mischievous and irreverent
(it was said that he could make babies laugh by pulling funny faces), he
was resolutely down-to-earth – a god for commoners rather than royalty.
Performers tattooed their bodies with images of Bes because of his
associations with music and dancing, while prostitutes may have placed
tattoos of Bes near their genitalia, in order to stave off sexually
transmitted diseases.
By the end of the second millennium BC, Bes
had proliferated across the Mediterranean world. Even local,
non-Egyptian craftsmen produced objects decorated with his image. Early
in the first millennium, the Phoenicians became big fans of Bes, as the
Romans would too. Bes occasionally appears dressed as a Roman
legionnaire. His rampant popularity even survived the advent of
Christianity.
