Set With Teeth

Set With Teeth
August 29, 2005

© JAL

From time to time I see a bit of false information crop on in Kemetic pages. Some are spreading the idea that Set had red hair and white skin. Actually, from all I've read, Set was NOT portrayed with white skin, but with RED skin. He was the only deity to be so portrayed. In contrast, Osirus (Wesir) was the only deity to be portrayed with GREEN skin. The 'red' was to convey Set's power. Furthermore, that 'red' skin was feared as showing the 'dangerous' properties, the chaotic aspects of raw power. Later on, the Egyptians associated red with 'evil'.
Also, Set is associated with 'the Red Land'- (dsrt) the desert, away from the Nile, the region of vast and desolate country inhabited by foreigners, on the outskirts of civilization.
In this picture, I tried to give Set a more fierce look, such that he might have towards those who have not earned his favor. I used crocodile pictures as models for those teeth, and apparently, I am not too far off from original Egyptian envisionings. The god Sobek is given the crocodile head in his images. Yet there are similarities between these two gods.
Sobek=Son of Nit
Set=Son of Nut
Both Nit and Nut were given the title 'Mother of the Gods'. Also, "Several bynames of Set have the determinative of the crocodile." and crocodiles are"regarded as messengers of Set"(TeVelde, page 150)
A couple of weeks after drawing this image, I happened to see a documentary on Super Croc, the prehistoric crocodile. Super croc, he didn't 'walk with dinosaurs', he ATE them! The biggest croc now is twenty feet. Figuring out from the skull they have, prehistoric croc could be 40 feet (12 meters). The jaw strength of the croc is tremendous. They had a device to measure pounds of pressure those jaws can exercise, and yes, ancient croc could take down a dinosaur, no problem. They said how the croc is nature's ultimate predator in terms of speed and efficiency of attack and ability to remain hidden while waiting for 'chow' to appear.
So that gives me renewed respect for this animal which has associations with Set, "Great of Strength".