Name That Bronx Zoo Cobra? “Wadjet” Of Course!

Last Friday, my husband came home with a New York Post article announcing that the young female cobra who escaped from the Bronx zoo, thus becoming probably the most famous snake in the New York area, if not the whole country, had been found and that a contest to name her is now being held.  Distractedly looking up from my work, I replied: “That’s silly.  It is perfectly obvious that her name should be Wadjet, after the cobra goddess of Lower Egypt!” and proceeded to tell him why at length.

Egyptologists are lobbying for "Wadjet."

Since then the naming contest has made the pages of The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times and I see that other “Egyptologically-minded” readers have already suggested the name Wadjet.  Unfortunately, this name does not appear to be a “front-runner” among suggestions so far, at least according to the Times.

As it happens, last year I was invited to write an entry on the goddess Wadjet for a forthcoming Encyclopedia of Ancient History, which naturally required lots of enjoyable research.  I would therefore like to point out why the name of Wadjet seems so entirely appropriate to me.

Head of Hatshepsut or Thutmose III, ca. 1479-1425 B.C.E. Granite, 10 3/8in. (26.3cm). Brooklyn Museum, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund, 55.118. Creative Commons-BY-NC

The goddess Wadjet (also called Wadjyt, Ouadjet, Uto, and Edjo in Egyptological literature) appears in ancient Egyptian mythology from the earliest times.  Her name means something like “The Green or Fresh One” or “She of the Papyrus Plant.”   Associated with Lower Egypt, she is often paired with the goddess Nekhbet of Upper Egypt; together they are the Two Ladies in the second title of the king, representing the crowns of Upper and Lower Egypt.  In her earliest form, as a cobra, Wadjet is also the uraeus snake that appears on all Egyptian royal headgear, performing a protective function.

Statue of Wadjet, 664 B.C.E. – 332 B.C.E. Bronze, 20 1/2 x 4 7/8 x 9 1/2 in. (52.1 x 12.4 x 24.1 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund, 36.622. Creative Commons-BY-NC

Wadjet’s embodiment as a fierce, spitting cobra leads to her inclusion in a group of goddesses, who are all variously identified with The Eye of Re in ancient Egyptian religion.  Many of the other goddesses in this group are often depicted with lion heads and therefore Wadjet too could be shown with a lion head from the New Kingdom period on; we have a fine example of this here at The Museum.

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