Editing Hathor (section)

===Temples in Egypt===

[[File:Dendera hypostyle hall crosswise.jpg|thumb|alt=Room with tall stone columns topped by faces of women. The columns, walls, and ceiling are covered in painted reliefs.|[[Hypostyle]] hall of the [[Temple of Hathor at Dendera]], first century AD]]

More temples were dedicated to Hathor than to any other Egyptian goddess.{{sfn|Graves-Brown|2010|p=166}} During the Old Kingdom her most important center of worship was in the region of [[Memphis, Egypt|Memphis]], where "Hathor of the Sycamore" was worshipped at many sites throughout the [[Memphite Necropolis]]. During the New Kingdom era, the temple of Hathor of the Southern Sycamore was her main temple in Memphis.{{sfn|Gillam|1995|pp=219–221}} At that site she was described as the daughter of the city's main deity, [[Ptah]].{{sfn|Vischak|2001|p=82}} The cult of Ra and Atum at Heliopolis, northeast of Memphis, included a temple to Hathor-Nebethetepet that was probably built in the Middle Kingdom. A willow and a sycamore tree stood near the sanctuary and may have been worshipped as manifestations of the goddess.{{sfn|Quirke|2001|pp=102–105}} A few cities farther north in the [[Nile Delta]], such as [[Yamu]] and [[Terenuthis]], also had temples to her.{{sfn|Wilkinson|2000|pp=108, 111}}

Dendera, Hathor's oldest temple in Upper Egypt, dates to at least to the Fourth Dynasty.{{sfn|Gillam|1995|p=227}} After the end of the Old Kingdom it surpassed her Memphite temples in importance.{{sfn|Vischak|2001|p=83}} Many kings made additions to the temple complex through Egyptian history. The last version of the temple was built in the Ptolemaic and Roman Periods and is today one of the best-preserved Egyptian temples from that time.{{sfn|Wilkinson|2000|pp=149–151}}

As the rulers of the Old Kingdom made an effort to develop towns in Upper and [[Middle Egypt]], several cult centers of Hathor were founded across the region, at sites such as [[Cusae]], [[Akhmim]], and [[Naga ed-Der]].{{sfn|Gillam|1995|pp=226, 229}} In the [[First Intermediate Period]] (c. 2181–2055 BC) her cult statue from Dendera was periodically carried to the Theban necropolis. During the beginning of the Middle Kingdom, Mentuhotep{{nbsp}}II established a permanent cult center for her in the necropolis at Deir el-Bahari.{{sfn|Goedicke|1991|pp=245, 252}} The nearby village of [[Deir el-Medina]], home to the tomb workers of the necropolis during the New Kingdom, also contained temples of Hathor. One continued to function and was periodically rebuilt as late as the Ptolemaic Period, centuries after the village was abandoned.{{sfn|Wilkinson|2000|pp=189–190}}

In the Old Kingdom, most priests of Hathor, including the highest ranks, were women. Many of these women were members of the royal family.{{sfn|Lesko|1999|pp=240–241}} In the course of the Middle Kingdom, women were increasingly excluded from the highest priestly positions, at the same time that queens were becoming more closely tied to Hathor's cult. Thus, non-royal women disappeared from the high ranks of Hathor's priesthood,{{sfn|Gillam|1995|pp=233–234}} although women continued to serve as musicians and singers in temple cults across Egypt.{{sfn|Lesko|1999|pp=243–244}}

The most frequent temple rite for any deity was the daily offering ritual, in which the cult image, or statue, of a deity would be clothed and given food.{{sfn|Thompson|2001|p=328}} The daily ritual was largely the same in every Egyptian temple,{{sfn|Thompson|2001|p=328}} although the goods given as offerings could vary according to which deity received them.{{sfn|Meeks|Favard-Meeks|1996|pp=126–128}} Wine and beer were common offerings in all temples, but especially in rituals in Hathor's honor,{{sfn|Poo|2010|pp=2–3}} and she and the goddesses related to her often received sistra and ''menat'' necklaces.{{sfn|Meeks|Favard-Meeks|1996|pp=126–128}} In Late and Ptolemaic times, they were also offered a pair of mirrors, representing the sun and the moon.{{sfn|Derriks|2001|pp=421–422}}