Bastet Rib tattoo

Per Wikipedia’s definition a Bastet is the name commonly used by scholars today to refer to a feline goddess of Ancient Egyptian religion who was worshipped at least since the Second Dynasty. That bastet is beautifully done on this woman’s rib side, makes her sort of look like a “goddess” too.

From lion-goddess to cat-goddess

From the third millennium B.C., when Bastet begins to appear in our record, she is depicted as either a fierce lioness or a woman with the head of a lion. Images of Bast were created from a local stone, named alabaster today.

Originally she was viewed as the protector goddess of Lower Egypt. As protector, she was seen as defender of the pharaoh, and consequently of the later chief male deity, Ra, who was also a solar deity, gaining her the titles Lady of Flame and Eye of Ra.

Her role in the pantheon became diminished as Sekhmet, a similar lioness war deity, became more dominant in the unified culture of Lower and Upper Egypt.[citation needed]

In the first millennium BC, when domesticated cats were popularly kept as pets, Bastet began to be represented as a woman with the head of a cat and ultimately emerged as the Egyptian cat-goddess par excellence. In the Middle Kingdom, the domestic cat appeared as Bastet’s sacred animal and after the New Kingdom she was depicted as a woman with the head of a cat or a lioness, carrying a sacred rattle and a box or basket.