Seth Tattoo Meaning

Chaos, the storm, the desert, and the disruption the universe cannot function without.

Seth is the god of chaos, storms, and the desert — the violent, disruptive force of the Egyptian cosmos who murdered his brother Osiris, yet also the only god strong enough to defend the sun against the serpent of chaos each night, the necessary monster the universe cannot function without. To carry Seth is to carry chaos, the storm, the desert, and the disruption the universe cannot function without — the violent force that is both the problem and the solution, the useful destroyer, the chaos that keeps a deeper chaos at bay.

Seth (also Set or Sutekh) is the Egyptian god of chaos, storms, violence, and the desert — the principle of uncontrolled, disruptive force in the Egyptian cosmos. His defining act is one of the foundational crimes of Egyptian mythology: he murdered his own brother Osiris, the good king. In the fullest version, Seth not only killed Osiris but dismembered his body, cutting it into pieces and scattering them across the whole of Egypt, so that Osiris's wife Isis had to wander the land gathering the scattered parts to restore him.

Seth's violence brought consequences. He was opposed by Horus, the son of Osiris, in the long and bitter struggle known as the Contendings of Horus and Seth — and in the end Seth was defeated, castrated, and exiled, driven out as the loser of the cosmic conflict. He is associated throughout with everything wild, hostile, and disordered: with the red land of the desert (as opposed to the fertile black land of the Nile), with thunder and storms, with foreigners and the lands beyond Egypt's order, and with fierce, dangerous animals — the hippopotamus and the crocodile. Seth is the embodiment of the disruptive force that breaks order apart: the violent brother, the murderer, the storm in the shape of a god. The Egyptian Seth murdered and dismembered Osiris — the god of chaos, storm, and desert, the disruptive force itself. The Egyptian Seth is the murderer of Osiris — the god of chaos, storms, violence, and the desert who murdered and dismembered his brother Osiris, scattering the pieces across Egypt, was defeated in the Contendings with Horus, and was castrated and exiled; the principle of uncontrolled, disruptive force, associated with the red land of the desert, with thunder, with foreigners, and with the hippo and the crocodile — the violent brother, the storm in the shape of a god.

Seth's mythology is among the most complex in the Egyptian pantheon — he is the clearest Egyptian example of a deity who is simultaneously villain and protector. His cult was strong in the Delta and in the eastern desert regions; several pharaohs (particularly Seti I and Ramesses II, whose names incorporate Seth) were his devotees. The Contendings of Horus and Set (Papyrus Chester Beatty I, c. 1160 BCE) is the most complete account of the cosmic struggle between Seth and Horus — it is also one of the most comedic texts in Egyptian literature, with judges who cannot decide, Seth losing his semen to Thoth in a humiliating episode, and Horus eventually winning not through combat but through a legal argument. Seth's animal is uncertain — the 'Set animal' has a distinctively forked tail, long snout, and squared ears that do not match any known animal; it may be an extinct species, a fabulous composite, or a purely symbolic form.

Seth across cultures

Related symbols