BUBASTIS, an ancient city of Egypt, near the modern Zag azig ; the Pa-Bast of the hieroglyphics, and the Pibeseth of the prophet Ezekiel. It is now a heap of mounds called Tell Basta, which were carefully excavated in 1886-87. The ancient city was probably built on made ground, over the level of the surrounding country. Remains were found, dating from as far back as the IVth. Dynasty, and Seti restored monuments in it which had been erected under the XVIIIth. Dynasty. His son Rameses II. is be lieved to have laid out a canal which ran from the Tanitic branch of the Nile here to the Bitter Lakes and the Gulf of Suez. In the period of decline about moo B.C., the descendant of a Libyan adventurer seized the title of Pharaoh and set up his throne here : this was Shashanq I., the Shishak of the books of Kings and Chronicles, and the founder of the XXIInd. or Bubastite Dynasty. About 35o B.C. the city was captured by the Persians, and from the destruction which they inflicted it never recovered.
Bubastis is the Graecized name of the Egyptian goddess Ubasti, meaning "she of [the city] Bast" (B', s-t), a city better known by its later name, P-ubasti, "place of Ubasti"; thus the goddess derived her name Ubasti from her city (Bast), and in turn the city derived its name P-ubasti from that of the goddess; the Greeks, confusing the name of the city with that of the goddess, called the latter Bubastis, and the former also Bubastis (later Bu bastos).
Ubasti was one of many feline goddesses, figured with the head of a lioness. The domestic cat was especially the animal of Bu bastis, although it had also to serve for all the other feline god desses. Her hieratic and most general form was still lioness headed, but a popular form, especially in bronze, was a cat-headed woman, often holding in her right hand a lion aegis, i.e., a broad semicircular pectoral surmounted by the head of a lioness, and on the left arm a basket. The cat cemetery on the west side of the town consisted of numbers of large brick chambers, crammed with burnt and decayed mummies, many of which had been enclosed in cat-shaped cases of wood and bronze. The festival of Bubastis was attended by thousands from all parts of Egypt and was a very riotous affair. There were two festivals of Bubastis, the great and the lesser : perhaps the lesser festival was held at Memphis, where the quarter called Ankhto contained a temple to this goddess. Her name is found on monuments from the 3rd dynasty onwards, but a great stimulus was given to her worship by the 22nd (Bubastite) dynasty and generally by the increased importance of Lower Egypt in later times. Her character seems to have been essentially mild and playful. The Greeks equated Ubasti with their Artemis, con fusing her with the leonine Tafne, sister of Shoou (Apollo). The name of her son Iphthimis (Nfr-tm), pronounced Eftem, may mean "All-good," and, in the absence of other information about him, suggests why he was identified with Prometheus.