Maát (also Mait) stood for the good spiritual ideals and human behaviour and was patroness of moral, harmony, justice, truth and cosmic order. She was in the funeral cult and Osiris court of Justice where she put her ostrich feather in the scale of balance with the heart of the deceased. If he had been living according to her norms the heart was light and he would pass, if not the heart was eaten up by the evil monster Ammut. Máat was depicted as a woman, and in her hair she wore the feather of truth (its name was Máat). Sometimes she was kneeling with outstretched arms like wings. In the New Kingdom many pharaohs took her name into theirs and stated to lived according to her rules. She helped Re to navigate his solar bark upon the sky and her masculine counterpart was Thoth.
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