Scepter of Ra
The was-sceptre, the long staff with a forked base and a stylised animal head, is the Egyptian emblem of power and dominion, and as the sceptre of the sun god Ra it stands for the authority of the creator who orders the world. Gods are shown holding the was-staff as the sign of their rule, and kings carry it in ritual scenes to declare that they exercise the dominion the gods have given; its name is written with its own hieroglyph, and the sceptre was a fixture of temple reliefs, royal ceremony, and funerary art from the Old Kingdom onward. Its forked foot and forked head are sometimes read as