Babi was the baboon god associated with virility and the devouring of the dead in the Egyptian underworld.
Babi represented the hamadryas baboon, an animal Egyptians observed to be aggressive, powerful, and highly sexual. His name is often translated as “Bull of the Baboons,” suggesting dominance and strength. These traits helped shape his association with masculine potency and fertility.
In funerary traditions, Babi could be imagined as a bloodthirsty being who consumed the souls or entrails of the unrighteous after judgment. Some accounts place him near a lake of fire, a symbol of destruction. His frightening role contrasted with his power to guarantee sexual vitality in the afterlife.
Babi is sometimes confused with Thoth because Thoth could also appear as a baboon. The distinction is important: the baboon was one of Thoth’s sacred forms, while Babi was specifically the deified baboon and a separate underworld figure. Babi’s imagery could be deliberately explicit, reflecting ancient Egyptian ideas about potency after death.