Roundel with Human Head
Description
Object Label: All three of these objects display the unrealistic hairdos and overlarge, staring eyes found on many forgeries of Late Antique Egyptian sculpture. Each also has other unconvincing details not typical of the period. The head on the roundel wears a necklace of unknown type and appears to emerge from some sort of egg. The arch is much too small to be a true tomb arch of the type seen elsewhere in this exhibition. The unidentifiable figure in its center is overshadowed by a welter of unrelated animals and decorative motifs. The male figure, unlike a true funerary representation, turns away from the viewer. His garment has no historical parallels, and the object in his hand is unrecognizable. Caption: Roundel with Human Head, 20th century (probably). Nummulitic limestone, pigment, 3 15/16 x Diam. 15 3/16 in. (10 x 38.5 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Louis Beck and Jerome M. Eisenberg, 60.212. (Photo: Brooklyn Museum)
AI image analysis GPT-5.4-nano
Machine-generated from the object's image on Jul 2026. Not curatorial; treat deities, names, and signs below as the model's best reading, not authority.
A roundel carved in relief featuring a stylized human head with long, wig-like hair, set in a circular disk and framed by radiating leaf/feather motifs.
The image shows a stone roundel (a circular plaque) with a relief human head centered at the top portion of the disk. The head appears front-facing with simplified facial features and large, rounded eyes; long, horizontally ribbed hair/winged wig curls extend to both sides. The head merges into a central rounded area resembling a disk or chest/body element. Around the inner edge of the roundel is a circular border, and beyond that is an outer wreath-like frame of repeating leaf/feather shapes arranged symmetrically on both sides. No readable hieroglyphic, Greek, Coptic, or Arabic inscription is visible in the provided view. The surface is largely monochrome gray/white, with slight discoloration consistent with stone and possible pigment traces, but no distinct color blocks can be reliably confirmed from this image alone.
Cross-references (2)
- BKM-Accession 60.212 tier-2
- BKM-Object 78256 tier-2
About this record's data
- From the source institution — accession, description, dimensions, and dating are as catalogued by Brooklyn Museum — Egyptian, Classical, Ancient Near Eastern Art.
- AI-inferred — the image-analysis panel (deities, names, signs) is machine-generated and may be wrong.
- Approximate location — most map points are plotted at the site centroid, not the exact findspot.
- Inferred links — cross-references marked with a match method other than explicit-source-field were matched by us, not stated by the source.