Ostracon
Description
Caption: Ostracon, Year 23, Epeiph 30. Terracotta, pigment, 2 1/4 x 3/8 x 5 7/16 in. (5.7 x 1 x 13.8 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund, 37.1856E. (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 broken terracotta ostracon with dense dark ink inscription running in horizontal lines across the upper portion and orange/red pigment traces on the surface.
The image shows a triangular, fragmentary terracotta piece (ostracon) with one long edge and rounded break surfaces. The upper right portion bears numerous small, dark characters arranged in several closely spaced lines, consistent with an inked textual inscription (likely hieroglyphic or cursive Egyptian). Beneath and around the text are visible areas of orange/red pigment or wash. No clearly identifiable deity iconography (figures) or legible royal cartouche is visible at the resolution provided. No Greek/Coptic/Arabic script is clearly present. A small museum label with the number appears in the lower left, but it is not part of the ancient text.
Cross-references (2)
- BKM-Accession 37.1856E tier-2
- BKM-Object 4185 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.