Shrew Mummy
Description
Object Label: Shrews and ichneumons both prey on snakes and therefore won the Egyptians’ admiration and worship. Though snakes could turn their powers to protecting kings and queens, serpents also threatened the sun god Re on his journey through the next world. Egyptian religion made room for both the positive and negative aspects of certain animals. The shrew mummy bundle shows that more than one animal was sometimes included in one package. Caption: Shrew Mummy, 30 B.C.E. – 50 C.E.. Animal remains (Crocidura flavescens, C. nana, C. olivieri, or C. religiosa), linen, 1 1/4 × 8 9/16 × 1 3/8 in. (3.2 × 21.7 × 3.5 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of the Egypt Exploration Fund, 14.653. (Photo: Brooklyn Museum)
AI image analysis GPT-4o-2024-08-06
Machine-generated from the object's image on May 2026. Not curatorial; treat deities, names, and signs below as the model's best reading, not authority.
A mummified catfish wrapped in striped linen.
The artifact depicts a catfish that has been carefully mummified, a process typically reserved for both human and animal remains in ancient Egypt. The wrapping is done in a distinctive striped pattern with alternating light and dark bands. Such animal mummies were often used as offerings to deities, particularly those associated with the Nile and fertility.
Cross-references (2)
- BKM-Accession 14.653 tier-2
- BKM-Object 8645 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.