Sakhmet
Description
Object Label: The lion goddess Sakhmet represented the eye of the sun god Re, which alerted him to all potential enemies. Her aggressive protection of him could be so fierce that in one myth she threatened all human existence through her raging attacks. Only beer—dyed red to resemble human blood—could placate Sakhmet; the beer returned her to a quieter, housecat-like disposition. Her story incorporating bloodlike red recalled for the Egyptians the annual Nile flood, also colored red, because of the silt it carried, and thus tied Sakhmet to a powerful force of nature. Caption: Sakhmet, 664–332 B.C.E.. Bronze, 3 7/8 x 1 3/8 x 1 1/8 in. (9.8 x 3.5 x 2.9 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund, 37.405E. (Photo: Brooklyn Museum (Gavin Ashworth, photographer))
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.
Bronze figurine of a lioness-headed female deity standing with hands held in front, shown with a broad collar and headgear/emanation-like mane elements.
The image shows a single cast bronze standing figure viewed front-on. The figure has a lioness (or lioness-like) head with a rounded face and pointed ears, wearing a broad beaded collar across the chest and a headdress/manelike framing around the head. The arms hang forward with hands held near the abdomen. The body is stylized with a tight torso and a skirt-like form falling to the ankles, and the legs end in large feet with a stance suggesting a deity statue rather than a human figure. The surface is worn and darkened by age/patina; small chips and abrasions are visible, especially along raised edges. No legible hieroglyphic text, cartouches, or Greek/Coptic/Arabic inscriptions are visible on the visible surfaces. No separate base inscription can be read clearly at this resolution. Overall appearance is consistent with a goddess depiction such as Sekhmet (lioness-headed), though the exact identification cannot be confirmed from text or inscriptions in the image alone.
Cross-references (2)
- BKM-Accession 37.405E tier-2
- BKM-Object 117059 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.