Protective God
Description
Object Label: The Egyptians had a special class of deities, including Bes, Aha, and Hayet, that protected mothers and very young children. This piece shows one of these deities nursing an infant god. In antiquity metal rings were inserted into the holes at the top of the headdress and through the pierced ears. When shaken like a rattle, the piece produced a rustling sound intended to soothe a crying baby. Caption: Protective God, ca. 945–718 B.C.E.. Faience, 5 15/16 x 2 1/2 x 15/16 in. (15.1 x 6.4 x 2.4 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund, 58.171. (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 painted/colored Egyptian faience amulet-like figure of a protective deity/personhood on a pedestal, with a high feathered headdress and a central face motif holding or embracing ritual implements.
The image shows an upright, small-scale hollow or solid figurine/amulet mounted on a modern stand. The figure has a tall, fluted feather or plume headdress in light yellow/green tones and a face with prominent eyes and a stylized mouth. Surrounding or attached around the central body are molded arms/hands and decorative elements, including circular/loop-like ornaments and curving components that may represent ritual objects. The surface is glazed and appears turquoise/green with darker brown/black linework and accents, consistent with a faience object. No clearly legible hieroglyphic, Greek, Coptic, or Arabic text is visible; there is also no discernible cartouche. The exact deity identity is not confidently determinable from the provided view alone.
Cross-references (2)
- BKM-Accession 58.171 tier-2
- BKM-Object 3663 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.