Set of Thirteen Gaming Pieces
Description
Object Label: The game called senet, or “passing,” was played for over three thousand years in Egypt. In it, two players rolled stick-like dice to advance their gaming pieces, which in this board were otherwise stored in a sliding drawer. The movement of pieces across the board symbolized the soul’s journey through the underworld, and the game was often included in the tomb. Caption: Set of Thirteen Gaming Pieces, ca. 1390–1353 B.C.E.. Faience, Greatest dimensions for reel-shaped pieces: 1/2 x Diam. 13/16 in. (1.3 x 2 cm) Greatest dimensions for cone-shaped pieces: 1 x Diam. 11/16 in. (2.6 x 1.7 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund, 49.57.1-.13.
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.
The artifact is an ancient Egyptian board game known as Senet, with faience pieces and a decorated game board.
This is a Senet game board featuring a grid of thirty squares, elaborately decorated with hieroglyphic inscriptions along the sides. The board is made from faience, a glazed non-clay ceramic material, colored in a vibrant blue. The game pieces, consisting of small cones and round markers, are also in blue. Notable features include the drawer for storing pieces and the intricate hieroglyphic designs which may indicate protective or symbolic spells.
Cross-references (2)
- BKM-Accession 49.57.1-.13 tier-2
- BKM-Object 3537 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.