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Cleveland Museum of Art (Egyptian) · textile

Alexander the Great on Horseback

Source of record: Cleveland Museum of Art (Egyptian) — catalogued by the holding institution. View the original record →

Description

[Egypt, Umayyad period (661–750) or Abbasid period (750–1258)] Featuring imperial Byzantine themes, this rare roundel originally decorated a tunic. Genii (guardian spirits) crown the mounted horseman in military dress while an animal runs below. The inscription at the top identifies the horseman as Alexander the Great (356-323 bc), a popular cult figure in Egypt for centuries. The pattern’s mirror-image symmetry indicates the influence of costlier Byzantine silks.

Inscriptions (1)

Inscription #1

Transcription

partial inscription in Greek above.

Cross-references (2)

  • Wikidata Q80028964 tier-1
  • CMA-id 135578 tier-2
About this record's data
  • From the source institution — accession, description, dimensions, and dating are as catalogued by Cleveland Museum of Art (Egyptian).
  • 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.