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Metropolitan Museum of Art — Egyptian Art (Open Access) · relief_fragment

Hippopotamus Head

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

Description

Twentieth Century; original New Kingdom, Dynasty 18, Joint reign of Hatshepsut and Thutmose III, A.D. 1914–1915; original ca. 1479–1458 B.C. Tempera on paper. H. 13.5 cm (5 5/16 in); w. 21 cm (8 1/4 in), scale 1:1. Original from: Tomb of Puyemre (TT 39), el-Khokha, Upper Egypt, Thebes, Egypt. Excavation: MMA Graphic Section, 1914-1915. Subject: Hippos. Credit: Rogers Fund, 1930.

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 drawing depicting the head of a hippopotamus (with open jaws showing teeth) on an aged, beige background.

The image shows a stylized hippopotamus head viewed from the side, with the jaw open and prominent curved teeth. The animal’s hide is rendered in mottled brown and reddish-brown tones, while the interior of the mouth and lower jaw includes lighter areas. The surrounding background consists of torn or collage-like beige/brown shapes, suggesting a reproduced artwork or restoration. A small red handwritten/printed notation appears near the lower center that reads like “30:2:3” (exact characters unclear). No Egyptian hieroglyphs, cartouches, or Greek/Coptic/Arabic text are clearly legible elsewhere. No visible royal insignia or inscriptions that would identify a specific ruler are present. The overall appearance and media presentation suggest a modern/processed artwork on paper rather than an original New Kingdom artifact.

daily life Twentieth Century (as a modern drawing/reproduction), with subject inspired by ancient Egyptian themes; original New Kingdom claim cannot be confirmed from the image. good
Materials tempera on paper (as catalogued; consistent with painted-on-paper appearance)
Visible text "Lower center: unclear red notation resembling “30:2:3” (exact text not fully legible)."

Inscriptions (1)

Inscription #1 AI reading of the photograph

Visible text (machine reading)

Lower center: unclear red notation resembling “30:2:3” (exact text not fully legible).

Connections

Found at el-Khokha
About this record's data
  • From the source institution — accession, description, dimensions, and dating are as catalogued by Metropolitan Museum of Art — Egyptian Art (Open Access).
  • 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.