Comb decorated with a hippo
Description
Comb, hippo. Predynastic, Late Naqada l–Naqada II, ca. 3900–3500 B.C. Ivory (elephant). h. 10 x w. 5.9 x th. 1 cm (3 15/16 x 2 5/16 x 3/8 in.). Said to be from: Balyana, Northern Upper Egypt. Subject: Hippos. Credit: Rogers Fund, 1955.
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.
Late Predynastic Egyptian ivory comb with a zoomorphic (hippo-like) top projecting above the teeth.
The object is a small hand-held comb carved from ivory. The upper portion is shaped as a rounded head with a suggested open mouth/nostril area, and it rises above the comb body, consistent with a hippo/hypopotamus motif. The lower half consists of a single row of long, narrow, evenly spaced teeth carved integrally with the comb base; several teeth are intact while others show minor edge wear. No clear carved hieroglyphs or alphabets are visible on the comb body in the provided image. The surface has natural discoloration and abrasions consistent with age or handling. The background is neutral and does not include any additional inscriptions.
Connections
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.