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

Counterweight of a <em>menit</em> necklace with an image of Bastet nursing King Taharqo

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

Description

Menat, Taharqo nursed by the lion-headed goddess Bastet. Third Intermediate Period, Kushite Period, Dynasty 25, reign of Taharqo, ca. 690–664 BCE. Faience. H. 9.6 × W. 4.3 × Th. 0.9 cm (3 3/4 × 1 11/16 × 3/8 in.). Possibly from: Nubia. Subject: Birds, Kings, Sekhmet, Snakes. Credit: Bequest of W. Gedney Beatty, 1941.

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.

Faience counterweight pendant shaped like a rectangular plaque with an arched top, showing a nude royal figure holding a small figure and kneeling figures, plus a large animal on the lower register.

The object appears as a vertically oriented faience piece with a rounded/arched top and a recessed border. In the upper register, a human figure stands or kneels with arms held close to the body and with a small secondary figure or emblem held between the arms; above and around the upper area are small incised markings resembling hieroglyphs, though individual signs are not fully legible. The lower register shows a large crouched animal (likely feline) facing right, with a second smaller animal or figure adjacent, and a decorative band at the very bottom. The overall composition resembles a narrative religious royal image, consistent with a necklace counterweight format, but the specific attribution to Bastet nursing King Taharqo cannot be confirmed from the visible details alone due to limited legibility and uncertainty about the exact subjects.

religious Third Intermediate Period / Kushite Period (as catalogued) good
Deities unknown (feline-associated deity could be present but not confidently identifiable)
Royals unknown (possible royal name not legible)
Materials faience
Signs unidentified hieroglyphic incisions (not confidently legible) ×6
Visible text "Unclear short incised hieroglyphs near the top; exact text cannot be reliably read from the image."

Connections

Deities Bastet
Royals Taharqa
Materials Faience

Cross-references (4)

  • Wikidata-Q Q116413714 tier-1
  • Collection-QID Q160236 tier-2 (wikidata-mediated)
  • Inventory-Number 41.160.104 tier-2 (wikidata-mediated)
  • MET-Object 544882 tier-2 (wikidata-mediated)
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.