Bes-Image Amulet
Description
Object Label: Ancient Egyptian women wore amulets of birth gods to protect them during and immediately after childbirth. One of these birth gods, a female deity often known as Taweret, was shown with the head and body of a hippopotamus, lion's paws, and a stylized crocodile hanging down her back. Her male counterpart, commonly called Bes, usually appeared frontally. In early Dynasty 18, artists depicted Bes with a human face and a lion's body and mane. Caption: Bes-Image Amulet, ca. 1539–1478 B.C.E.. Faience, 1 3/16 × 5/8 × 3/16 in. (3 × 1.6 × 0.5 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund, 37.914E. (Photo: Brooklyn Museum)
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.
Small blue-green faience amulet depicting a standing Bes-like dwarf figure with a stylized face and arms out to the sides.
The image shows a compact, upright amulet in blue-green (turquoise) tone. The central figure has an exaggerated frontal face with a broad mouth and beard or chin ornament. Large, raised hands/arms extend downward and outward on either side. The torso is decorated with horizontal banded lines resembling a kilt or patterned garment. The figure stands with legs separated, ending in small feet. No hieroglyphic inscription, cartouche, or additional iconographic text is visible in the photographed area. The surface appears molded/relief-carved typical of faience amulets, though fine details are slightly blurred due to image resolution. A small peg or attachment element is visible at the bottom edge.
Cross-references (2)
- BKM-Accession 37.914E tier-2
- BKM-Object 4112 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.