Hippopotamus
Description
Object Label: The standing hippopotamus represented Seth, the brother of Osiris who murdered him and then claimed his throne. It was thus a symbol of chaos. Egyptians controlled negative forces in the tomb by including a hippopotamus with the legs purposely broken. The lotus flowers drawn on its flanks reflect the animal as it would be seen standing in the Nile among the natural vegetation. Caption: Hippopotamus, ca. 1938–1539 B.C.E.. Faience, 4 5/16 × 2 15/16 × 7 3/16 in., 2 lb. (11 × 7.5 × 18.3 cm, 0.91kg). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of the Ernest Erickson Foundation, Inc., 86.226.2. (Photo: Brooklyn Museum)
AI image analysis GPT-4o-2024-08-06
Machine-generated from the object's image on May 2026. Not curatorial; treat deities, names, and signs below as the model's best reading, not authority.
A blue-green glazed faience hippopotamus sculpture from ancient Egypt.
The artifact is a small, blue-green faience hippopotamus statue, depicting the animal in a stylized form typical of ancient Egyptian art. The glaze provides a vibrant color, characteristic of the use of faience for decorative purposes. It likely served an amuletic or symbolic function, as hippos were associated with protection and rebirth. The statue is supported by a modern stand for display.
Cross-references (2)
- BKM-Accession 86.226.2 tier-2
- BKM-Object 4255 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.