- Description
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Hollow-cast, copper alloy votive box, also known as relic-box or animal coffin; rectangular case surmounted by two solid-cast figures of lizards missing their head) lying side by side ; two eyelets for suspension on opposite corners of the case, one on top and the other on a long side; mostly complete, but very corroded and base open; case previously contained a mummified lizard or two (or parts of).
- Production date
- 500 BC - 300 BC (late 5th - early 4th century?)
- Dimensions
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Height: 2.60 centimetres
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Length: 5.10 centimetres
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Width: 3.80 centimetres
- Curator's comments
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Object owned and held by World Museum, Liverpool. This record is included in the British Museum database as part of the Museum’s Naukratis Project, a research collaboration that aims to virtually re-unite finds from the ancient port city of Naukratis, now distributed over 80 museums worldwide.
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Some votive boxes surmounted by two lizards were discovered in Naukratis. According to Petrie, the cache of bronzes found in a building located in the southern part of the city provided four of this category of votive boxes (Petrie 1886, 41-42). This specimen could originate from this cache that can be dated around the end of the 5th-beginning of the 4th century BC (Masson 2015). However, Griffith signalled in his notes from January 1885 several bronze reptile cases in a trench located outside the Great Temenos (Masson forthcoming b).
Votive boxes of this type were particularly associated to the solar god and demiurge Atum (Weiss 2012, 278-279). They belong to the type T 15 in the typology of animal bronzes by K. Weiss (Weiss 2012, 731-738, Pl. 42g-i, Typ T 15, esp. Nr. 771-782, 784-791 from Naukratis).
Bienkowski, P., Southworth E. 1986, Egyptian Antiquities in the Liverpool Museum, I: A List of Provenanced Objects, Warminster, 85.
Petrie, W. M. F. 1886, Naukratis. Part I., 1884-5 (Third Memoir of the Egypt Exploration Fund), London, 41-42.
Masson, A. 2015, ‘Cult and Trade. A reflexion on Egyptian metal offerings from Naukratis’, in D. Robinson and F. Goddio (eds), Thonis Heracleion in Context, Oxford Centre for Maritime Archaeology Monograph 8, Oxford, 71-88.
Masson, A. forthcoming b, ‘Naukratis: Egyptian offerings in context’, in M. Bergeron and A. Masson (eds), Naukratis in Context: Cults, Sanctuaries and Offerings, Proceedings of the Second Naukratis Project Workshop, held at the British Museum 22nd – 23rd June 2013.
Weiss, K. 2012, Ägyptische Tier- und Götterbronzen aus Unterägypten : Untersuchungen zu Typus, Ikonographie und Funktion sowie der Bedeutung innerhalb der Kulturkontakte zu Griechenland, Ägypten und Altes Testament 81, 278-279, 731-738, Pl. 42g-i, Typ T 15 (see Nr. 758 for this specimen, but wrongly attributed to the type 14).
- Location
- Not on display
- Condition
- Relatively poor, corroded
- Department
- External
- Additional IDs
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Miscellaneous number: 9,9,86,96 (Accession Number)