A small copper alloy votive statuette from Egypt's Late Period, roughly 664 to 332 BCE, showing Bastet in her standard collared cat form, seated atop a papyriform column, a composition common in the mass-produced bronze votives dedicated at her cult centers in this period. A hieroglyphic dedicatory inscription on the piece names Ankhhor as the dedicatee and Horsaiset as his father, a typical formula asking Bastet's favor for the donor and his family. The statuette entered the Louvre's Department of Egyptian Antiquities in 1864 from the collection of Pacifique Henri Delaporte, inventory number E 4257, and is now displayed in the Sully Wing, Room 643. Bastet, daughter of the sun god Ra, was worshipped across Egypt as a protective and nurturing goddess, and this Late Period cat form is the iconography by which she is most widely recognized today.
Facts
Subject Matter
Devotional FunctionA piece like this was an ex-voto rather than a household object: Late Period worshippers commissioned small bronzes of exactly this kind in large numbers to deposit at Bastet's cult centers in fulfillment of a vow or a request, and the dedicatory inscription naming the donor and his father is the standard formula for recording who made the offering and on whose behalf. 1 Physical Form
MediumCopper alloy statuette, Late Period 664 to 332 BCE, Musee du Louvre 1 Medium (class) Connections
Belongs to Tradition
Source Bastet on Pillar E 4257, Museum Record (Musee du Louvre)
Depicts
The statuette's sole subject, in the Louvre's own catalogue title ("Bastet sur pilier") and standard Late Period iconography for the goddess.
Source Bastet on Pillar E 4257, Museum Record (Musee du Louvre)
Additional Source Bastet on Pillar E 4257, Structured Record (Wikidata)
Sources
1. Bastet on Pillar E 4257, Museum Record (Musee du Louvre)
Musee du Louvrecatalogue record, medium/object-type descriptionQuote, catalogue record, medium/object-type description
A small copper alloy votive statuette from Egypt's Late Period, roughly 664 to 332 BCE, showing Bastet in her standard collared cat form, seated atop a papyriform column, a composition common in the mass-produced bronze votives dedicated at her cult centers in this period.
Apotropaic magic (Wikipedia)
In Group: Egyptian Protective and Apotropaic Deities, the Musee du Louvre record identifies the pillar figure's subject as Bastet, a protective goddessView the Source Bastet on Pillar E 4257, Structured Record (Wikidata)
WikidataDepicts: BastetQuote, Depicts: Bastet
Bastet on pillar, inventory E 4257, Late Period, copper alloy, Department of Egyptian Antiquities, Musee du Louvre, Room 643, acquired 1864.
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