LOT 0033

Egyptian Bronze Head of a Cat

LATE-PTOLEMAIC PERIOD, 664-30 B.C.

1 1/4 in. (40.4 grams, 33.6 mm high).

The head of goddess Bastet modelled in the round with alert ears and eyes, ears pierced; hollow-formed.

Acquired in the mid 1990s.
Private collection, Switzerland, thence by descent.
Private collection, since the late 1990s.

Cf. Roeder, G., Ägyptische Bronzefiguren II, Berlin, 1956, pl. 50 l and m, for comparable cat heads; Waziry, M., Vestiges of Ancient Egypt: The Bubasteion Votive Cachette at Saqqara, Houston, 2023, p. 68, fig. 19, for an example of a bronze cat head attached to carved wooden body, discovered at the cult centre of Bastet at Saqqara.

The feline's pierced ears likely once held earrings or other ornaments. It was probably attached to a statuette of a cat, whose body may have been crafted from wood.
The cat was sacred to Bastet, a protective mother goddess and the daughter of the sun god Re. Amulets provided the wearer with the goddess's protection. Her name means ‘she of the bast [ointment jar],’ which may have contained a substance favoured by or exclusive to royalty. Originally, Bastet was depicted as a woman with the head of a lioness, but by the late New Kingdom, she was typically shown with a cat's head. She is sometimes portrayed with kittens, emphasising her maternal role as a fierce protector of her offspring.