Published Catalogue Text: Ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern Bronzes at the Harvard Art Museums
The ichneumon, a mongoose-like animal that inhabited the marshes of Egypt, was known in ancient Egypt for raiding birds’ nests and fighting with snakes. It joined the ranks of sacred animals in the second millennium BCE and was associated with the spirits of the netherworld. Like the cat, falcon, ibis, and other sacred animals, the ichneumon became the focus of cult activity in the later periods, especially the Ptolemaic (332-30 BCE). Inscriptions on bronze statues connect the weasel-like creature to the cults of Horus at Letopolis and Wadjet (Uto) at Buto, both in the Delta region, as well as to the god Atum (1). Despite its small scale, the Harvard ichneumon conveys the slinking motion of the animal through its long, pointed snout, arching back and extended tail, which is supported by a strut (2). The rectangular container on which it stands is open at the back end; it may have held a portion of the remains of an ichneumon, since it is too small to have held an entire animal (3).
NOTES:
1. G. Roeder, Ägyptische Bronzefiguren, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Mitteilungen aus der Ägyptischen Sammlung 6 (Berlin, 1956) 375; and J. Thum, Creatures Compartmentalised: Establishing a Typology for the Ancient Egyptian Bronze ‘Reliquaries’ in the British Museum, London (MPhil. thesis, University of Oxford, 2012) 45.
2. The piece may instead represent a shrewmouse, a related animal often confused with the ichneumon; see Thum 2012 (supra 1) 40-41 and 45-46, figs. 22 and 24. Compare ibid., 117-19, nos. C-17 to C-22.
3. Roeder 1956 (supra 1) 382. For a discussion of the uses and symbolism of copper alloy animals on containers or coffins, see Thum 2012 (supra 1).
Marian Feldman
