Skip to Content

About Amulets Cat. 71 Amulet of Bes, Late Period–Ptolemaic Period Cat. 72 Amulet of Imsety, One of the Four Sons of Horus, Ptolemaic Period Cat. 73 Nehebkau Amulet, Late Period Cat. 74 Nephthys, Horus the Child, and Isis Amulet, Late Period Cat. 75 Amulet of Mut and Khonsu, Third Intermediate Period Cat. 76 Amulet of Pataikos, Third Intermediate Period Cat. 77 Amulet of Re-Horakhty, Late Period–Ptolemaic Period Cats. 78–79 Sekhmet Amulets, Third Intermediate Period Cats. 80–81 Taweret Amulets, Third Intermediate Period–Late Period and New Kingdom Cats. 82–83 Thoth Amulets, Ptolemaic Period Cat. 84 Ram Amulet, Late Period–Ptolemaic Period

Cat. 84

Ram Amulet


Late Period–Ptolemaic Period (664–30 BCE)

Ancient Egyptian

Glass; 1.9 × 2.4 × 0.5 cm (3/4 × 1 × 3/16 in.)

The Art Institute of Chicago, W. Moses Willner Fund, 1910.161

This small, cast plaque of a ram in right profile shows amazing artistry and detail. The ram strides with his left legs ahead of his right, imitating the position of the legs in representations of humans. This plaque is made of at least four colors of glass—black along the animal’s spine and behind his head, yellow on his face and chest, and blue and white on his body and the base line. Although the end of his muzzle is broken away, the ram’s large, outlined eye and recurved horn are preserved. The musculature of his shoulder of the front leg, the articulation of the joints in his legs, the pattern on his chest that suggests fleece (see cat. 15 for a similar representation of fleece), and his genitalia are clearly detailed. Seen from the reverse, the area that is blue on the front appears as a transparent light blue surrounded by opaque, white glass (fig. 1). Most of the reverse is covered with a dark adhesive that once attached the ram to another surface.1

The ram was a symbol of virility and power. Since the words “ram” and “soul” were one and the same in ancient Egyptian (ba), this ram amulet is a visual pun intended to give power to the soul of the deceased.
2

64165 1

Fig. 1


Back of cat. 84.

For more on amulets, see About Amulets.3

Provenance

The Art Institute of Chicago, acquired in 1910.4

Publication History

Thomas George Allen, A Handbook of the Egyptian Collection (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1923), 133 (ill.).5

Roberta Casagrande-Kim, ed., When the Greeks Ruled Egypt: From Alexander the Great to Cleopatra, with contributions by Mary C. Greuel et al., exh. cat. (New York: Institute for the Study of the Ancient World, 2014), 78, fig. 5-9; 100, no. 97.
6

Entry by

How to Cite

Emily Teeter, “Cat. 84 Ram Amulet,” in Ancient Egyptian Art at the Art Institute of Chicago by Emily Teeter and Ashley F. Arico, ed. Ashley F. Arico (Art Institute of Chicago, 2025), https://doi.org/10.53269/9780865593213/87.

© 2025 by The Art Institute of Chicago. This work is licensed under a CC BY-NC 4.0 license: creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/.

Sign up for our enewsletter to receive updates.
Learn more

Image actions

Share

Suggested Terms