Egyptian bronze figure of Bastet

Late Dynastic Period, 26th-30th Dynasty, c. 663-332 BC
height: 19.5 cm
 
An exquisitely detailed bronze figurine of the cat-headed goddess Bastet of museum quality. The benevolent goddess of fertility and abundance is seen with her left hand holding a menat, an amuletic bead necklace with lion-headed aegis, perhaps representing her more fearsome sister Sekhmet, the warrior goddess. Her right hand would originally have held a separately cast sistrum (rattle), symbolizing the musical and celebratory aspects of her divinity,
 
Provenance: Collection of Baron H.W. Herwarth von Bittenfeld (1871-1942); Collection of Mrs Elias-Vaes (1908-2002), The Netherlands, acquired 1960s-early 1970s.