Scaraboid Stamp Seal: Head of Bes

This scarab stamp seal features an image of a bearded head. The lozenge-shaped head is frontal. The lower portion of the face is covered by a beard, indicated by a series of vertical lines. He has a long, wedge-shaped nose, almond-shaped eyes with thick rims, and a brow in the shape of chevron. There are ears on either side of the head, and two large round elements, which may represent earrings. A row of tight curls lines the top of the head, beneath the crown. The crown is wide and flat at the top. A pair of wings flank the beard, and the entire image is encircled by a hatched border. This frontal, bearded face with a trapezoidal crown most likely represents Bes, an Egyptian god believed to have protective powers. He was popular outside of Egypt in the first millennium BCE. Usually he is shown wearing a feathered crown; on this scarab the crown has been rendered geometrically, suggesting this seal was not made in Egypt. The narrow face and stylized crown bear some resemblance to a seal impression found in a tomb of fifth century BCE date at Ur (1). This tomb contained impressions of a wide variety of objects originating across the eastern Mediterranean and Near East, so the seal that created this impression was not necessarily from Ur. Scarab stamp seals were made in Phoenicia as well as in Egypt during this period, and given Bes’ non-Egyptian features, a Phoenician origin seems likely for this seal (2). NOTES 1. D. Collon, “A Hoard of Sealings from Ur,” in Archives et sceaux du monde hellénistique: actes du colloque de Turin, 1993, eds. M.-F. Boussac and A. Invernizzi (Paris, 1996) pl. 15c. 2. J. Boardman, Classical Phoenician Scarabs: A Catalogue and Study (Oxford, 2003) 111.