Frog Amulet (c. 1540–1296 BCE): Art, History and Details

Frog Amulet (c. 1540–1296 BCE) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

The frog, because of its numerous offspring, was a symbol of fertility. In fact, the hieroglyphic sign for 100,000 was a tadpole. Frog amulets were very popular both in semiprecious stone and in faience, and were worn by women hoping for an easy delivery. Both sexes wore the frog in expectation of a successful rebirth in the afterlife.

Object facts

• Title: Frog Amulet
• Date: c. 1540–1296 BCE
• Culture: Egypt, New Kingdom (1540–1069 BCE), Dynasty 18
• Type: Amulets
• Technique: carnelian
• Dimensions: Overall: 0.9 x 0.9 cm (3/8 x 3/8 in.)
• Collection: Egypt - New Kingdom
• Department: Egyptian and Ancient Near Eastern Art
• Accession number: 1914.570

Collection credit

Gift of the John Huntington Art and Polytechnic Trust

Further reading listed by the museum

• Cooney, John D. “Intaglios, Cameos, and Related Works.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 55, no. 4 (April 1968): 113–119.
• Berman, Lawrence M., and Kenneth J. Bohač. Catalogue of Egyptian Art: The Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1999

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.