Sole Egyptian museum for an animal

Sobek first appeared in the Old Kingdom (about 2500 BC). He was worshipped until the end of the Roman era (4th century AD). His cult became increasingly important during the Middle Kingdom (ca. 2000 BC) in Kom Ombo and Fayyum.

Sobek is depicted either as a crocodile or as a crocodile-headed man wearing a headdress of ram’s horns topped by a sun disk and two tall plumes.

Originally Sobek only protected his worshippers from crocodiles. Later, he became known as the Lord of the Waters as the Egyptians believed that he had created the Nile from his own sweat. In one Egyptian creation myth, Sobek appeared on a mound that arose from the primaeval waters (called Nun) and laid his eggs, beginning the process of creation. He was also the God of the Inundation, perhaps because crocodiles were known to predict the height of the flood, as they always built their nests above the flood level.

The museum, which was opened in 2012, displays 74 artefacts including mummies, statues, eggs and votive stelae.

On display are different sizes of crocodile mummies which vary in length between 150 cm to 4 metres. There is the largest showcase ever in the Egyptian museums, measuring 12 x 4 metres, containing 20 mummified crocodiles.

Museum director Saad Zaghloul told the Egyptian Mail that most of these mummies were found in the Sobek cemetery near El-Shatb village, about two kilometres south of Kom Ombo. It was used from the Middle Kingdom through the Graeco-Roman period.

Most of the tombs in the Sobek Cemetery were cut into the hard ground with mud-brick supports added wherever the soil was unstable. These unadorned tombs had no superstructures. Although there were architectural changes over time, most of the tombs of the Graeco-Roman era consist of an entrance from above with a staircase leading down the shaft into an antechamber, which opens into the burial chamber.

The cemetery contains a large number of animal mummies, the majority of which are crocodiles of various sizes, from egg to adult.

A model simulating the tomb of crocodiles found in El-Shatb is at the museum. It contains pottery coffins in which the mummies of crocodiles were put in addition to mummified eggs, mummified crocodile foetuses. On display a broken egg and the mummified foetus appear from inside.

Zaghloul said that the ancient Egyptian view of the crocodile is different from the current Egyptians’ view of this animal.

He explained that they didn’t consider it a predator devouring its victims. But it appears in big numbers along the Nile banks, laying their eggs in the time of flood, a time of agriculture and good days for Egypt. The ancient Egyptians prayed to Sobek for protection, strength and fertility.

Small figurines as offerings presented by people to Sobek as vows adorn the one-storey museum.

Don’t miss that mummified crocodile placed on a bier with carrying poles, and balanced on a wooden plinth shaped like a shrine. This was probably a sacred crocodile, revered during its lifetime and preserved for eternity. According to Classical authors, these sacred crocodiles were often bejewelled and even had their claws gilded.

Also there is a group of mummified crocodiles in their ceramic coffins, together with grave goods of pots and offering tables.

Linen bandages, saturated with resins and oils, wrapped the crocodiles that had been desiccated with natron, and palm-ribs served to strengthen and support the mummies are also featured there.

The museum is the next and final stop for those who visit the Kom Ombo Temple, which is named after the town that lies about 28 miles north of Aswan.

The temple is dated back to the Ptolemy era, about 180 BC. It is built on a high dune overlooking the Nile. Its location gave it some control over trade routes from Nubia to the Nile Valley. The temple has two entrances, two colonnades, two hypostyle halls, two courts and two sanctuaries. The left, or northern, side is dedicated to the falcon-headed sky god named Haroeris and the right side is dedicated to Sobek.