This ugly creature is an Egyptian god called Bes. Although he looks threatening, the Egyptians thought he was a kind god. They believed he protected the family, and they wore amulets like this to ward off the dangers of every day life. He is 37mm high and there is a hole at the back so that he could be hung on a thread around the neck.

This amulet was found during excavations at a site called Gurob in Egypt in 1890. The archaeologist William Flinders Petrie excavated part of a town there, dating from the New Kingdom (1550-1069 BC). Flinders Petrie brought careful modern excavation to Egypt in the late 1800s, in place of the earlier looting of antiquities for collectors and museums abroad.

Flinders Petrie raised the money to carry out his excavations from subscriptions. Partly to reward his subscribers and partly to spread knowledge about ancient Egypt, he gave away some of the finds to subscribers and museums. William Fennell, a Wakefield wine merchant, paid into the fund for several years. In return he received a collection of small domestic objects from Gurob, including this amulet of Bes, necklaces, moulds and oil lamps. The Fennell family then donated this collection to Wakefield Museum in the 1930s.