Numerous faience figurines of women, children and baboons have been found at temple sites of the Early Dynastic Period. The precise meaning of these baboons is uncertain, and may not be the same as at later periods, when the baboon form was used to depict especially, Thoth the god of wisdom. The small votives of the earliest periods provide important evidence for the history of glazing technology. It is thought that the artificial composition faience was developed in Western Asia and imported into Egypt; these figures indicate the production of faience in Egypt on some scale by at least 3000 BC.
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