Crocodile veneration at Kom Ombo has roots stretching back to the earliest periods of Egyptian history. The site’s position at a Nile bend where crocodiles historically gathered made it a natural focus for Sobek worship. By the Ptolemaic period, when the current temple complex was built, Kom Ombo had become one of the primary cult centers for Sobek in Upper Egypt.
The mummified crocodiles were discovered in caches near the temple beginning in the 1890s. Georges Legrain and other excavators found them bundled in linen wrappings and stored in purpose-built vaults. Mummification techniques range from simple natural desiccation to elaborate treatments involving resin and linen bandaging.
The museum was constructed in 2012 using a modern structure designed to harmonize with the temple’s sandstone architecture — one of the first purpose-built satellite museums created to display finds at their site of discovery rather than shipping them to Cairo.
