Offerings to the discerning eye: an Egyptological medley in honor of Jack A. Josephson

Culture and History of the Ancient Near East Series Editors Eckart Frahm (Yale University) W. Randall Garr (University...

Author: Sue D'Auria | Jack A. Josephson

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Culture and History of the Ancient Near East Series Editors

Eckart Frahm (Yale University) W. Randall Garr (University of California, Santa Barbara) B. Halpern (Pennsylvania State University) Theo P.J. van den Hout (Oriental Institute) Thomas Schneider (University of British Columbia) Irene J. Winter (Harvard University)

VOLUME 38

Jack A. Josephson and a Middle Kingdom Nobleman—the Josephson Head

Offerings to the Discerning Eye An Egyptological Medley in Honor of Jack A. Josephson

Edited by

Sue H. D’Auria

LEIDEN • BOSTON 2010

This book is printed on acid-free paper. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Offerings to the discerning eye : an Egyptological medley in honor of Jack A. Josephson / edited by Sue H. D’Auria. p. cm. — (Culture and history of the ancient Near East, ISSN 1566-2055 ; v. 38) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-90-04-17874-8 (hard cover : alk. paper) 1. Egypt—Antiquities. 2. Historic sites—Egypt. 3. Excavations (Archaeology—Egypt. 4. Egyptology. 5. Egypt—Civilization— To 332 B.C. 6. Josephson, Jack A. I. D’Auria, Sue. II. Title. III. Series. DT60.O58 2009 932—dc22 2009022055

ISSN: 1566-2055 ISBN: 978 90 04 17874 8 Copyright 2010 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands. Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Hotei Publishing, IDC Publishers, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers and VSP. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal use is granted by Koninklijke Brill NV provided that the appropriate fees are paid directly to The Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910, Danvers, MA 01923, USA. Fees are subject to change. printed in the netherlands

contents

v

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Magda Saleh

Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

vii

Magda Saleh

Jack A. Josephson: A Biographical Narrative . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

ix

Diane Bergman

Bibliography of Jack A. Josephson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

xv

List of Abbreviations

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xvii

List of Illustrations

........................................................

xxi

The Shunet el-Zebib at Abydos: Architectural Conservation at One of Egypt’s Oldest Preserved Royal Monuments . . . . . . . . . . .

1

Earthquakes in Egypt in the Pharaonic Period: The Evidence at Dahshur in the Late Middle Kingdom . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

9

Dorothea Arnold

Foreign and Female . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

17

Kathryn A. Bard and Rodolfo Fattovich

Recent Excavations at the Ancient Harbor of Saww (Mersa/Wadi Gawasis) on the Red Sea . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

33

Edward Bleiberg

Reused or Restored? The Wooden Shabti of Amenemhat in the Brooklyn Museum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

39

Andrey Bolshakov

Persians and Egyptians: Cooperation in Vandalism? . . . . . . . . . . .

45

Bob Brier

The Great Pyramid: The Internal Ramp Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

55

Betsy M. Bryan

Amenhotep III’s Legacy in the Temple of Mut . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

63

Günter Dreyer

Eine Statue des Königs Dewen aus Abydos? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

73

Mamdouh Eldamaty

Die leeren Kartuschen von Akhenaten . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

79

Richard Fazzini

Aspects of the Mut Temple’s Contra-Temple at South Karnak, Part II . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

83

Matthew Douglas Adams and David O’Connor Dieter Arnold

Erica Feucht

A God’s Head in Heidelberg . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103

Rita E. Freed

Reconstructing a Statue from a Head . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109

G.A. Gaballa

The Stela of Djehutynefer, Called Seshu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115

Ogden Goelet, Jr.

Observations on Copying and the Hieroglyphic Tradition in the Production of the Book of the Dead . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121

Tom Hardwick

A Group of Art Works in the Amarna Style. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133

W. Benson Harer, Jr.

Sexually Transmitted Diseases in Ancient Egypt. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153

Melinda Hartwig

The Tomb of a HAty-a, Theban Tomb 116 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159

Zahi Hawass

A Head of Rameses II from Tell Basta . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169

Salima Ikram

A Pasha’s Pleasures: R.G. Gayer-Anderson and his Pharaonic Collection in Cairo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177

Sameh Iskander

Merenptah’s Confrontations in the Western Desert and the Delta 187

T.G.H. James

A Contemplation of the Late Period . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195

contents

vi Peter Jánosi

“He is the son of a woman of Ta-Sety . . .”—The Offering Table of the King’s Mother Nefret (MMA 22.1.21) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201

Nozomu Kawai

Theban Tomb 46 and Its Owner, Ramose . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209

Peter Lacovara

A Unique Sphinx of Amenhotep II . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 217

Sarwat Okasha

Rameses Recrowned: The International Campaign to Preserve the Monuments of Nubia, 1959-68 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223

Paul F. O’Rourke

Some Thoughts on τὸ ὕδωρ of Thales and τὸ ἄπειρον of Anaximander . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245

William H. Peck

Mapping the Temple of the Goddess Mut, Karnak: A Basis for Further Exploration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 253

Elena Pischikova

The Dog of Karakhamun . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 263

Donald B. Redford

The Second Pylon of the Temple of Ba-neb-djed at Mendes . . . . 271

Gerry D. Scott, III

Four Late Period Sculptures in the San Antonio Museum of Art

Hourig Sourouzian

News from Kom el-Hettan in the Season of Spring 2007 . . . . . . . 285

Rainer Stadelmann

The Prince Kawab, Oldest Son of Khufu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 295

Paul Edmund Stanwick

New Perspectives on the Brooklyn Black Head . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301

Emily Teeter

A “Realistic” Head in the Oriental Institute Museum (OIM 13952). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 313 Transformation of a Royal Head: Notes on a Portrait of Nectanebo I . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 317

Nancy Thomas

277

Jacobus van Dijk

A Cat, a Nurse, and a Standard-Bearer: Notes on Three Late Eighteenth Dynasty Statues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 321

Kent R. Weeks

The Theban Mapping Project’s Online Image Database of the Valley of the Kings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 333

Christiane Ziegler

The Tomb of Iahmes, Son of Psamtikseneb, at Saqqara . . . . . . . . . 339

Alain Zivie

The “Saga” of ‘Aper-El’s Funerary Treasure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 349

Index

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 357

Dynasties

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 362

Theban Tombs

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 362

Egyptian Words and Phrases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 362

preface

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PREFACE

With sincere pleasure, this volume is dedicated to Jack A. Josephson by his friends and colleagues in token of their esteem and affection, on the occasion of his approaching 80th birthday on January 31, 2010. May he, as the ancient Egyptians wished, live 110 years in robust health, joyfully pursuing his passion for Egypt and its great civilization as energetically and purposefully as he does today. Jack is a singular scholar in a rarified field. A latecomer to Egyptology, he has molded himself into a writer and researcher in the tradition of the “gentleman scholar.” In the process, he has attained specialized expertise in three-dimensional sculpture and achieved broad recognition as an authority in Egyptian art history. Museums and collectors seek his advice on matters of authenticity and identification, and young scholars look to him for guidance. Over the years, Jack’s lucid investigative analyses have probed and redefined the limits of inquiry, expanded research parameters, and broadened perspectives. His scholarship helps validate the discipline, emphasizing its undeniable contributions in an intra-disciplinary framework and highlighting its promise of further potential. In clear, concise language and a crisp, unadorned style, his output displays the rigorous application of conventional methodological tools and techniques, informed by an increasingly original, innovative approach, instilling new vitality into a field too often dismissed or ignored. At their most complex, his writings and lectures weave cultural and political history into fascinating vignettes and narratives reflected in the formulaic art of the Egyptian civilization. Arthistorical interpretation thus applied can reveal tantalizing insights—clues offering a figurative reading between the lines—which might elude the philologist solely focused on often propagandizing, and often misleading, hieroglyphic texts. To cite one example, Jack’s comparative study of two contrasting statues of the 26th Dynasty vizier Mentuemhat posits an elaborate power struggle pitting

the ambitious Theban against the wily Psamtik I—a protracted long-distance intrigue culminating in a stalemate, but foiling the southerner’s apparent aspirations to royal status. Innumerable extant sculptures—deprived of archaeological context, intact but shorn of inscription, archaizing, usurped, re-carved, or broken and battered fragments, the detritus of time—can, under the practiced scrutiny of the art historian, still have a name to regain, a period, a reign, a workshop, or even a master sculptor to be assigned to, and still provide answers to queries and elucidate historical conundrums. Yet others, embellished in modern times, or altogether fake, can be exposed under the stylistic assessment of a keen and knowledgeable eye. In one such instance, a collaborative research effort by Jack and Rita Freed concluded that the stunning Middle Kingdom sphinx head of a queen, a masterpiece of the Brooklyn Museum collection, while indeed ancient, had undergone substantial repair and re-working in eighteenthcentury Italy. The inquiry setting the investigation in motion was an initial observation, made during an earlier joint endeavor on the identification of another MK sphinx queen’s head now at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston (the Centennial Queen).The Brooklyn Queen, viewed in the context of the known corpus of MK female sphinx heads, appeared anomalous. With the two scholars pursuing all leads, from scouring every available source reference to seeking out comparable sculptures in Roman museums, the resulting article is a classic example of art-historical analysis in application at its best. Intensely examining an enigmatic image may give Jack the eerie sensation of communing with the artifact, of seeking to inhabit the world of its maker. In reality, he is mustering an array of the invaluable personal resources of connoisseurship —a discerning eye; an innate aesthetic sensibility; insight and intuition; strong visual recall and mental acuity bolstered by avid reading; constant interaction with fellow scholars; and the continu-

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preface

ous scrutiny of countless images. The course of art-historical analysis is painstakingly methodical and protracted. Sometimes, in an exciting procedural reversal, the trigger is an exhilarating “Eureka!” In one startling occurrence, the mass of information stored in a supple mind fused in instant revelation. Examining a photograph of the Cairo Museum statue of King Snefru set bells ringing and led to the identification of a rare surviving head of a statue of the first ruler of the Fourth Dynasty, once namelessly assigned to the Fifth. Intuitive recognition, honed by eye and memory, had still to be substantiated by strict science—but it was a moment to be savored. As a critical area of study, Egyptian art history is currently imperiled, to the serious detriment of the field of Egyptology. To Jack’s dismay, the subject has all but disappeared from the curricula of the few institutions both in the United States and Europe offering graduate degrees in the field. Deploring this untoward attrition, Jack is a determined proponent of its reinstatement as an essential component in the formation of new cadres. He voices unbounded reverence for the giants of Egyptian art history, among them his mentor Bernard V. Bothmer (a.k.a. BVB), and his personal ideal, William Stevenson Smith, for their inestimable contributions to the discipline. Profound thanks are due to many participants who have in various ways made this Festschrift possible. Foremost among these are Jack’s friends and colleagues, the authors who have, despite the heavy demands of their notoriously overburdened schedules, so generously joined together to offer Jack an exceptional gift. I note with satisfaction that the articles included here reflect a diversity of topics and themes of particular interest and importance to the writers, and I am infinitely

touched by their gracious response. I am truly grateful to my two fellow coordinators of this project, our peerless editor Sue D’Auria, who has undertaken this lengthy, arduous task—a labor of love—with infinite patience, unfailing good humor, and a scrupulous efficiency; and Rita Freed, Jack’s good friend and frequent collaborator, who found time despite her weighty duties as John F. Cogan, Jr. and Mary L. Cornille Chair, Art of the Ancient World at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, to function as logistics manager, wise advisor, and ever-optimistic encourager—and to contribute an article! The team at our publisher Brill, including Publishing Manager Michiel Klein Swormink, Production Editor Michael Mozina, and Acquisitions Editor Jennifer Pavelko, whose dedicated professionalism has made all our dealings a pleasure, has produced a quality publication of which we are all justly proud. My friends Mary McKercher and Malcolm McCormick have provided heartily appreciated assistance and support. Mikhail Ghali kindly supplied e-mail linkage services from Cairo. Amal Safwat el Alfy, Director of the Supreme Council of Antiquities Press, and Janice Kamrin, Director of the Egyptian Museum Database and Registrar Training Projects at the American Research Center in Egypt obligingly forwarded urgently needed archival photographs. Ben Harer proposed an inspired amendment to the working title, and Ogden Goelet contributed the perfectly apt cover illustration. In the interests of discretion, local e-maildrop was orchestrated by Helen Atlas and Michaela Gold. Without all these, and many other aiders, abettors, and wellwishers, this volume would not have seen the light of day. Thank you, one and all. Shukran! To JJ, with love and admiration, Magda Saleh

jack a. josephson: a biographical narrative

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JACK A. JOSEPHSON: A BIOGRAPHICAL NARRATIVE Magda Saleh

Jack A. Josephson, many would concur, has led a charmed triple life, but its inauspicious beginnings hardly heralded the compelling saga to come. A child of the Great Depression, Jack was born on January 31, 1930, in Atlantic City, New Jersey, the second son of immigrant parents. His mother, Eva Rounick, hailed from a village on the border region between Poland and Belarus, emigrating to the United States at age fifteen. His father, Joseph Josephson, was born in Constantinople under Ottoman rule. His family later moved to the town of Iasi in present-day Romania as frontier settlers sent to consolidate the threatened borders of a crumbling empire. Soon orphaned, Joseph was dispatched unaccompanied to New York, making his solitary journey to these shores across a continent and an ocean. He was all of ten years of age, and furnished, like a self-delivering parcel, with an address inked out on a cardboard square hanging from his neck. In those pre-Ellis Island times, young Joseph walked off the boat and into the maze of Lower Manhattan. Accosting, as advised, “men in blue with brass buttons,” helpful policemen who pointed out the direction to the address on his makeshift label, he duly arrived at destination, the home of family friends who would take him in. Following two years of schooling, he was put to work to earn his keep. Joseph Josephson later became a renowned horse-racing handicapper who for years coauthored a weekly column, “Long-shot Joe,” for the Morning Telegraph and Sun. A mathematical savant, despite his lack of formal education, he devised a method for weighting horses—still in use—enabling tracks to start a race from a single line of gates. This considerable improvement replaced the unwieldy system of staggered starting positions. For this achievement, the name of Joseph Josephson was secured for posterity in the Racing Hall of Fame in Saratoga, New York. After his marriage in 1919, he quit horse racing and opened a retail business in Atlantic City with his wife. There, the couple raised two sons.

The 1929 Wall Street financial crash struck, ushering in the grim decade of the Great Depression. Life became a grinding struggle for the Josephsons, and growing up was a challenging affair, but nothing if not character-forming for brothers Marvin and Jack, each of whom went on to highly successful careers, individual embodiments of the American Dream. Jack remembers the long years of exhausting daily hours his parents spent at their small clothing store, which often ran on barter in a cashstarved economy. Yet he still recalls with emotion the charity of his father in those times of utter destitution for so many. On a frigid winter night, Joseph, alone in the store, and braving his overworked wife’s understandable ire, gave away a warm woolen coat to a customer, a young black woman, shivering in a thin shawl, who desperately offered a dollar down payment on a purchase she could not afford. To the child, this was an act of selflessness that he never forgot. To the father, his family had barely enough, but others had even less. Then came World War II. America joined the Allies after Pearl Harbor. German U-boats prowled the eastern shores of the United States with impunity, scuttling tankers loaded with precious Venezuelan oil. They brazenly surfaced so close that, from the shore, the helpless onlookers, among whom Marvin and Jack, could clearly see, and all but hear, the U-boat captains using megaphones to order crews off the doomed vessels. Atlantic City’s beaches were covered in tar. Jack fervently prayed for the war to last till he was of an age to enlist. Near the end of the war, Marvin joined the Navy, but Jack was disappointed. With hostilities at an end, the would-be warrior enrolled in the University of Michigan’s College of Engineering, after obtaining one of the two offcampus Annapolis grants offered in New Jersey by the United States Navy through the Holloway Plan. This distinction was not matched by his academic performance, far from A-average. By his own unabashed admission, he preferred

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the lucrative activity of pool playing, at which he was exceptionally adept, and sweating it out on the university wrestling team, to hunkering down to his books. Despite this blithe insouciance, he graduated, receiving a BSE CE in 1951. His most treasured possession from that period, a superbly crafted drafting set, was a gift from the uncle of a roommate, C.V. Raman, the renowned Indian Nobel Laureate in physics. His alma mater had no reservations in later years about claiming him for its own, proudly citing him among the top 150 graduates of its College of Engineering on its 150th anniversary—based on his post-graduation lifetime performance. In 1992, at the instigation of College Dean Peter Banks, a member of the Jason Group, a Department of Defensefunded problem-solving think tank composed of leading U.S. scientists, Jack was invited to La Jolla to pose a challenging problem for them to resolve. Entering the workforce, the newly minted civil engineer found employment in Morocco with a construction company contracted to build overseas tactical bases for the United States Air Force. Aside from his engineering duties at his isolated base of operations in the deep desert south of the country, Jack’s most unusual task consisted of compiling weather data for statistical use by the Air Force. He documented the highest temperature officially recorded to date on the face of the globe, a sizzling 141.2°F, a measurement duly noted in annals of the International Bureau of Standards in Sèvres, France. By shipping out to French Morocco, Jack had unknowingly taken his first step toward his lifedefining, deep and abiding love affair with Egypt. To alleviate numbing boredom in the bleak, inhospitable surroundings, he would occasionally take weekend R&R jaunts to swinging Cairo, flying to adventure across North Africa with a buddy, Richard (Dick) Skelley, a former major in the Marine Corps piloting the company’s two-engine plane (they paid for the gas). On his fateful last visit at this time, there was, alas, more excitement than either fun seeker had bargained for. Those were grim, restive times in Egypt, nominally a kingdom since 1922 but still a British-dominated “colony,” and seething popular rage finally exploded on January 26, 1952, in a devastating orgy of looting, burning and killing. Cairo was afire. Abandoning breakfast and luggage, Jack and Dick escaped the Shepheard’s Hotel, waving their American pass-

ports as they pushed through the menacing crowd surrounding the building. They sought sanctuary at the United States Embassy in Garden City, already besieged by refugees. There they spent a cold, wet night, safe but miserably shivering on the lawn. Next day, discovering that their fabled hotel was burned to the ground with heartbreaking loss of life among both staff and guests, the pair made straight to the airport and escaped to Morocco. It was a harrowing experience. Jack would only return in 1978, but Egypt, and especially the remains of her ancient civilization— pyramids, temples, tombs, sphinxes, the art and artifacts stored in museums, with their aura of mystery—had left an indelible imprint upon his untutored sensibilities. The grandeur of the splendid monuments awed and fascinated the youthful engineer, while the enchanting beauty of the luminous art enthralled him and stirred a latent aesthetic flair, presaging the mature connoisseurship yet far in the future. After a year in Morocco, a severe attack of amoebic dysentery incapacitated Jack and, sadly, felled Dick. Jack returned home, and agonizing years of recovery ensued, even while necessity dictated that he work despite debilitating pain. He was hired as an engineer on heavy construction jobs in New York City on and off for four years—grueling labor that entailed gaining acceptance in the notoriously rough, tough, close-knit community of hardened iron workers, members of a predominantly Irish union. He was unmercifully, even dangerously, tested—once having a red-hot rivet dropped close to him as he walked a steel beam forty floors above ground! He eventually succeeded in earning respect within the gritty fraternity, and was subsequently promoted to foreman. In this capacity, Jack supervised construction on several Manhattan buildings, prominent among which are 99 Park Avenue and the Marion Davies building at 57th and Park, whose distinctive prefabricated façade was applied in 24 hours as a well-advertised publicity stunt! In 1953 Jack married his sweetheart Elizabeth Asher, and by 1955 the young couple was expecting the first of three children—Mark, Paul, and Eve. Irregular employment in construction would not provide the dependable income required for a growing family. Looking to secure the future, Jack made his first, most risky career switch. Preferring to be his own boss, he morphed into an entrepreneur, founding J. Josephson Incorporated

jack a. josephson: a biographical narrative with $5000 in savings and a Volkswagen Beetle as the sole movable asset, to produce wall covering. He developed an innovative formula for combining polyvinyl chloride sheeting with an adherent substrate, an inexpensive, durable, and attractive product, thus solving a major problem plaguing construction of high-rise buildings—the interior finish. This product attracted a broad spectrum of customers both domestically and abroad, including hotel chains. J. Josephson Incorporated soared, and the rest—of this part of Jack’s tale—is history. He became recognized as a pioneer in the business, once referred to in a trade publication as “the legendary Jack Josephson.” Jack first sold his company in 1970 to the Coronet Carpet Co., which soon became a subsidiary of the RCA Corporation. As part of the deal, he signed a five-year contract with the corporation, winding up with “quite a bit” of RCA stock. At the expiration of this agreement, Jack declined a renewal. The enterprise eventually foundered, and RCA offered to sell him back the company in a deal too good to refuse. Four years later, a Canadian business made a cash offer for the revived company. Not yet done, Jack, together with a partner, designer George Sellers, started a new, rapidly profitable rival company, Sellers and Josephson, which he then also proceeded to sell. Today, J. Josephson Inc. and Sellers and Josephson are linked to their founder solely by name. These years of intensive labor did not prevent Jack from initiating another transformation. Now with the means to satisfy his innate but still unformed taste for art, he began acquiring rare artifacts bequeathed by the vanished civilizations of bygone ages. His first indulgence was the purchase of a Greek skyphos, which caught his eye. He later became strongly attracted to the graceful flourishes and elegant geometry of Islamic art, and adorned his home with a select and wellrounded collection of bronzes, ceramics, brassware, Persian miniatures, and calligraphy. Here fate intervened, rekindling faded memories of his early experience: an Egyptian statue fragment offered for sale triggered a spontaneous aesthetic epiphany. This, Jack recognized, was a profoundly human, expressive form of art that evoked in him an emotional response at a deeply instinctive level of his being. The walls, shelves, and all available surfaces at home were gradually occupied by an expanding collection of ancient Egyptian statuary and reliefs, refined as objects came and went, replaced by ever superior choices as his under-

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standing, discernment, and appreciation developed. The vast majority of his Islamic collection was acquired by Sheikh Nasser Al-Sabbah and is now displayed in the National Museum of Kuwait— whence part of it was looted, transferred to Baghdad during the 1990 Iraqi invasion, fortunately to be repatriated in the aftermath of the Gulf War. Jack’s eventual transition to the study of Egyptology and an exclusive dedication to scholarship were initially prompted by an eminently logical and pragmatic consideration. The antiquities market generally follows one rule: “caveat emptor.” Buyer, beware! Jack soon realized that, in purchasing a coveted object, specialized knowledge alone would provide the confidence necessary to a personal, informed decision in making the investment. This consideration was serious enough to cause him, now in his early forties, to make what was to be another life-changing move: he went back to school to educate himself and acquire the requisite qualified connoisseurship. It is impossible to overestimate the importance of his discriminating talent in collecting, and his genuine passion for his artworks, in leading him to discover his true vocation as a scholar and researcher, and thus undertake, in a dramatic redirection, the shift to his third, and supremely fulfilling, career. Auditing classes in Egyptology conducted by the eminent scholar Bernard V. Bothmer (BVB) at New York University’s Institute of Fine Arts (IFA), Jack immersed himself in ancient Egypt under his mentor’s inspiring tutelage, though his sincere pleasure in his cherished objects eventually ebbed as vocal and contentious controversy over collecting rattled museums and collectors. Jack finally disposed of his collection, once his pride and joy, but at last found his real direction: his true legacy would be his acknowledged scholarship and other worthy contributions to the discipline. BVB, perceiving in his unlikely pupil a distinct aptitude for art history and art-historical analysis, encouraged Jack to attempt serious scholarly research and writing. Modest success with a first published article was followed by an increasingly well-received output over the years appearing in established academic journals and other publications (see Bibliography, p. xv). An initial focus on three-dimensional sculpture of the Late Period—stimulated by BVB’s own interest in that time—established Jack’s rising reputation in Egyptological circles as a sound art

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historian and an authority and specialist in the once-neglected art of that era. Over the years, his relentless curiosity and questing mind have led him to expand and embrace inquiry spanning the full spectrum of Egyptian history, from the earliest evidence of the civilization to the Ptolemies and beyond. His scholarly output—a select and growing body of writing, including collaborations with Mamdouh Eldamaty, Richard Fazzini, Rita Freed, Paul O’Rourke, Peter De Smet, and Günter Dreyer (forthcoming)—constitutes a significant addition to the literature. These include exercises in conventional art history, exemplars of innovative, inclusive thinking and approach, and several distinctly seminal works. The invitation by the former director of the Cairo Museum, Dr. Mohammed Saleh, to compile a Catalogue General of Egyptian Antiquities Nrs 48601-48649, Statues of the XXVth and XXVIth Dynasties with Eldamaty—completed in less than three years— Jack considers a major accolade. Surveying at Mendes in the Delta in 1978 under the direction of the IFA’s BVB and Donald Hansen gave Jack his first taste of “dirt archaeology,” and the first of many opportunities to offer support for the pursuits of his colleagues, in excavation, conservation, and restoration, and for fieldwork and other publications. While nominally a research associate at IFA, Jack is more truly an independent scholar. As such, he participates in academic seminars and symposia and enjoys delivering the odd lecture at prestigious venues, including the American University in Cairo in 2007 as W.K. Simpson Distinguished Visiting Professor. He also dedicates generous time to young aspiring scholars seeking his advice and guidance. Many distinctions have been awarded Jack in recognition of his achievements and service. In July 1990, Jack was designated Chairman of the Cultural Property Advisory Committee at the United States Information Agency (USIA) by President George H.W. Bush. He was reappointed to this post toward the end of the Bush presidency, serving President Bill Clinton until 1995. He traveled to Cambodia, Egypt, Turkey, Greece, and Syria as a forceful advocate for United States policy in the government’s efforts to promote the protection of cultural heritage worldwide, and to implement the 1970 UNESCO convention on the unauthorized movement of cultural property across international boundaries. As Advisory Committee Chairman, together with Dean Banks, he orchestrated the participation of the Univer-

sity of Michigan’s College of Engineering and the Army Corps of Engineers in the assessment of structural damage to Cairo’s Islamic monuments and other buildings following the severe 1992 earthquake. The resulting evaluation also helped to allay fears of another imminent quake. During a visit to Syria, a bold statement about his host country’s poor human rights record, aired live during a TV interview, resulted in an unscheduled “invitation” to meet President Hafez al-Assad at his residence. A police detail, tracking him down in Aleppo, escorted an apprehensive Jack to Damascus. The feared tyrant of Syria proved surprisingly conciliatory, and the meeting, attended by U.S. Ambassador Christopher Ross, was even pleasant. Mr. Assad, noting their striking facial resemblance, mildly observed to Jack that “…we could be brothers.” He promised his bemused guests a surprise. Several weeks later, Syria lifted travel restrictions on the country’s Jewish citizenry, long hostage to the region’s bitter Arab-Israeli conflict. Jack does not claim credit for a policy change evidently already in process, but his outspoken remarks did earn him an unforgettable encounter—and a commendation from U.S. Secretary of State William Baker. On a handsome cut glass obelisk occupying pride of place in his living room an inscription reads “…In Appreciation For Extraordinary Contributions To The American Research Center In Egypt New York April 29 2006.” Jack served as a governor on ARCE’s board and sat on its financial committee for many years. He also long served as a trustee of the Brooklyn Museum, and there headed the Circle of Friends of the Egyptian Department, a position he also held over time at the Institute of Fine Arts. Supporting IFA’s fund-raising efforts, he helped obtain the financing for the Lila Acheson Wallace Chair in Egyptian Art History, established in 1982 and first held by BVB. He is currently chairman of the International Foundation for Art Research, a service organization dedicated to art authentication, the compilation of international art law and catalogues raisonnés databases, and the publication of a major journal. Being named a Corresponding Member of the German Archaeological Institute in 2005 was another highlight in a career of many milestones. In a further fund-raising endeavor, Jack founded the fledgling American Friends of the German Archaeological Institute in 2006. Jack happily shared his treasured objects through loans to museums, and frequently

jack a. josephson: a biographical narrative received visitors and groups from various institutions at home to view his collection. He has endowed museums (the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, the Brooklyn Museum) with gifts and partial gifts of both Islamic and Egyptian art, most notable among which the Middle Kingdom masterpiece, “Head of a Nobleman” (the “Josephson Head”), now housed at the MFA. Many are the friends and colleagues who, whether visiting or enjoying the home hospitality of this convivial oenophile, can look forward to a protracted happy hour stretching well into the night, engaging in lively discussion and a profitable exchange of ideas—or a bit of jovial Egyptological gossip—with liberal libations of Jack’s choice wine or cognac whetting the discourse! An ongoing bimonthly game of poker, reaching back forty years with cast changes over time—his “boys’ night out”—still satisfies Jack’s competitive streak and hones the keen edge of an active intellect, as does a habit of avid reading and crossword puzzle solving. As Jack’s mentor in nuanced appreciation of classical music and its interpreters, his friend and poker pal, the late renowned music critic Harold Schonberg, nurtured an informed taste and profound and enduring enjoyment of classical music and opera. Listening to music is a soothing constant in Jack’s busy daily schedule. Closely contested games of chess, mainly played with Harold, once served as an introduction to celebrated pianist Vladimir Horowitz. By checkmating him at a round of chess, Jack earned the privilege of a private recital, unfortunately curtailed by Wanda, the maestro’s protective wife! A lifelong dedication to health and physical fitness still dictates regular workouts at the gym and strenuous tennis singles in season at his Shelter Island retreat.

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In private life, tragedy struck in 1987, with the loss of Betsy (Elizabeth), his wife of 34 years. A widower for 6 years, in 1993 Jack married Magda Saleh, an Egyptian pursuing a career in dance remarkable for a Middle Eastern woman (Prima Ballerina of Egypt, Dean of the Higher Institute of Ballet and Professor at the Academy of Arts, and Founding Director of the New Cairo Opera House). He thereby acquired an Egyptian family, a second home in Cairo, and a host of new friends who fondly address him as “Abu Khalil.” Among the many special, close relationships Jack has formed in Egypt over ensuing years, perhaps the most meaningful has been the unexpectedly empathetic bond that developed between him and Egypt’s former Deputy Prime Minister and legendary Minister of Culture, Dr. Sarwat Okasha, to whom he was introduced by Magda. On his yearly trips to his adoptive country, he relishes the pervasive, infectious spirit of warm welcome and camaraderie that unfailingly greets him as he visits homes, offices, dig houses, and excavation sites—and there is always the exciting promise of witnessing another discovery, as Egypt yields evermore tantalizing secrets to the devotees of her ancient past. With the publication of this Festschrift in his honor, all Jack’s friends, colleagues, and family will celebrate the inestimable gift bestowed by his peers. As he approaches the ninth decade of his long and richly productive life, his energy continues unflagging, his drive unabated, his appetite for learning unquenched. Jack pursues with delight and diligence his many absorbing interests, and he demonstrates an admirable urge to forge full speed ahead, hoping and expecting to continue his studies, his research and writing, his tennis and travel—all the activities he loves, for many years to come, insh’Allah. The rest of us can only wish to keep up with him on his future journey.

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preface

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BIBLIOGRAPHY OF JACK A. JOSEPHSON Diane Bergman Sackler Library, University of Oxford

“An Altered Royal Head of the Twenty-sixth Dynasty.” Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 74 (1988), pp. 232-235. “A Masterwork of Middle Kingdom Sculpture (Brussels, MRAH E. 6748).” Bulletin des Musées royaux d’art et d’histoire 62 (1991), pp. 5-14, with P. De Smet. “Royal Sculpture of the Later XXVIth Dynasty.” Mitteilungen des Deutschen archäologischen Instituts Kairo 48 (1992), pp. 93-97. “A Variant Type of the Uraeus in the Late Period.” Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt 29 (1992), pp. 123-130. “Bernard V. Bothmer, 1912-1993.” American Journal of Archaeology 98 (1994), pp. 345-346. “A Fragmentary Egyptian Head from Heliopolis.” Metropolitan Museum Journal 30 (1995), pp. 5-15. “A Portrait Head of Psamtik I?” Studies in honor of William Kelly Simpson. Boston: Department of Ancient Egyptian, Nubian, and Near Eastern Art, Museum of Fine Arts, 1996, pp. 429-438. Egyptian royal sculpture of the Late Period 400-246 B.C. (Sonderschrift [Deutsches Archäologisches Institut. Abteilung Kairo] 30). Mainz am Rhein: Verlag Philipp von Zabern, 1997.

World. Cairo: Supreme Council of Antiquities, 2002, pp. 619-627. “La période de transition à Thèbes, 663-648 avant J.-C.” Egypte Afrique et Orient 28 (2003), pp. 39-46. “The Doha Head: A Late Period Egyptian Portrait.” Mitteilungen des Deutschen archäologischen Instituts Kairo 61 (2005), pp. 219-242, with Paul O’Rourke and Richard Fazzini. “An Early Royal Portrait.” Studies in Honor of Mohamed Saleh, Bulletin of the Egyptian Museum 2 (2005), pp. 89-96. “The Use of “Sand-Box” Foundations in Ancient Egypt.” Structure and Significance: Thoughts on Ancient Egyptian Architecture (Untersuchungen der Zweigstelle Kairo des Österreichischen Archäologischen Institutes 25) (Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften Denkschriften der Gesamtakademie 33). Wien: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2005, pp. 401-406. “The Brooklyn Sphinx Head (56.85).” Zeichen aus dem Sand, Streiflichter aus Ägyptens Geschichte zu Ehren von Günter Dreyer. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2008, pp. 295-306, with Rita E. Freed.

“Egyptian Sculpture of the Late Period Revisited.” Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt 34 (1997), pp. 1-20.

“The Portrait of a 12th Dynasty Nobleman.” Servant of Mut: Studies in Honor of Richard A. Fazzini (Probleme der Ägyptologie 28). Leiden: Brill, 2008, pp. 141–148, with Rita E. Freed.

Statues of the XXVth and XXVIth dynasties (Catalogue général des antiquités égyptiennes du Musée du Caire; no. 48601-48649). Cairo: Supreme Council of Antiquities Press, 1999, with Mamdouh Mohamed Eldamaty.

“The Status of the Queen in Dynasty XII.” Bulletin of the Egyptological Seminar of New York 17 (2008) = Studies in Memory of James F. Romano, pp. 135-143, with Rita E. Freed.

“Amasis,” “Archaism,” “Imhotep,” and “Nectanebo.” The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt. New York: Oxford University Press, 2001, pp. 66-67, 109-113, 151-152, and 517-518. “An Enigmatic Egyptian Portrait in the British Museum (EA 37883).” Göttinger Miszellen 184 (2001), pp. 15-25. “Sacred and profane: the two faces of Mentuemhat.” Egyptian Museum Collections Around the

“A Middle Kingdom Masterwork, Boston 2002. 609.” Archaism and Innovation: The Culture of Middle Kingdom Egypt. New Haven and Philadelphia: Yale University and University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, 2009, pp. 1-15, with Rita E. Freed. The Scepter of Egypt: a Background for the Study of the Egyptian Antiquities in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Part III: The Late Period, with Paul Stanwick [unpublished manuscript]

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bibliography of jack a. josephson

preface

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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS AASOR ÄA ÄAT AcOr AEB ÄgLev AH AJA AOAT ÄPN ASAE ÄUAT AV BÄBA BACE BdE BICS BIFAO BiGen BiAe BiOr BMFA BSAE BSFE Bull. Seism. Soc. Am. CAJ CASAE CdE CGC CNWS DE DFIFAO EA EgUit ERA GM GOF HÄB JARCE JBerlMus J Hist Collections JdI JEA JEOL

Annual of the American Schools of Oriental Research (Ann Arbor) Ägyptologische Abhandlungen (Wiesbaden) Ägypten und Altes Testament (Wiesbaden) Acta Orientalia (Lund, Copenhagen) Annual Egyptological Bibliography (Leiden) Ägypten und Levante (Vienna) Aegyptiaca Helvetica (Basel/Genf) American Journal of Archaeology (Boston) Alter Orient und Altes Testament (Münster) Hermann Ranke, Die Ägyptische Personennamen, 3 vols. (Glückstadt, 1935-77) Annales du Service des Antiquités de l’Égypte (Cairo) Agypten und Altes Testaments: Studien zur Geschichte, Kultur und Religion Ägyptens und des Alten Testaments (Wiesbaden) Archäologische Veröffentlichungen, Deutsches Archäologisches Institut, Abteilung Kairo (Berlin) Beitrage zur ägyptischen Bauforschung und Altertumskunde (Cairo) Bulletin of the Australian Centre for Egyptology (North Ryde) Bibliothèque d’Étude (IFAO, Cairo) Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies (London) Bulletin de l’Institut français d’archéologie orientale (Cairo) Bibliothèque générale (IFAO, Cairo) Bibliotheca Aegyptiaca (Brussels) Bibliotheca Orientalis (Leiden) Bulletin of the Museum of Fine Arts (Boston) British School of Archaeology in Egypt (London) Bulletin de la Société française d’Égyptologie, Paris Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America (Stanford) Cambridge Archaeological Journal (Cambridge) Cahiers, Annales du Service des antiquités de l’Égypte (Cairo) Chronique d’Égypt (Brussels) Catalogue général du musée du Caire (Cairo) Centre of Non-Western Studies (Leiden) Discussions in Egyptology (Oxford) Documents de fouille, l’Institut français d’archéologie orientale (Cairo) Egyptian Archaeology (London) Egyptologische Uitgaven (Leiden) Egyptian Research Account (London) Göttinger Miszellen (Göttingen) Göttinger Orientforschungen (Hildesheim) Hildesheimer Ägyptologische Beitrage (Hildesheim) Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt (Boston/New York) Jahrbuch der Berliner Museen (Berlin) Journal of the History of Collections (Oxford) Jahrbuch des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts (Berlin) Journal of Egyptian Archaeology (London) Jaarbericht van het Voorasiatisch-Egyptisch Genootschap (“Ex Oriente Lux” (Leiden)

xviii JMFA LÄ LD MÄS MDAIK MEEF MIEAA MIFAO MJBK MMAF MMJ MonAeg MRE NARCE NGWG OBO OIP OLA OLP OMRO Or OrMonsp PÄ PIREI PM

PMMA PN RAAO RAPH RdE RecTrav RM SAGA SAK SAOC SSEAJ StädelJb

list of abbreviations Journal of the Museum of Fine Arts (Boston) Lexikon der Ägyptologie, ed. Wolfgang Helck, Eberhard Otto, Wolfhart Westendorf, 7 vols. (Wiesbaden, 1972-1992) Denkmäler aus Aegypten und Aethiopien, ed. Karl Richard Lepsius, 12 vols. (Berlin, 1849-1859) Münchner ägyptologische Studien (Munich/Berlin) Mitteilungen des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts, Abteilung Kairo (Berlin/Wiesbaden/Mainz) Memoirs of the Egypt Exploration Fund (London) Monographs of the Institute of Egyptian Art and Archaeology (Memphis) Mémoires publiés par les membres de l’Institut français d’archéologie orientale du Caire (Cairo) Münchner Jahrbuch der Bildenden Kunst (Munich) Mémoires publiés par les membres de la Mission archéologique française du Caire (Cairo) Metropolitan Museum Journal (New York) Monumenta Aegyptiaca (Brussels) Monographies Reine Élisabeth (Brussels) Newsletter of the American Research Center in Egypt (Cairo) Nachrichten von der Königlichen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen (Göttingen) Orbis Biblicus et Orientalis (Freiburg and Göttingen) Oriental Institute Publications (Chicago) Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta (Leuven) Orientalia Lovaniensia Periodica (Leuven) Oudheidkundige Mededelingen uit het Rijksmuseum van Oudheden (Leiden) Orientalia: commentarii trimestres a Facultate Studiorum Orientis Antiqui Pontificii Instituti Biblici in lucem editi. (Rome) Orientalia Monspeliensia (Montpellier) Probleme der Ägyptologie (Leiden) Publications Interuniversitaires de Recherches Égyptologiques Informatisées (CCER, Utrecht) Topographical Bibliography of Ancient Egyptian Hieroglyphic Texts, Reliefs and Paintings, ed. Bertha Porter, Rosalind L.B. Moss, and Jaromír Málek, 8 vols. (Oxford, 1960-2007) Publications of the Metropolitan Museum of Art Egyptian Expedition (New York) Hermann Ranke, Die ägyptischen Personennamen, 3 vols. (Glückstadt, 1935-77) Revue d’assyriologie et d’archéologie orientale (Paris) Recherches d’archéologie, de philologie et d’histoire (Cairo) Revue d’Égyptologie (Paris) Recueil de travaux relatifs à la philologie et à l’archéologie égyptiennes et assyriennes (Paris) Mitteilungen des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts, Römische Abteilung (Rome) Studien zur Archäologie und Geschichte Altägyptens (Heidelberg) Studien zur Altägyptischen Kultur (Hamburg) Studies in Ancient Oriental Civilization (Chicago) Journal of the Society for the Study of Egyptian Antiquities (Toronto) Städel-Jahrbuch (Frankfurt-am-Main)

list of abbreviations TCAM Urk. VA Wb. ZÄS ZDMG ZDPLV

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Travaux du centre d’archéologie méditerranéenne de l’Académie polonaise des sciences (Varsovie) Urkunden des ägyptischen Altertums, ed. Kurte Sethe et al., 8 vols. (Leipzig/ Berlin, 1903-57) Varia Aegyptiaca (San Antonio) Wörterbuch der ägyptischen Sprache, ed. Adolf Erman and Hermann Grapow, 7 vols. (Lepizig/Berlin, 1926-1931) Zeitschrift für Ägyptische Sprache und Altertumskunde (Berlin/Lepizig) Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenlandischen Gesellschaft (Wiesbaden) Zeitschrift des Deutschen Palästina-Vereins (Lepizig/Wiesbaden)

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list of illustrations

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LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Frontispiece Jack A. Josephson and a Middle Kingdom Nobleman—the Josephson Head. Photograph by Chris Churchill. Matthew Douglas Adams and David O’Connor Fig. 1. The Shunet el-Zebib at Abydos. Photo by Matthew Adams for the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, 2007. Fig. 2. Plan of the known royal cultic enclosures of Dynasties 1 and 2 and associated features at Abydos. Fig. 3. Shunet el-Zebib main inner enclosure wall, and lower outer perimeter wall. Photo by Robert Fletcher for the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, 2004. Fig. 4. Two large voids in the southwest wall of the main enclosure. Photo by Matthew Adams for the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, 2004. Fig. 5. The section of the southwest wall of the main enclosure shown in fig. 4. Photo by Matthew Adams for the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, 2007. Fig. 6. The area of the collapsed gateway in southwest wall of the main enclosure. Photo by Robert Fletcher for the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, 2001. Fig. 7. The partially reconstructed gateway in the southwest wall of the main enclosure. Photo by Matthew Adams for the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, 2008. Dieter Arnold Fig. 1. The temple ruin of Behbet el-Hagar (Iseum). Fig. 2. Earthquake damage at the tombs of el-Bersheh. Fig. 3. Fallen brick enclosure wall of the pyramid complex of Senwosret III at Dahshur. Fig. 4. Fallen casing blocks of the mastaba of Nebit at Dahshur. Fig. 5. Remains of damaged coffin of Sitwerut, in original position. Fig. 6. Damaged rear and right side wall of the burial chamber of Amenemhat I at. Lisht.

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Dorothea Arnold Figs. 1-2. Female foreigner with baby, painted wood, National Museums of Scotland, Edinburgh, A. 1911.260 (photographs courtesy Trustees of the National Museums of Scotland). Fig. 3. Female foreigner with baby, National Museums of Scotland, Edinburgh, top of head (photograph courtesy Trustees of the National Museums of Scotland). Figs. 4 – 6. Female foreigner with baby, ivory, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 54.994 (photographs courtesy Museum of Fine Arts). Fig. 7. Female foreigner with baby, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, top of head (photograph courtesy Museum of Fine Arts). Fig. 8. Details from the north (A, B, C, E) and east (D) walls in the tomb of Ukhhotep III at Meir after A.M. Blackman, The Rock Tombs of Meir VI (London, 1953), pls. 10, 18. Fig. 9. Ornamental combs. A: Detail from the north wall of Ukhhotep III’s tomb chamber (archival photograph, The Metropolitan Museum of Art). B: Suggested attachment on the head of the statuette figs. 1-3 (drawing by Scott Murphy). Fig. 10. Third millennium Mesopotamian headdresses after A. Spycket, “La coiffure féminine en mésopotamie des origines à la Ier dynastie de Babylone,” Revue d’Assyriologie et d’Archéologie Orientale 48 (1954), p. 123, fig. 26, Mari (A); p. 126, fig. 45, Kish (B); p. 170, fig. 60, cylinder seal, Chicago (C); p. 174, fig. 76, plaque, Berlin (D).

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Kathryn A. Bard and Rodolfo Fattovich Fig. 1. Steering oar/rudder blade 2, excavated at the entrance to Cave 2, at Mersa/Wadi Gawawis. Studied by C. Zazzaro in 2005-08. Fig. 2. Coiled ropes used as ship rigging, lying on the floor of Cave 5. Fig. 3. Stela 5 inscribed with a text about expeditions to Punt and Bia-Punt during the reign of Amenemhat III. Fig. 4. Inscription on cargo box 2, with the cartouche of Amenemhat IV, describing the box’s contents: “the wonders of Punt.” Edward Bleiberg Fig. 1. Shabti of Amenemhat, Thebes, Egypt, New Kingdom, 18th Dynasty, reign of Thutmose IV—reign of Akhenaten, ca. 1400-1336 BC, limestone, painted, 9 5/8 x 3 1/4 in. (24.5 x 8.2 cm), 50.128, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund. Fig. 2. Shabti of the Scribe Amenemhat, Thebes, Egypt, New Kingdom, 18th Dynasty, reign of Thutmose IV—reign of Akhenaten, ca. 1400-1336 BC, wood, 8 7/16 x 2 1/2 in. (21.5 x 6.3 cm). 50.129, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund. Fig. 3. Shabti box of Amenemhat, Thebes, Egypt, New Kingdom, 18th Dynasty, reign of Thutmose IV—reign of Akhenaten, ca. 1400-1336 BC, wood, 12 1/2 x 4 1/8 x 5 in. (31.7 x 10.5 x 12.7 cm), 50.130a-b, front, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund. Fig. 4. Shabti box of Amenemhat, Thebes, Egypt, New Kingdom, 18th Dynasty, reign of Thutmose IV—reign of Akhenaten, ca. 1400-1336 BC, wood, 12 1/2 x 4 1/8 x 5 in. (31.7 x 10.5 x 12.7 cm), 50.130a-b, back, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund. Fig. 5. Shabti box of Amenemhat, Thebes, Egypt, New Kingdom, 18th Dynasty, reign of Thutmose IV—reign of Akhenaten, ca. 1400-1336 BC, wood, 12 1/2 x 4 1/8 x 5 in. (31.7 x 10.5 x 12.7 cm), 50.130a-b, proper-right side, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund. Fig. 6. Shabti box of Amenemhat, Thebes, Egypt, New Kingdom, 18th Dynasty, reign of Thutmose IV—reign of Akhenaten, ca. 1400-1336 BC, wood, 12 1/2 x 4 1/8 x 5 in. (31.7 x 10.5 x 12.7 cm), 50.130a-b, proper-left side, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund. Andrey Bolshakov Fig. 1. Sarcophagus of Nekhtbastetru, right side. © Hermitage Museum. Fig. 2. Sarcophagus of Nekhtbastetru, left side. © Hermitage Museum. Fig. 3. Sarcophagus of Nekhtbastetru, foot side. © Hermitage Museum. Fig. 4. Sarcophagus of Nekhtbastetru, lid, col.1–2. © Hermitage Museum. Fig. 5. Sarcophagus of Nekhtbastetru, lid, col. 3–4. © Hermitage Museum. Fig. 6. Sarcophagus of Iahmes, foot side, right half. © Hermitage Museum. Fig. 7. Sarcophagus of Iahmes, foot side, left half. © Hermitage Museum. Fig. 8. Sarcophagus of Iahmes, lid, col. 1. © Hermitage Museum. Fig. 9. Sarcophagus of Iahmes, lid, col. 12–13. © Hermitage Museum. Fig. 10. Sarcophagus of Nekhtbastetru, lid, col. 2 (detail). © Hermitage Museum. Fig. 11. Sarcophagus of Nekhtbastetru, left side (detail). © Hermitage Museum. Fig. 12. Sarcophagus of Nekhtbastetru, right side (detail). © Hermitage Museum. Bob Brier Fig. 1. Fig. 2. Fig. 3. Fig. 4. Fig. 5. Fig. 6.

The single ramp theory. Photograph courtesy of Dassault Systèmes. The corkscrew ramp theory. Photograph courtesy of Dassault Systèmes. The internal ramp. Photograph courtesy of Dassault Systèmes. Notches at the corners were left open to help turn the blocks with simple cranes. Photograph courtesy of Dassault Systèmes. Possible remains of a notch visible today. Photograph by Pat Remler. The French team’s microgravemetric image of what appears to be an internal ramp. Photograph courtesy of Fondation EDF.


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Betsy M. Bryan Fig. 1. Second Court of the Mut Temple with statues of Sekhmet and the king on the west and east sides. Fig. 2. Frontal view of the granodiorite royal statue in the Second Court of the Mut Temple. Fig. 3. Proper-left side of royal statue showing ancient repair to arm. Fig. 4. Proper-left side of throne showing erasure of color bars and internal decoration. Fig. 5. Rear of statue showing erasure of inscription. Fig. 6. Neck and shoulder of royal figure showing erased cartouches and necklace area. Fig. 7. Lower half of statue showing carved rectangle beneath kilt. Fig. 8. British Museum EA4 of Amenhotep III showing carved rectangle beneath kilt. Fig. 9. Face of royal figure, Mut Temple Second Court. Fig. 10. Cleveland Museum of Art CMA 52.513 showing convex lid and eyeball carved to create downward stare. Fig. 11. Profile of face of Mut Temple royal statue showing recut eye lid and socket. Fig. 12. Detail of belt area, Mut Temple royal statue. Günter Dreyer Abb. 1a-b. Holzmaske, Boston 60.1181. Face from a composite statue, Egyptian, Early Dynastic Period, Dynasty 1, 2960–2770 B.C. Findspot: Egypt, Probably Abydos. Wood, height x width (max): 16.3 x 9.7 cm (6 7/16 x 3 13/16 in.). Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Gift of J. J. Klejman, 60.1181. Photograph ©2009, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Abb. 2. Holzmaske, Boston 60.1181, Profil (Photograph ©2009, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston). Abb. 3. Holzmaske, Boston 60.1181, Unterseite (Photograph ©2009, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston). Abb. 4. Jahrestäfelchen Abydos K 2554 (Photo F. Barthel). Abb. 5a-b. Holzfragmente, Ashmolean E 1129 + Abydos K 5193 (Photos G. Dreyer). Abb. 6. Würfelstab des Qa’a, Kairo JE 34386 (Photo P. Windszus). Abb. 7. Grab des Dewen, Königskammer und Annex mit Statuenbasis (Photo D. Johannes) . Abb. 8. Rekonstruktion der Statuenkammer (Zeichnung N. Hampikian). Mamdouh Eldamaty Abb. 1. Stele aus Amarna, Berlin Museum ÄMP 17813, Photo Eva-Maria Borgwaldt (Genemigung des Berliner Museums). Abb. 2. Stele aus Amarna, Berlin Museum ÄMP 25574, Photo unbekannt (Genemigung des Berliner Museums). Abb. 3. Echnatonkopf, Kairo Museum JE 98894. Richard Fazzini All photos by M. McKercher for the Brooklyn Museum Mut Expedition. Fig. 1a. Plan of the Mut Temple’s Contra-Temple, including the stonework (“pier”) to its west. Fig. 1b. General view north to the Contra-Temple. Figs. 2a-b. Façade of the Contra-Temple: (a) west and (b) east wings. The re-used block showing statues of female offering bearers is visible at the lower right side of the east wing. Fig. 3a. Reveal of the east wing of the Contra-Temple’s entrance, with the partial cartouche of Nectanebo II at the top of the right-hand column. Fig. 3b. Reveal of the west wing of the Contra-Temple’s entrance. Figs. 4a-b. Room X, south wall (rear of the façade): (a) east and (b) west sides. Fig. 4c. Fragment of a cornice with the remains of a double crown and the title nbt-pt (1MWB.191) that may belong to the inner lintel of this doorway. Fig. 5. Room X, west wall. Fig. 6. Room X, east wall. Fig. 7a. Room X, north wall: west side of the doorway to Room Y. Fig. 7b. Detail of Ptolemy VIII cartouche on the wall of Fig. 7a .

xxiv Fig. 7c. Figs. 8a-b. Figs. 8c-d. Fig. 9. Fig. 10. Fig. 11.

Fig. 12. Figs. 13a-b. Erica Feucht Fig. 1. Fig. 2. Fig. 3. Fig. 4. Fig. 5. Fig. 6. Fig. 7. Fig. 8. Fig. 9.

list of illustrations Room X, north wall: east side of the doorway to Room Y. Room Y, south wall: (a) east and (b) west sides of the doorway to Room X. Room Y, north wall: (c) west and (d) east sides of the doorway to Room Z. Room Y, west wall. Room Y, east wall. Graffiti, numbered from top left. Graffito of Ammonios (a) is on the east wall of Room X. The rest are on the west wall as follows: (b) head; (c) striding man with feathers(?); (d) gazelle with hieroglyphs in front of it; (e) curly-haired, bearded man with staff; (f) graffito of sandals. (Photographs are not to scale.) Re-used block in the topmost preserved course of the south end of the east wall. Two fragments of Hathor frieze (6MWB.96a-b) found in Room Y. Heidelberg Inv. no. 300, frontal view. Heidelberg Inv. no. 300, side view. Heidelberg Inv. no. 300, top view from behind. Munich Inv. no. 500: Amenhotep II. Courtesy Staatliche Sammlung Ägyptische Kunst, München. Cairo JE 43611 Thutmose IV, frontal view. Courtesy Egyptian Museum, Cairo. Cairo JE 43611 Thutmose IV, side view. Courtesy Egyptian Museum, Cairo. Sety I in Abydos, Chapel of Osiris. Copenhagen ÆIN 1483. Dyad of Ramses II and Atum. Basel, private collector. Dyad.

Rita E. Freed Fig. 1. Head of a man, frontal view. Egyptian, New Kingdom, Dynasty 19, 1295-1186 BC, Granodiorite, Height: 16 cm (5 5/16 in.) Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Museum Special Purchase Fund, Photograph ©2009 Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. 1980.29. Fig. 2. Head of a man, three-quarters view. Photograph ©2009 Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. 1980.29. Fig. 3. Head of a man, proper-right view. Photograph ©2009 Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. 1980.29. Fig. 4. Head of man, back view. Photograph ©2009 Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. 1980.29. Fig. 5. Rameses II from Bubastis, Boston, MFA 89.558. Granite, H. 137 cm, w. 72.5 cm (H. 53 15/16 in., w. 28 9/16 in.). Gift of the Egypt Exploration Fund. Photograph ©2009, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Fig. 6. Block statue of Sedjememwaw from Terenuthis, Avignon, Musée Calvet A 35. G.A. Gaballa Fig.1. Stela of Djehutynefer, called Seshu. Museo delle Antichità Egizie di Torino, Inv. Cat. No. 1639. Tom Hardwick Figs. 1-4. Bolton Museum 2004.7, the “Amarna Princess”: frontal, profile, and rear views. Images courtesy Bolton Council. Fig. 5. Bolton Museum 2004.7, the “Amarna Princess”: detail showing carving of streamer (highlighted) on the negative space of the statue. Author’s photograph; drawing by Pablo Perez d’Ors. Figs. 6-8. Figure of a second Amarna princess: front, right profile, and rear views. Author’s photographs. Figs. 9-10. Head of a third Amarna princess: front and right profile views. Author’s photographs. Figs. 11-12. Torso of a third Amarna princess: front and right profile views. Author’s photographs. Fig. 13. Detail of a sketch of the head of an Amarna princess, with added sidelocks. Image courtesy the Metropolitan Police.

list of illustrations Fig. 14. Figs. 15-16. Fig. 17. Fig. 18.

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Detail of a pencil technical sketch of an Amarna royal female torso. Author’s photograph. Bust of Akhenaten. Author’s photographs. Photographs of a stone slab carved with a relief of Akhenaten as a sphinx. Image courtesy the Metropolitan Police. Relief of Sety I. Photograph courtesy Bolton Council.

W. Benson Harer, Jr. Fig. 1. Histology of the papilloma that Dr. A.T. Sandison found on a mummy. Courtesy of Cambridge University Press. Fig. 2. Portrait of a youth with a surgical cut in one eye, AD 190-210, Roman Period, encaustic paint on limewood, H. 13 ¾ x 6 ¾ in. (35 x 17.2 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Rogers Fund, 1909 (09.181.4). Image © The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Melinda Hartwig Fig. 1. Tomb Plan TT 116, Friederike Kampp, Die thebanische Nekropole. Zum Wandel des Grabgedankens von der XVIII. bis zur XX. Dynastie, 2 vols. Theben XIII (Mainz, 1996). Courtesy of Friederike Kampp-Seyfried. Fig. 2. Daughter offering a chalice to tomb owner and wife, near-left wall of the transverse hall, far left, TT 116, PM I2, part I, (1). Fig. 3. Female banqueters behind daughter, near-left wall of the transverse hall, far left, TT 116, PM I2, part I, (1). Fig. 4. Offering bearers in the register below the tomb owner and wife, near-left wall of the transverse hall, far left, TT 116, PM I2, part I, (1). Fig. 5. King seated in a kiosk, fanned by the tomb owner with wife offering a bouquet, Far-right wall of the transverse hall, far right, TT 116, PM I2, part I, (2). Fig. 6. Line drawing, Far-right wall of the transverse hall, far right, TT 116, PM I2, part I, (2). Zahi Hawass Fig. 1. Fig. 2. Fig. 3. Fig. 4. Fig. 5. Fig. 6. Fig. 7. Fig. 8. Fig. 9. Fig. 10. Fig. 11. Fig. 12.

Overview of the site of Tell Basta. The salvage site under cultivation. Graeco-Roman settlement remains on the site. Graeco-Roman lamp. Long-necked glass bottle. Roman coin. View of the head in situ. Close view of the head in situ. Close-up of the wig, diadem, and uraeus. Three-quarter view of the head. Frontal view of the head. View of the face.

Salima Ikram Fig. 1. A painting of Gayer-Anderson by his twin brother, showing him at work with his collection (photograph Francis Dzikowski). Fig. 2. A photograph of the Beit al-Kretliya during Gayer-Anderson’s tenure (photograph Francis Dzikowski). Fig. 3. One of the painted relief fragments before it was released from the wall and put into a new vitrine (photograph Francis Dzikowski). Fig. 4. A limestone fragment from a Memphite tomb that has been embedded into the wall (photograph Francis Dzikowski). Fig. 5. A terracotta figurine of Bes, one of many Bes images that Gayer-Anderson collected and kept (photograph Timothy Loveless). Fig. 6. A terracotta statue of a woman or goddess (photograph Timothy Loveless). Fig. 7. Images of terracotta Harpocrates figurines (photograph Timothy Loveless).

xxvi Fig. 8. Fig. 9. Fig. 10.

list of illustrations A painted cartonnage coffin from Thebes that is coated with black resinous oils (photograph Francis Dzikowski). Gilded protective images of goddesses and amulets from a coffin of the Graeco-Roman Period (photograph Francis Dzikowski). Gayer-Anderson in the guise of the enigmatic Great Sphinx of Giza (photograph Francis Dzikowski).

Peter Jánosi Fig. 1. The offering table of the king’s mother Nefret (MMA 22.1.21)(Photo: Bill Garret). Fig. 2. The offering table of the king’s mother Nefret (MMA 22.1.21) (Drawing: Liza Majerus). Fig. 3. Detail of the offering table (MMA 22.1.21) showing the interior design of the bread loaf (Photo: Bill Garret). Figs. 4a-b. Details of the inscription on the offering table (MMA 22.1.21) (Photo: Bill Garret). Nozomu Kawai Fig. 1. TT 46 and its vicinity (After F. Kampp, Die Thebanische Nekropole, Plan III: Sh. Abd elQurna, Teil II [Upper enclosure]). Fig. 2. The plan of TT46 (Slightly modified from F. Kampp, Die Thebanische Nekropole, Teil I, Fig. 143). Fig. 3. Ramose presenting offerings to Osiris on the right rear wall of the chapel. Photo by Nozomu Kawai. Fig. 4. Relief decoration of Ramose and his inscriptions on the north wall of the western part of the transverse hall. Photo by Nozomu Kawai. Fig. 5. Painting on the north side of the easternmost pillar of the transverse hall. Photo by Nozomu Kawai. Peter Lacovara Fig. 1. The inscribed fragment of a sphinx, 16-3-314, from Barkal Temples, fig. 18. Figs. 2a-b. Leg and paw fragment of sphinx, Egyptian, reign of Amenhotep II, 1427-1400 BC, Findspot: Nubia (Sudan), Gebel Barkal, Debris between 600-1000, Granodiorite, 24.5 x 11.8 x 14.5 cm (9 5/8 x 4 5/8 x 5 11/16 in.), Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Harvard UniversityMFA Expedition, 16-3-314. Photograph ©2009, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Figs. 3a-b. Sculpture fragment, Egyptian, reign of Amenhotep II, 1427-1400 BC, Findspot: Nubia (Sudan), Gebel Barkal, between D500 and curtain wall 1000, Black granodiorite with sparkly inclusions, 13.8 x 17.8 x 9 cm (5 7/16 x 7 x 3 9/16 in.), Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Harvard University-MFA Expedition, 16-4-275b. Photograph ©2009, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Figs. 4a-b. Head fragment of sphinx, Egyptian, reign of Amenhotep II, 1427-1400 BC, Findspot: Nubia (Sudan), Gebel Barkal, D-500 2 and circular wall B1000, Granodiorite, 23.5 x 25 x 16.5 cm (9 ¼ x 9 13/16 x 6 ½ in.), Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Harvard UniversityMFA Expedition, 16-4-275a. Photograph ©2009, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Fig. 5. Reconstructed side view of sphinx and Nubian prisoners (drawing by Nina West). Sarwat Okasha Fig. 1. Transferring the head of Rameses II during the synthesis of the main temple at Abu Simbel. Fig. 2. Dr. Okasha (at left) with Mrs. Kennedy during the opening of the exhibition in Washington in 1961. Fig. 3. Dr. Okasha, President Nasser, and UNESCO head Vittorino Veronese. Fig. 4. Synthesis of the main temple of Abu Simbel in the new site. Fig. 5. The temple of Nefertari at Abu Simbel: salvage of the temple, re-erection of the façade on the new site, Oct. 1966. SCA Archives. Fig. 6. Dr. Okasha with President De Gaulle in Paris, 1967.

list of illustrations Fig. 7. Fig. 8.

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Dr. Okasha congratulating Mr. René Maheu upon the inauguration of the new temple site on September 22, 1968. General view of the temples of Philae with the machinery used to construct the cofferdam, Dec. 1972. SCA Archives.

William H. Peck Fig. 1. Plan of the Temple of the Goddess Mut by the Brooklyn Museum Expedition Fig. 2. Mut Precinct as recorded by the eighteenth century French expedition. From Description de l’Égypte, vol. III, pl. 16. Fig. 3. Lepsius’s plan of the Temple Complex. From LD, Abth. I, Bl. 74. Fig. 4. Plan of the Temple Complex by Auguste Mariette. From Karnak, as reprinted in M. Benson, J. Gourlay, and P. Newberry, Temple of Mut in Asher (London, 1899). Fig. 5. The Mut Temple Complex as recorded by E.F. Benson. From The Temple of Mut in Asher, opposite p. 36. Fig. 6. The Entrance Colonnade. Brooklyn Museum Expedition. Fig. 7. The First Pylon and First Court. Brooklyn Museum Expedition. Fig. 8. The South Wall of the First Court. Brooklyn Museum Expedition. Fig. 9. The Second Court. Brooklyn Museum Expedition. Fig. 10. The Body of the Temple. Brooklyn Museum Expedition. Fig. 11. The Contra-Temple. Brooklyn Museum Expedition. Elena Pischikova Fig. 1. First Pillared Hall in the process of excavation in 2007. Fig. 2. North Section of East Wall. Figs. 3-4. Dogs under the chair of Karakhamun. First Pillared Hall, East Wall. North and South sections. Donald B. Redford Fig. 1. Plan of the temple of Ba-neb-djed, oriented (local) north. Fig. 2. Section through the western massif of the Second Pylon. The prominent sand stratum marks the bottom of the foundation trench. The scattered bricks (58) represent the demolition of a structure (MK?), while the surface below loci 63, 64, 84, 85 and 88 is the bottom of the Thutmoside pit. The limestone blocks at the bottom of the control trench belong to the partly preserved burial installation immediately east of the sloping corridor of Pepyyema. Fig. 3. Thutmose III bricks spanning the bottom of the foundation trench of the Second Pylon (facing south). Fig. 4. The westernmost line of bricks, showing the pattern of stacking. Fig. 5. Brick stamped with the cartouche of Thutmose III.

Gerry D. Scott, III Fig. 1. Relief depiction of Mentuemhat, San Antonio 91.129.1. Courtesy of the San Antonio Museum of Art. Fig. 2. Relief depicting an attendant, San Antonio 2005.1.35. Courtesy of the San Antonio Museum of Art. Figs. 3-6. Sculpture fragment depicting an official under the protection of a bovine deity, San Antonio 91.80.122. Courtesy of the San Antonio Museum of Art. Figs. 7-9. Sculpture fragment depicting General Ahmose, 91.129.2. Courtesy of the San Antonio Museum of Art.

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Hourig Sourouzian Fig. 1. Preliminary reconstruction of the temple precinct by Nairy Hampikian. Fig. 2. View of conservation works in the Peristyle Court. Courtesy of Memnon/Amenhotep III Project. Fig. 3. Jack Josephson and Magda Saleh visiting the work. Courtesy of Memnon/Amenhotep III Project. Fig. 4. Heaving a royal torso to be joined to the legs. Courtesy of Memnon/Amenhotep III Project. Fig. 5. The royal torso in quartzite placed in the West Portico. Courtesy of Memnon/Amenhotep III Project. Fig. 6. The quartzite colossus of Amenhotep III raised in spring 2008, with the replica of the head EA6 from the British Museum. Courtesy of Memnon/Amenhotep III Project. Fig. 7. A red granite royal torso in reassembly. Courtesy of Memnon/Amenhotep III Project. Fig. 8. Three statues of the mighty goddess Sekhmet, before conservation. Courtesy of Memnon/ Amenhotep III Project. Fig. 9. Three statues of the mighty goddess Sekhmet during conservation. Courtesy of Memnon/ Amenhotep III Project. Rainer Stadelmann Fig. 1. Giza East Cemetery, G 7000. Photo: M. Haase. Fig. 2. Giza East Cemetery. Queens’ Pyramids and Mastabas. Fig. 3. Giza East Cemetery. First row. Mastabas of Kawab and Khaefkhufu. From W. K. Simpson, The Mastabas of Kawab, Khaefkhufu I and II, fig. 3. Fig. 4. Giza East Cemetery. The Mastaba of Kawab. Isometric drawing by T. Kendall. From W. K. Simpson, The Mastabas of Kawab, Khaefkhufu I and II, fig. 4. Paul Edmund Stanwick Figs. 1-2. The Brooklyn Black Head. Brooklyn Museum 58.30, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund (photos: Brooklyn Museum). Figs. 3-4. Marble head attributed to a late Ptolemy. Alexandria, Graeco-Roman Museum 24660 (photos: Deutsches Archäologisches Institut, Cairo). Fig. 5. Back pillar of the Brooklyn Black Head. Brooklyn Museum 58.30, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund (photo: Brooklyn Museum). Fig. 6. Male head. Brooklyn Museum 55.120, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund (photo: Brooklyn Museum). Figs. 7-8. Male head. Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek ÆIN 944 (photos: Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek). Emily Teeter Fig. 1. OIM 13952, front view. Fig. 2. OIM 13952, right side. Fig. 3. OIM 13952, left side. Nancy Thomas Figs. 1-4. View of royal head, possibly King Nectanebo I (LACMA 49.23.7), prior to rerestoration, photographed about 1965. Photograph ©2007 Museum Associates/LACMA. Fig. 5. LACMA Conservation Center photograph 87.546 of 49.23.7, showing disfiguring cavity cut for eighteenth- or nineteenth-century restoration. Photographed on 17 July 1987. Photograph ©2007 Museum Associates/LACMA. Fig. 6. LACMA Conservation Center photograph 81.398s, following completion of rerestoration, photographed March 1988. Photograph ©2007 Museum Associates/LACMA.


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Jacobus van Dijk Fig. 1a. Cat statue from the Mut Precinct, Karnak. Photograph: Mary McKercher. Fig. 1b. Inscription on top of base. Photograph: author. Fig. 2a. Cat statue from the Mut Precinct, front. 2b. Cat statue from the Mut Precinct, left side. Photographs: Mary McKercher. Fig. 3a. Cat statue from the Mut Precinct, back. 3b. Cat statue from the Mut Precinct, right side. Photographs: Mary McKercher. Fig. 4a. Cat statue from the Mut Precinct, Karnak. Diagram showing position of texts. 4b. Inscription on top of base. Fig. 5. Cat statue from the Mut Precinct. Inscriptions around base. Fig. 6. Cat statue in Luxor Temple blockyard. Photographs: author. Fig. 7. Nurse statue Cairo JE 91301. From E.A. Hastings, The Sculpture from the Sacred Animal Necropolis at North Saqqâra 1964–76 (London, 1997), Pls. X (detail) and XI (left). Fig. 8a. Nurse statue Cairo JE 91301. Diagram showing position of texts. 8b. Hand copies of inscriptions on base. Fig. 9. Standard-bearing statue Cairo CG 42194. From Le règne du Soleil: Akhnaton et Nefertiti (Brussels, 1975), 140–141. Kent R. Weeks Fig. 1. The Book of the Earth, part A, scene 6, on the right wall, upper level, burial chamber “J” in the tomb of Rameses V/VI in the Valley of the Kings; photographed by Francis Dzikowski in 1999 for the Theban Mapping Project. ©1999 TMP. Fig. 2. The same scene, a painting by Henri-Joseph Redouté for the Description de l’Egypte (1812), 2: 86.6. Christiane Ziegler Fig. 1. Saqqara, Tomb of Iahmes. Plan of tomb. Fig. 2. Lekythos. Fig. 3. Amulets. Fig. 4. Openwork wedjat eye. Fig. 5. General view of the chamber. Fig. 6. Coffin of Iahmes. Fig. 7. Statuette of Ptah-Sokar-Osiris belonging to Iahmes. Fig. 8. Chest of Iahmes. Alain Zivie Fig. 1. Plan of the tomb (Bubasteion I.1) of ‘Aper-El, by Marie-Geneviève Froidevaux (CNRS, MAFB). © Hypogées. Fig. 2. Perspective showing the four levels of the tomb (Bubasteion I.1) of ‘Aper-El. Axonometric drawing by Marie-Geneviève Froidevaux (CNRS, MAFB). © Hypogées. Fig. 3. General view of the case devoted to ‘Aper-El’s treasure in the Imhotep Museum, Saqqara. Picture A. Zivie © Hypogées.

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contents

the shunet el-zebib at abydos

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THE SHUNET ELZEBIB AT ABYDOS: ARCHITECTURAL CONSERVATION AT ONE OF EGYPT’S OLDEST PRESERVED ROYAL MONUMENTS Matthew Douglas Adams and David O’Connor Institute of Fine Arts, New York University

This contribution is dedicated to Jack Josephson, long-time friend of the Institute of Fine Arts, with fond memories of his visit to our work at the Shunet el-Zebib in 2007. The monument at Abydos known today as the Shunet el-Zebib (or the “Shuneh,” for short) was built as the funerary cult enclosure of King Khasekhemwy at the end of the 2nd Dynasty (ca. 2700 BC). It represents both the fullest expression and the only still-standing representative of Egypt’s earliest tradition of royal monumental

funerary building.1 Since its construction, it has dominated the landscape of north Abydos and has shaped the patterns of activity that define the long history of the site, down to the present day (fig. 1). The enclosure is the focus of a large-scale program, directed by the authors and sponsored by the Institute of Fine Arts,2 of architectural conservation and archaeological investigation, aimed at preserving this uniquely significant ancient royal monument, and at defining fully both its original function and changing use over time.

Fig. 1. The Shunet el-Zebib at Abydos, built to serve as the monumental funerary cult enclosure of king Khasekhemwy of Dynasty 2. Photo by Matthew Adams for the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, 2007. 1 A smaller structure built by Khasekhemwy at Hierakonpolis, while cultic in function, is not associated with a royal tomb and does not appear to be part of a broader tradition of royal construction at that site. 2 As part of the University of Pennsylvania MuseumYale University-Institute of Fine Arts, New York University

Expedition to Abydos, William Kelly Simpson and David O’Connor, Co-directors. The work at the Shuneh to date has been carried out with the generous support of the Egyptian Antiquities Project of the American Research Center in Egypt, with funds provided by the United States Agency for International Development.

matthew douglas adams and david o’connor

2

Aha

Djet ?

Djer

Meret-Neith

Peribsen "Western Mastaba"

Boat Graves

local N

N

Khasekhemwy "Shunet el-Zebib" 0

25

50m

Fig. 2. Plan of the known royal cultic enclosures of Dynasties 1 and 2 and associated features at Abydos.

Khasekhemwy’s enclosure was the largest, the most elaborate, and the last example of a long tradition of similar royal constructions in north Abydos (fig. 2), a tradition integrally related to the royal cemetery of the 1st and 2nd Dynasties some 1.5 km to the south, at a part of Abydos known today as Umm el-Qa’ab. All the rulers of the 1st Dynasty and the last two of the 2nd were buried there in underground tombs. The tombs themselves consisted primarily of mud-brick substructures. In most cases, the evidence for any above-ground components of the tombs is

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G. Dreyer et al., “Umm el-Qaab: Nachuntersuchungen im frühzeitlichen Königsfriedhof 16./17./18. Vorbericht,” MDAIK 62 (2006), 67-129.

equivocal, although it is likely that they were marked by some kind of visible tumulus, as has been suggested by Günter Dreyer for the tomb of Khasekhemwy.3 For each of these tombs, there appears to have been an associated monumental brick enclosure built much closer to the alluvial plain, on the low-desert terrace in north Abydos overlooking the site of the ancient town. Given the remoteness of the royal tombs and the likely modest character of any surface features associated with them, the enclosure built in north Abydos appears to have served as the primary


3

Fig. 3. Khasekhemwy’s monument consisted of a main inner enclosure wall, which still stands in most places to near its original height, and a lower outer perimeter wall, now much more denuded, visible at lower left. The original niched and plastered exterior façade is preserved along the lower part of the main enclosure wall, visible in the excavated corridor between the two walls. Photo by Robert Fletcher for the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, 2004.

monumental statement of royal presence and power for each king at the site. Although none of the earlier royal enclosures is still standing, excavation of their denuded remains has revealed that each followed a similar template. A large rectangular interior space was defined by a single massive mud-brick enclosure wall. Longer in the north-south axis than on the east-west, each enclosure was built such that the long axis was oriented to local, or river, north. The exterior of each enclosure possessed a repeated series of alternating niches and pilasters, a pattern frequently characterized as a niched or “palace” façade. Special attention was focused on the northeast, or local east, wall, where simple niches alternated with deeper and wider “complex” ones. The interior of each enclosure consisted largely of open space with the exception of a small mud-brick chapel, which was usually constructed in the southeastern part. Access to the interior was through gateways at the north and east corners. Although in many respects Khasekhemwy’s monument conformed to the general pattern seen in the preceding enclosures, in significant ways it was unique. Unlike any of the earlier examples,

that of Khasekhemwy actually consists of two concentric rectangular mud-brick enclosures: a massive inner, or main, wall, and a now much more denuded outer, or perimeter, wall (fig. 3). The walls of the main enclosure are 5 meters thick and still stand to near their original height of 11-12 meters. They were substantially thicker and presumably taller than those of the earlier enclosures. The perimeter wall was around 3.5 meters thick and probably 7-8 meters high. With overall dimensions of 137 x 77 meters, the entire complex covers an area of more than 10,500 square meters and was the largest in extent of the Early Dynastic royal monuments at Abydos. The interior space defined by the main enclosure is more than 6250 square meters in area. Like its predecessors, the exterior of the Shuneh’s main enclosure wall was characterized by the niched, or “palace,” façade, with alternating simple and more elaborate niches on the northeast side. The façade of the lower perimeter wall was plain and would have rendered only the upper third of the more elaborate façade of the main enclosure visible from a distance. The Shuneh, like the earlier enclosures, had elaborate gateways at the north and east cor-

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ners, but it also had additional simpler entrances in the southwest and southeast walls. Like its antecedents, the Shuneh also had an interior chapel, although this is larger and more elaborate than any of the known earlier examples. Architecturally, the enclosure of Khasekhemwy also relates closely to later royal monuments, particularly those of the 3rd Dynasty, and thus is part of the development of the royal pyramid complex. Khasekhemwy’s successor, Netjerikhet Djoser, built his own funerary complex at Saqqara, near the ancient capital of Memphis. This king’s tomb, covered by Egypt’s first pyramid, was situated within a huge rectangular enclosure; although built in stone on a much larger scale and incorporating many important innovations, this enclosure clearly draws inspiration from the Shuneh and the other Abydos enclosures for many of its basic design elements, including its overall proportions, niched or “palace” façade, the location and design of its entrance, and the location of some of its interior cultic features. After standing nearly 5,000 years exposed to the elements and suffering extensive damage from human, animal, and insect activity, by the end of the last century Khasekhemwy’s great Abydos enclosure could be seen to be in a precarious state. Large sections of the main enclosure wall had collapsed, and deep structural cracks had developed in many areas, threatening further losses. Parts of the walls were heavily undermined by animal burrows, large voids existed in the masonry in many areas, and losses to the lower parts of walls had resulted in dangerous and unstable overhangs. Representing both the fullest achievement and only surviving example of Egypt’s earliest tradition of royal monumental funerary building, and standing as it does at the transition to the succeeding development of the royal pyramid complex, the Abydos enclosure of Khasekhemwy holds a unique position in Egypt’s architectural and archaeological heritage. Consequently, beginning in 1999 a major initiative was undertaken to document systematically the standing architecture of the monument, to analyze its condition, and to develop and implement conservation solutions to the many problems that were already obvious, and others that might be identified. Essential to the project has been a team of architectural conservation consultants, initially assembled by preservation architect William Remsen, and including mud-brick conservation specialist Anthony Crosby and structural engineer

Conor Power. These experts undertook an architectural and condition survey of the standing walls, identifying the methods of original construction, important details of the original design of the complex, areas of both large- and smallerscale structural instability and other problematic conditions, and defining the processes that had resulted in the precarious state of the monument. Before any conservation work was done, the existing condition of the walls was fully documented by a systematic photogrammetric survey, led by preservation architect Robert Letellier. The architectural survey and condition assessment determined that most of the condition problems affecting the monument were structural in nature: large sections of the walls were in danger of catastrophic collapse, and many smaller areas were subject to smaller-scale, more localized processes of collapse that, over time, would gradually worsen until they affected major parts of the walls. In most instances, structural instability was primarily the result of missing masonry. The factors identified as contributing to the decay and damage were numerous and were both intrinsic and extrinsic. Intrinsic factors related to the original design and method of construction. One involved the four original gateways. The openings of the gateways were almost certainly spanned with wooden beams or poles; such poles were represented in stone in the entryway to the Step Pyramid complex of Djoser. At the Shuneh, once the wood decayed, was weakened by insects, or was robbed out, the brickwork above would have begun to collapse. After a localized collapse started, a second intrinsic factor would have contributed to further losses. This was due to the basic method of the construction of the walls. Although the original faces of the walls were constructed of alternating well-bonded brickwork courses of headers and stretchers, this facing in reality formed only a thin veneer over wall cores that were constructed in stacked header courses. Masonry constructed in this way is not internally well bonded, although the massive wall cores of the Shuneh were relatively stable, unless affected by other factors. Extrinsic factors affecting the condition of the walls of the Shuneh include human, animal, and insect activity, as well as environmental forces. Human agency is seen primarily in two types of damage. One relates to the occupation of the monument in late antiquity, when the enclosure was occupied by an early Christian monastic com-

the shunet el-zebib at abydos munity. At that time, large cavities were excavated into the cores of the walls to create living spaces. The original wall fabric above and adjacent to these rooms (or cells) has in most instances long since collapsed, resulting in very large areas of missing masonry, causing major areas of structural weakness. Losses of original masonry around the original gateways were greatly exacerbated by the creation, and subsequent collapse, of cells excavated into the immediately adjacent parts of the walls. Human agency is also represented in damage caused by large-scale and largely undocumented excavations in the mid-nineteenth century conducted by Auguste Mariette. His failed search for some underground component at the monument left much of the base of the interior side of the northeast wall of the main enclosure extensively undermined and structurally weakened. The undermined area invited the attention of burrowing animals, presumably the jackals and foxes still sometimes seen in the area today. Their extensive tunneling further weakened the wall, threatening much of it with catastrophic collapse. A process that has resulted in some of the most extensive damage to the monument is nest building by the Oriental hornet (Vespa orientalis). These hornets excavate large and distinctive disk-shaped holes in the mud-brick masonry in which they build substantial, sometimes multilevel, paper nests. In some cases, these nest holes are as much as 1.5 meters deep. Virtually all of the hundreds of medium-sized and small holes in the walls were initially created by these insects. Once such holes exist in the walls, they serve as localized points of structural weakness and localized collapse, which gradually enlarge over time. Wind and water erosion have also taken their toll, particularly on delicate original plaster finishes, and frequently accelerate decay in areas of the walls compromised by other factors. Photographs from Egypt Exploration Fund excavations early in the twentieth century show extensive areas of well-preserved plaster finish on the exterior façade of the northeast wall of the main enclosure. In the century since, virtually all of the plaster left exposed has been lost. Additionally, cavities in the walls resulting from monastic cells, animal burrows, or hornets create wind eddies, which serve to expand existing voids and further weaken adjacent masonry. Once any part of a wall core was compromised, for example through the loss of the wooden lintels

5

over the gateways, the excavation of a monastic cell cavity or hornet nest hole, or undermining by animal tunnels or old excavations, the result would inevitably be a cascading and ever-expanding series of localized or large-scale collapses. In areas where large losses have occurred in the past, the lack of strong internal bonding in the wall core has resulted in the development of deep structural cracks, which create further structural weaknesses and threaten adjacent sections of masonry with collapse. Given that most of the condition problems affecting the Shuneh are structural in nature, the fundamental solution is to re-establish structural stability where it is currently lacking. The question then becomes what is the most appropriate means of achieving this goal, and considerable attention has been given to defining the conservation philosophy that guides the work at the Shuneh. Essentially, the intent of the conservation program is to repair the condition problems while maintaining the present character of the monument, the result of its nearly 5,000 years of existence. The conservation work does not aim to recreate the original appearance of the monument, even where evidence regarding that appearance is preserved in the standing remains or has been revealed by excavation. The primary method adopted for the conservation of the Shuneh is to use new mud bricks of the same size and general character as the originals to replace missing sections of masonry, and thereby to re-establish structural stability in unstable areas. The new masonry provides structural support to the preserved original fabric of the walls and impedes further collapse and deterioration, but it is textured so as to reflect the existing eroded character of the original walls. This basic approach is illustrated by the solution used in dealing with one of the most serious types of condition problems, that presented by large voids in the walls left by the creation and subsequent collapse of the late antique monastic cells (fig. 4). Each cell is completely excavated and documented in detail prior to conservation. All preserved original surfaces and other significant features of each cell are protected by a separation layer of fine, sieved, compacted sand. New masonry is then used to fill the void. This new work maintains and is keyed into the coursing of the surrounding original wall fabric. The visible outer face of the new masonry is textured so as to reflect the eroded surfaces of the original wall,

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Fig. 4. These two large voids in the southwest wall of the main enclosure were the result of the excavation and subsequent collapse of living spaces in the wall in late antiquity. Photo by Matthew Adams for the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, 2004.

and the in-fill is slightly concave and is set back slightly from the existing wall face. The purpose of the set back and concavity is both to allow the new masonry to be distinguished from the old, and to provide a visual marker for the presence of the cell, since the cells represent an important phase in the history of the monument (fig. 5). To date, six cell voids in the exterior side of the southwest wall of the main enclosure have been stabilized, as well as one in the interior side of its northeast wall. Undermined wall bases, gaps in the standing walls, and the many hundreds of hornet-nest holes have been similarly repaired, with the difference that the new masonry in-fills are not concave, as they do not represent significant cultural features. A somewhat different approach has been taken in the stabilization of the walls around the collapsed original gateway in the southwest wall of the main enclosure (fig. 6). Here unstable columns of masonry on both sides of the gateway, 4 Slightly more than one meter, as in this period one cubit equals 52.5 cm.

separated from the main wall mass by deep structural cracks, threatened to collapse and required structural support. This could only be achieved by spanning the gateway opening, such that the supporting new masonry could reach high enough to support fully the unstable vertical wall ends. The need to span the gateway opening presented a significant philosophical challenge, namely how to achieve this without obscuring the presence of a defining feature of the original design of the monument (the gateway), while remaining in keeping with the overall conservation approach of addressing condition problems in a way that is sensitive to the existing state of the monument. The solution adopted was a partial reconstruction of the gateway (fig. 7). Drawing on both architectural parallels and the iconography of the Early Dynastic Period, the proportions of the original gateway opening were estimated at 1:3, i.e., two Egyptian cubits4 wide (the width attested archaeologically) to six cubits high. Although the gateway was almost certainly roofed with wooden


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Fig. 5. The section of the southwest wall of the main enclosure shown in fig. 4, after stabilization. A number of smaller holes have also been stabilized. Photo by Matthew Adams for the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, 2007.

Fig. 6. The area of the collapsed gateway in southwest wall of the main enclosure. The vertical wall ends adjacent to the gateway were highly unstable and were separated from the main wall mass by deep vertical cracks. Photo by Robert Fletcher for the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, 2001.

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Fig. 7. The partially reconstructed gateway in the southwest wall of the main enclosure. As shown here, the stabilization of the gateway area is incomplete; additional masonry will be added to the upper part of the wall that will fully stabilize the adjacent wall ends. Photo by Matthew Adams for the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, 2008.

elements originally, wood was not used in the reconstruction. Because wood is prone to insect attack or vandalism, reinforced concrete lintels were employed. The concrete was tinted to blend visually with the surrounding brickwork, and the lintels were shaped to evoke the original wooden elements. The architectural features that defined the gateway opening itself were reconstructed; with distance from the gateway, however, the degree of reconstruction decreases and the remainder of the new masonry is textured to reflect and blend smoothly into the surrounding eroded wall surfaces. Work at the gateway is presently only partly completed, and additional masonry will be added to the upper part of the wall, such that the distinct

notch seen in fig. 7 will not be present. Because similar problematic conditions exist around the other gateways, a similar approach will also be followed in those areas. At this writing, approximately half the conservation work needed at the Shunet el-Zebib has been completed. Nearly 250,000 new bricks have been manufactured and used in the stabilization of the walls, and overall the condition of the monument is significantly improved. Nevertheless, much remains to be done and is planned for the near future, such that Khasekhemwy’s great monument can remain a sentinel in the landscape of the site, a reminder of Abydos’s singular significance to Egypt’s early kings.

earthquakes in egypt in the pharaonic period

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EARTHQUAKES IN EGYPT IN THE PHARAONIC PERIOD: THE EVIDENCE AT DAHSHUR IN THE LATE MIDDLE KINGDOM1 Dieter Arnold Metropolitan Museum of Art

Mediterranean archaeology is increasingly concerned with the impact of earthquakes on ancient monuments and cultures, as demonstrated, for example, by a conference on Archaeoseismology in 1995 in Athens.2 The fact that ancient Egypt was not represented indicates that Egyptologists have rarely observed or studied seismic events in ancient times. Egypt, however, located at the boundary of the African and the Arabian plates, is an earthquake-prone land. An earthquake of 1992, during which about 500 people died, is still vividly remembered.3 Though ancient Egyptians mentioned earthquakes (nwr-tA), it is not as historic and real events but in a general, symbolic way. Several sites and monuments attest that disastrous seismic events occurred in pharaonic times,4 though, without careful archaeological observations, it is often difficult to distinguish between earthquake damage and wreckage induced by other causes, such as sagging of buildings or human quarrying activities. It is even more problematic to determine the date of a seismic incident. Numerous severe earthquakes in Egypt are recorded from the Roman Period through the Middle Ages and in modern times.5 For example, a strong earthquake in the year 27 BC caused heavy damage in the Theban area, destroying, among other monuments, the upper part of the northern

Memnon statue.6 Around that time the same or another earthquake destroyed the Iseum (Behbet el-Hagar). The damage was recorded later by the European traveler Paul Lucas (1664-1737).7 The huge pile of fallen blocks does not show heaps of debris or other traces of quarrying activity, but the temple seems to have collapsed on itself, a typical earthquake scenario (fig. 1). The same event might also have brought down the huge Delta temple of Bubastis (Tell Basta).8 In a very few cases, an approximate date for an earthquake in pharaonic times can be established. For example, the huge funerary temple of Amenhotep III on the Theban west bank was apparently toppled by a powerful earthquake in the early part of the reign of Merenptah (1213-1203 BC), most likely around 1210 BC.9 One suspects that the nearby Ramesseum was also heavily damaged by the same seismic event, because this building was soon afterward used as a quarry to supply stones for the mortuary temples of succeeding kings.10 The same earthquake perhaps also triggered a rock fall that damaged the temple of Mentuhotep at Deir el-Bahri (and thereby instigating the repair work of Siptah).11 This temple and the nearby temple of Thutmose III were apparently finally destroyed by another rock fall in later Ramesside times.12 Was this also the earthquake of 1210 BC that brought down the upper half of one of the

1 This article is dedicated to Jack A. Josephson, a friend of long standing, whose broad interest in ancient Egypt also includes the archaeology of the Dahshur monuments. 2 S. Stiros and R.E. Jones, eds., Archaeoseismology, British School at Athens, Fitch Laboratory Occasional Paper 7 (Athens, 1996). 3 For recent damage at Saqqara, see E.D. Johnson, “The Need of Seismic Analysis and Planning as Part of Ongoing Archaeological Site Management and Conservation: A Case Study of the Necropolis of Saqqara,” JARCE 36 (1999), 135147. 4 R. M. Kebeasy, “Seismicity,” in The Geology of Egypt, ed. R. Said (Rotterdam, 1990), 51-52, C. Traunecker, “Les restaurations et les reprises antiques,” in Les Dossiers d’Archéologie 265 (2001), 70-71. 5 J.P. Poirier and M.A. Taher, “Historical Seismicity in the Near and Middle East, North Africa and Spain from

Arabic Documents (7th-8th centuries)” Bull. Seism. Soc. Am. 70, 218-220. 6 A. Bataille, “Thèbes gréco-romaine,” CdE 26 (1951), 348. 7 C. Favard-Meeks, Le temple de Behbeit el-Hagar (Hamburg, 1991), 311. 8 I thank Daniela Rosenow for this communication. 9 G. Haeny, Untersuchungen im Totentempel Amenophis’ III., BÄBA 11 (Wiesbaden, 1981), 17-18. 10 Since several older temples of the 11th, 18th, and early 19th Dynasties served as quarries for buildings of Rameses III and IV, one wonders whether these monuments had all been ruined by the earthquake of 1210 BC. 11 D. Arnold, Der Tempel des Königs Mentuhotep von Deir el-Bahari (Mainz, 1974), 69. 12 J. Lipinska, “Sanctuaries Built by Tuthmosis III,” JEA 53 (1967), 29.

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Fig. 1. The temple ruin of Behbet el-Hagar (Iseum).

seated colossi of Rameses II from the façade of his rock temple at Abu Simbel?13 An earlier earthquake during the 11th Dynasty seems to have destroyed the pre-11th Dynasty temple on the Thoth Hill of western Thebes, bringing about a reconstruction under Mentuhotep Seankhkare.14 One might assume that this earthquake occurred in the early years of that king (about 1995 BC). Other seismic events cannot yet be accurately dated. For example, severe earthquake damage was observed at the early 4th Dynasty mastaba of Nefermaat at Meidum.15 The collapse of the pyramid temple of Sahure at Abusir was probably also a result of such an event: the monolithic granite columns and architraves were not smashed by stone robbers but fell in one piece, tumbling over each other,16 suggesting that they

were knocked down by a heavy earthquake. Borchardt observed that Greek visitors’ inscriptions had been scratched onto the monument while it was still standing, which would date the collapse to an unknown later period. In Middle Egypt, the 12th Dynasty rock tombs of el-Bersheh17 were crushed most probably in pharaonic times by a powerful earthquake that buried the tombs under enormous masses of collapsed rock (fig. 2). The Fraser tombs at Tehneh, not far away, northeast of Miniya, were so heavily shaken that whole walls were displaced, perhaps by the same seismic event.18 Collapsed ceilings of rock tombs can further be observed in many places in Egypt, such as in the Faiyum19 and at Lisht-South, although not all tombs were necessarily ruined by earthquakes, but by ancient quarrying activity.

13 L.-A. Christophe, Abou Simbel et l’epopée de sa découverte (Brussels, 1965), 206-207; K. A. Kitchen, The Life and Times of Ramesses II (Warminster, 1982), 135-136. O. Goelet, “The Blessing of Ptah,” in Fragments of a Shattered Visage, ed. E. Bleiberg and R. Freed, MIEAA I (Memphis, 1991), 70-71. 14 G. Vörös and R. Pudleiner, “Preliminary Report of the Excavations at Thoth Hill, Thebes,” MDAIK 54 (1998), 338. 15 Y. Harpur, The Tombs of Nefermaat and Rahotep at Maidum (Oxford 2001), 42, 240, 283 n. 28, 309, figs. 17677, 179. 16 L. Borchardt, Das Grabdenkmal des Königs Sahu-Re,

vol. 1, Der Bau (Leipzig, 1910), 105-106, figs. 42-43. Borchardt’s assumption that the fall was caused by stone robbers who started pulling out columns from the east portico is not convincing, because such a procedure would not have affected the other columns. 17 P. Newberry, El Bersheh (London, 1892, 1894), e.g., vol. 1, pp. 2, 9-10; vol. 2, pp. 17, 30, 60-62. 18 M. G. Fraser, “The Early Tombs at Tehneh,” ASAE 3 (1902), 74. 19 D. Arnold, “Bericht über Fahrten in das El-GharaqBecken (Faijum),” MDAIK 21 (1966), pl. 29a-b.


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Fig. 2. Earthquake damage at the tombs of el-Bersheh.

The expedition of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, at Dahshur now has evidence of a strong earthquake that shook the Dahshur area in the later 12th Dynasty.20 We found earthquake damage at the following monuments: (1) In 1992 we excavated parts of the southern outer brick enclosure wall of the Senwosret III complex at Dahshur. The excavation showed that the brick wall had sheared off about 1.70 m above court level and fallen inward to the north. Approximately 30 brick courses were still stacked on top of each other, like the tiles of a roof, allowing us to estimate a wall height of about 5 m. The pattern of the staggered bricks cannot be explained as a natural event because brick walls normally “melt” down, leaving a pile of brick debris above the center of the wall. In this case a whole wall section fell in one piece, obviously caused by an earthquake wave striking the wall from the north and toppling the wall backward in that direction (fig. 3). The earthquake must have occurred when the wall was still standing upright and covered with white wall plaster. This collapse did not take 20 Visiting geologists confirmed the presence of a geological fold under the Dahshur area.

place immediately after the construction of the wall, because the wall section fell on a 1.7 m high mound of wind-blown sand. The amount of time required for the north wind to pile up this mound can be roughly estimated. From our observation at the site one would estimate a minimum of five years. (2) The mastaba of Nebit (NM18/19) in the cemetery north of the pyramid of Senwosret III consisted of a brick core cased with three courses of heavy limestone blocks. The two lowermost courses consisted of 40 cm thick slabs ca. 1.80 m high and one to two meters wide. These courses were topped by 1.70 m long blocks that were only 52.5 cm high. Ancient stone robbers—probably in the Late New Kingdom—quarried this material away down to the foundation trenches, leaving only a few broken pieces and limestone chip. They reasonably worked along the foot of the mastaba and did not search for material further away. They therefore missed a group of blocks that was lying in the northern court about two to five meters distant from the foot of the mastaba. The blocks

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Fig. 3. Fallen brick enclosure wall of the pyramid complex of Senwosret III at Dahshur.

were still lying face down in the same sequence as they had fallen from the mastaba north side (fig. 4). They obviously had not fallen vertically to the mastaba’s foot but were hurled with an enormous force away from the building. This force cannot have been accomplished by human means, but rather suggests a strong seismic shock. The inscribed blocks do not show signs of long exposure or weathering but are covered by a solid yellow/brown patina that is also typical for the surface of pyramid casing blocks. How much time is necessary to produce this phenomenon is unknown. The slabs were lying on the clean court surface, some of them in a gap in the flattened northern enclosure wall of the tomb complex. This location shows that at the moment of the fall, the center part of the north wall had already been completely removed.21 3) We made a corresponding observation during the excavation of the mastaba of Khnumhotep, also north of the pyramid of Senwosret III. Again, the brick core of the mastaba had been cased with limestone blocks, most of which were removed by ancient stone robbers. They overlooked, however, the blocks of the northwest and northeast 21

It could be argued that this would signal that the earthquake happened much later, after brick robbers had removed the entire wall. Only this section of the wall had been taken

corners. We found those of the northwest corner lying as they had fallen, arranged like roof tiles three to five meters northwest of the corner, suggesting that the corner blocks fell as a unit. De Morgan excavated in 1894 nearly all the blocks of the corresponding northeast corner of the mastaba but did not describe the circumstances of the discovery. Since most of the blocks of other parts of the building were removed by stone robbers, the fact that nine blocks of the northeast corner were preserved suggests again that they had fallen together and were thrown so far from the foot of the mastaba that stone robbers overlooked them. One may therefore conclude that both northern corners of the building were blasted off by the same earthquake. 4) Certainly the same earthquake ruined the burial of Sitwerut, wife of Horkherty, who attached his tomb complex to the northern enclosure wall of Nebit. We found the wood coffin untouched by human activity close to the south end of the sarcophagus, but unmistakable brown traces on the floor of the stone sarcophagus showed the original position of the coffin 30 cm further to the north (fig. 5). It can only have been an earthquake that down, however, for some unknown purpose, while the rest of the wall is still standing today several courses high.


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Fig. 4. Fallen casing blocks of the mastaba of Nebit at Dahshur.

smashed the coffin against the foot of the stone sarcophagus, causing the heavy cedar box to fall apart.22 A study of structural damage to the monuments of Dahshur automatically brings to mind the Dahshur pyramid of Amenemhat III. Exploration of the underground apartments of that pyramid has clearly shown that a catastrophic event brought construction work to an end23 shortly before the completion of the interior rooms, at a moment when the above-ground buildings had already been built, even after the pyramid temple was decorated (about 1848 BC). At the moment of impact, the stone ceiling of the underground chambers was cracked so vigorously that the chambers and corridors were expected to collapse.24 The workers undertook some emergency measures to shore up the endangered parts but were soon ordered to abandon the site and build another pyramid far away in the Faiyum. Until recently I had assumed that the reason for that accident was the soft clay underground

that sagged under the steadily increasing weight of the pyramid. The accident occurred, however, not during the construction of the pyramid but after its completion, when no more weight was added. It is more likely, therefore, that the damage was inflicted by an earthquake, apparently the same event described above. One could dismiss the association of the damage to the Amenemhat III pyramid with a seismic event as too hypothetical, but a date of 1848 BC would fit amazingly well with the condition of the Dahshur monuments described above, and within the chronological framework of the period. (1) The brick enclosure wall of Senwosret III would have been standing 15-17 years. (2) The casing of the Nebit mastaba would have been exposed to weathering for over 20 years, and (3) the coffin of Sitwerut would have been buried for five years. Since a strong earthquake at Dahshur would also have affected neighboring areas, one might also turn attention to el-Lisht. There the crypt of the so-called French tomb at Lisht, also dating

22 Damage by rotting can be excluded, because the ground-water level in the Middle Kingdom was so much lower that humidity could not yet have reached the tombs. 23 Around year 31 of Senwosret III and year 12 of

Amenemhat III (assuming a reign of Amenemhat III from 1859 to 1813 BC). 24 D. Arnold, Der Pyramidenbezirk des Königs Amenemhet III. in Dahschur (Mainz, 1987), 83-84.

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Fig. 5 Remains of damaged coffin of Sitwerut, in original position.

from the later part of the reign of Senwosret III,25 displays a surprising amount of small-scale patchup work with patch stones and plaster,26 similar to the repair work in the underground apartments of the pyramid of Senwosret III and the crypt of Queen Weret II at Dahshur. The repairs in these three tombs conceal damage that must have occurred when the crypts were not yet sealed, but still accessible to restorers, confirming a date in the later years of the coregency between Senwosret III and Amenemhat III. The damage to the casing of the pyramid of Senwosret I at Lisht has been explained until now entirely as structural failure.27 I would now differentiate between broken edges that were repaired during the construction period and the projecting casing blocks that could have been displaced by the earthquake of the year 31 of Senwosret III. Huge cracks also split the granite blocks of the crypt of Amenemhat I at Lisht. The south wall of

25 D. Arnold, Middle Kingdom Tomb Architecture at Lisht, PMMAE 28 (New York, 2007), 32. 26 D. Arnold, The Pyramid Complex of Senwosret III at Dahshur (New York, 2000), 79. 27 D. Arnold, The Pyramid of Senwosret I (New York, 1988), pls. 40-41.

Fig. 6. Damaged rear and right-side walls of the burial chamber of Amenemhat I at Lisht.

earthquakes in egypt in the pharaonic period the “well chamber” did indeed sag, but there is no reason why the downward movement of the block—which did not carry any load—would have caused such damage (fig. 6). If the theory of an extraordinary seismic event during the reign of Amenemhat III (or around 1848 BC) is accepted, one would also have to

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consider the probability that the nearby settlements and even the royal residence itself were harmed, with serious consequences for the whole country. More details of the strength and date of such an event may be provided in the future from evidence of archaeologists currently working in the Memphite area.

Chronological list of events 1887 -1878 1885

SENWOSRET II Illahun-Pyramid Construction

1880 1878 -1840

2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 SENWOSRET III Dahshur-Pyramid Construction

1875 Sobekemhat mastaba Construction

1870

Nebit mastaba Construction Fallen casing South temple

1865 Horkherty mastaba Construction Shifted coffin Fallen wall 1860

1855

Senwosretankh mastaba Construction Fallen casing?

1850

Treasure of Lahun I damaged

1848

Earthquake? Abydos tomb Construction

1845

1840

Treasure of Lahun II

SIII dies 1840

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39

Khnumhotep mastaba Construction Fallen casing

1859 -1813

AMENEMHAT III Dahshur-Pyramid Construction

Interior damage Hawara-Pyramid Construction

AIII dies 1813 ⇓

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

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foreign and female

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FOREIGN AND FEMALE* Dorothea Arnold The Metropolitan Museum of Art

The statuette in the National Museums of Scotland, Edinburgh1 here illustrated as figs. 1-3 has intrigued admirers of Egyptian art ever since Cyril Aldred included it in his 1956 Egyptian Art in the Middle Kingdom2 and Janine Bourriau exhibited it in her memorable show “Pharaohs and Mortals” at the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, in 1988.3 Carved from (most probably sycamore) wood, the figure was originally covered with a thin layer of gesso and painted. When excavated in shaft tomb 181 at Beni Hasan by John Garstang,4 the surface, especially of the face, was somewhat blistered, and that damage was reportedly aggravated during World War II storage. Before Aldred’s publication the figure was, therefore, cleaned and the “features” repainted; in addition, the right hand and the tip of the left foot were restored.5 A somewhat stocky, light-skinned6 woman sets her left foot forward. She wears yellow boots and a light reddish brown, lower-than-calf-length garment of heavy material under which she carries a baby on her back. In order to envelope and support the infant, the garment (or an added shawl) is tightly drawn over the woman’s shoulders and arms. Only the right hand remains free, while part of the woman’s shoulders and neck emerges from a V-shaped neckline. Of the infant, only a little bald, yellow-painted head is exposed. Below the

cover of the shawl or garment, the woman’s left hand and arm are turned backward to further support the baby’s body.7 The most striking part of the figure is its large head. With a slightly uplifted face, the head is supported on a long, curved neck marked by an incipient “Adam’s apple” in front and a thick roll of flesh below the hairline in the back. All the hair is drawn upwards and off the face and neck, and a band or shawl is wrapped around it. Under this barrette-shaped hairdo, the face, although marked by pouches below the eyes and deep lines on the cheeks, does not strike the viewer as that of an old woman. On the contrary, this remarkable woman is either still young or certainly not more than middle aged, and there is a decidedly attractive, if unusual, charm about her. Below her thick black brows, the narrowly spaced eyes are wide open, and the aquiline nose has broad nostrils. The mouth is slightly pursed, and the lips are full and sensuous. The overlarge, somewhat faun-like ears would not have marred the woman’s appeal in the eyes of ancient Egyptians, because they might well have associated them with the cow ears of Hathor, goddess of beauty and all things exotic. The unusual character of the figure is further emphasized by her clothing, on which the excavator John Garstang still observed remains of

* I want to thank Irit Ziffer, Kim Benzell, and Jean Evans for their very helpful and enlightening contributions to this article. I am also grateful to my colleague Joan Aruz, who asked me to give a talk about the matter discussed in this article to her “Scholars’ Workshop” on February 4, 2009, at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. This made it possible for me to discuss some of my ideas with the Ancient Near East scholars and Egyptologists present at the occasion. All mistakes in this article are, of course, my own. The exhibition “Beyond Babylon, Art, Trade and Diplomacy in the Second Millennium B.C.” that made the workshop possible was an overall inspiration for matters of interconnections. 1 Inventory number 1911.260. Height 6 inches (15.3 cm); width 1 ¾ inch (4.4 cm). 2 C. Aldred, Middle Kingdom Art in Ancient Egypt, 23001590 B.C. (London, 1956), 42, no. 30 with ill. 3 J. Bourriau, Pharaohs and Mortals: Egyptian Art in the Middle Kingdom (Cambridge, 1988), 108-109, no. 97 with ill. 4 J. Garstang, Burial Customs of Ancient Egypt (London,

1907), 139-141, fig. 138, and 218 for the content of the tomb. 5 See Aldred, Middle Kingdom Art. 6 Due to the report about repainting, it is not possible to determine for sure whether the woman had a light reddish, pink, or yellow skin. Remains that look original around the ears suggest the former. 7 I prefer Aldred’s (Middle Kingdom Art) interpretation of the left arm against Bourriau’s (Pharaohs and Mortals) suggestion of a harness. The difference between the manner in which the arms are depicted below the garment is otherwise not explainable: compare fig. 2 in this article with fig. 138 in Garstang, Burial Customs. Compare also the statuette in the Metropolitan Museum of Art Purchase, Edward S. Harkness Gift, 1926 26.7.1407 (W.C. Hayes, The Scepter of Egypt, Part 2: The Hyksos Period and New Kingdom [New York, 1959], 34, fig. 16) and G. Brunton, “Two Faience Statuettes,” ASAE 39 (1939), 102, fig. 2.

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Figs. 1–2. Female foreigner with baby, painted wood, National Museums of Scotland, Edinburgh, A. 1911.260 (photographs courtesy Trustees of the National Museums of Scotland).

Fig. 3. Female foreigner with baby, National Museums of Scotland, Edinburgh, top of head (photograph courtesy Trustees of the National Museums of Scotland).

foreign and female patterning.8 Indeed, in the profile view (fig. 2), some zigzag lines might be still discernable. Also unusual and foreign looking are the use of a heavy (woolen?) fabric, the shape of the garment that almost totally conceals the woman’s body, the boots, and the woman’s strange hairdo. No question: this statuette represents a foreigner. Bourriau called her a Bedouin, Garstang suggested Libyan connections, and Aldred described her as a “foreign woman.” All three scholars reminded their readers of the group of “Asiatic” Aamu in the large rock tomb of the nomarch Khnumhotep, just above the cemetery of shaft tombs in one of which the figure was found,9 not without pointing out the differences between the statuette and the people of the wall decoration. Khnumhotep’s tomb is dated to the reign of Senwosret II, but it is certainly one of the latest among the rock tombs at the site. Best evidence for a date for the remarkable Edinburgh figure should be supplied by the context of the particular shaft tomb (no. 181) in which it was found. Unfortunately, this context is not all that easy to reconstruct. Garstang evidently found remains of two coffins—a man’s and a woman’s—in tomb 181, but he does not specify which objects in his list of finds belonged to which of the two burials.10 Neither does the pottery listed help much to date either of the burials, because the types were found so frequently throughout the cemetery that Stephan Seidlmayer in his study of First Intermediate Period and early Middle Kingdom pottery calls them “indifferent” for dating purposes. He assigns shaft tomb 181 on the evidence of its location inside the cemetery to his “Stufe II,” during which—he suggests—“an essential extension” of the cemetery took place that included above all “the lower ranges of the slope,”11 placing the “Stufe II” tombs with all due caution into the reigns of Amenemhat I and Senwosret I.12 This coincides 8

Burial Customs, 140. No. 3: P. Newberry, Beni Hasan, Part 1 (London, 1893), 69, pls. 28, 30, 31. For recent interpretations of the scene see J. Kamrin, The Cosmos of Khnumhotep II at Beni Hasan, (London and New York, 1999), 93-96. 10 Garstang, Burial Customs, 218, no. 181, lists the (most probably male) name Wes[e]ri and the (certainly female because “lady of the house”) Arjthetep. His list of finds on p. 218 does not, however, differentiate between two burial groups. 11 S. Seidlmayer, Gräberfelder aus dem Übergang vom Alten zum Mittleren Reich (Heidelberg, 1990), 231, fig. 95, for the characterization of jar types 23 and 25 of Garstang. Tomb 181 in “Stufe II”: ibid., 229. For the position of tomb 181, see Garstang, Burial Customs, pl. 4, in middle to lower range below rock tomb XVIII. 12 Seidlmayer, Gräberfelder, 233. 9

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with Bourriau’s “early 12th Dynasty” date for the woman’s figure.13 Archaeological context aside, general art-historical considerations suggest that the figure of a foreign woman from Beni Hasan might fit well into a trend in early- to mid-12th Dynasty art toward subtle characterizations of human beings outside the general Egyptian type. This trend was already well under way during the later years of Senwosret I, when some remarkably shallow reliefs were added to the king’s funerary monument at LishtSouth.14 There is no comparable female image on the preserved fragments. But in the sparing use of markers and the proudly asserted identity, the reliefs resemble the female statuette here under consideration. Further along in the development of the same trend is the Metropolitan Museum’s small pygmy figure from the burial of Hepy at Lisht-South.15 The archaeological context of this ivory statuette—one of four found in front of the wall that closed the burial of a woman called Hepy—dates into the late reign of Senwosret I and the reign of his successor Amenemhat II.16 Although the ivory figure is undoubtedly more sophisticated than the Edinburgh statuette in material and artistic quality, the two statuettes are very close in the daring with which the artists brought forward unusual human physiognomies. One is actually very much tempted to call the Edinburgh figure a provincial version of the trends expressed in the pygmy representation. What would eventually be achieved in royal portraits of Senwosret III and Amenemhat III is here somehow foreshadowed. Dating the Beni Hasan statuette in the same time frame that was suggested for the pygmy seems, after all, a reasonable suggestion. Bourriau rightly noticed that an ivory statuette in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (figs. 4-7)17 is a close parallel to the Beni Hasan statuette. This 13

Bourriau, Pharaohs and Mortals, 108. One fragment published: M. Hill, “Relief of a Foreigner Throwing a Spear,” in The American Discovery of Ancient Egypt, ed. N. Thomas (Los Angeles 1995), 153, no. 59. 15 Rogers Fund, 1934 34.1.130. Excavated in the mastaba tomb west of the tomb of Senwosretankh, in front of the brick wall blocking the burial of a woman called Hepy. W.C. Hayes, The Scepter of Egypt, Part 1: From the Earliest Times to the End of the Old Kingdom (New York, 1990), 223, fig. 139. 16 D. Arnold, Middle Kingdom Tomb Architecture at Lisht, PMMA 28 (New York, 2008), 24 and (in more detail) Do. Arnold, Art and Archaeology at Lisht South (forthcoming). 17 Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 54.994. Height 3 ½ in. (9cm). D. Wildung, L’Age d’Or de l’Égypte: Le Moyen Empire (Fribourg, 1984), 182, fig. 159, wrongly stated to be from Kerma; the piece has no provenance. 14

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4

5

Figs. 4–6. Female foreigner with baby, ivory, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 54.994 (photographs courtesy Museum of Fine Arts).

female also wears an off-the-body garment (or cloak) whose veritable bell shape is even further removed from typical Egyptian sheath dresses than the heavy woolen dress of the Beni Hasan statuette. A slight bulge in the woman’s silhouette at the height of her elbow is all that reminds the viewer of the body beneath the garment. A fair degree of abstraction is also discernible in the way the woman carries the infant on her back. Again, only the baby’s head is visible, but here its body is not even indicated below the cloth, and the whole narrative is condensed into an eloquent

curve described by the upper end of the woman’s garment at the back. Fringed, or more probably reinforced by cross-stitching, this upper seam is held fast in front by the woman’s—now mostly missing—hands and stretches tightly over the shoulders, from which it passes into the loop at the back. The Boston figure’s garment is unmistakably marked as foreign by the presence of a fringe along the bottom and the vertical seam in front. In addition, a checkerboard pattern has been boldly incised into the surface of the cloak. The woman’s

foreign and female

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Fig. 6.

Fig. 7. Female foreigner with baby, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, top of head (photograph courtesy Museum of Fine Arts).

hands were carved separately and then inserted into drilled holes; only the left wrist, from which the hand was broken off, remains. The separately made left leg was inserted into the underside of the figure with the help of a peg whose original drill hole is still partly preserved in the remains of the leg. The right leg was probably carved as one piece together with the rest of the figure’s body. More of the legs must have been visible below the garment than in the Beni Hasan statuette, to ensure the right proportions for the figure. Or are we perhaps seeing a female dwarf? Female dwarfs with children were often represented in small figurines during the Middle Kingdom, and these figurines invariably wear cloak-like garments

similar in nature to the ones worn by the two statuettes here under consideration.18 The carver did not attempt to indicate anything unusual in the woman’s somewhat masculine facial features beyond a friendly smile. Her hairdo, however, closely resembles the one of the Edinburgh figure. It leaves the face and neck entirely uncovered and is wrapped by bands or a shawl to look like a kind of cap. No provenance is known for the piece, and it is difficult to ascribe more than a general “Middle Kingdom” date to the figure. A late Middle Kingdom date might be suggested by the advanced stylization of the piece. The top of each woman’s head shows a flattened area of roughly circular shape. Inside these

18 V. Dasen, Dwarfs in Ancient Egypt and Greece (Oxford, 1993), 140-141, and D. Arnold, The Pyramid Complex of Senwosret I, PMMA 25 (New York, 1992), 78-79, pls. 85-86, nos.

235-237. None of these figures show, however, the unusual hairdo of the Beni Hasan and Boston statuettes.

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areas—and off center in the case of the Beni Hasan figure—holes have been drilled into the heads (figs. 3,7). These holes have formerly been explained as providing the opportunity to fasten baskets to the women’s heads, and this led to the universal understanding that the women were offering bearers. Closer inspection of the figures’ heads, however, throws serious doubts on this reconstruction. The flattened area surrounding the drill hole on the head of the Beni Hasan figure (figs. 2-3) is slanting considerably toward the back. This would have caused a basket to rest dangerously askew on the woman’s head. On the top of the Boston figure’s head, moreover, a ridge can be seen that runs from at least one side of the area around the hole toward the back of the head (fig. 7). Tool marks at the sides of the ridge show that the area in question is part of the ancient, carved surface, not caused by material having been broken off later. Again, a basket would have sat very insecurely on top of this head. It should, moreover, be noted that the hole on the Beni Hasan figure’s head is not centered on the flattened area around it. This suggests the addition by pegging of an irregularly shaped additional piece. On further consideration, it must also be mentioned that, although many women to this day carry loads on their heads and babies on their backs at the same time, ancient Egyptian offering bearers are always represented steadying the baskets on their heads with one hand.19 The question of what the two women who are represented in the Edinburgh and Boston statuettes carried on their heads must, therefore, be reconsidered. A solution might be provided by some striking parallels for the women’s barrette-shaped hairdos in the paintings of a Middle Kingdom tomb.

One of the most extraordinary monuments of the 12th Dynasty is the painted rock tomb of Ukhhotep III, son of another Ukhhotep and his wife Henyherib (C 1) at Meir in Middle Egypt.20 Like his ancestors, Ukhhotep III was a member of the country’s highest elite, a royal sealer and nomarch, with his main position of power that of an overseer of priests of the local deity, Hathor of Qusiya (Cusae).21 His rock-cut tomb in the cliffs to the west of the capital was of simple shape, following in ground plan a tradition that went at least as far back as the early 12th Dynasty,22 but presenting in the details of its wall decoration a unique example of the versatility, inventiveness, and sheer beauty of Middle Kingdom tomb design. Unfortunately, the drawings—painstakingly executed by Blackman’s draftsmen23—do not convey the rich palette of colors used in the paintings. To mention just one example: the tomb owner’s large figure at the west end of the north wall stands out against a yellow-orange background, while his cloak is decorated with broad stripes of saturated green.24 After having traversed a now almost totally destroyed forecourt, the visitor to Ukhhotep III’s tomb enters the main chamber, whose focus is a niche directly opposite the entrance. Here doubtlessly a statue of the tomb owner was placed amid decorated walls that characterize the niche as an offering chapel.25 North and south of this niche on the tomb chamber’s west wall, over-life-size figures of the tomb owner occupy the whole height of the wall above a dado with a niche motif.26 On the north side—and to the right of the statue chapel—Ukhhotep, accompanied by various women of his family, is depicted hunting birds in the papyrus thicket with his boomerang. On the opposite, south side—left of the statue niche—he is represented spearing fish in a thicket of lilies,27

19 A good example showing the upraised arm together with a fully horizontal flattened attachment area for the basket on top of the head is the female offering bearer, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston 05.231: Do. Arnold, “Amenemhat I and the Early Twelfth Dynasty at Thebes,” MMJ 26 (1991), 34, fig. 50. Most offering bearers, however, do not have flattened areas on their heads: the basket sits either on the peak of the curved top of the head, or its own bottom is cut out to make room for inserting the top of the head: see Hayes, Scepter of Egypt 1, 267, fig. 174 for the cutout basket bottom, and R.E. Freed, L.M. Berman, and D.M. Doxey, Arts of Ancient Egypt, MFA Highlights (Boston, 2003), 125, ill. 20 A.M. Blackman, The Rock Tombs of Meir VI (London, 1953), 8-37, pls. 10-31, 32, figs. 1-2; D. Kessler, “Meir,” LÄ 4, 14-19, especially 17. For the date of this tomb around the middle of the 12th Dynasty, see also Blackman, The Rock Tombs of Meir I (London, 1914), 12-13. 21 D. Kessler, “Qusae,” LÄ 5, 73-74.

22 See A.M. Blackman, The Rock Tombs of Meir II (London, 1915), pl. 1, of the early 12th Dynasty. 23 The main artist was Ismail Sadeq; S.R. Shepherd did the inking: see Blackman, Meir VI, Preface. The accuracy of the drawings to the minute detail can be checked by comparison with black and white photographs in the archives of the Department of Egyptian Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, see here fig. 9A. Some color photographs were taken in the 1960s by Dieter Arnold. The tomb urgently needs to be re-documented with present-day technological methods. 24 It is the figure in Blackman, Meir VI, pl. 18. 25 Ibid., 32-37, pls. 15-1. 7 26 Ibid., 25-29, pl. 13. 27 This unusual way of bringing the antithesis of Upper versus Lower Egypt into the fishing and fowling activities is one of the ways in which this tomb owner aspires to the role of the pharaoh. See below for that ambitious undertaking.

foreign and female flanked by wedjat eyes and again accompanied by female members of his family. The east wall of the chamber to both sides of the entry is badly damaged.28 But what remains appears to indicate that the themes in the upper parts of both sides of the wall to the right and left of the entrance corresponded to some extent to their opposites in the west, while the rows of women in the bottom registers are best understood as prolonging the main theme of the north and south walls: the Hathor festival. Leaving these bottom registers aside for the time being, the subject north of the entrance was hunting in the desert. Of the upper part of the east wall, south and left of the entrance, not a trace is preserved. One might conjecture that here the life of the herds was depicted, because this crucial theme does not appear otherwise in the chamber. A fight of bulls was, moreover, evidently an important part of the Hathor festivals at Qusiya.29 But since the adjacent south wall deals with the catching of birds and fish, one might also suggest further representations of an aquatic nature. On both the north and south walls of the chamber, the decoration is divided between an upper and a lower half. Activities on the lower halves of both walls are directed toward the west, where an imposing standing figure of the tomb owner appears to emerge from the realm of the dead in the west to receive and supervise the offering bearers and other people confronting him.30 In the upper scenes on both walls, the focus figure at the west end is a less-dominating image of the seated Ukhhotep accompanied by female members of his family.31 The main theme on these upper parts of the north and south walls represents what can be called the central topic of the tomb: the worship of the goddess Hathor.32 And this goes far in explaining the less-conspicuous status of the tomb owner on these upper sections of the walls. Ukhhotep is here, after all, less the recipient of honors himself than a participant in the various ritual performances in honor of the goddess, even if it is true that the ultimate effect of the depiction of these performances in the tomb was believed to be in favor of Ukhhotep, high priest of Hathor: 28

Blackman, Meir VI, 15-17, pls. 9-10. S. Allam, Beiträge zum Hathorkult (bis zum Ende des Mittleren Reiches) (Berlin, 1963), 31-32 on Blackman, Meir II, pl. 15. 30 Blackman, Meir VI, 18-21, pls. 18, 30 (north wall), 23-24, pls. 11, 23 fig. 2 (south wall). 31 Ibid., 21-22, pls. 19, 32 fig. 1 (north wall), 24-25, pls. 12, 32 fig. 2 (south wall). 32 Blackman, Meir I, 2-4, and Allam, Hathorkult, 23-41 29

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“For your kas,” says one of the officiating women, “the menit of your mother Hathor, may she let you live as long as you wish.”33 In the lower half of the north wall34—opposite intriguing scenes of fishing and bird catching on the south wall—three magnificent registers depict offering bearers bringing desert animals and enormously fattened oxen, as well as all manner of fruit and vegetables, toward Ukhhotep, who is standing under a canopy, enveloped in his striped cloak and accompanied by a small figure of a female member of his family. In front of the canopy roof that shelters the tomb owner is written: “Words spoken by (the god) Kahetep(y?).” Whether this deity was actually depicted where a niche for a later stela has destroyed the wall cannot be determined with certainty. Most probably his “words” were enough to evoke the presence of this lessfamiliar form of the god Osiris.35 But even so, a deity preceding a cortege of offering bearers— even if only present by speech—is a very unusual feature for a monument dedicated to a non-royal person. At the least, the divine speech makes it clear that the goods brought are without doubt provisions for Ukhhotep’s sustenance in eternity. And the inscriptions specify these provisions as coming from the Delta.36 Several of the women who carry these goods from the Delta are depicted with hairdos that are strikingly similar to the hairstyle of the two statuettes in Edinburgh and Boston (figs. 8A-C, E). More examples of the same type of coiffures appear among the women in the bottom register on the east wall, north of the entrance (fig. 8D).37 Its counterpart on the south side of the east wall is too destroyed to determine the women’s headgear. The Ukhhotep women’s hair is swept up from the neck, and in several cases it is made clear that the hair is kept in shape by bands or fillets (fig. 8A). The result is a cap-like coiffure with a thick bun-like part protruding at the back and a bulge above the forehead, much as it is seen in the two statuettes. The Ukhhotep women provide, however, additional information on this type of (with other early references) have not yet been superseded in describing and interpreting in depth these rites according to the representations in the Meir tombs. 33 Blackman, Meir I, pl. 2. 34 Blackman, Meir VI, pl. 18. 35 For Kahetep see: C. Leitz, Lexikon der ägyptischen Götter und Götterbezeichnungen 7 (Leuven, 2002), 239. 36 Blackman, Meir VI, pl. 18. 37 Ibid., pl. 10.

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headgear. In some instances (fig. 8B, D, E), the cap-like “turban” is topped by an angular slightly wedge-shaped protrusion that appears in one case (figs. 8B, 9A) alone, in one case (fig. 8C) in combination with a ponytail, in a third case (fig. 8D) in combination with a braid, and in yet another case with a counterpart, also of wedge shape, protruding downward from the “bun” in the back (fig. 8E). These protrusions can be reasonably only identified as ornamental combs of the “Spanish comb” type. It is more than tempting to associate the ornamental combs of the Meir women with the drill holes in the heads of the two statuettes and suggest that such combs were also added to the heads of the cap-like coiffure of the two statuettes. The combs would not have been inserted directly into the preserved drill holes but were carved in one piece with the uppermost part of the women’s coiffures, which explains the flattened areas around the holes on the heads. One might, for instance, reconstruct the Beni Hasan figure (figs. 1-3) according to the Meir woman in figs. 8B and 9A. A disk-shaped piece of wood with a slightly concave top and a wedge-shaped protrusion representing the comb would have been attached by inserting the peg on its underside into the drilled hole in the top of the head (fig. 9B). A parallel for this method of attaching parts of hair to the head of a statuette can be seen on a wooden figure in the Dumbarton Oaks collection.38 There, braids of hair have been fixed onto a girl’s shaven head by pegging not only the braids, but with them also parts of the head itself, onto flattened areas at the sides and back of the head. The Boston figure (figs. 4-6) could be reconstructed in a similar way, but here one might in addition suggest a somewhat more elaborate attachment in order to explain the concave area beside the drill hole (fig. 7) and the broken-off section at the back of that statuette’s “turban” (fig. 5). The attachment would include a single braid at the back covering—at some distance—the strangely

“naked” area above the infant’s head (fig. 4). Single braids at the back of servant women’s heads are often depicted in Middle Kingdom and early New Kingdom art, and some of the women with braids are actually identified as Asiatics.39 The identification of the Ukhhotep tomb women with the cap-like hairdo as foreigners is made absolutely clear by objects that are depicted in association with them. Behind the third woman from the right in the uppermost register of the north wall of Ukhhotep’s tomb (fig. 8A) is a table on which three vessels stand, covered by a kind of canopy decorated with grapes or the leaves of a plant. Two of the vessels have handles, as do two others, one held in the left hand of the last figure in the row and another on the table that she carries on her shoulder (fig. 8A). Handles of this type, though known in the Canaanite Early Bronze Age IV to Middle Bronze Age I ceramic repertoire as well as—occasionally—in Syrian and Mesopotamian pottery of the later Early to Middle Bronze Age, are practically unknown in Egypt during the Middle Kingdom.40 This endows the group a priori with a foreign character, an impression that is only increased after a closer look at the shapes of the vessels. With their globular bodies, sharply emphasized—in some cases undulating—rims, and thin hoop handles, the vessels in the Meir painting resemble, most of all, metal containers. In fact, the silver cups with hoop and loop handles from the famous “Tôd Treasure” temple deposit come vividly to mind. These silver vessels, although discussions about the exact place of their origin are still ongoing (the Aegean and Anatolia are most frequently mentioned), were certainly foreign imports to Egypt.41 And the representation of such items in close proximity with the women with cap-like hairdos in the Meir paintings is enough to also mark these women as foreigners. The presence in Middle Kingdom Egypt of great numbers of eastern foreigners, many of them females, has recently again been widely

38 J.H. Breasted, Egyptian Servant Statues (Washington, 1948), 95. pl. 89b, c. 39 H.G. Fischer, “A Shrine and Statue of the Thirteenth Dynasty,” Varia Nova, Egyptian Studies 3 (New York, 1996), 123-125 with fig. 1. 40 For double-handled Canaanite pots: R. Amiran, Ancient Pottery of the Holy Land (Jerusalem, 1969), 78-89, especially 83 photo 90, pl. 22, 12, pl. 23, 11, pl. 24, 10, 19: all Early Bronze IV to Middle Bronze I; during Middle Bronze IIA double handles seem to be fairly rare (except, of course for the “Canaanite jars”), see, however, ibid., pl. 29, nos. 2, 3.

For Syria/Mesopotamia: M. al-Maqdissi, V. Matoian, and C. Nicolle, eds., Céramique de l’âge du bronze en Syrie (Beirut, 2007). 41 F. Bisson de la Roque, Trésor de Tôd, Catalogue général des antiquités égyptiennes du Musée du Caire, Nos. 7050170754 (Cairo, 1950), 17-20, pls. 12-14, nos. 70580, 70583, 70590, 70591. G. Pierrat-Bonnefois, “The Tôd Treasure” and “Bowls, Cups, and Chest,” in Beyond Babylon: Art, Trade, and Diplomacy in the Second Millennium B.C., ed. J. Aruz (New York, 2008), 65-67.

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A

B

C

D

E Fig. 8. Details from the north (A, B, C, E) and east (D) walls in the tomb of Ukhhotep III at Meir after A.M. Blackman, The Rock Tombs of Meir VI (London, 1953), pls. 10, 18.

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A

B Fig. 9. Ornamental combs. A: Detail from the north wall of Ukhhotep III’s tomb chamber (archival photograph The Metropolitan Museum of Art). B: Suggested attachment on the head of the statuette figs. 1-3 (drawing by Scott Murphy).

foreign and female

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A

B

C

D Fig. 10. Third millennium Mesopotamian headdresses after A. Spycket, “La coiffure féminine en Mésopotamie des origines à la Ier dynastie de Babylone,” Revue d’Assyriologie et d’Archéologie Orientale 48 (1954), p. 123, fig. 26, Mari (A); p. 126, fig. 45, Kish (B); p. 170, fig. 60, cylinder seal, Chicago (C); p. 174, fig. 76, plaque, Berlin (D).

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commented on,42 and it has been shown that the females especially appear in two capacities: as servants in elite Egyptian households, and as musicians and attendants in Egyptian temples.43 In the Ukhhotep tomb, both functions might be alluded to. The women with the striking coiffure could be household servants who have joined the offering bearers in Ukhhotep’s tomb, and they could be members of the temple personnel of Hathor of Cusae who functioned under the overseer of priests in life as well as death. In both capacities, the foreign women added an exoticism to the proceedings that was doubtlessly thought to be pleasing to the goddess, and thus beneficial for the tomb owner. The next question would be whether one can narrow down the evidence from the Meir tombs to suggest where in particular the foreign women in the employ of Ukhhotep III’s household and/ or the temple of Hathor at Cusae came from, and where we might, therefore, also place the ethnic origin of the women represented in the two statuettes that wear the same hairdo. A final answer to this question must ultimately come from Ancient Near Eastern scholars, but a few tentative remarks may perhaps be allowed here. A survey of hairstyles depicted on monuments from the Levant has only negative results: no hairstyle of this shape is known from representations on objects excavated in this area.44 Hairdos very similar to the ones of 42

T. Schneider, Ausländer in Ägypten während des Mittleren Reiches und der Hyksoszeit, Part 2: Die ausländische Bevölkerung (Wiesbaden, 2003), with further references. 43 Temple: ibid., 26-27 (Papyrus Berlin 10002), 57 (Papyrus University College XLI, 1); 264-78; servants, only to mention a few examples: ibid., 52 (stela in Liverpool E. 30), 58-59 (Meir, Tomb B2), 61-62 (stela MMA 63.154) and passim. 44 The closest parallels are the caps of Shasu Bedouins: M.G. Hasel, Domination and Resistance: Egyptian Military Activity in the Southern Levant, ca. 1300-1185 B.C. (Boston, 1998), 217-235. However, more than 500 years lie between these people and the women from Meir, and—not to forget— the caps are worn by Shasu men, not women. 45 “La coiffure féminine en Mésopotamie des origines à la Ier dynastie de Babylone,” RAAO 48 (1954), 113-129, 169-177; and 49 (1955), 113-128. More recent are the PhD dissertation by A. Baadsgaard, Trends, Traditions, and Transformations: Fashions in Dress in Early Dynastic Mesopotamia (University of Pennsylvania, 2008), and the PhD thesis in the making by Kim Benzell, Sites of Enchantment: the Technology of Ur in Mesopotamia. 46 A. Parrot, “Les Fouilles de Mari, septième campagne (hiver 1951-1952),” Syria 29 (1952), 194-195, pl. 20, 1. See also P. Collins, “Inlay of a woman wearing a cylinder seal.” Also similar is the “Inlay of a woman’s head,” P. Collins in Art of the First Cities: The Third Millennium B.C. from the Mediterranean to the Indus, ed. J. Aruz (New York, 2003), 161-162, nos. 104a, b. 47 RAAO 48, 122.

the Meir women are, however, found in images from third millennium Mesopotamia, with a few less-close examples from the same area dating to the early second millennium. The drawings in fig. 10 are taken from the more-than-half-a-century-old, but admirably extensive, study by Agnès Spycket.45 Fig. 10A, for instance, represents a shell inlay from Mari showing the head of a woman in an elaborate turban that bulges in front and back, very much like the “caps” of the Meir women, as well as the statuettes in Edinburgh and Boston. The excavator André Parrot called this the typical pre-Sargonite (Early Dynastic) head gear,46 and Agnès Spycket observed that such turbans were evidently used rather inventively, that is with many variations, by the ancient Mesopotamians.47 Even closer to the Meir women’s hairstyle is that of fig. 10B. It shows a piece of inlay from ancient Kish, where the hair is looped up at the back and bound by a fillet that has been fixed by a pin or comb with a rectangular end.48 A magnificent golden pin, decorated with flowers, was also fastened in the same way into the back of the elaborate headdress of Puabi at Ur. The back view of the reconstructed arrangement of this piece reveals that below all the petals and other ornament, this headdress, too, consisted of bands wound around the lady’s head.49 Somewhat closer in date to the Meir paintings is a seal showing attendants of a deity in fringed 48

E. Mackay, A Sumerian Palace and the “A” Cemetery at Kish, Mesopotamia (Chicago, 1929), part 2, 122, pl. 35, 1. The intricacies of this hairdo are best understood from another inlay, ibid., pl. 26, 4, and P. Collins, “Inlay of a female musician,” in Art of the First Cities, 91, no. 50. I do not agree with the last author that these fillets are knotted at the back. No proper knot is visible, and the surface of the rectangular upright protrusion at the back is clearly differentiated from the one of the fillet. A person who has ever tried to keep looped-up long hair in place with just a band knows that the band has to be fastened with something like a pin, or here most probably a comb. Otherwise the band slips off very easily. 49 R.L. Zettler and L. Horne, eds., Treasures from the Royal Tombs of Ur (Philadelphia, 1998), 89-92. H. Pittman, “Puabi’s headdress,” in Art of the First Cities, 110-111, ills. Irit Ziffer refers me also to: A.R. Gansell, “Identity and Adornment in the Third Millennium Mesopotamian ‘Royal Cemetery’ at Ur,” CAJ 17 (2007), 29-46, for more information on the “Spanish combs” used by most of the attendants in the “royal” tombs at Ur. Also pointed out to me by Irit Ziffer are the third millennium combs(?) excavated at Umm el-Marra in Syria: G.M. Schwartz et al., “A Third Millennium B.C. Elite Mortuary Complex at Umm el-Marra, Syria: 2002 and 2004 Excavations,” AJA 110 (2006), 616, fig. 14 with ibid. 614 and 615, fig. 13 for the find context close to skulls. The shape of these possible hair ornaments with two points on each side is strikingly paralleled by the depiction of two comb ends in the Meir woman, fig. 8E.

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garments (fig. 10C).50 Their hair lacks the turbanlike overall shape, but similar pins or combs seem to be stuck into the backs of their fillets. Although also possible, it is less likely that knot ends are depicted, because a knot actually has two ends, not just one. Dominique Collon has placed this and other related seals into the very end of the third millennium.51 Another image of a date truly contemporaneous with the 12th Dynasty (fig. 10D) shows a sombrero type of female hairstyle whose cone-shaped top might either be a kind of bun, or again a—in this case more carelessly depicted—comb of the style worn by the Meir women and the statuettes.52 The image in question depicts a nude female musician standing on a small base and playing a lyre while a male dancer performs in front of her, tapping his small drum at the same time. Of about the same date, finally, are two nude female dancers or worshipers on a terracotta mold in Baghdad, whose surrounding figures (monkeys and dwarfs) must raise the interest of any Egyptologist, because of their similarity with Egyptian monkeys depicted in connection with the goddess Hathor in general, and a group of very similar dancing pygmies found at Middle Kingdom Lisht in particular.53 However, these late third millennium and early second millennium representations are significantly less close to the Meir women’s hairdo, and it seems indeed—at least after this admittedly cursory survey—that the closest parallels to these hairdos are found in a phase of Mesopotamian art contemporary with Egypt’s Old Kingdom. The third millennium date for the prototypes of hairstyles depicted in the Meir paintings and their parallels, the statuettes at Edinburgh and Boston,

must throw serious doubts on any historical conclusions that might at first glance be drawn from them about the presence of foreign women from Mesopotamia in 12th Dynasty Middle Egypt. One has to ask, indeed, how a third millennium Mesopotamian female hairstyle could have become known to Middle Kingdom Egyptians, when there were no known direct contacts between Egypt and the Near East further inland than the Levant before the early 18th Dynasty?54 The fact that a number of our comparative images were inlays (figs. 10A, B) might provide a possible explanation. The inlays from Mari, Kish and other sites in Mesopotamia and inland Syria appear mostly to have been set into stone slabs and friezes, and thus would have served as wall decorations in palaces and temples.55 But one should not forget, however, that boxes, pieces of furniture, and musical instruments were also embellished with inlays of shell or ivory.56 Such precious items from Mesopotamia could well have reached Egypt by trade (via Byblos, for instance) to be kept in the temple treasures of Hathor of Cusae, as well as the likewise-important sanctuary of Hathor of Nefrusi, located north of Cusae and governed by the nomarchs entombed at Beni Hasan.57 The lapis lazuli objects in the “Tôd Treasure” show clearly that exotic imports could live for long spans of time in temple treasures.58 The makers of the statuettes, and the painters at Meir, could thus have copied impressive foreign hairstyles from third millennium heirlooms in the temple treasures. If such an explanation of the depiction of third millennium hairstyles on foreign women in 12th Dynasty art were accepted, no direct Middle Kingdom relations between Mesopotamia and Egypt

50 Drawing from Spycket, RAAO 48, 170, fig. 60, after an Akkadian seal in Chicago: H. Frankfort, Cylinder Seals; A Documentary Essay on the Art and Religion of the Ancient Near East (London, 1939), pl. 24f. 51 See also D. Collon, First Impressions: Cylinder Seals in the Ancient Near East (London, 2005), 36-37, fig. 113, 148149, fig. 642. 52 E. Klengel-Brandt in Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Das Vorderasiatische Museum (Mainz, 1992), 103, no. 47, provenance unknown. 53 F. Basmachi, The Treasures of the Iraq Museum (Baghdad, 1976-77), 401, fig. 108. For the pygmy figures from Lisht, see Arnold, Middle Kingdom Tomb Architecture, pl. 31a. 54 D.B. Redford, Egypt, Canaan, and Israel in Ancient Times (Princeton, 1992), 17-24, reflects well the problems concerning the mechanics of Egypt-Mesopotamia relations even in the later fourth millennium, when such contacts are well evidenced in objects and iconographical details. For the Early Dynastic Period and Old Kingdom, evidence for contacts beyond Palestine/Syria is scarce to nonexistent: ibid., 33-48, 51-55, and the same remains true for the Middle

Kingdom: ibid., esp. 87-93 for the areas covered by the execration texts. See also the recent summing up by Joan Aruz, “Art of the First Cities: The Third Millennium B.C. from the Mediterranean to the Indus,” in Art of the First Cities, 7; J. P. Allen, “Egypt and the Near East in the Third Millennium B.C.,” in Art of the First Cities, 251, 253, and P. Collins, “Standing nude female figure with folded arms,” in Art of the First Cities, 252. 55 P. Collins, “Palace,” in Art of the First Cities, 89-92, 156-162. Somewhat astonishing for the non-Near Eastern scholar, however, are the small sizes of the various inlays and inlaid stones. Do we rather see decorations of thrones, throne platforms and other installations? 56 For inlays in transportable objects such as the “standard” and lyres from Ur, see D.P. Hansen, “‘Standard of Ur,’” “‘Great Lyre’ with bull’s head and inlaid front panel,” and “Inlaid panel from front of a lyre,” in Art of the First Cities, 97-100, 105-107. 57 See D. Kessler, “Neferusi,” LÄ 4, 383-385. 58 M. Casanova, “Lapis Lazuli in the Tôd Treasure,” in Aruz, ed., Beyond Babylon, 69.

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need to be reconstructed, even if one might be tempted to bring into the discussion the recently identified Middle Kingdom harbor at the Red Sea coast.59 What we are witnessing in the statuettes and Meir paintings is most probably not a historical situation, but rather a wishful kind of costume display where women—foreign or not—are fitted out according to depictions on very old temple objects.60 The matter becomes reminiscent of that Chinese Mandarin in full regalia who partook, to the wonder of the audience, in the ceremony of opening the Great Exhibition of 1851 by Queen Victoria: the man turned out to be the dressedup captain of a Chinese junk anchored in the London docks for people to visit with paid admission. Nobody, including the Queen, doubted that China might have sent an envoy to the great event who would kow-tow to the queen.61 The tomb of Ukhhotep, son of Senbi, is an extraordinary monument to an Egyptian dignitary’s ambitions and his attempt to soften the impact of a daring visual expression of these ambitions. Around the entry to Ukhhotep’s statue niche, a number of images were placed that must have looked to any ancient Egyptian visitor to the tomb as a virtual coup d’état, an attempt by the nomarch to assume the role of the pharaoh. In the center just above the niche was placed a large-size emblem of the unity of the two lands, flanked by two deities doubtlessly representing Upper and Lower Egypt.62 This is not a loyalist introduction of the pharaoh’s image into a non-royal tomb, according to a custom known at Thebes, where several tombs from the later 11th and early 12th Dynasties onward included an image of the ruling king’s person.63 Ukhhotep is not shown in a deferential attitude in front of the king but is seated at left and right: you did not sit down in the

pharaoh’s presence.64 Further indications that Ukhhotep indeed “arrogated to himself the attributes of royalty,” as Blackman phrases it,65 are furnished by the row of fecundity figures bringing goods that are depicted in the lowest register, inside the offering and statue niche: another representation from the royal repertoire. All these images around the outside of the niche were eventually willfully destroyed and covered with red paint, leading Blackman to conclude: “The inclusion of such scenes in the decoration of the tombchapel of a subject would surely be considered a sufficient reason for their mutilation or destruction.”66 Add to this the Upper and Lower Egypt symbolism that has been introduced into the fishing and fowling scenes and the large ankh amulets (usually reserved for deities and dead kings) carried by the tomb owner on various occasions, and one might not be too far off an explanation why Ukhhotep III was the last known provincial ruler of the nome of Cusae.67 Ukhhotep and his designing artists had, however, made at least an attempt to soften the blow by transposing all the activities depicted in the tomb chamber into the fairyland of the goddess Hathor. Indeed, except for the traditional scenes of the offering ritual inside the statue niche,68 all the actors in the proceedings are women. Women bring and carry the offerings, unload the fish, and catch the birds by drawing the clap-net shut as they, of course, perform the music and dance and attend the performances as spectators.69 Henry Fischer has rightly pointed out the intriguing parallel to this assumption of male roles by women in the likewise Middle Egyptian tale of Sneferu and his female rowers from the Papyrus Westcar.70 But there are also parallels in the 11th Dynasty tomb of Queen Neferu, where women were depicted

59 For general information see Égypte Afrique & Orient 41 (April 2006), passim. 60 Blackman, Meir VI, 19, 21 observed that one can see below the hairdos the women’s natural hair “painted red” at the nape of the neck. This can be verified by the photograph fig. 9A. Was this an indication by the painter that the women in the paintings were “dressed up?” Nothing comparable can be seen in the statuettes. 61 One can follow this story (with pictures) on the Internet under BBC News Magazine, The Great Exhibition and London’s Chinese Junk, and other websites on the Great Exhibition of 1851 as, for instance, www.vam.ac.uk on the large painting by H.C. Selous. 62 Blackman, Meir VI, pl. 13. 63 For the tomb of Mentuhotep II’s treasurer Khety, see: Hayes, Scepter 1, 11-12, erroneously called “stelae.” Face of king illustrated in D. Wildung, ed., Ägypten 2000 v. Chr.: Die Geburt des Individuums (Munich, 2000), 54, no. 4. For the

tomb of Senet, wife of Antefiker, see: N. de G. Davies, The Tomb of Antefoker, Vizier of Sesostris I, and of his Wife, Senet (London, 1920), pl. 16. 64 Note that there is a definite separation between the seated Ukhhotep and the emblems of Hathor on the north wall: Blackman, Meir VI, pl. 19. So, a connection of the goddess with a seated human is avoided. 65 Blackman, Meir VI, 30. 66 Ibid., 31. 67 Ibid., pls. 11, 13, 15, 16, 17, 18. 68 Ibid., pls. 15-17. 69 Ibid., pls. 11-13, 18-19. 70 H.G. Fischer, “Some Iconographic and Literary Comparisons,” in Fragen an die altägyptische Literatur: Studien zum Gedenken an Eberhard Otto, ed. J. Assmann, E. Feucht, and R. Grieshammer (Wiesbaden, 1977), 161-162. For the text, see R. Parkinson, The Tale of Sinuhe and other Ancient Egyptian Poems, 1940-1640 B.C. (Oxford, 1997), 109-112.

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carrying large storage jars, an action also usually performed by men.71 Queen Neferu was a priestess of Hathor, and there can be no doubt that the “female takeover” of the world in her tomb and at Meir has to be understood in association with the cult of that goddess who was, after all, called in a Meir tomb “mistress of all.”72 In the framework of the depiction of a Hathoric world, the emphasis on a foreign character of some of the Ukhhotep women takes on an added meaning. Hathor was not least the goddess of foreign lands, a deity whom, in fact, Egyptians believed to have withdrawn at some occasion—or occasions— into a faraway country from which she had to be cozened to come back to Egypt.73 Consciously or unconsciously, the ancient Egyptians appear to have experienced femininity as a somewhat foreign, at times even threatening, force,74 while they were also deeply aware of its intricate connection with—indeed its crucial role in guaranteeing— the origins of life. This kind of thinking goes far in explaining the myriads of female figurines75

emphasizing sexual parts and very often represented with children on their backs or in their arms.76 Egyptians deposited such figurines at sites in faraway desert places, sites that also were, in many cases, sources of precious materials.77 Productivity and life giving were clearly understood as emanating from a common divine source of mysterious character beyond the grasp of ordinary human beings. It is only natural that such forces were also drawn upon by people furnishing graves. Thus the foreign/female powers incorporated in statuettes like the ones in Edinburgh and Boston could be believed to create new life from death. Let us give these two pieces the benefit of the doubt and assume that they were deposited not as phony costume items, but in good faith, into the tomb. The appearance of the foreign ladies in the tomb of Ukhhotep, on the other hand, although certainly also based on genuine beliefs, exemplifies how such beliefs could be used—then as now—for political purposes.

71 W.K. Simpson, “The Middle Kingdom in Egypt: Some recent Acquisitions,” BMFA 72 (1974), 106-107, figs. 7-8a, b. 72 Allam, Hathorkult, 41. 73 D. Inconnu-Bocquillon, Le mythe de la déesse lointaine à Philae, BdE 132 (Cairo, 2001), with earlier literature. 74 So impressively in the “Hirtengeschichte:” Parkinson, Sinuhe, 287-288. 75 G. Pinch, Votive Offerings to Hathor (Oxford, 1993). 76 In certain faience figures, another version of “foreignness” is expressed by the figures’ character as dwarfs: Dasen, Dwarfs in Ancient Egypt and Greece, 140-141 and passim. Dieter Arnold, The Pyramid Complex of Senwosret I, PMMA 25 (New York, 1992), 78-79, pls. 85-86, nos. 235-237. The latter figures’ garments are strikingly reminiscent of the Edinburgh and Boston statuettes.

77 Geraldine Pinch, Votive Offerings, most importantly: 199-203, types 2 and 3. I am grateful to Marsha Hill for pointing out to me an interesting special type discovered among the female figurines from the Red Sea galena mine sites; see: G. Castel, J.-F. Gout, and G. Soukassian, “Fouilles de Gebel Zeit (Mer Rouge), Première et deuxième campagnes (198283),” ASAE 70, 1984-85, 104, pl. 4, no. 9, and N. Cherpion, ed., 25 ans de découvertes archéologiques sur les chantiers de l’IFAO 1981-2006: exposition au Musée Égyptien, Le Caire (Cairo, 2007), 52, ill. 54, no. JE 98130. In this example, the usual hairstyle of long tresses is topped by a hat-like structure that just might be a reminiscence of the Mesopotamian hairstyle here under consideration.

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recent excavations at the ancient harbor of saww (mersa/wadi gawasis)

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RECENT EXCAVATIONS AT THE ANCIENT HARBOR OF SAWW MERSA/WADI GAWASIS ON THE RED SEA Kathryn A. Bard and Rodolfo Fattovich Boston University and University of Naples “l’Orientale”

In the 1970s, Abdel Monem Sayed (University of Alexandria) identified the remains of a Middle Kingdom harbor, known anciently as Saww, at Mersa/Wadi Gawasis on the Red Sea, about 22 km south of the modern port of Safaga. Sayed found 12 th Dynasty inscriptions there from a shrine of an official of Senwosret I named Ankhu, and an inscribed stela of the king’s vizier Intef-iker (Antefoker).1 The latter text describes ships that were built in Coptos for an expedition to “BiaPunt” with over 3,700 men. Based on these and other finds of Sayed’s, re-investigation of the site by the University of Naples “l’Orientale” (UNO) and Boston University (BU) began in 2001 under the direction of Kathryn Bard and Rodolfo Fattovich. The harbor of Saww was located near the shortest overland route from the Nile Valley in Upper Egypt to the Red Sea, from Qift through Wadi Qena and then Wadi Gasus. Saww was the staging point and harbor for pharaonic seafaring expeditions to regions in the southern Red Sea (Punt and Bia-Punt) to obtain exotic raw materials. The sea route to Punt was an alternative to the river/land routes, and was much less frequently undertaken because of the complexity of the logistics required for such expeditions, and the risky nature of longdistance voyages to and from the southern Red Sea. The rise of the kingdom of Kerma in the late third millennium BC (and its eventual control of the Upper Nile) was probably the major impetus for the organization of seafaring expeditions to Punt in the Middle Kingdom, the period to which most of the excavated material at Mersa/ Wadi Gawasis dates. There may also have been threats on overland routes across the Eastern Desert/Mountains from desert peoples that were belligerent or simply capable of robbing Egyptian expeditions.

1 A.M. Sayed, “Discovery of the Site of the 12th Dynasty Port at Wadi Gawasis on the Red Sea Shore,” RdE 29 (1977), 150-173.

Unlike the 17 large mud-brick forts that were built in Nubia during the 12th Dynasty, there is no evidence of large permanent architecture at Mersa/Wadi Gawasis, and use of the site was temporary—for seafaring expeditions. The main problem for permanent habitation at Saww was a lack of fresh water, which must have been obtained by excavating wells/holes in the wadi. Although the sea could have provided edible protein, and some hunting of (scarce?) desert mammals was possible, emmer wheat and barley for bread and beer, the staples of ancient Egyptian life, could not be grown in the desert environment and had to be brought from the Nile Valley to supply all expeditions. Thus, the difficult environmental conditions, lack of resources, and logistical complexities all mitigated against permanent occupation at Mersa/Wadi Gawasis. Mersa Gawasis is located at the northern end of Wadi Gawasis. Surface remains are found in an area of ca. 14 ha. Archaeological evidence includes temporary shelters on top of a fossil coral terrace (tent circles and light structures with post holes), ceremonial structures along the sea shore, and rock-cut storerooms/man-made caves in the coral terrace. At the foot of the terrace, about 700 m from the shore line, is a large industrial area. After the last seafaring expedition from Saww for which there is evidence, in the early New Kingdom, the western terrace slope became covered with meters of windblown sand, as the site was abandoned and forgotten. Environmental conditions at the site, especially in the caves, have helped preserve unique organic evidence of ship timbers and equipment, and the many supplies needed for these expeditions, and texts from the site provide more specific information about the expeditions. Thus, at Mersa/Wadi Gawasis there is unique and well-preserved archaeological and

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textual evidence for major seafaring expeditions to the southern Red Sea region. The pottery typology and stratigraphic sequence at Mersa/Wadi Gawasis point to three different periods of site use: 1) late Old Kingdom (6th Dynasty, ca. 2345–2181 BC); 2) Middle Kingdom (later 11th, 12th, and 13th Dynasties, ca. 2055–1650 BC); and 3) early New Kingdom (18th Dynasty, ca. 1550–1295 BC).2 Inscribed stelae and ostraca from Mersa/Wadi Gawasis record concentrated use of the site throughout most of the 12th Dynasty, during the reigns of Senwosret I (ca. 1956–1911 BC), Senwosret II (ca. 1877–1870 BC), Senwosret III (ca. 1870–1831 BC), Amenemhat III (ca. 1831–1786 BC), and Amenemhat IV (ca. 1786–1777 BC).3 An inscription from Wadi Gasus, ca. 1 km to the north of Mersa/Wadi Gawasis, recording a seafaring expedition during the reign of Amenemhat II (ca. 1911–1877 BC), suggests use of the site during the reign of this king as well.4 The occurrence of Middle Nubian pottery at Mersa/Wadi Gawasis, in assemblages dating to the early- to mid-second millennium BC, suggests that the harbor was also frequented by peoples of Nubian cultures (perhaps local Eastern Desert peoples), when the Egyptians were there and/or in their absence.5 Egyptian bowls with decorations imitating Nubian motifs also suggest the presence of Medjaw soldiers.6

Archaeological Evidence of Seafaring Expeditions In the Middle Kingdom, the entire site, from the eastern terrace to the western slope and base, was occupied and used. Small ceremonial structures were built along the eastern and southern edges of the terrace, from the sea shore to inland above Wadi Gawasis. Shelters were erected on the top of the terrace in the western sector of the site. 2 C. Perlingieri, “Egyptian ceramics,” in K.A. Bard and R. Fattovich, eds., Harbor of the Pharaohs to the Land of Punt (Napoli, 2007), 110-125. Dates used here are based on the chronology in The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt, ed. I. Shaw (Oxford, 2000), 480-481. 3 R. Pirelli, “Stela 1,” “Stela 2,” “Stela 5”; E. Mahfouz, “Stelae 6, 7, 8,” in Bard and Fattovich, Harbor, 217-225; Fattovich and Bard, eds., “Mersa/Wadi Gawasis 2006-2007,” (http://www.archaeogate.org, 2007); A.M. Sayed, “Wadi Gasus,” in Encyclopedia of the Archaeology of Ancient Egypt, ed. K.A. Bard (London, 1999), 867-868. 4 Sayed, “Wadi Gasus,” 866-867.

Cave 1 (with ceramic evidence from the late Old Kingdom) was reused and large man-made caves (Caves 2-7) were cut in the terrace wall at the top of the western slope, with more intense activity there in the later Middle Kingdom. Production areas were located at the base and along the western slope of the terrace, as well as at the base of the southern slope. Caves 2-7, which were probably carved from a natural rock shelter, provide evidence from the end of several 12th Dynasty seafaring expeditions. Although the ships returning to Mersa/ Wadi Gawasis must have been disassembled in another part of the site (the harbor area?), some large ship timbers were abandoned outside the caves, after they had been pried apart. Other ship timbers were used to construct a ramp to facilitate moving materials into (and out of?) Cave 2, while other timbers were placed in the caves for storage. Possibly some ship timbers were carried back to the Nile Valley. Some timbers were also salvaged by carpenters to remove areas damaged by shipworms, as the large amounts of gribble at the entrances of Caves 2 and 3 demonstrate.7 The two steering oar/rudder blades (fig. 1) that were found at the entrance to Cave 2, lying on top of a deep deposit of windblown sand, which represents a long period of abandonment, were associated with later evidence of early New Kingdom pottery8—and were possibly from the famous seafaring expedition of Queen Hatshepsut’s, described in her mortuary temple at Deir el-Bahri. Wood species of the ship timbers have been identified by Rainer Gerisch as cedar, with some of Nile acacia.9 Excavated tongue tenons and dovetail tenons used to join these timbers were also of Nile acacia.10 Sometime during the 12th Dynasty, a huge amount of rope used for rigging was removed from ships after a voyage, carefully coiled, and left in piles on the floor of Cave 5 (fig. 2). Officers of the expedition must have decided to leave it in this cave, planning to use it on a future expedi5 A. Manzo, “Exotic ceramics,” in Bard and Fattovich, Harbor, 126-130. 6 Ibid.,131-132. 7 C. Ward, “Preliminary analysis of ship timbers,” in Bard and Fattovich, Harbor, 145. 8 C. Zazzaro, “Ship blades,” in Bard and Fattovich, Harbor, 150-153. 9 R. Gerisch, “Ship timber and parts, cargo boxes,” in Bard and Fattovich, Harbor, 185-188; Fattovich and Bard, “Mersa/Wadi Gawasis 2006-2007.” 10 Gerisch, “Ship timber and parts, cargo boxes,” 186-187.


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Fig. 1. Steering oar/rudder blade 2, excavated at the entrance to Cave 2, at Mersa/Wadi Gawawis. Studied by C. Zazzaro in 2005-08.

Fig. 2. Coiled ropes used as ship rigging, lying on the floor of Cave 5.

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kathryn a. bard and rodolfo fattovich occurs on both sides of the southern Red Sea, in Eritrea (mainly near Adulis on the Gulf of Zula) and Yemen.18 Ebony, a tree that grows in what is today eastern Sudan and Eritrea, was identified in the charcoal from the production area. Additionally, a few potsherds excavated at Mersa/Wadi Gawasis are of wares identified as originating in regions of the southern Red Sea, in what are today western and southern Yemen. These exotic sherds may have been brought there by men from these regions who accompanied the Egyptian expeditions. Exotic ceramics associated with Middle Kingdom assemblages at Mersa/Wadi Gawasis are of a ware of the Malayba culture in the region of Aden, which possibly suggests that the Egyptians entered the Gulf of Aden in the early second millennium BC.19 Exotic ceramics associated with New Kingdom ceramics at Mersa/Wadi Gawasis are similar to those from Sabir (Aden region) and Wadi Urq’ (Hodeidah region).20

tion, but the ropes were never reused and remain in Cave 5 today. The large production area (WG 19/25/26/27/44) is located at the base of the western slope, where at least five different types of fire pits and hearths, and many ceramic scrapers, were recorded. The earliest evidence of use of this area dates to the first half of the Middle Kingdom, but most of the area was used in the mid to late Middle Kingdom.11 Also associated with this production area is a lithics workshop, where most of the tools are opportunistically made flake-scrapers.12 An earlier production area was also excavated at the base of the southern slope (WG 10).13 Probably the main activity in WG 19/25/26/27/44 was the production of local ceramics: long cylindrical bread molds that are typical of the Middle Kingdom and large chaff-tempered ceramic platters of uncertain use (possibly for baking flat bread).14 Huge deposits of ash and charcoal are the remains of many fires from multiple use of the area. Charcoal samples examined from this area by Rainer Gerisch are of wood from many different regions: southwest Asia (cedar, pine, and two species of oak), the Nile Valley, and the southern Red Sea region (ebony),15 demonstrating that valuable imported woods were even used in these fires, probably when they were in such small pieces that they could not be used for anything else. Emmer wheat and barley seeds were also identified in the production area.16 These cereals could not be grown at Mersa/Wadi Gawasis and had to have been brought by expeditions from the Nile Valley. Although no large ceramic vats for beer production have been found in the production area, it is likely that bread making at Saww was associated with beer making, as certainly occurred at pharaonic settlements in the Nile Valley. Materials found at Mersa/Wadi Gawasis also provide evidence of what was imported from Punt, including surface finds of obsidian,17 which

To the south of the entrance to Cave 2 are carved niches for small limestone stelae, only a few of which were still found in situ. Some of these stelae may have had inscriptions that were painted on the plastered surface and are now gone. The best preserved of these stelae (Stela 5, fig. 3) was found face down in a deposit of sand beneath its niche. The inscriptions and scene on this stela are complete, with the cartouche of Amenemhat III at the top above an offering scene to Min of Coptos. The main text of this stela is about two expeditions to Punt and Bia-Punt, led by two officials, Nebsu and Amenhotep.21 The inscription provides important historical information, confirming that Saww was the harbor for seafaring expeditions to Punt. That an expedition to Bia-Punt is mentioned on the Mersa/Wadi Gawasis text in association with one to Punt possibly implies that Saww was the starting point for expeditions to both of these

11 C. Perlingieri, “Chronological sequence of the excavation units,” in Bard and Fattovich, Harbor, 120-121. 12 G. Lucarini, “Lithics and grinding stones,” in Bard and Fattovich, Harbor, 211. 13 Bard and Fattovich, Harbor, 50-51. 14 C. Perlingieri, “Evidence of pottery production,” in Bard and Fattovich, Harbor, 107-110. 15 R. Gerisch, “Identification of charcoal and wood,” in Bard and Fattovich, Harbor, 170-185. 16 Fattovich and Bard, “Mersa/Wadi Gawasis 2006-2007.” 17 Lucarini, “Lithics and grinding stones,” 207.

18 A. Manzo, Echanges et contacts le long du Nil et de la Mer Rouge dans l’époque protohistorique (IIIe et IIe millénaires avant J.-C.) (Oxford, 1999), 8. 19 A. Manzo, “Potsherds from the southern Arabian coast,” in Bard and Fattovich, Harbor, 130-131. 20 See B. Vogt and A. Sedov, “The Sabir Culture and Coastal Yemen during the Second Millennium BC—The Present State of Discussion,” Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies 28 (1998), 261-270. 21 Pirelli, “Stelae 1, 2, 5,” in Bard and Fattovich, Harbor, 219-221.

Textual Evidence


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Fig. 3. Stela 5 inscribed with a text about expeditions to Punt and Bia-Punt during the reign of Amenemhat III.

Wadi Gawasis Inscription sur la caisse 02 EM 22/1/06 Fig. 4. Inscription on cargo box 2, with the cartouche of Amenemhat IV, describing the box’s contents: “the wonders of Punt.”

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regions, and that Bia-Punt, the location of which is unknown, may also have been located somewhere in the southern Red Sea region. More historical information is also provided in the inscriptions of Stelae 6 and 8, both of which have damaged texts. In the preserved part of Stela 6 are the five royal names of Amenemhat III and an image of the god Min of Coptos.22 The cartouche of Amenemhat III and the image of Min are also visible on Stela 8.23 These stelae commemorate one or more seafaring expeditions, and the officials who led it or them, during the reign of Amenemhat III. The expeditions(s) probably started out from Coptos, the location of the cult of Min, a deity who was also associated with the Eastern Desert. Of all the preserved scenes and inscriptions on stelae from the area of Cave 2, the most unusual one is on Stela 2. At the bottom of the stela is a carved scene of two seated men facing a huge pile of food offerings in the center. The offerings are not placed on the traditional offering table, but on a mat. Although most of the text is now missing, the beginning of the offering-formula text is still visible.24 This stela is certainly not associated with a tomb at Mersa/Wadi Gawasis, and a shrine for some kind of cult has not been located. Excavations in the area outside of Caves 5 and 6 have uncovered the remains of 43 wooden cargo boxes, on three of which were painted hieroglyphic inscriptions dated to Year 8 of Amenemhat IV.25 These boxes are made of a species of wood (sycomore) found in the Nile Valley and must have been transported to Mersa/Wadi Gawasis for the expedition to Punt. Although the sand deposits within and around the boxes were carefully sieved, there was no trace of what products or materials were brought from Punt in these boxes. The painted inscription on Box 2 describes its contents: in translation, “of wonderful things of Punt” (fig. 4).26 Whatever was imported from Punt in these boxes must have been emptied into other containers (cloth bags?) for easier transport

to the Nile Valley, and the boxes were abandoned in this location. Many broken clay sealings were also excavated in association with the boxes, with two phases of seal use. Sealings from the earlier phase were used for the management of expedition supplies, and were associated with artifacts such as a wooden jar stopper, whereas sealings of the later phase were used for the administrative control of imported goods.27 The later sealings had been placed on the sealed boxes (in Punt?), and the sealings were broken off at Mersa/Wadi Gawasis as the boxes were emptied of their contents. Although most of the sealings do not have writing on them, two sealings have the name of a scribe, Djedy, whose name is also written on Box 2.28

22 Mahfouz, “Stelae 6, 7, 8,” in Bard and Fattovich, Harbor, 221-224. 23 Ibid., 224-225. 24 Pirelli, “Stelae 1, 2, 5,” 217-219. 25 C. Zazzaro and A. Manzo,”Wooden artifacts,” in Bard and Fattovich, Harbor, 165-168; Fattovich and Bard, “Mersa/ Wadi Gawasis 2006-2007.” 26 E. Mahfouz, “Inscribed box,” in Bard and Fattovich, Harbor, 238; Fattovich and Bard, “Mersa/Wadi Gawasis 2006-2007.”

27 A. Manzo and R. Pirelli, “The Sealings from Marsa Gawasis: Preliminary Considerations on the Administration of the Port,” in Festschrift Volume Presented to Prof. Abdel Monem AbdelHaleem Sayed, eds. E. Mahfouz and A. M. Megahed (Alexandria, 2006), 95. 28 A. Manzo and R. Pirelli, “Sealings,” in Bard and Fattovich, Harbor, 232-234. 29 See C. Ward, Sacred and Secular: Ancient Egyptian Ships and Boats (Boston, 2000).

Conclusions The first six field seasons at Mersa/Wadi Gawasis have now provided more information about ancient Egyptian navigation in the Red Sea, and the possible location of Punt. The remains of seafaring ships at Mersa/Wadi Gawasis demonstrate that these ships were built with a more sophisticated technology than the well-known Egyptian boats used on the Nile.29 We also now know that imported wood (cedar) and wood found in the Nile Valley (Nile acacia) were used for their construction. Imported materials and exotic ceramics suggest that Punt was located in the southern Red Sea region. Many questions, of course, remain unanswered, and will be some of the main foci of future investigations at Mersa/Wadi Gawasis. What we think is the harbor area remains to be excavated, and more information is definitely needed about the logistics of seafaring expeditions, construction (and size) of the ships, long-distance trade, and the interaction with local peoples of the Eastern Desert and sea coast.

the wooden shabti of amenemhat in the brooklyn museum

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REUSED OR RESTORED? THE WOODEN SHABTI OF AMENEMHAT IN THE BROOKLYN MUSEUM Edward Bleiberg Brooklyn Museum

The Brooklyn Museum Egyptian collection includes two very fine shabtis of a certain Amenemhat, an official who lived during the 18th Dynasty. In addition to a limestone shabti (fig. 1, Brooklyn 50.128) and a wooden shabti (fig. 2, Brooklyn 50.129), there is a wooden box (figs. 3-6, Brooklyn, 50.130). The Museum purchased these three objects from a New York dealer. They were published together in the auction catalogue of the Mansoor Collection in 1947, the first publication of these objects known to me.1 The catalogue’s author asserts a connection between these objects and Theban Tomb 82, the burial spot for the Scribe of the Counting of the Grain of Amun, Amenemhat, who lived during the reign of Thutmose III.2 This connection was affirmed by John Cooney in a brief article the year following their purchase.3 T.G.H. James echoed Cooney’s opinion on the provenance and date of these objects, though he reduced the likelihood of the connection to the tomb to “probable.”4 In the course of research on these objects for a traveling exhibition in 2007,5 it became clear both that the shabtis and wooden box date to later in the 18th Dynasty than the reign of Thutmose III and that the name Amenemhat, inscribed twice on the wooden shabti, was added in ancient times after the shabti was varnished. The following discussion re-dates these objects to the late 18th Dynasty, examines other possible connections to Theban Tomb 82, and raises questions about the name change made after the initial manufacture of the wooden shabti.

1 Parke-Bernet Galleries, Notable Egyptian Art from the Collection of M.A. Mansoor (New York, 1947), 72, lot no. 300. 2 For the tomb itself, Nina de G. Davies and A. H. Gardiner, The Tomb of Amenemhet (No. 82) (London, 1915). 3 “Equipment for Eternity,” Brooklyn Museum Bulletin 12, no. 2 (Winter 1951), 4, figs 2-3. 4 Corpus of Hieroglyphic Inscriptions in the Brooklyn Museum: From Dynasty I to the end of Dynasty XVIII (Brooklyn, 1974), 81-83.

The Date of the Shabtis and Box At some point after the publication of James’s Corpus, the departmental records in the Brooklyn Museum were altered to date these objects to the “Reign of Thutmose IV to Akhenaten.” Though no explanation was included with the change, it is clear why it was made. The limestone shabti holds a hoe and a basket in each hand. Schneider’s study of shabtis indicates that this feature of shabtis first appeared either in the reign of Thutmose IV or Amenhotep III.6 Moreover, the wooden shabti’s face, with its narrow, almond-shaped eyes, lower inner canthi of the eyes, and a distinctly carved lip line, suggests a date in the reign of Amenhotep III. The shabti-box inscription mentions both Re-Horakhty and the Aten. The spells quoted on it are Schneider’s Aten-formula spells.7 Thus the dates of these three objects seem to cluster in the years between the reigns of Thutmose IV and Akhenaten, a period of roughly 90 years. Therefore, the owner of these objects could not be the same individual for whom Theban Tomb 82 was created. Yet there still might be a connection to the tomb owner’s descendants, as can be seen through their overlapping titles.

Connections to Theban Tomb 82 The two shabtis and the box record Amenemhat’s title nine times. Most often, he is merely “the Scribe, Amenemhat.”8 On the limestone shabti

5 E. Bleiberg, To Live Forever: Egyptian Treasures from the Brooklyn Museum (London, 2008), frontispiece, pp. 16, 92-93. 6 H. Schneider, Shabtis: An Introduction to the History of Ancient Egyptian Funerary Statuettes 1 (Leiden, 1977), 168. 7 Ibid., 289-292. 8 On 50.128 (limestone), line 3; on 50.129 (wood), lines 1 & 3; on 50.130, (box), side C.

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Fig. 1. Shabti of Amenemhat, Thebes, Egypt, New Kingdom, 18th Dynasty, reign of Thutmose IV—reign of Akhenaten, ca. 1400-1336 BC, limestone, painted, 9 5/8 x 3 1/4 in. (24.5 x 8.2 cm), 50.128, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund.

Fig. 2. Shabti of the Scribe Amenemhat, Thebes, Egypt, New Kingdom, 18th Dynasty, reign of Thutmose IV—reign of Akhenaten, ca. 1400-1336 BC, wood, 8 7/16 x 2 1/2 in. (21.5 x 6.3 cm). 50.129, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund.

the wooden shabti of amenemhat in the brooklyn museum he is once called “the Guardian of Amun, Amenemhat,” a title notably absent from Tomb 82. It is striking that the lowest, most general title, “scribe,” is found three out of four times on the two shabtis. The box, however, gives two higher titles in addition to “scribe.” These inscriptions include “Scribe of the Counting of the Grain” twice, and most likely the highest title in his career, “True Chief Scribe of the Counting of the Grain.” It is perhaps no coincidence that the later the likely date of the object, the higher the scribal title the owner bears. It is these last two titles that perhaps link the owner of these objects to the descendants of the original owner of Theban Tomb 82. Amenemhat, owner of Theban Tomb 82, dates his stela in it to Year 28 of Thutmose III. Gardiner suggested that by that year, most of his career was over.9 His highest title was “scribe of the counting of the grain of Amun.” Though the owner of the shabtis and box did not bear exactly the same title, since the name of the god is omitted on the box, the titles are very close. If the shabti/box owner began his activities at the beginning of Amenhotep III’s reign, up to 33 years separate the two Amenemhats’ careers.10 Of course, even more years could separate them, since there is no evidence of when in Amenhotep III’s reign the younger Amenemhat worked. In fact, the true time span between their careers could well be over 60 years, if the shabti/box owner began his career closer to the end of Amenhotep III’s reign, as is likely from the dating of the shabti box. Thus if there is a connection between the two Amenemhats, the younger is likely the grandson or great-grandson of the Amenemhat who lived in the reign of Thutmose III. The first thread connecting them, then, is the similarity of their titles as “Scribe of Counting the Grain.” Since such titles were, in general, inherited from one generation to the next, the younger Amenemhat may have been a descendant of the elder Amenemhat. Speculating further, it is possible that the tomb was in fact a family crypt in the same way that Senedjem’s tomb in Deir el-Medina (Theban Tomb 1) served several generations. One detail of Davies and Gardiner’s site report, and one feature the tomb holds in common with the wooden shabti, might indicate that the shabti/box owner

could have also been buried in Theban Tomb 82. In the excavation of Theban Tomb 82, Gardiner reports that Davies and Mackay found remains of burials of later date. He says that “…bodies and broken coffins and furniture heaped together in wild confusion” in the underground chamber. The excavators also found cones, fragments of canopic jars, a mummified dog, 150 crude, un-inscribed shabtis in grey clay, and a magic brick. Though there is no other record of these later burials, one of them could have been the younger Amenemhat. Moreover, Gardiner also points out that within the tomb, the name “Amun” and the word for “gods” were consistently erased in the upper chamber.11 The same was true of the priest clad in a leopard skin found in six different scenes, presumably the tomb owner’s oldest son, also called Amenemhat.12 He logically connects these facts with actions known to be taken on other major Theban monuments during the Amarna Period. Perhaps the addition of Amenemhat’s name on the wooden shabti and box is actually a restoration that also followed erasures made during the Amarna Period. If so, this would be a unique restoration on a private monument, carefully made in the style of the original inscription. Scholars know little of the impact that the Amarna “revolution” had on individual bureaucrats such as Amenemhat. His very name marked him as a follower of the now-despised god, Amun. If indeed he was a grandson or great-grandson of the Scribe of the Counting of the Grain of Amun, Amenemhat, he then belonged to a family with a long history of association with the god’s estate and temple. Could the name on the shabti have been changed to a more acceptable “Aten” name during Akhenaten’s reign and then changed again when Amun’s temple was restored? There is no trace of the name inscribed on the shabti before the current name was inscribed. Alternatively, the name Amenemhat was perhaps added to this shabti after its original completion and is an example of reuse. The reuse of funerary objects by Theban officials of the middle rank, like Amenemhat, is an often-noted, but little-analyzed, feature of Theban tomb equipment.

9

11

10

12

Davies and Gardiner, Amenemhet, 8. The 24 remaining years of Thutmose III’s reign plus the 9 years of Thutmose IV’s reign would put him at the beginning of Amenhotep III’s reign, 34 years later.

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Davies and Gardiner, Amenemhet, 24-25. Ibid., pls V, X, XIV, XVII, XVIII, XXI.

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Fig. 3. Shabti box of Amenemhat, Thebes, Egypt, New Kingdom, 18th Dynasty, reign of Thutmose IV—reign of Akhenaten, ca. 1400-1336 BC, wood, 12 1/2 x 4 1/8 x 5 in. (31.7 x 10.5 x 12.7 cm), 50.130a-b, front, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund.

Fig. 4. Shabti box of Amenemhat, Thebes, Egypt, New Kingdom, 18th Dynasty, reign of Thutmose IV—reign of Akhenaten, ca. 1400-1336 BC, wood, 12 1/2 x 4 1/8 x 5 in. (31.7 x 10.5 x 12.7 cm), 50.130a-b, back, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund.

the wooden shabti of amenemhat in the brooklyn museum

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Fig. 5. Shabti box of Amenemhat, Thebes, Egypt, New Kingdom, 18th Dynasty, reign of Thutmose IV—reign of Akhenaten, ca. 1400-1336 BC, wood, 12 1/2 x 4 1/8 x 5 in. (31.7 x 10.5 x 12.7 cm), 50.130a-b, proper-right side, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund.

Fig. 6. Shabti box of Amenemhat, Thebes, Egypt, New Kingdom, 18th Dynasty, reign of Thutmose IV—reign of Akhenaten, ca. 1400-1336 BC, wood, 12 1/2 x 4 1/8 x 5 in. (31.7 x 10.5 x 12.7 cm), 50.130a-b, proper-left side, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund.

The shabti itself, made of imported cedar, must have been a relatively expensive object. Almost nothing is known of how a secondary market in reused funerary equipment would have operated. In this case, the name was inscribed carefully in a color and style that matches the hieroglyphs of the whole spell. The preceding raises more questions than I can answer. But it points further research toward two possible directions. The first is to determine

whether it was common for middle-ranking Theban officials who lived before and after the Amarna Period to alter their names and/or funerary equipment to comply with Akhenaten’s religious policy. The second question is how reuse of funerary objects, a common practice, would have worked in reality. I hope that by raising these questions here, I have contributed to the database needed to answer such questions.

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persians and egyptians: cooperation in vandalism?

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PERSIANS AND EGYPTIANS: COOPERATION IN VANDALISM?

Andrey O. Bolshakov Hermitage Museum

Two anthropomorphic sarcophagi of black greywacke flanking the entrance to the Egyptian gallery of the Hermitage Museum are the largest monuments in its Egyptian collection and, at the same time, one of the earliest by the date of acquisition. On the watercolor of 1858 by Constantine Ukhtomski representing the “Room of Egyptian Sculpture” (the first Egyptian gallery in the Hermitage, now Room 129) they occupy the central place.1 The sarcophagi belong to Queen Nekhtbastetru2 and Prince, Overseer of the Army Iahmes3—the wife and the son of the last important king of the 26th Dynasty, Amasis (his other son Psamtik III4 ruled for only a year before the Persian invasion). Discovered in the middle of the nineteenth century at Giza, they were first seen by Karl Richard Lepsius, one of the founders of scientific Egyptology, and reproductions of some of their inscriptions and representations were published in his Denkmäler aus Ægypten and Æethiopien.5 Lepsius related them to the tomb LG 83 located not far from the Great Sphinx,6 but he said nothing about the tomb itself, which would be rather strange if he had excavated it, especially if it had been one of the great shaft-tombs, so time con-

suming for clearance.7 Shortly thereafter, the sarcophagi were bought by the Duke Maximillien of Leuchtenberg and presented to the Hermitage. They were mentioned in the works by Jens Lieblein,8 Auguste Mariette,9 and others,10 but their earliest serious investigator was Wladimir Golénischeff, who gave their first complete description and translation of the texts in the catalogue of the Hermitage collection of 1891.11 Six decades later, they were mentioned in the catalogue of the late stone sarcophagi by Marie-Louise Buhl,12 but she never saw the originals, or at least their photographs, and could use only a description made for her by Militsa Matthiew, the then-Keeper of the collection; as a result, her work, although important in general, adds nothing to our knowledge in this instance. Representations of the deities on the sarcophagus of Iahmes were discussed by Jean Leclant,13 but he used them only as comparative material. It must be admitted that the Hermitage sarcophagi still are not sufficiently used in Late Period studies and require a proper publication. The present paper does not claim to be a detailed study of the sarcophagi in general or at least of their inscriptions—this is a task that can be fulfilled only in a voluminous work—and thus, it is

1 See А. Н. Воронихина, Виды залов Эрмитажа и Зимнего дворца, Ленинград, 1983, табл.13. 2 Hermitage inv. no. дв767. She is mentioned also on the stela Serapeum IM.4053. Her name is spelled normatively (Nxt-bAst.t-r.w, see H. Ranke, Die ägyptischen Personennamen I (Glückstadt, 1935), 210:8) only on the sarcophagus of Iahmes; on her own sarcophagus the spelling with a reduplicated r is used repeatedly. 3 Hermitage inv. no. дв766. 4 According to Herod. III, 10. 5 LD III, 276:f, g, h; LD Text I, 98–99. 6 From the same tomb is said to be a sarcophagus of a certain Tashentihet, her relation to Nekhtbastetru and Iahmes remaining uncertain and the dating of her monument problematic. For some time it stood in the court of the Cairo Medical School, but in the beginning of the twentieth century that practically unpublished sarcophagus disappeared without any trace; see PM III2, 290. 7 Perhaps this made Ch. M. Zivie-Coche (Giza au premier millénaire : autour du temple d’Isis, dame des pyramides

[Boston, 1991], 283) suppose that the tomb was “un simple puits creusé dans le roc.” Only an archaeological exploration of the said terrain can confirm or disprove this idea, but the silence of Lepsius may be explicable also if the tomb had been looted and the sarcophagi removed from it before his time—in this case the burial chamber may not have been investigated by the Prussian expedition (a conjecture proposed by Silke Grallert in a personal talk). 8 J. Lieblein, Die Aegyptischen Denkmäler in St. Petersburg, Helsingfors, Upsala und Copenhagen (Christiania, 1873), 12. 9 A. Mariette, Les mastabas de l’Ancien Empire (Paris, 1889), 554–561. 10 For bibliography see PM III2, 289. 11 W. S. Golénischeff, Ermitage Impérial. Inventaire de la collection égyptienne (n.p., 1891), 94–97. 12 M.-L. Buhl, The Late Egyptian Anthropoid Stone Sarcophagi (Copenhagen, 1959), 197. 13 J. Leclant, “Les génies-gardiens de Montouemhat,” in Древний мир (Москва, 1962), figs. 17–18.

andrey o. bolshakov

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devoted only to a single, although very interesting, aspect of the inscriptions—to their intentional mutilations. They were noticed first by Golénischeff, who supposed that they had been made in the time of the conquest of Egypt by Cambyses;14 his opinion was wholeheartedly shared by Boris Turaev,15 but afterwards it was never evolved or proved. This idea seems quite attractive, but it must be reconsidered on the strength of both a careful analysis of the mutilations and of the modern understanding of the situation in Egypt during the first Persian conquest. All the names and titles of the owners of the sarcophagi are chiseled off, as well as a record of the filiation of Iahmes; the suffix pronouns .s designating Nekhtbastetru are also erased everywhere.16 It should be noticed that the man who mutilated the inscriptions acted according to certain rules that he followed undeviatingly. Let us consider all the cases of mutilation.17

1. Sarcophagus of Nekhtbastetru, right side (fig. 1):

[Hm.t n(j)-sw.t Nxt]-bAst.t-[{r}r-w] nb(.t) jmAx— [King’s Wife Nekht]bastet[ru], lady of reverence. 2. Sarcophagus of Nekhtbastetru, left side (fig. 2): [Hm.t n(j)-sw.t Nxt]-bAst.t-[{r}r-w] nb(.t) jmAx— [King’s Wife Nekht]bastet[ru], lady of reverence. 3. Sarcophagus of Nekhtbastetru, foot side (fig. 3): [Hm.t n(j)-sw.t Nxt]-bAs[t.t-{r}r-w] mAa(.t)-xrw— [King’s Wife Nekht]bas[tetru], true of voice.

Fig. 1. Sarcophagus of Nekhtbastetru, right side. © Hermitage Museum.

Fig. 2. Sarcophagus of Nekhtbastetru, left side. © Hermitage Museum.

Fig. 3. Sarcophagus of Nekhtbastetru, foot side. © Hermitage Museum. 14

Golénischeff, Inventaire, 94. Б. А. Тураев, История Древнего Востока II (Ленинград, 1936), 123–124. 16 The suffix pronoun .f is absent on the sarcophagus of 15

Iahmes; otherwise, if taking into consideration the coherence of the destruction, it would be no doubt erased as well. 17 Only mutilated passages are reproduced in standard hieroglyphs.

persians and egyptians: cooperation in vandalism? 4. Sarcophagus of Nekhtbastetru, lid, col.1–2 (fig. 4):

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5–7. Sarcophagus of Nekhtbastetru, lid, col.3–4 (fig. 5): The suffix pronoun .s is erased three times. 8. Sarcophagus of Iahmes, foot side, right half (fig. 6):

[Hm.t n(j)-sw.t Nxt]-bAst.t-[{r}r-w mAa(.t)-xrw] nb(.t) jmAx— [King’s Wife Nekht]bastet[ru, true of voice], lady of reverence.

Fig. 4. Sarcophagus of Nekhtbastetru, lid, col.1–2. © Hermitage Museum.

(J)s.t-jr(.t) [(j)m(j)]-r(A) [m]S[a] JAH-[ms(.w)] mAa-xrw nb jmAx [ms(j) n Hm.t n(j)-sw.t Nx] t-bAs[t.t-r-w] – Osiris, [Overse]er [of the Ar]m[y] Iah[mes], true of voice, lord of reverence, [born of King’s Wife Nekh]tbas[tetru].

Fig. 5. Sarcophagus of Nekhtbastetru, lid, col. 3–4. © Hermitage Museum.

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Fig. 6. Sarcophagus of Iahmes, foot side, right half. © Hermitage Museum.

Fig. 7. Sarcophagus of Iahmes, foot side, left half. © Hermitage Museum.


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10. Sarcophagus of Iahmes, lid, col. 1 (fig. 8): 9. Sarcophagus of Iahmes, foot side, left half (fig. 7):

(J)s.t-jr(.t) [(j)m(j)-r(A) [m]S[a] JAH-[ms(.w)] mAa-xrw – Osiris, [Overseer of the Ar]m[y] Iah[mes], true of voice.

(J)s.t-jr(.t) [(j)m(j)-r(A) mSa] JAH-[ms(.w)] mAaxrw – Osiris, [Overseer of the Army 18] Iah[mes], true of voice. 11. Sarcophagus of Iahmes, lid, col. 12–13 (fig. 9):

(J)s.t-jr(.t) [(j)m(j)-r(A) mSa] JAH-[ms(.w)] mAaxrw – Osiris, [Overseer of the Arm]y Iah[mes], true of voice.

Fig. 8. Sarcophagus of Iahmes, lid, col. 1. © Hermitage Museum.

18

The word mSa is everywhere determined by four human

; as for the first, its details figures. Three last are no doubt are practically lost, but in cases 9 and 11 a vertical line that must be a feather can be seen over the head, and in case 8 an

The unknown vandal acted very sensibly. He destroyed all the signs belonging to the titles of the owners of the sarcophagi19 and fixed parts of their extended arm with a bow is visible. Thus, in all of the cases, including 10 where the destruction is complete, one must see , and thus, the spelling of mSa is standard everywhere. 19 The filiation of Iahmes in case 8 is essentially equal to

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andrey o. bolshakov the signs used for the elements nxt and rw/rrw are erased, while all the signs, both ideographic and phonetic, belonging to the name Bastet are intact: signs

.20 In case 8, two phonetic corresponding to auxiliary morphemes are

effaced: . Of special interest, however, is case 3, where the most refined method was used: in the name of Bastet, the phonetic and both are completely obliterated, and the legs are damaged: . of Such a maiming of hieroglyphs was in use in the Old Kingdom, when the signs representing living beings had to be rendered harmless in the Pyramid Texts or in the texts of private burial chambers;21 the fact that it was done there at the moment of carving inscriptions, and not by erasing, but by initial depicting of hieroglyphs deprived of some instead of , etc.) does not part(s) (e.g., hide the crux of the problem—the sign had to be present, but the manifestation of the being standing behind it had to be made inactive. Thus, in , which could be case 3, only the ideogram harmed on no account because it corresponds to the morpheme bAs containing the essence of the name Bastet, is undamaged, while the attitude to sign was ambivalent: one both wanted to the destroy it and was terrified to do it. The only possible explanation is that the vandal apprehended

names. Both names are theophorus—“Iah is born” and “Bastet is strong against them”— and the signs of the gods’ names remain intact. The case of the name Iahmes that is spelled with two hieroglyphs is quite obvious—the sign is chiseled off everywhere, while the sign , an ideogram for Iah, is untouched. The name Nekhtbastetru is spelled with several signs of various types, and thus the system of mutilations is more intricate, but nonetheless most consistent as well. In cases 1, 2, and 4

as a part of the triconsonant morpheme bAs and could not remove the hieroglyph completely for fear of Bastet. It should be also noted that, with the exception of case 4, the important epithets nb/nb(.t) jmAx, «lord/ lady of reverence» and mAa/mAa.t xrw, «true of voice» were not erased either.22 Thus, it is obvious that the man responsible for the mutilation of inscriptions was well educated and, when destroying the eternal existence of Iahmes and Nekhtbastetru, he tried at the same time not to conflict with gods. Moreover, he brilliantly understood the consonant-morpheme nature of the Egyptian script that was recognized by modern Egyptology (in the face of Nikolai

a title, and it is also destroyed. Several signs at the edges of inscriptions on his sarcophagus are erased incompletely (cases 8, 9 and especially 11, end of col. 12), but this is only a result of some negligence. 20 Generalized reproduction. 21 This tradition is continued also on First Intermediate Period and Middle Kingdom sarcophagi and, strangely enough, on some First Intermediate Period stelae from

Gebelein—Rizaqat (A. O. Bolshakov, S. G. Quirke, The Middle Kingdom Stelae in the Hermitage, PIREI 3 [Leiden and Paris, 1999], 18–19, comm.C); in the latter cases it was most probably done without understanding of the original idea: stelae belonged to decoration of the cult part of the tomb, where the fear of dangerous creatures was unjustified. 22 With an occasional exception of case 4.

Fig. 9. Sarcophagus of Iahmes, lid, col. 12–13. © Hermitage Museum.


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Petrovsky) only three decades ago.23 Of course, one cannot expect such an Egyptian literacy, such a purely Egyptian apprehension, and such an Egyptian piety from the Persians accustomed to a qualitatively different system of writing (let alone another religion). The inscriptions had to be destroyed by quite a competent Egyptian. The practice of destruction of names and representations existed in Egypt from of old and had two aims: first, the name could be erased for inscribing another one over it in order to usurp a monument; second, it was a method of depriving enemies of their next life (both objects could be purposed simultaneously). The first option may be discarded in the case of Iahmes and Nekhtbastetru, for no new names were written and the tomb perhaps was not reused.24 However, the alternative also causes serious doubts. Since there was an erasure of both the mother’s and son’s names, this action had to be imposed by enmity to them as the closest relatives of Amasis rather than individuals. A certain aversion to Amasis no doubt existed among Egyptians; it could be caused by his being an usurper as well as by his sympathy to Hellenes. It could well be a basis of Herodotus’ image of Amasis as a drunkard and thief;25 the same tradition was kept by Egyptian sources as well. However, this was hardly enough for painstaking activities directed to the persecution of his memory; besides, the Egyptians had practically no time for it: during the short reign of Psamtik III, it is unlikely that the monuments of his father would have been damaged, while the Persian invasion caused numerous new problems, and the persecution of the memory of Amasis would have become irrelevant in a new political situation.

Another possibility is the mutilation of the sarcophagi as a result of vandalism by the Persians. At first sight, it seems probable in the light of Herodotus’ evidence on the outrage of Cambyses, but, if taken unconditionally, such an explanation is also questionable. As we have seen, the conquerors would not have been literate enough to erase the titles and names so ably. Moreover, the information on the Persian invasion and the villainy of Cambyses in Egypt is known mainly from Greek sources and is considered with a good deal of skepticism nowadays as a reflection of the Greek anti-Persian literary tradition. Indeed, if Herodotus, the first who wrote on the subject, tells only about executions of the nobility and the son of Psamtik III,26 the abuse of the mummy of Amasis,27 and the murder of Apis,28 the assortment of misdeeds is widened by the later authors. Strabo mentions mass destruction of temples29 that turns into committing them to the flames in Diodorus.30 This obviously is a purely literary development of the plot that took the course of the introduction of new vivid details and that was permanently recharged by the hatred of Greeks against Persians; Egyptian sources, archaeological ones included, seem to contain no records of such destruction.31 However, on the other hand, even such a pro-Persian figure as Udjahorresent calls some events of the reign of Cambyses “very great disorder 32 that happened in the whole land, the like of which had not happened in this land.”33 Perhaps one must draw a distinction between the early, relatively quiet period after the conquest of Egypt when Udjahorresent composed a pharaonic titulary for Cambyses and “let him know the greatness of Sais,” while the latter restored the cult in the temple of Neith, and the period after an

23 Н. С. Петровский, Звуковые знаки египетского письма как система (Москва, 1978). 24 If only the burial of Tashentihet was not intrusive, which is hardly possible, for the insertion of an enormous sarcophagus would require a radical modification of the structure of the tomb. 25 Herod. II, 173–174. 26 Herod. III, 14. 27 Herod. III, 16. 28 Herod. III, 27–29. 29 Strabo XVII, 1, 27. 30 Diod. I, 46, 4. 31 G. Burkard, “Literarische Tradition und historische Realität. Die persische Eroberung Ägyptens am Beispiel Elephantine,” ZÄS 121 (1994), 93–106; ZÄS 122 (1995), 31–37. 32 The word nSn(j) used by Udjahorresent has a general negative semantics opposite as a whole to that of Htp. One of its particular manifestations is “illness” (Wb. II, 341:5). The

words “time of illness” (rk n mn(.t)) were used in the Instruction for Merykare (142, W.S. Golénischeff, Les papyrus hiératiques № 1115, 1116 A et 1116 B de l’Ermitage Impérial à St.-Pétersbourg [St. Pétersbourg, 1913], pl. 14) as a term for the troubled years of the First Intermediate Period, while in the Prophecy of Neferti (38, 54) mn(.t) appeared in the same context (ibid., pls. 24, 25). Mn.t was also applied to the reign of Akhenaten in the Restoration inscription of Tutankhamun (Urk. IV, 2026). On the meaning of the “time of illness” see now an exemplary analysis by Demidchik, А.Е.Демидчик, Безымянная пирамида. Государственная доктрина древнеегипетской Гераклеопольской монархии (Санкт-Петербург, 2005), passim, especially pp. 44–49. It seems that a certain continuity existed in the description of social disorder as a disease. 33 Statue Vatican 158, ll. 33–34, G. Posener, La première domination perse en Égypte : receuil d’inscriptions hiéroglyphiques, BdÉ 11 (Cairo, 1936), 18–19.

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Fig. 10. Sarcophagus of Nekhtbastetru, lid, col. 2 (detail). © Hermitage Museum.

Fig. 11. Sarcophagus of Nekhtbastetru, left side (detail). © Hermitage Museum.

Fig. 12. Sarcophagus of Nekhtbastetru, right side (detail). © Hermitage Museum.


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unsuccessful Ethiopian campaign of Cambyses and the attempt of revolt undertaken by Psamtik III.34 The end of the sojourn of Cambyses in Egypt may be the time of the “very great disorder/illness,” and theoretically the mutilations of some monuments of Amasis35 and his relatives may be dated back to it. Thus, we are at a deadlock. Egyptians had knowledge to erase the right signs, but they evidently had neither a motive nor an opportunity to do it; as for the Persians, they might have had both a reason and a possibility to mutilate, but not the ability to mutilate in such an Egyptian manner. However, minus by minus is plus not only in mathematics. It is probable that the mutilation of the sarcophagi was made by order of Cambyses but under the supervision of a welleducated Egyptian. He could not help taking down dictation, but he did everything to avoid a sacrilege. If the tradition of Herodotus has a realistic kernel, our sarcophagi could be damaged only in such a way. This assumption is confirmed by the fact that, although the mutilations were made very carefully, not a single sign was chiseled completely, and the contours or the deepest lines of all the erased hieroglyphs are quite distinguishable for a trained eye (figs. 10–12). It is difficult to imagine that the masters did not cut another millimeter deeper into stone by pure accident: first, the already fulfilled destructive work had been much more substantial than the required last exertion;

second, a permanent fortuity is already a regularity. It looks very much as if the unknown collaborator did his best to pay Peter without robbing Paul. The Persians got the desired destruction of the monuments (to those who do not know hieroglyphs the damaged signs seem completely erased, especially in the darkness of a tomb), but in actual fact their object was not gained and all the names remained existing in eternity. The same meaning has the intact state of the epithets “lord/ lady of reverence” and “true of voice” describing Nekhtbastetru and Iahmes as the beings who had attained eternal existence. This reconstruction appears rather convincing, although it cannot be formally proven. First, the Egyptian policy of Cambyses still requires a serious study of the sources and all the i’s will be dotted only in a rather distant future. Second, the described situation is most probable if both sarcophagi existed under Cambyses, i.e., if both Nekhtbastetru and Iahmes did not outlive Amasis for more than a year or two. Unfortunately, we know almost nothing about them, and the argumentation can be only very indirect: the number of monuments under the Persians was reduced dramatically, and one can hardly expect an appearance of such luxurious sarcophagi at that time, especially if taking into account their adherence to the Saite traditions.36 Only a discovery of some new data on the wife and son of Amasis can change the state of affairs radically.37

34 On Cambyses in Egypt see A. Klasens, “Egypte onder Perzen en Grieken-Romeinen. Cambyses en Egypte,” JEOL 10 (1944/48), 339–349. 35 H. De Meulenaere, “La famille du roi Amasis,” JEA 54 (1968), 184, n. 3. 36 H. Sternberg-el Hotabi (“Politische und sozio-ökonomische Strukturen im perserzeitlichen Ägypten: neue Perspektiven,” ZÄS 127 [2000], 153–167) recently suggested that the Persian Period had not been such a hole in a history of Egyptian monuments as it is usually considered and it may be filled with the monuments traditionally dated both to previous and later times. If her idea is correct, no speculations on what features are and are not characteristic of the

monuments of the Persian time will be possible until the total revision of the heritage of the 26th and 30th Dynasties is completed. 37 However, even if it turns out that they died much later than Amasis, this will not be decisive counter-evidence. Since the tomb with all its equipment had to be created in the lifetime of the owner(s), the sarcophagi of people who died, say, under Darius, could have existed and have been mutilated under Cambyses. This possibility is vanishingly small because the inscriptions probably would have been restored after the time of excesses, but it is a good illustration of the difficulties we encounter as soon as we turn from general regularities to concrete details of the lives of ancient Egyptians.

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the great pyramid: the internal ramp theory

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THE GREAT PYRAMID: THE INTERNAL RAMP THEORY Bob Brier C.W. Post Campus of Long Island University

Introduction My involvement with the internal ramp theory is due to Jack Josephson, so I am delighted to be able to contribute this article to his Festschrift. Most of us think of Jack as an art historian, but he also has an engineering degree, and this is primarily an engineering story. As is well known, the Great Pyramid of Giza is the only member of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World that remains intact. Serious study of the Great Pyramid began in the seventeenth century, when the Oxford astronomer, John Greaves, visited the pyramid and in 1638 published the first book devoted to it.1 Greaves, like so many other earlier investigators, believed the Egyptians had advanced knowledge of all kinds of things and encoded this knowledge into the dimensions of the pyramid. During his visit to the pyramid, he took what he believed to be precise measurements (they were considerably off) and discovered the well-like chamber at the base of the Grand Gallery. Greaves’s publication stirred others to visit the pyramid, but the next important discovery was made more than a century later. In 1765 Nathaniel Davison noticed a three-foot hole at the top of the Grand Gallery. When he climbed through it, he discovered the first relieving chamber above the King’s Chamber. He did not, however, realize that there were four other relieving chambers higher up. The next discovery inside the pyramid came in 1835, when Captain G. B. Caviglia cleared both the descending passageway and the well discovered by Greaves and found that they connect. It is now generally agreed that the “well” was dug to provide air for the workers excavating the descending passageway. Colonel Howard Vyse conducted extensive explorations in and around

1

J. Greaves, Pyramidographia (London, 1646). H. Vyse, The Pyramids of Gizeh, 3 vols. (London, 1842). 2

the Great Pyramid from 1836-40, making the most important discoveries of the nineteenth century. Finding a crack in Davison’s relieving chamber, he blasted above it and discovered more relieving chambers that he named: Wellington’s Chamber, Lady Arbuthnot’s Chamber, and Campbell’s Chamber. In these relieving chambers, Vyse also found the now-famous graffiti associating Khufu with the pyramid. Also of great importance, he discovered beneath the rubble at the base of the pyramid two of the original casing stones and was thus able to determine for the first time the exact angle of the pyramid’s sides.2 Probably the most eccentric of the nineteenthcentury investigators was Piazzi Smyth, the Astronomer Royal of Scotland, who believed that the pyramid was basically a Christian monument whose measurements contained Biblical revelations.3 In spite of his extreme religious beliefs, Smyth was also a capable scientist and in 1864 conducted the most detailed survey of the pyramid up to that time. He even invented a miniature eight-inch camera so he could photograph in the smallest of crevices. Smyth’s expedition was a remarkable combination of exacting science and delusion. When he first published his findings in 1867, they were universally rejected by the scientific community as the rantings of a religious fanatic. Still, his theory of revelations built into the Great Pyramid did not die easily, and the next surveyor of the Great Pyramid, Flinders Petrie, became interested only because his father was a believer. Petrie’s father, a mechanical engineer, had read Piazzi Smyth’s book and became infatuated with the Great Pyramid and Smyth’s idea of divine inspiration. Young Petrie grew up hearing about his father’s plans to do a proper survey. For twenty years the father procrastinated, and in the

3 C. P. Smyth, Our Inheritance in the Great Pyramid (London, 1880).

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meantime, Flinders became a proficient surveyor and conducted the first careful documentation of Stonehenge. In November of 1880, following in the footsteps of Smyth, 26-year-old Flinders Petrie embarked for Egypt accompanied by crates of scientific instruments. Using a theodolite and a telescope, Petrie used the surveyor’s system of triangulation to take thousands of measurements all over the Giza Plateau. To ensure accuracy, he sometimes took the same measurement a dozen times. Inside the pyramid, he used a plumb line to determine the vertical and measured the walls at various heights to detect if there were even the tiniest of construction errors. Petrie was amazed at the precision of the Great Pyramid’s construction, and his measurements and observations4 are, until today, the basis of many discussions of the pyramid’s dimensions. Usually level headed, Petrie got carried away when he measured the granite sarcophagus inside the burial chamber. Because granite is so hard, and because the sarcophagus was so finely crafted, Petrie concluded that the ancients had drills and saws embedded with diamonds. Still, his survey is the foundation of much of the later work on the pyramid.

The Crane Theory There are two basic theories of how nearly two million blocks of stone averaging two and onehalf tons were raised during the construction of the Great Pyramid: cranes and ramps. The crane theory has its origins with Herodotus, who mentions that levers were used to raise the blocks.5 When this theory is discussed, something like the modern Egyptian shadouf is usually imagined. New Kingdom tomb paintings show farmers using shadoufs, so we know they were used in ancient Egypt, at least during the New Kingdom, and quite possibly in the Old Kingdom. However, there are several problems with the crane theory. It suggests that hundreds of these cranes were positioned at various levels of the pyramid to lift the blocks. One problem with this is that a tremendous amount of timber would have been needed for these cranes, and Egypt simply didn’t have forests to provide the wood. Large timbers

4 W.M.F. Petrie, The Pyramids and Temples of Gizeh (London, 1883). 5 Herodotus, History (Cambridge, 1990), Book II, 125.

for shipbuilding were imported from Lebanon, but this was a very expensive enterprise, so importing enough wood for hundreds of cranes would have been impractical. An even greater problem for the crane theory is that there would not have been adequate room on the pyramid to place all these cranes. The size of the pyramid’s blocks tend to decrease in size towards the top; towards the surface of the pyramid sometimes there is only 18 inches of standing room, certainly not enough space for a crane large enough to lift a two-ton stone. So the crane theory can’t adequately explain how the blocks were raised, and this takes us to the ramp theory.

The Ramp Theory Diodorus of Sicily, writing three hundred years after Herodotus, said, “The construction was effected by means of mounds,” which is almost certainly a reference to ramps.6 Although Diodorus never suggested what the ramps might have looked like, Egyptologists have speculated about this for years. One version of this ramp theory is that a ramp was built on one side of the pyramid and as the pyramid grew, the ramp was raised so that throughout construction, blocks could be moved up the ramp all the way to the top (fig. 1). The ramp could have a maximum slope of eight percent, as this is about the limit for men hauling heavy blocks. With an eight-percent slope for the ramp and a height of approximately 480 feet for the pyramid, the ramp would stretch for approximately one mile. Although such a ramp is easy to imagine, there are three basic problems with this theory: 1) A mile-long ramp would have approximately the same volume as the Great Pyramid itself, nearly doubling the time needed to build the pyramid. Also, when the three sides of the pyramid that did not have the ramp were completed, then the ramp would have had to be dismantled, and finally, only after the ramp was dismantled could the face it rested against be completed. This too would add years to the project. 2) The pyramid is on a plateau, and it is not clear where one could put a mile-long ramp. 3) The remains of such a huge ramp have never been found. It is inconceivable that something almost as large as the Great

6 Diodorus Siculus, Library of History (Cambridge, 1968), Book I, 63. 4-9.


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Fig. 1. The single ramp theory. Photograph courtesy of Dassault Systèmes.

Pyramid could have been dismantled and moved so far away that it did not leave clear traces. For these three reasons, it seems unlikely that a single ramp was used to raise the blocks.

The Corkscrew Ramp Theory Because the straight ramp theory doesn’t seem to work, several experts have described a different kind of ramp.7 This approach suggests that a ramp corkscrewed up the outside of the pyramid, much the way a mountain road spirals upwards (fig. 2). The ramp would still have to be eight percent or less, and a mile long, but we have a place to put it—on the pyramid—and this also explains why the remains of a ramp has never been found; it was part of the pyramid. However, the corkscrew ramp theory also has a serious flaw. With a ramp corkscrewing up the outside of the pyramid, the 7

M. Lehner, The Complete Pyramids (London, 1997), 215-216.

four corners couldn’t be completed till the final stages of construction. The pyramid’s builders had to take constant measurements of the angles at the corners to ensure that they were constant as the pyramid rose. If they were off by an inch at the bottom, the pyramid’s edges would be off by yards at the top and would not meet in a point. In his definitive work, Building in Egypt, Dieter Arnold comments, “During the whole construction period, the pyramid trunk would have been completely buried under the ramps. The surveyors could therefore not have used the four corners, edges, and foot line of the pyramid for their calculations. Furthermore, at a certain height the sides of the pyramid would no longer be wide enough to provide a ramp from one corner to the next.”8 From this consideration, we can see that the corkscrew ramp theory also does not seem practical. Although almost every writer on the pyramids realizes that the crane theory and both versions 8

D. Arnold, Building in Egypt (Oxford, 1991), 100.

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Fig. 2. The corkscrew ramp theory. Photograph courtesy of Dassault Systèmes.

of the ramp theory are seriously flawed, few have ventured to offer a reasonable alternative. The best attempt is by Arnold, who suggests that a single frontal ramp could have been used for the lower portion of the pyramid’s construction (such a smaller ramp would not have had to be a mile long), and then several smaller ramps branched off throughout the pyramid.9 Arnold is not completely happy with this theory, but it is the best theory offered so far.

The Internal Ramp Theory The purpose of this paper is to present a new theory that overcomes many of the problems encountered with the theories discussed above. I must emphasize that this theory is not mine in any way. I only became involved in its development because Jack Josephson suggested that its

9

Ibid., 101.

originator, Jean-Pierre Houdin, contact me. Since that initial contact in 2003, my role has been minimal—providing Egyptological background and trying to facilitate the testing of the theory at the site. It will be helpful to understand how the theory arose and how it developed. Houdin is an architect, but his father, Henri, an engineer, was the first to suggest that the blocks at the top of the Great Pyramid might have been brought up via an interior ramp that remains hidden inside the pyramid today. The architect son realized that many of the details suggested by his father were impractical and soon began refining the theory. It would be reasonable to assume that Jean-Pierre Houdin was able to develop his theory “because he was standing on the shoulders of giants,” but this is not really the case. The theory did not develop directly out of the work of others. One reason he has been able to see farther than those before him is that he has made


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Fig. 3. The internal ramp. Photograph courtesy of Dassault Systèmes.

extensive use of computer software unavailable to earlier researchers. Using programs designed by Dassault Systems for architects, Houdin spent five years building the most detailed 3-D models of the interior and exterior of the Great Pyramid ever created. These models enabled him to visualize and project the pyramid in three dimensions as no other researcher had ever imagined.10 Houdin’s theory suggests that for the bottom third of the pyramid, the blocks were hauled up a straight, external ramp. This ramp was far shorter than one needed to reach the top, and was made of limestone blocks slightly smaller than those used to build the bottom third of the pyramid. As the bottom of the pyramid was being built via the external ramp, a second ramp, inside the pyramid, was being built, on which the blocks for the top two-thirds of the pyramid would be hauled. This internal ramp begins at the bottom of the pyramid, is about six feet wide, and has a slope of approximately seven percent. The ramp was put into use after the lower third of the pyramid was completed and the external ramp had served its purpose. Not all the upper blocks, however, could be brought up through the internal ramp. 10 J.-P. and H. Houdin, La Pyramide de Kheops (Paris, 2003).

Huge granite slabs were needed for the roof beams of the King’s Chamber and the relieving chambers above it. Some of these beams weigh more than 60 tons and are far too large to have been brought up through an internal ramp, so the external ramp had to remain in use until these huge blocks were hauled up it. Once that was done, the external ramp was dismantled and the blocks it was composed of were brought up the pyramid via the internal ramp to the top twothirds of the pyramid. Thus the top two-thirds of the pyramid were built out of the ramp. Most of the blocks in the upper portion of the pyramid are smaller than in the bottom third, because they had to be brought up through the internal ramp, where space was limited. Several considerations went into the design of the internal ramp. First, its position had to be selected precisely so that it would not intersect with any of the pyramid’s internal chambers or passageways (fig. 3). Second, men hauling heavy blocks of stone up a narrow passageway can’t turn a 90-degree corner easily; they need a place ahead of the block to stand and pull. The internal ramp had to provide a means of turning its

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Fig. 4. Notches at the corners were left open to help turn the blocks with simple cranes. Photograph courtesy of Dassault Systèmes.

corners; consequently, the ramp had openings at the corners, where a simple crane could turn the blocks (fig. 4). I have presented Houdin’s internal ramp theory in a highly simplified manner because I do not want this paper to be too long. Other aspects of the theory include the function of the Grand Gallery, determining when the roof beams of the King’s Chamber cracked, and even when the pyramid’s facing stones were set in place. The purpose of this paper is only to discuss the question of how the blocks could have been raised for the construction of the Great Pyramid. The internal ramp theory avoids the pitfalls of the earlier theories, but it is just theory, it shows the blocks could have been raised in this manner, not that they were raised in this manner. As with any theory it is reasonable to ask, is there any empirical evidence to support it? The answer is “yes.” One bit of evidence is what appears to be one of the ramp’s corner notches used for turning the blocks. Two-thirds up the northeast edge, precisely where Houdin’s theory predicts there should be one, is a notch (fig. 5). Furthermore, in

1986 a member of a French team that was surveying the pyramid reported seeing a desert fox entering the pyramid through a hole next to the notch, suggesting that there is an open area behind the notch, perhaps the ramp. It seems improbable that the fox climbed more than halfway up the pyramid; more likely there is some undetected crevice toward the bottom where the fox entered the ramp and then made its way up the ramp and exited at the notch. It would be interesting to attach a telemetric device to a fox, send him into the hole, and monitor his movements. The notch is suggestive, but there is another bit of evidence supplied by the French team that is far more compelling. When the French team surveyed the Great Pyramid, they used microgravimetry, a technique that enabled them to measure the density of different sections of the pyramid, in order to detect hidden chambers. None were discovered, and this seems to contradict Houdin’s theory that there is an internal ramp inside. Shouldn’t the French have detected it? In 2000 Jean-Pierre Houdin’s father was presenting an early version of the internal ramp theory at a scientific conference,


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Fig. 5. Possible remains of a notch visible today. Photograph by Pat Remler.

and one of the members of the French team was present. He mentioned to Henri Houdin that the computer analysis of all their data did yield one curious image, something they couldn’t interpret. That image showed what Houdin’s theory predicted—a ramp spiraling up through the pyramid (fig. 6). The computer printout of what appears to be the internal ramp is very encouraging. It is important to note that the printout was obtained more than a decade before the internal ramp theory was formulated. In Philosophy of Science it is generally agreed that when evidence for supporting a theory is obtained before or without knowledge of the theory, it is considered stronger than if obtained with knowledge of the theory—no biases could have been involved in the gathering of the data, experimenter fraud can be ruled out, etc., etc. The spiral printout seems to be such a case.

Fig. 6. The French team’s microgravemetric image of what appears to be an internal ramp. Photograph courtesy of Fondation EDF.

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In spite of these encouraging findings, the internal ramp theory is far from proven, and more evidence is needed. Such evidence could be provided by any of several noninvasive tests conducted at the side of the pyramid. Another microgravimetics test designed specifically to detect the ramp is possible. In addition, such methods as sonar,

ground-penetrating radar, and infrared photography could also confirm the existence of an internal ramp inside the pyramid. As of this writing, a proposal for a noninvasive survey of the Great Pyramid has been submitted and we are optimistic that the Supreme Council of Antiquities will grant that request.

amenhotep iii’s legacy in the temple of mut

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AMENHOTEP III’S LEGACY IN THE TEMPLE OF MUT Betsy M. Bryan Johns Hopkins University

Jack Josephson is an art historian and a connoisseur of Egyptian artisanship whose many discussions of Ptolemaic and other periods of art speak for themselves. His love of the field and his constancy in supporting Egyptology inspire all who know him. I am honored to be able to submit this small article to celebrate his contributions to the study of ancient Egypt. Although the statue I focus on is perhaps not the best-preserved example of royal sculpture, its condition is at least partly a result of its ancient usage. A survey of that long and somewhat enigmatic history will, I hope, serve as a sincere tribute to Jack by adding to our understanding of the reuse of earlier monuments. Any visitor to the precinct of Mut is familiar with two large figures in the Second Court of the Mut Temple: the oversized statue of Sekhmet wearing a diadem of uraei on the west side of the court, and the seated figure of a king on the east (fig. 1). Both were found prone by the Benson and Gourlay expedition and restored as we see them today. The royal statue is the subject of the discussion below. It will be argued that its original subject was Amenhotep III, that it was altered and reinscribed in the Ramesside era, and was then changed again, most probably in the 21st Dynasty. Benson and Gourlay’s vivid prose describing work in the 1896 season includes a description of finding the royal statue in question:

until the whole thing is free. We must in such a case too work carefully and slowly, and it seemed long before all was uncovered and we turned over the upper part of a king’s figure. The arms were broken off above the elbow; the face was scarred, but not too much to exhibit a physiognomy of the most pleasing character. We then searched further to the east—the direction from which the figure had fallen—and found the lower part of the statue. Very little was actually missing, so that we were able subsequently to mend and set it up in the temple. The statue, with its pedestal, is about 8 feet high. The one fact which proved disappointing was that there was no certain evidence of date. A friend called our attention to the fact that an oval mark on the shoulder showed that a cartouche had been chiseled out, and a broad band of roughened granite up the back of the seat witnessed to the erasure of an inscription.1

Description and Identification of the Seated Royal Statue 1. General Description, Damage, and Erasures

We had hardly passed the gateway [the Second Pylon] when we struck on what appeared to be part of a large sphere of granite, and while we were still wondering what this could be we found an edge and two rounded projections and suddenly perceived it to be the back of the rounded wig kings wear, with the king’s shoulders beneath it. It tries the patience of an excavator to work slowly at a statue which is lying flat on its face, so that the most important point cannot be determined

The granodiorite image has an overall height of 2.5 meters2 (fig. 2). The height from bottom of the foot to the hairline is 2.10 meters, and the socle height is .20 meters. The king is seated on a throne, wearing the nemes headdress and shendyt kilt, broad collar, and bracelets. There is a belt with zigzag pattern, but no central buckle oval. The surface is rubbed and consequently obscured in that area, indicating that an erasure likely took place. The king’s hands are open, palm-down on the lap, in a gesture of acceptance. The properright arm was broken above the elbow, although the hand remains on the lap. The left arm had been broken in antiquity and was repaired (fig. 3). The carefully finished surface from shoulder

1 PM II 2, 259; M. Benson and J. Gourlay, with P. Newberry, The Temple of Mut in Asher (London, 1899), 38-39; 208, pl. XV; plan, no. 15.

2 Perhaps originally 2.6 m (equivalent to 5 cubits). The socle, now .20 m, is highly degraded, and .30 m is not unusual for Amenhotep-era statues.

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Fig. 1. Second Court of the Mut Temple with statues of Sekhmet and the king on the west and east sides.

to elbow indicates the repair. The break runs vertically through the remains of a cartouche carved on the proper-left shoulder. The replacement element was narrow and vertical and shaped to complete the shoulder and elbow; its midsection was a thick slot that formed the locking mechanism. A similar, but not identical, repair may be found on the Metropolitan Museum of Art statue of Amenhotep III, usurped for Merenptah, 22.5.2.3 Another repair may be seen on the Luxor Temple striding statue of Amenhotep III.4 The date of the Mut Temple statue’s repair is uncertain. The statue is particularly damaged on its proper right. On that side, the eye and mouth are both damaged, as was the arm, as already noted. The main break had been through the waist level, but the proper-right side of the throne was more heavily cracked and consequently restored by the Benson and Gourlay team. The break was also larger at the rear than in front, and there is heavy cement on the back pillar. The socle stone is degraded, and the feet are poorly preserved.

The king is seated on a throne that shows the partially erased remains of a “color bar” framing the seat on both right and left (fig. 4). The front bar, running vertically on the proper left, is well cut in straight lines on the bottom half of the seat, but is sloppily incised in the top part. When viewed from the front of the statue, the properleft side of the throne seat is not square, but tapers inward from bottom to top. The area within the bars is highly roughened and was erased, and in view of the tapering, the upper portion was more deeply cut away than the bottom, necessitating the re-incision of the bars on the top half of the seat. It is not possible to see any inscription or decoration within the color-bar area. The proper right may show this same pattern, but it is more damaged. The rear of the statue similarly shows that a lengthy inscription was erased from the narrower upper throne back and the entire area of the seat (fig. 5). The breadth of the inscription was that of the smaller upper pillar and did not widen in the seat area below. So far, the only certain glyph

3 W.C. Hayes, The Scepter of Egypt, Part 2: The Hyksos Period and New Kingdom (New York, 1959), 234-235, fig. 140. Cf. the repair of the ear of Cleveland 52.513, as discussed by Bryan in: A.P. Kozloff and B.M. Bryan, Egypt’s Dazzling Sun: Amenhotep III and his World (Cleveland, 1992), 166-167

and n. 2. See more recently, L. Berman, Catalogue of Egyptian Art: The Cleveland Museum of Art (Cleveland, 1999), 222224, who speculates that the ears were replaced at the time of manufacture due to weakness in the stone. 4 Luxor Museum J. 131.


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Fig. 2. Frontal view of the granodiorite royal statue in the Fig. 3. Proper-left side of royal statue showing ancient repair to Second Court of the Mut Temple. arm.

traces that have been recovered from the back pillar represent the tops of two cartouches with sun disks as the first element. Other circular signs appear, in twos at several locations on the pillar, one set being larger than the others. It is tempting to see these as the “city” sign. Both shoulders show erasure patterns where cartouches had identified a ruler’s name (fig. 6). That on the proper-right shoulder now shows a lighter, rougher oval, but the surface has been somewhat smoothed. On the left shoulder, part of the cartouche ring is still visible, but the erasure marks are as well. The mark of the latter covers a small part of the broad collar, but it is otherwise 5 One possibility is that it was an adjustment to the statue’s temple location at some time in its use. Another explanation

rather neatly placed. An unusual detail of the statue is the presence of two somewhat regular cuts on the lower rear corners of the throne. That on the proper right is larger than on the left, but the areas both were smoothed over after the cuts were made. It remains unclear when and for what purpose these alterations were made.5 2. Identification of the Original Subject by Iconography and Style The general statue type, throne shape, and physical features are reminiscent of Amenhotep III, but there is no remaining inscription, and there are is that stone from these cuts was used to create the proper-left arm’s repair patch.

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Fig. 4. Proper-left side of throne showing erasure of color bars and internal decoration.

Fig. 5. Rear of statue showing erasure of inscription.

Fig. 6. Neck and shoulder of royal figure showing erased cartouches and necklace area.

amenhotep iii’s legacy in the temple of mut many crudely carved details and rough areas that suggest the statue was reworked after its original creation.6 Since there are a number of seated granodiorite figures of Amenhotep III, it is possible to compare them with regard to their proportions, in order to strengthen an identification with that ruler. Such proportions have been shown to have been date sensitive.7 1. Height of the figure from bottom of foot to hairline is 2.1 m (equivalent of 4 cubits), representing 14 grid squares. 2. Height of the throne, bottom of foot to top of seat is .82 m, equivalent to 5.46 grid squares. 3. Depth of the throne is .70 m, representing 4.66 squares. 4. Height of the knees is .93/.95 m, representing 6.2-6.33 grid squares. 5. Width of the shoulders (estimated from one complete half) is .85 m, representing 5.66 grid squares. 6. Width of the breast is .48 m, equivalent to 3.2 grid squares. 7. Width of the waist (narrowest point) is .35 m, equivalent to 2.33 grid squares. 8. Height of back at belt top is equivalent to 8.56 grid squares. 9. Height of back at shoulder is equivalent to 12.0 grid squares. The statue with proportions closest to this one is Metropolitan Museum of Art 22.5.2,8 to which the name of Merenptah was added without reworking of the sculpture. It shows the following hypothetical grid proportions: seat height: 5.2, seat depth 4.2, knee height 6.3, shoulder width 5.5, breast width 3.4, waist width 2.3, height of back 8.4, and shoulder height 11.9. In comparing these hypothetical grid square numbers with those from sampled statues, the proportions suggest Amenhotep III as the likely original model for the Mut Second

6 Benson and Gourlay identified the king as Tutankhamun, pl. XV facing p. 208. 7 Bryan in Egypt’s Dazzling Sun, Appendix, table 1, pp. 461-63, for seated statues, with comparisons to Hatshepsut, Thutmose III, Thutmose IV, Tutankhamun, and Rameses II. 8 H. Sourouzian, Les monuments du roi Merenptah (Mainz, 1989), 159 and 162, where she notes that the statue has not been re-carved. 9 Bryan, in Egypt’s Dazzling Sun, p. 148, Appendix, table 1, 462. For the lengthened leg on Ramesside figures, see G. Robins, Proportion and Style in Ancient Egyptian Art (Austin, 1994), chapters 6 and 7. 10 The workshop distinctions between the granitic and

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Court royal statue, particularly based on the seat dimensions, which routinely showed thrones approximately one grid square higher than they were deep, in contrast to those carved earlier, which were either squared or even deeper than tall. The one-square difference in height to depth is found on many later New Kingdom examples, but these are also taller than the Amenhotep III thrones and accommodated the lengthened legs for Ramesside figures.9 It is not the proportions alone that suggest Amenhotep III as the original owner of this statue, but a variety of iconographic details, including one that is highly supportive. A bull’s tail is carved in raised relief between the king’s legs, and above it is a flat rectangle carved in raised relief, the lower border of which is the line of the top of the seat (fig. 7). It was apparently intended as a negative space but also modestly prevented focus beneath the king’s kilt. The same treatment may be seen on the British Museum statues EA 4 and 5, the granodiorite figures of Amenhotep III from his mortuary temple at Kom el-Hettan, and on the Metropolitan Museum of Art seated images, 22.5.1-2 (fig. 8). Bulls’ tails were a consistent feature of Amenhotep III’s statues, both striding and seated, but the small rectangular tab above the tail characterizes only those in the granitic stones.10 Seated figures of other rulers do not display this specific detail. Frequently, they were carved to show the bulls’ tails extending up to the shendyt kilt.11 This small feature of the raised relief above the tail appears thus far to be unique to the royal statuary of Amenhotep III, and it is also seen on the Louvre statue A20, shown to have been recarved for Rameses II from a figure of Amenhotep III.12 From the proportions and this tiny detail, the probability that the Mut Temple statue originally represented Amenhotep III is nearly certain.

sedimentary-stone sculpture were first laid out by Bryan in Egypt’s Dazzling Sun, Chapter 5. The seated colossal limestone group in Cairo, number 610, shows the tail extending all the way up to the kilt. 11 For example, on statues of Thutmose IV (CG 42080) and Amenemhat III (GM 284) the tail continues. On JE 49537 and JE 39260, both of Thutmose III, the tail terminates below the shendyt, but not at the line of the seat, and the negative space in both cases is recessed, rather than in raised relief. See, for example, Z. Hawass and A. De Luca, The Illustrated Guide to the Egyptian Museum in Cairo (Cairo, 2001). 12 Kozloff, in Egypt’s Dazzling Sun, pl. XIV, p. 189, and catalogue entry 14, pp. 172-74.

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Fig. 7. Lower half of statue showing carved rectangle beneath kilt.

3. Original and Retouched Features The overall shape of the face is slightly rounded, with fleshy cheeks nearly devoid of bone structure (fig. 9). This shape is characteristic of Amenhotep III’s portraits and can be favorably compared with his visage on such statues as the colossal head from Kom el-Hettan, Luxor J 133. Likewise such soft fleshiness may be seen on the images of Amenhotep III in quartzite, such as British Museum EA 6 and 7.13 The mouth, although damaged, clearly shows a lip-line around the rim, as did virtually every royal portrait of Amenhotep III. Nothing suggests that the mouth was altered, as was the case with Louvre A20.14 The nose is preserved in outline only but shows no evidence of having been narrowed or changed at its bridge—a feature seen, for example, on the Osiride of Thutmose IV recarved for Rameses II and now part of the Luxor Museum.15 The earring holes in the ears and two incised lines on the neck were presumably added at the time of the Ramesside reworking. In contrast to the polished and well-modeled cheek, nose, and mouth areas, the eyes of the 13

Color plates in Egypt’s Dazzling Sun, pp. 121-124; 185-

187. 14

Kozloff, in Egypt’s Dazzling Sun, 172-74. The Luxor Museum of Ancient Art: Catalogue, no. 224, p. 147, figs. 118-119. 15

Fig. 8. British Museum EA4 of Amenhotep III showing carved rectangle beneath kilt.

Mut statue show a roughly finished surface in the eyelid areas that betray the mark of reworking. In a close-up view, the polished and precise outline of the proper-left eyebrow appears distinctively different from the irregular and shallow cosmetic banding of the eye beneath. The eye type here is what Bernard Bothmer referred to as “banded,” and it includes cosmetic lines on the upper lids that are etched in a hieroglyphic style extending toward the nemes tabs.16 Although the eyes 16 B.V. Bothmer, “Eyes and Iconography in the Splendid Century: King Amenhotep III and His Aftermath,” in The Art of Amenhotep III: Art Historical Analysis, ed. L. Berman (Cleveland, 1990), 84-92.


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Fig. 9. Face of royal figure, Mut Temple Second Court.

of Amenhotep III’s statues were carved to show cosmetic lines of various shapes, they nonetheless were consistently almond shaped and obliquely set. In addition, the king’s eye was always carved on a lid that swelled in a convex shape between lid and brow17 (fig. 10). It was this feature that was changed on the Mut Temple sculpture. The original eyes of the Mut Temple statue were cut back vertically between the banded eye and the brow to render a hollowed, or concave-shaped, eyelid—a style introduced with Amenhotep IV and that also characterized the portraits of Ramesside rulers. In addition, it was characteristic of Amenhotep III eyeballs to have bulged at the top beyond the line of the lid, and to then have receded beneath the center of the eyeball (see fig. 10). From the front view, this gives the impression of a downward gaze, and Amenhotep III had portraits with various degrees of vertical angling. 17

Bryan, Egypt’s Dazzling Sun, 144. This is unvarying for the sculpture of Amenhotep III, unless one dates works in the “Gurob” style to the lifetime of the king. For this author, Amenhotep IV’s reign commences the representation of a concave eyelid. 18 This has been documented by study of the angle of Amenhotep III’s statuary in comparison with reworked examples. See Bryan, Egypt’s Dazzling Sun, 144, 157 with a drawing showing the angle, and the Appendix with the measurements of vertical angles of the eyeballs. 19 CG 607, JE 31414, a statue of Merenptah from his mortuary temple. PM II 2, 448; M. Saleh and H. Sourouzian, The Egyptian Museum Cairo: Official Catalogue (Mainz, 1987), no. 211; See also CG 601 from Medinet Habu, but which could depict Rameses II rather than Merenptah. C. Ziegler, ed., The Pharaohs (Milan, 2002), 66, 438, cat. no. 125, entry by A. Mahmoud. For Merenptah’s reuse of statuary, see Sourouzian, Monuments du roi Merenptah, 170-172, for this statue,

Fig. 10. Cleveland Museum of Art CMA 52.513 showing convex lid and eyeball carved to create downward stare.

The larger the statue, the greater the vertical angle was cut. 18 Here the eyes have been cut to eliminate any angle in the eyeball, although the eye sockets themselves are in the same general position as before recarving (fig. 11). Similar treatment of the eyelids and eyeballs is seen on a granodiorite statue of Merenptah in the Egyptian Museum (CG 607), certainly also taken over from Amenhotep III. Hourig Sourouzian has persuasively argued that this recarved image resulted in a true portrait type for Merenptah, although the same approach to reworking eyes also occurred on works reused for Rameses II.19 especially 171, regarding the reuse of Amenhotep III’s images. Sourouzian notes that CG 607 has been entirely changed to express the true portrait of Merenptah. That seems true to me as well, and in contrast to the situation with the Mut Temple king. For examples of Rameses II with similar eye treatment, see Vienna ÄS 5770, a greywacke statue of a deity, with inscribed back pillar and the beginning of Rameses II’s prenomen: E. Rogge, Statuen des Neuen Reiches und der Dritten Zwischenzeit (Vienna, 1987), 76-83.The close-up of the face (and the back pillar) shows the areas of roughening and also the lip-line of the Amenhotep III version. The remains of a second area of eyelid is visible on p. 83. See also Walters 22.107, a reworked head in the blue crown, which Sourouzian also discusses, Monuments du roi Merenptah, 170-171. B. Bryan, “A ‘New’ Statue of Amenhotep III and the meaning of the Khepresh Crown,” in Archaeology and Art of Ancient Egypt: Studies in honor of David O’Connor, ed. Z. Hawass and J. Richards (Cairo, 2007), 154-156, figs. 7-8.

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Fig. 11. Profile of face of Mut Temple royal statue showing recut eye lid and socket.

Although the Mut Temple statue shows recarving in several locations other than the eyes, most retouching does not suggest that the statue was remodeled. In addition to the eyes, the nemes borders and tabs, as well as the beard straps, have been redefined, although not relocated (see fig. 11). There is no clear indication that the stripes of the headdress were changed. The belt has been adjusted across the front, and perhaps on more than one occasion. As mentioned earlier, the front of the belt was erased, such that now the surface is smooth to the touch but shows no remains of the original oval (fig. 12). The zigzag pattern on the belt is carefully incised in fifteen small lines on the proper right and left of the statue, but it is crudely incised on the front, where there are only five sloppy and large zigzags. The contrast with the sides of the belt strongly indicates that the redefinition was in concert with changes to the front oval and not part of a remodeling of the figure. Unlike the situation with Louvre A20, where the belt width and decorative motif were changed, here the belt width was unaltered, and only the number of zigzags differs. The necklace area at first appearance looks as if it was retouched, but on closer observation, it is original. The rows of rectangular and teardrop beads are regular and well cut, but on the proper left of the statue the spaces between beads has been smoothed, while on the proper right they are rough. This is consistent for the entire necklace

Fig. 12. Detail of belt area, Mut Temple royal statue.


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The Mut Temple statue was fashioned as an image of King Amenhotep III in the later 18th Dynasty. It originally was inscribed on the back pillar and perhaps on the belt’s buckle, which now shows a roughened surface. Other seated granodiorite figures of that king might carry inscriptions on their back pillars, on the throne front next to the king’s legs, and on the belt fronts. However, there was no consistency, and some were inscribed at all three locations, some on one or two, and some were not inscribed all. Thus the Mut Temple statue, having had texts on the rear and the belt, was entirely consistent with other Amenhotep III seated sculpture. The statue originally had no cartouches on the shoulders, although two were added when the piece was retouched for a later king.21 Indeed, no original statue of Amenhotep III bore cartouches on the body—whether abdomen, arms, or shoulders. Rather, the addition of a king’s cartouches on royal statues began after the Amarna era, and it was a common feature of both reused and original statuary of Rameses II, Merenptah, and other Ramesside rulers. Sometimes these statues were otherwise retouched, as here, but often not.22 Four statues of Amenhotep III have added body

cartouches naming Merenptah.23 None bears a body cartouche with another name, despite significant numbers of Amenhotep’s statues having been reused and reinscribed on socles, back pillars, thrones, and belt buckles, particularly for Rameses II and III. This fact would certainly favor Merenptah as the king whose name was within the added body cartouches on the Mut Temple statue. However, these cartouches were erased later when the statue was once again reused. The thrones of Amenhotep III’s seated figures were decorated with either the union of the plants of Upper and Lower Egypt carved within a rectangle, or the Nile gods tying plants together.24 The throne decoration on the Mut Temple statue cannot be determined due to complete erasure within the color bars. The imprecise lines of the bars on the top half of the throne signal that these were recarved, but the erasure pattern covers these as well. We may thus conclude that here also, two periods of reuse are in evidence. The Amenhotep III statue, Louvre A20, reused by Rameses II, was recut on the throne sides by shaving back only the surface defined within color bars, and incising inscriptions. The throne sides on Metropolitan Museum of Art 22.5.1 and 22.5.2, reused for Merenptah, were shaved back on the entire decorated surfaces, including the color bars—which were then re-incised. This would have been the same method used on the Mut Temple statue during its first reuse. An arm repair on the proper-left arm of the Mut Temple statue is another feature that may be paralleled by comparison with other reused Amenhotep III sculptures. Metropolitan Museum of Art 22.5.1 and Luxor Museum J 131, both found in the Luxor Temple, had arm repairs using similar tenon-type patches, and both were also reused for Merenptah.25 It should be considered a possibility that the Ramesside reuses occasioned repairs to these three statues, and it might be worth com-

20 See, for example, the rough-surfaced broad collar on a Cairo torso of the king: Bryan, “A ‘New’ Statue.” Compare the quartzite Luxor Temple cachette statue with a broad, rough area that could have received metal sheeting. 21 Non-royal statues were carved with body cartouches of the reigning king from the mid-18th Dynasty onward in a similar, but not identical, approach to statue identification. Facial reworking of non-royal statues was apparently rare, and the addition of a later ruler’s cartouche rarer still. 22 CG 42096 of Horemheb was an early example. From the large temples of Luxor, Karnak, Medinet Habu, Memphis, Tanis, etc., statues in museums and still in situ display added cartouches on shoulders and chests. E.g., R.A. Schwaller de Lubicz, The Temples of Karnak (London, 1999), passim. Thutmoside colossi before the north flanks of the Seventh

Pylon carry the original features of the 18th Dynasty kings, but the cartouches on shoulders are of Rameses IV: ibid., plate 363. See also R. Freed, Ramesses the Great (Memphis, 1987), 16, 123 for two additional examples with the names of Merenptah. For a list of examples where the king added his name and may or may not have removed that of the earlier king, see W. Helck, “Usurpierung,” LÄ 6, 905-906, n. 7. 23 Sourouzian, Monuments du roi Merenptah, 159ff. ; three from the Luxor Temple (MMA 22.5.1 and 22.5.2) and one in situ (Freed, Ramesses the Great, 16). 24 For the former, British Museum EA 4 and 5; for the latter, Cairo JE 37640 and the so-called “Memnon colossi.” 25 Do. Arnold, The Royal Women of Amarna: Images of Beauty from Ancient Egypt (New York, 1996), 63, fig. 57; L. Berman, Catalogue of Egyptian Art, 224 and n. 6. Both

and therefore must be a relic of the original statue production, when sculptors worked the two sides of the statue separately. It is clear in detail views of the statue. A line of roughened surface beneath the broad collar may suggest that the jewelry area was at some time pigmented or even gilded, but the internal details of the necklace are unretouched. The roughened line does not appear on original statues of Amenhotep III that wear the broad collar, but roughly finished necklace areas did often contrast with the polished body parts.20

Reconstructing the History of the Statue in the Mut Temple

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paring the stone patches microscopically to determine whether they are similar. Several points of comparison suggest that the Ramesside reuse of the Mut Temple statue took place in the reign of Merenptah. The facial changes, body cartouches, throne-side reuse, and the arm repairs are all found on statues of Amenhotep III reused for Merenptah, but are not found on his sculptures reused by other kings. The final reuse of the Mut Temple statue remains far more elusive to determine. Several elements point, however, to the 21st Dynasty and perhaps to Pinudjem I as the ruler in question. First, there are two other Amenhotep III statue adoptions from the reign of Pinudjem I in the Mut Temple—a Sekhmet statue with an added back-pillar inscription of Queen Henettawy that mentions the work of King Pinudjem in Karnak, and the recently found statue of Queen Tiye with a back-pillar inscription for Queen Henettawy.26 In these cases, there was no reworking, and the name of Amenhotep III was left intact. The second reuse of the Mut Temple royal statue attempted to remove the evidence of the Ramesside retouching by erasing the body cartouches, belt inscription, and throne and back-pillar texts. The rough surfaces on the throne and back pillar suggest that the finish was accomplished in plaster and paint;

the deepened chisel marks around the necklace suggest likewise. Pinudjem and Henettawy’s work in the Khonsu Temple and Karnak stressed their associations with Amun-Re and Mut and their issue, Khonsu.27 The interest of both rulers in the Mut Temple would thus have continued this association. Further, the inscription added by Henettawy on the rear of the Queen Tiye statue listed her formal titles, but further privileged her consort role to the king in a manner paralleling Mut’s relation to Amun-Re.28 The find place of the Tiye and Henettawy statue was near the royal figure, in the porch of the temple. It was placed there in the Roman Period during a final renovation of the porch. The original height of the queen sculpture, 2.5 meters,29 is identical to that of the king statue, and it is quite possible that they were fashioned as a pair, perhaps to be displayed in concert with the similarly proportioned large Sekhmet statues, also in the Second Court. Although it must remain a speculation, the attempt to remove the Ramesside changes to the king figure may have signaled Pinudjem’s and Henettawy’s adoption of these statues, with an acknowledgment of their original association with Amenhotep III and Tiye.

consider that the repair on the Metropolitan Museum statue was original to the reign of Amenhotep III. 26 The Sekhmet, PM II2, 257 [6]; Benson and Gourlay, The Temple of Mut in Asher, 29-30, 245. The Queen statue, B.M. Bryan, “A Newly Discovered Statue of a Queen from the Reign of Amenhotep III,” in Servant of Mut: Studies in Honor of Richard A. Fazzini, ed. S. D’Auria (Leiden and Boston, 2007), 32-43.

27 S.-A. Naguib, Le clergé féminin d’Amon thébain à la 21e dynastie (Leuven, 1990), 218-221. 28 Bryan, “A Newly Discovered Statue,” 43: “She is summoned, entering and going forward because of the greatness of her love for the king. She is one great of terror, one sacred of dew/fragrance, the uraeus who guards Horus.” 29 Ibid.

eine statue des königs dewen aus abydos?

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EINE STATUE DES KÖNIGS DEWEN AUS ABYDOS?1 Günter Dreyer Deutsches Archäologisches Institut, Kairo

Rundplastik der 1. Dynastie ist nur in sehr wenigen, durchweg fragmentarischen Exemplaren belegt.2 Ein besonders interessantes Stück, eine Holzmaske, befindet sich im Museum of Fine Arts Boston (Inv. Nr. 60.1181). Diese Maske ist bereits 1967 ausführlich von William Stevenson Smith veröffentlicht worden nachdem sie 1960 auf sein Betreiben als Geschenk von J.J. Klejman in das Museum gelangt war.3 Vordem befand sie sich in der Sammlung von Madeleine Rousseau, die sie von einem Mitglied der Familie Amélineau erworben haben soll.4 W. St. Smith hat die Maske als Teil einer Kompositstatue erklärt und mit einem Holzfragment aus Petries Grabung am Grab des Dewen in Abydos in Verbindung gebracht, das mit Haarlocken reliefiert ist und offensichtlich ebenfalls von einer Kompositstatue stammt. Dementsprechend hat er eine Datierung der Maske in die 1. Dynastie vorgeschlagen. Im Vergleich mit verschiedenen Darstellungen kommt er zu der Ansicht, daß sie zu der Statue eines unterworfenen Feindes gehörte. Seither hat die Maske erstaunlich wenig Beachtung gefunden. Der Fund eines weiteren kleinen Haarlockenfragmentes und neue Erkenntnisse zum Grab des Dewen bei den Nachuntersuchungen des DAI bieten Anlaß, noch einmal darauf einzugehen. Die aus vier Fragmenten zusammengesetzte Holzmaske zeigt das Gesicht eines bärtigen Mannes mit dem vorderen Abschnitt seiner bis in die Stirn reichenden Haartracht sowie die Kinnpartie bis zum Halsansatz (Abb. 1a). Die Augenhöhlen sind für Einlagen aus anderem Material

offen ausgeführt. Die Rückseite ist ausgehöhlt und innen nur grob bearbeitet (Abb. 1b). Bis auf einen kleinen originalen Abschnitt beim Halsansatz mit gerade geschnittener Kante ist die Maske am Rand allseitig unregelmäßig abgebrochen.5 Die erhaltene Höhe beträgt 16,3 cm, die max. Breite 9,7 cm, die Tiefe in Kinnhöhe etwa 6 cm, am Rand ist das Holz ca. 0,6-0,8 cm dick. Womöglich schon bei der Auffindung bzw. bei späteren Restaurierungen ist das Holz mit Wachs stabilisiert worden. Ausbrüche an der linken Schläfe und rechts vom Kinn sowie einige kleinere Fehlstellen sind mit Wachs aufgefüllt. Die Maske ist als schmales Oval gebildet, wobei das Gesicht vom Kinn her gesehen einen fast parabelförmigen Umriß aufweist. Der erhaltene Abschnitt der Haartracht reicht weit bis in die Stirn und besteht aus drei Reihen nach vorn ausgerichteter, schmaler Haarsträhnen. Absätze zwischen den Reihen deuten an, daß sie sich überlappen. Jeweils 5-6 schräge Kerben sollen wohl anzeigen, daß sie in sich gewunden waren. Von der Stirn ist nur schmaler Streifen sichtbar. Darin ist der Umriß der Augenbrauen (für Einlagen aus anderem Material) flach eingekerbt. Sie setzen gerundet in einer Höhe mit den inneren Augenwinkeln an und verlaufen zu den Schläfen hin in kaum abnehmender Stärke etwas abwärts. An den breit mandelförmigen Augenhöhlen sind die oberen Augenlider nach innen hin deutlich breiter werdend bis weit unter die Nasenwurzel heruntergezogen modelliert, sodaß die Augen – auch gegenüber den Brauen – betont schräg gestellt erscheinen.

1 Für Jack Josephson in dankbarer Erinnerung an viele lebhafte Diskussionen bei manch gutem Glas Wein. 2 Basen von zwei Holzstatuen in Saqqara Grab 3505, W.B. Emery, Great Tombs of the First Dynasty III (London, 1958), 13, pl. 27; Fragment einer Holzfigur aus Abydos (Ashmolean Museum Oxford E 1525), W.M.F. Petrie, Royal Tombs of the Earliest Dynasties II, MEEF 21 (London, 1901), pl. XII. 2. 3 W.S. Smith, “Two Archaic Egyptian Sculptures,” BMFA 65 (1967), Nr. 340, S. 70ff. Für die Erlaubnis die Maske im Oktober 2007 genauer

anzusehen und auch Detailphotos anzufertigen, danke ich Rita Freed. 4 So Smith, a.a.O., Anm. 1. Dagegen wird von M. Rousseau, Introduction à la connaissance de l’art présent (Paris, 1953), 122 zu Fig. 140 wohl irrtümlich angegeben “... trouvé à Abydos (Fouilles Petrie).” Das Stück wird weder von Amélineau noch von Petrie erwähnt, eine Herkunft aus den Grabungen von Amélineau ist aber wesentlich plausibler. 5 Ursprünglich dürfte der Rand in Verlängerung der noch erhaltenen gerade abgeschnittenen Kante in einer vertikalen Ebene verlaufen sein.

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Abb. 1a-b. Holzmaske, Boston 60.1181. Face from a composite statue, Egyptian, Early Dynastic Period, Dynasty 1, 2960–2770 B.C. Findspot: Egypt, Probably Abydos. Wood, height x width (max): 16.3 x 9.7 cm (6 7/16 x 3 13/16 in.). Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Gift of J. J. Klejman, 60.1181. Photograph ©2009, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

Die schmale, lange Nase mit kaum ausgeprägten “Nasenflügeln” und leicht ausgehöhlten Nasenlöchern ist im Profil deutlich gebogen, der Eindruck einer “Adlernase” wird allerdings durch Abrieb an der Nasenspitze verstärkt (Abb. 2). In der besser erhaltenen linken Gesichtshälfte ist noch zu erkennen, daß die Wangenknochen (Jochbeine) verhältnismäßig tief, etwa in Höhe der Nasenflügel modelliert waren. Der Mund sitzt etwa mittig zwischen Nase und dem pointierten Kinn und ist dem schmalen Untergesicht entsprechend klein aber mit vollen Lippen ausgeführt. Die Mundwinkel sind in einem verhaltenen Lächeln leicht hochgezogen. Der Vollbart ist in engen Reihen kleiner hakenförmiger Locken flach reliefiert, die jeweils durch drei parallele Ritzlinien gezeichnet sind. Der Backenbart mit drei Lockenreihen teilt sich um den Mund in je zwei Reihen auf der Oberlippe und dem Kinn. Auf der Unterseite des Kinns verlaufen vier Lockenreihen, die durch den glatten, ca. 1,5 cm breiten Streifen des Halsansatzes begrenzt werden (Abb. 3). Insgesamt wirkt

das Gesicht leicht überlängt6 aber ausgezeichnet proportioniert und macht in seiner detaillierten Modellierung trotz der fehlenden Augeneinlagen einen sehr lebendigen Eindruck. Aufgrund der zu geringen Größe (etwa 2/3 Lebensgröße) ist auszuschließen, daß es sich um eine Maske im eigentlichen Sinne handelt, die bei Kulthandlungen vor das Gesicht gehalten wurde. Wie schon W. St. Smith feststellte, spricht gegen eine Verwendung als Maske auch die Ausführung mit der den Halsansatz einschließenden Kinnpartie. Smith folgend ist danach anzunehmen, daß die Maske Teil einer aus verschiedenen Stücken zusammengesetzten Kompositstatue war.7 6 Diese leichte Überlängung ist auch an vielen spätvordynastischen Stücken zu beobachten, z.B. einem Elfenbeinkopf aus der ‚main deposit’ von Hierakonpolis (Ashm. E 542), siehe T. Philipps, Hrsg., Afrika—Die Kunst eines Kontinents (Berlin, 1996), 68. 7 Allerdings stellt sich die Frage, warum sie ausgehöhlt und nicht wie z.B. spätere Sargmasken massiv angefertigt worden ist. Eine denkbare Erklärung wäre, daß damit die Augen von der Rückseite her so eingesetzt werden konnten, daß sie nicht herausfallen konnten.


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Abb. 3. Holzmaske, Boston 60.1181, Unterseite (Photograph ©2009, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston).

Abb. 2. Holzmaske, Boston 60.1181, Profil (Photograph ©2009, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston).

Abb. 4. Jahrestäfelchen Abydos K 2554 (Photo F. Barthel).

Das Holzfragment mit Haarlockenrelief aus Petries Grabung,8 auf das Smith verweist, befindet sich jetzt im Ashmolean Museum Oxford (Inv. Nr. E 1129).9 Es besteht aus weichem, fasrigen, hellbraunem Holz (erh. L. 8,1 cm, erh. B. 5,0 cm, D. ca. 0,4-0,7cm) und ist bis auf die annähernd horizontale originale Unterkante unregelmäßig abgebrochen (Abb. 5a-b links). Dunkle Verfärbungen am oberen Bruchrand lassen aber vermuten, daß das Stück unmittelbar darüber endete, zumal sich dort im rechten Abschnitt zwei kleine senkrechte Dübellöcher befinden. Die leicht konvexe Vorderseite ist mit 8 Haarsträhnen reliefiert, die jeweils in einer nach rechts eingerollten Locke enden.

Wie bei der Holzmaske weisen die Haarsträhnen in unterschiedlicher Höhe 4 bzw. 5 kleine Einkerbungen auf, womit – trotz größerer Abstände – sicher auch hier angezeigt werden soll, daß die Haarsträhnen gewunden sind.10 Auffälligerweise ist aber nicht die gesamte Fläche reliefiert: Die Haarsträhnen setzen erst ca. 2-2,5 cm unterhalb der Oberkante mit einem deutlichen Absatz an, der Abschnitt darüber ist etwas unregelmäßig geglättet und die Dicke nimmt nach oben hin auf nur 0,4 cm ab. Sehr wahrscheinlich überlappte hier ein weiteres flaches Holzstück mit Relief, das mit dem unteren Stück verdübelt war.

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Petrie, Royal Tombs II, pl. XL.92. Für die freundliche Genehmigung, das Fragment im August 2007 anzusehen und Digitalaufnahmen anzufertigen danke ich H. Whitehouse. 10 Vgl. die in großer Anzahl in der “main deposit” von Hierakonpolis gefundenen Haarsträhnen-Perlen aus Fayence, die von einer (oder mehreren) großen Statue(n) stammen dürften, J.E. Quibell, Hierakonpolis I, ERA 4 9

(London, 1900), 8, pl. XXIV.1.3. In ähnlichen Haarsträhnen endet auch die Perücke / Haartracht der weiblichen Statuette München ÄS 4234, A. Grimm und S. Schoske, Am Beginn der Zeit, Schriften aus der Ägyptischen Sammlung 9 (München, 2000), Nr. 43. 11 W.M.F. Petrie, Royal Tombs of the First Dynasty I, MEEF 18 (London, 1900), pl. XII,12-13, XVII.30; s.a. U. Rummel, Hrsg., Begegnung mit der Vergangenheit: 100

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Abb. 5a-b. Holzfragmente, Ashmolean E 1129 + Abydos K 5193 (Photos G. Dreyer).

Abb. 7. Grab des Dewen, Königskammer und Annex mit Statuenbasis (Photo D. Johannes).

Abb. 6. Würfelstab des Qa’a, Kairo JE 34386 (Photo P. Windszus).

Abb. 8. Rekonstruktion der Statuenkammer (Zeichnung N. Hampikian).


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Direkt unterhalb der Locken befindet sich ein schmaler Streifen mit Bohrlöchern, die augenscheinlich so zwischen den Lockenenden angebracht worden sind, daß sie kaum sichtbar waren. Die Rückseite des Fragmentes ist flach ausgeführt und weist allenthalben dunkelbraune Leimreste auf, die in Höhe der Durchbohrungen zum Teil wulstig verkrustet sind. Offenbar ist hier beim Verleimen mit einem anderen Holzteil überschüssiges Bindemittel ausgetreten. Ein weiteres Fragment dieser Haartracht kam 1993 beim Aussieben von Schutt südlich des Grabes des Dewen zutage (Abydos K 5193). Erhalten ist auf dem kleinen allseitig abgebrochen Holzstück (erh. H. 2,3 cm, erh. B. 1,0 cm, D. 0,5 cm) nur das Ende einer Haarsträhne mit eingerollter Locke (Abb. 5a-b rechts). Die Rückseite ist flach und weist ebenfalls Leimspuren auf. Diese Fragmente aus dem Grab des Dewen belegen auf jeden Fall, daß es in der 1. Dynastie tatsächlich Kompositstatuen gab, bei denen verschiedene Teilstücke vermutlich mit einem Holzkern verdübelt und verleimt waren. Für die Haartracht führt Smith einen Würfelstab aus dem Grab des Qa’a11 an, der einen gefesselten bärtigen Asiaten zeigt, dessen Haarsträhnen bis auf die Schulter reichen (Abb. 6). Wenngleich nicht nachgewiesen werden kann, daß Maske und Haarlockenfragment zu der gleichen Statue gehörten, hält Smith es zumindest für wahrscheinlich, daß die Maske von einer Statue mit ähnlicher Haartracht stammt.12 In Vergleichen mit weiteren Darstellungen von besiegten Feinden, insbesondere dem bärtigen Mann auf der Narmerpalette vermutet er, daß es sich dabei um die Figur eines wohl hockenden Gefangenen oder unterworfenen Feindes handelte.13 Bei dieser die Zuweisung geht Smith noch davon aus, daß in den frühen Königsgräbern keine Königsstatuen aufgestellt waren: “... it does not seem to have been the custom to place statues of the king in the underground chambers of the tomb, ... ”14 Außerdem verweist er darauf, daß der König und seine Hofleute – abgesehen von einem Zeremonialbart – überlicherweise bartlos dargestellt werden. Ebenso schließt er eine Göt-

terstatue aus, da es dafür in Gräbern überhaupt keine Belege gibt. Die Nachuntersuchungen des DAI am Grabkomplex des Königs Dewen haben aber ergeben, daß es eben dort tatsächlich eine Statuenkammer gab, die im SW an die Grabkammer des Königs angefügt war.15 In dieser Kammer war noch die Fundamentplatte für die Aufstellung einer Statue in situ vorhanden, die nach ihrer Größe (Breite 90 cm x Tiefe 30 cm) nur für eine Standfigur gedient haben kann, die wohl unterlebensgroß war (Abb. 7). Die Funktion der dort aufgestellten Statue ist aus der Lage der Kammer zu erschließen, von der eine Treppe zu einer Lücke im Zingel der Nebengräber führt (Abb. 8). Diese Lücke, die es auch bei allen anderen Königgräbern der 1. Dynastie seit Djer gibt, ist auf die Öffnung eines großen Wadis ausgerichtet, das offenbar als Eingang zur Unterwelt angesehen wurde. Ebenso wie die im SW der Königskammern von Djer und Wadj befindlichen Scheintürnischen sollten sie (als Scheindurchgänge) dem wiederauferstehenden König das Verlassen des Grabes ermöglichen, um ins Jenseits einzugehen.16 Die Statue kann daher nur den König dargestellt haben, Statuen anderer machen dort keinen Sinn. Von dieser Königsstatue dürften mit großer Wahrscheinlichkeit die Perückenfragmente stammen, die in der Umgebung des Grabes aufgefunden wurden. Demnach handelte es sich also um eine Kompositstatue. Was die Haartracht angeht, so ist König Dewen mit solchen Locken auch auf einem Fragment eines kleinen Jahres- oder Festtäfelchens aus Elfenbein abgebildet, das 1996 zwischen den Gräbern von Dewen und Semerchet gefunden wurde (Abydos K 2554; Abb. 5).17 Aufgrund der geringen Größe (erh. H. 0,75 cm, erh. B. 1,9 cm, D. 0,35 cm) ist die Darstellung zwar nicht sehr detailliert, läßt aber deutlich kleine schräge Einkerbungen in den Haarsträhnen erkennen, wie sie auch die Perückenfragmente aufweisen. Die Strähnen setzen beim Ohr an, reichen weit über die Schulter und enden auf einer Linie etwa in Achselhöhe.

Jahre in Ägypten (DAI centennial exhibition catalogue) (Cairo, 2007), S. 86 Nr. 69. 12 Smith, a.a.O., 72. 13 Smith, a.a.O., 78. 14 Smith, a.a.O., 73. 15 G. Dreyer, “Umm el-Qaab: Nachuntersuchungen im frühzeitlichen Königsfriedhof. 3./4. Vorbericht,” MDAIK 46 (1990) 76-78, Abb. 8. 16 Vgl. auch den tumulus mit “Ausgang” in der Grabgrube

über der Grabkammer des Wadj, G. Dreyer, “Zur Rekonstruktion der Oberbauten der Königsgräber der 1. Dynastie in Abydos,” MDAIK 47 (1991), 99. 17 Das Fragment stammt vielleicht von dem gleichen Täfelchen wie Petrie, Royal Tombs II, VII.8 (= Kairo JE 34905), zu dem vermutlich noch zwei weitere Stücke aus den Grabungen des DAI gehören (Abydos K 2505a,b), die aber noch nicht zusammengeführt werden konnten.

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Die Beobachtung, der König sei ansonsten stets bartlos bzw. mit Zeremonialbart dargestellt, ist zwar zutreffend, dabei ist aber zu bedenken, daß die Belege sämtlich auf kleine Anhängetäfelchen und Siegel beschränkt sind, auf denen er entweder beim Schlagen von Feinden auftritt oder Ritualhandlungen vollzieht. Es ist von daher keineswegs auszuschließen, daß der König als Auferstehender einen Vollbart trägt. Die Barttracht der Maske entspricht auch weder genau der des Asiaten auf dem Würfelstab des Qa’a, dessen Kinnbart weit auf die Brust reicht, noch der des unterworfenen Libyers auf der Narmerpalette, der ebenfalls einen verlängerten Kinnbart aufweist. Ein Oberlippenbart kommt überhaupt nie vor. Es läßt sich danach nur feststellen, daß der Bart der Maske so weder für den König noch Feinde, Privatleute oder Götter belegt ist. Eine ikonographische Zuordnung ist daher nicht möglich.

Wesentlich eindeutiger erscheinen dagegen die archäologischen Anhaltspunkte. Auch wenn sich nicht mit letzter Sicherheit entscheiden läßt, ob die Maske und die Haartrachtfragmente tatsächlich von ein und derselben Statue stammen,18 sprechen dafür neben der vermutliche Herkunft der Maske aus der Grabung von E. Amélineau in Abydos, sowohl die Zugehörigkeit von Maske und Fragmente zu Kompositstatuen als auch die gleichartige Ausführung, insbesondere die etwa gleiche Breite der Locken auf der Maske und den Fragmenten. Vor allem aber ist es schon mehr als unwahrscheinlich, daß sich Stücke von zwei ganz ähnlichen Kompositstatuen aus dem Königfriedhof von Abydos erhalten haben sollten, wenn es dort mit der Statuenkammer des Dewen nur einen passenden Aufstellungsort gibt.

18 Holzbestimmungen sind beabsichtigt aber noch nicht durchgeführt. Allerdings wären gleichartige Holzarten nicht mehr als ein weiterer Anhaltspunkt für die Zusammengehö-

rigkeit, da bei einer Kompositstatue auch unterschiedliche Holzarten verwendet worden sein könnten.

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DIE LEEREN KARTUSCHEN VON AKHENATEN1 Mamdouh Eldamaty Ain Shams University, Cairo

Zwei Stelen der Amarnazeit des Ägyptisches Museum und Papyrussammlung (Inv. Nr. 17813 und 25574) zeigen besondere Eigenschaften. Die erste Stele (Abb. 1) wurde in verschiedenen Artikeln untersucht.2 Sie ist eine königliche Stele, die für einen Beamten gefertigt wurde. Sie zeigt die Koregentschaft zweier Herrscher unter der Strahlen des Aten, die von sieben leeren Kartuschen flankiert werden. Die zweite Stele3 (Abb. 2) zeigt die Darstellung von Akhenaten und Nefertiti unter der Sonnenstrahlen des Aten; vier leere Karuschen sind über ihnen neben der Sonnenscheibe des Aten zu finden. Die Frage, wer die zwei auf der ersten Stele dargestellten Herrscher sind, wurde schon von Harris und Reeves beantwortet.4 Beide Autoren haben auch diskutiert, wem die leeren Kartuschen gehören. Mir geht es in diesem Artikel um die Bedeutung dieser leeren Kartuschen. Das Phänomen der leeren Kartuschen in den ägyptischen Tempeln der griechisch-römischen Zeit habe ich in drei separaten Artikeln abgehandelt,5 in denen ich die Meinung vertrat, dass eine leere Kartusche stellvertretend für den Namen eines Königs als rn bzw. als Ersatz des Namens in Form einer leere Kartusche als mnS zu lesen ist und sie die Bedeutung pr-aA “Herrscher” haben kann.

1 Meinem Freund Jack Josephson, von dem ich hoffe, dass diese ihm gewidmeten Zeilen sein Interesse finden werden. 2 P.E. Newberry, “Akhenaten’s eldest son-in-law Ankhkheprure,” JEA 14 (1928), 7f.; J.R. Harris, “Nefertiti rediviva,” AcOr 35 (1973), 5-13 und “Nefernefruaten regnans,” AcOr 36 (1974), 11-21; N. Reeves, Echnaton, Ägyptens falscher Prophet, Kulturgeschichte der Antiken Welt 91 (Mainz, 2002), 167-169. 3 Cf. Reeves, Echnaton, 169. 4 Harris, “Nefertiti rediviva,” 5-13 und “Nefernefruaten regnans,” 11-21; Reeves, Echnaton, 167-169. 5 M. Eldamaty, “Zur Bedeutung der leeren Kartuschen,” GM 207 (2005), 23-36; “Die leeren Kartuschen aus der Regierungszeit von Kleopatra VII. im Tempel von Dendera,” OLA 150 (2007), 511-544; “Die leeren Kartuschen im Tempel von Edfu” (FS Said Tawfik, im Druck). 6 G. Fecht, “Amarna-Probleme (1-2),” ZÄS 85 (1960), 105109; vgl. B. Gunn, “Notes on the Aten and his names,”JEA 29 (1923), 175; K. Sethe, “Beiträge zur Geschichte Amenophis’

Auf die Bedeutung dieser leeren Kartuschen komme ich wegen der besonderen Eigenschaften der beiden Stelen im Berliner Museum nochmals zurück. Bei genauer Betrachtung sind die Kartuschen von so kleinem Format , dass kein Königsname hinein passen kann. Meiner Meinung nach, sind sie absichtlich so klein und leer gefertigt, um als Personifikation des Akhenaten als Shu verstanden werde zu kommen. Die enge Beziehung zwischen dem König und Shu war bisher in der Amarna-Zeit am häufigsten zu finden.6 In den Amarnatexten spielt Shu eine besondere Rolle. Er ist an vielen Stellen identisch mit Akhenaten, wie die Benennung Akhenaten als Shu in den Gräber von Tell El-Amarna zeigt: pA ^w anx=j n ptr=f im Grab von Meryre,7 pA HqA ^w im Grab von Tutu,8 ^w n tA nb im Grab von Panehesy9 und ntk pA ^w anx=j m ptr=k auf einem Türpfosten vom Haus des Hohenpriesters Pawah.10 Dazu kommen die Darstellungen von Akhenaten mit der Federkrone, die den König als Personifikation des Shu darstellen11 (Abb. 3). Noch ein Hinweis auf Inkarnation des Akhenaten als Shu ist seine Darstellung auf einer Stele in Berliner Museum (Inv. Nr. 2045) und einem Skarabäus in London (UC 2233). Beide Objekte

IV.,” in NGWG (1921), 109f.; B. van de Walle, “Survivances mythologiques dans les coiffures royales de l’époque atonienne,” CdE (1980), 24-27; E. Cruz-Uribe, “Atum, Shu, and the Gods during the Amarna Period,” SSEAJ 25 (1995), 16-18. 7 Cf. M. Sandman, “Texts from the time of Akhenaten,” BiAe 8 (1938), 16, 10. 8 Ibid., 86, 12. 9 Ibid., 24, 5-6. 10 Ibid., 172, 12-13. Vgl. auch den Namen des Aten m rn=f m ^w ntj m Jtn “In seinem Namen als Shu, welcher Aten ist,” Fecht, “Amarna-Probleme,” 93; vgl. Gunn, “Notes on the Aten,” 168; Sethe, “Amenophis’ IV.,” 107. 11 Cf. M.H. Abd-ur-Rahman, “The four-feathered crown of Akhenaten,” ASAE 56 (1959), 247-249; D.B. Redford, Akhenaten, the Heretic King (Princeton, 1984), 103; vgl. auch E. Hornung, Echnaton: Die Religion des Lichtes (Zürich, 1995), 64.

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Abb. 1. Stele aus Amarna, Berlin Museum ÄMP 17813 Photo Eva-Maria Borgwaldt (Genemigung des Berliner Museums).

Abb. 2. Stele aus Amarna, Berlin Museum ÄMP 25574, Photo unbekannt (Genemigung des Berliner Museums).

zeigen Akhenaten beim Anheben der zwei Kartuschen des Aten, in der Haltung des Shu beim Himmelstragen, was sein Goldhorusname wTs rn n Jtn “der den Namen des Aten erhebt” in der Kunst wiedergegeben wurde.12 Hinzu kommt die Verbindung der leeren Kartuschen mit Shu. Seit dem Neuen Reich wurde der Name des Gottes Shu13 mit einer leeren Karmit der Bedeutung “der Leere” 14 tusche geschrieben. Er ist also der leere Raum zwischen Himmel und Erde, was dem leeren Raum in der Kartusche entspricht. In der ptolemäischen Zeit wird der Name des Shu mit zwei leeren Kartuoder . Dieses und schen geschrieben die Schreibung des Herrschers mit zwei leeren Kartusche beeinflussen einander anscheinend. Die Verbindung von König, Shu und zwei leeren Kartuschen hat einen religiösen Hintergrund, der

Abb. 3. Echnatonkopf, Kairo Museum JE 98894.

12 R. Krauss, “Piktogramme des jüngeren Goldhorusnamens von Achenaten,” ZÄS 121 (1994), 106-117. 13 Cf. C. Leitz, Hrsg., Lexikon der ägyptischen Götter und Götterbezeichnungen 2, OLA 116 (2002), 34a; E. Naville, The Temple of Deir El Bahari 3 (London, 1901), Pl. CXVI. 14 Zur Bedeutung des Namens Shu als “der Leere” cf. Ph. Derchain, “Sur le nom de Chou et sa fonction,” RdE 27 (1975), 110-116.

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auf der Herrschaft des Königs basiert, der als Vertreter der Herrschaft des Shu auf Erden gilt. dj=f n=f nsj.t n Ra HqA n ^w jmj pr-mDA.t n Wsjr Hr st @r xn.t anx.w D.t

“Er gibt dir das Königtum des Re, die Herrschaft des Shu, das Vermächtnis des Osiris, Onnophris, der Selige auf dem Thron des Horus, an der Spitze der Lebenden.”14

nsw bjtj nb tA.wj Sw sA Ra nb xa.w Sw Ha.w anx n ^w sA Ra sar mAa.t [n Jmn] “König von Ober- und Unterägypten, Herr der beiden Länder, der Herrscher, Sohn des Re, Herr der Kronen, der Herrscher, lebendige Verkörperung des Shu, des Sohnes des Re, der die Maat [an Amun] überreicht.”16

ägyptischen Denkmäler oft betont. Außerdem wird die Königswürde durch Shu verliehen: der König wird von ihm gekrönt und sitzt auf seinem Thron als dessen Nachfolger.19 Als Sohn des Re nimmt Shu die gleiche Stelle ein wie der König und umgekehrt, was ihm zusätzliches Gewicht verleiht. Die enge Beziehung bzw. die Inkarnation des Königs Akhenaten mit Shu ist am häufigsten in den ägyptischen Denkmäler zu finden. Die zwei Stelen des Berliner Museum zeigen die Darstellung der Namen des Akhenaten, der Nefertiti und des Aten mit leeren Kartuschen, die, meiner Meinung nach, Sw zu lesen und mit der Bedeutung “Herrscher” zu verstehen sind.20

Im zweiten Satz bezeichnet der Ausdruck Ha.w n anx “Inkarnation eines Gottes”17 den König als Inkarnation des Shu und Sohn des Re. Der König führt das Maat-Opfer als lebende irdische Verkörperung des Shu (Ha.w anx n ^w) aus. Die Funktion des Königs entspricht also der des ältesten Sohnes des Re ^w sA Ra.18 Diese wurde in den 15

S. Sauneron, Esna 2 (Cairo, 1963), 254, 4 (= Nr. 141), vgl. ibid., 113, 4 (= Nr. 51) ; 254, 4 (= Nr. 141) und É. Chassinat, Le temple d’Edfou 1 (Cairo, 1895), 230, 6-7 (d.) ; 231, 3-5 (d.). 16 R.A. Parker and L.H. Lesko, “The Khonsu Cosmogony,” in J. Baines et al., Hrsg., Pyramid studies and other essays presented to I.E.S. Edwards (London, 1988), Pl. 34; D. Mendel, Die kosmogonischen Inschriften in der Barkenkapelle des Chonstempels von Karnak, MRE 9 (Brepols, 2003), 29 und Taf. 3; E. Cruz-Uribe, “The Khonsu Cosmogony,” JARCE 31 (1994), 170. 17 Wb. III, 39, 7; vgl. Chassinat, Le temple d’Edfou 5 (Cairo, 1930), 152, 15; 169, 14; 208, 18; 233, 2; 234, 19; H. Junker, Der grosse Pylon des Tempels der Isis in Philä 1 (Vienna, 1958), 6, 13, Abb. 3; Urk. VIII, 19h; 92a.

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Mendel, Kosmogonischen Inschriften, 29f.; über Shu Sohn des Re, cf. H. Junker, Der Auszug der Hathor-Tefnut aus Nubien (Berlin, 1911), 37-40. 19 Cf. W. Barta, Untersuchungen zum Götterkreis der Neunheit, MÄS 28 (1973), 88. 20 Deswegen korrigiere ich meine vorherige Interpretation der Lesung der leeren Kartusche als mnS. Die leere Kartusche ist also ^w statt mnS zu lesen und als “Herrscher” zu übertragen; z. B.: Hs=s nsw bjtj ^w Dt “Sie lobt den König von Ober- und Unterägypten, Shu (= den Herrscher) ewiglich.” M. Eldamaty, “Zur Bedeutung der leeren Kartuschen,” GM 207 (2005), 32.

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aspects of the mut temple’s contra-temple at south karnak, part ii

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ASPECTS OF THE MUT TEMPLE’S CONTRATEMPLE AT SOUTH KARNAK, PART II1 Richard Fazzini Brooklyn Museum

This is the second part of an article on the ContraTemple. The first was Richard Fazzini and Paul O’Rourke, “Aspects of the Mut Temple’s ContraTemple at South Karnak Part I,” in the Festschrift for Jean-Claude Goyon.2 The main thrust of this first part was evidence for the Contra-Temple having begun with what is probably a partially preserved graffito of Mentuemhat and his first son Nesptah3 on the rear wall of the Mut Temple that possibly predates, at least slightly, the construction of the building, which grows forward from it into a three-room structure. In addition, fallen blocks from the side walls of the rear room bear inscriptions related to those of Mentuemhat in the Mut Temple’s so-called “Crypt of Taharqa” or “Crypt of Mentuemhat.”4

1

The Brooklyn Museum Archaeological Expedition to the Precinct of the Goddess Mut at South Karnak is a project of the Brooklyn Museum conducted under the auspices of the American Research Center in Egypt. In some years it was conducted with the assistance of the Detroit Institute of Arts and the University of Groningen, and it staff still includes members and retired members of the staffs of those institutions. 2 Hommages offerts à Jean-Claude Goyon pour son 70ème anniversaire, ed. L. Gabolde (Cairo, 2008), 139-150. 3 During a lecture in Luxor in the winter of 2006-2007, F. Gomaà reported that his work in the tomb of Mentuemhat has indicated that this great noble had two sons named Nesptah. The Contra-Temple graffito consists of two figures facing in from each side towards offering stands and shrines, presumably once each with a deity. This organization is similar to that of the perspectival reconstruction of the restored contra-temple of the Karnak Khonsu Temple, with figures facing in from each side towards back-to-back pairs of deities (seated gods with a goddess standing behind each): F. Laroche and C. Traunecker, “La chapelle adossée au temple de Khonsou,” Centre franco-égyptien d’étude des temples de Karnak, Cahiers de Karnak VI: 1973-1977 (Cairo, 1980), 167196, esp. fig. 5 on p. 175. 4 J. Leclant, Montouemhat: quatrième prophète d’Amon, prince de la ville, BdE 35 (Cairo, 1961), 193-238, and pls. LXVI-LXIX. PM II2, 258. Cf. also R. Fazzini, Egypt, Dynasty XXII-XXV, Iconography of Religions XVI, 10 (Leiden, 1988), 16-17, where it is noted that the images on its rear wall are depictions of cult objects, possibly an inventory of those kept in this room, and/or gifts to Mut by Mentuemhat and family. They could also, without negating the last-named possibility, be an inventory of

This second part is dedicated to Jack A. Josephson, and it seems appropriate to do so for several reasons, including his long involvement with Egyptological research on Dynasties 25 and later in general,5 and on Mentuemhat in particular,6 and his long-time support of the Mut Expedition. The figures in this article are organized according to the plan of the building from front to back. As the discussion of the building is not organized in this manner, figure references in the text are not in numerical order. Mentuemhat’s “autobiographical texts,”7 which claim responsibility for a great amount of building, do not mention Mut’s Contra-Temple, perhaps because the Contra-Temple may have been built after the “crypt.” However, the Contra-Tem-

images elsewhere in the temple and even an example of a class of Late Period texts and representations in relief of the divine residents and cult objects of particular temples, explainable by the existence of the “Great Inventory.” If this structure has been called a crypt or a chapel, it has also been termed a sideroom or “niche room”: K. Kitchen, The Third Intermediate Period in Egypt (1100-650 B.C.), 2nd ed. with suppl. (Warminster, l986), 398. The present writer has also mentioned the possibilities that it was a statue chamber (serdab, a suggestion of William H. Peck) or a sort of _wtKa: R. Fazzini, “Two Semi-Erased Kushite Cartouches in the Precinct of Mut at South Karnak,” in Causing His Name to Live: Studies in Egyptian Epigraphy and History in Memory of William J. Murnane (2007), at present an online publication at http://history.memphis.edu/murnane/Fazzini.pdf, p. 2. 5 J. Josephson, Egyptian Royal Sculpture of the Late Period 400-246 B.C. (Mainz am Rhein, 1997); and J. Josephson and M. Eldamaty, Statues of the XXVth and XXVIth Dynasties, Catalogue Général of Egyptian Antiquities in the Cairo Museum, nrs. 48601-48649 (Cairo, 1999); J. Josephson, P. O’Rourke, and R. Fazzini, “The Doha Head: A Late Period Egyptian Portrait,” MDAIK 61 (2005), 219-241. 6 J. Josephson, “Sacred and Profane: The Two Faces of Mentuemhat,” in Egyptian Museum Collections Around the World: Studies for the Centennial of the Egyptian Museum, Cairo 1, ed. M. Eldamaty and M. Trad (Cairo, 2002), 619627; J. Josephson, “La période de transition à Thèbes, 663-648 avant J.-C.,” Égypte Afrique & Orient 28 (February, 2003), 39-46. 7 See, e.g., A. Gnirs, “Biographies,” in The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt 1, ed. D. Redford et al. (Oxford, 2001), 184-189.

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Fig. 1a. Plan of the Mut Temple’s Contra-Temple, including the stonework (“pier”) to its west.

Fig. 1b. General view north to the Contra-Temple. The masses of baked brick on either side of the stonework to the west are sections of brick that have separated from the baked-brick/mud-brick wall and fallen southward.


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ple’s inscriptions have a direct relationship to the crypt. The small temple abutting the rear wall of the Temple of Mut was discovered, partially excavated, and planned by Margaret Benson and Janet Gourlay in the 1890s.8 Fig. 1a is a more accurate plan of the structure by the Brooklyn Museum Expedition’s William H. Peck, made in connection with the expedition’s work on the structure.9 Fig. 1b is a general view from the south of the area of the Contra-Temple. Benson and Gourlay dated the structure to Ptolemy Philadelphus II, and Porter and Moss10 identified it as “probably Nektanebos I, re-used by Ptolemy II Philadelphus.” However, as noted elsewhere, the attribution to Nectanebo I is questionable because the only Dynasty 30 name visible in the building is the partial cartouche of what is probably the nomen of Nectanebo II11 on the reveal of the eastern jamb of the entrance (fig. 3a). In addition, the two Ptolemaic cartouches still preserved in a scene of a king offering to Mut12 on the west half of the wall flanking the doorway between Rooms X and Y (figs. 7a-b) do not support an attribution to Ptolemy II. Indeed, the

closest parallels I can find for the prenomen are the cartouches of Ptolemy VIII in the Opet Temple at Karnak.13 Of the corresponding scene on the east wall of the doorway between Rooms X and Y, only the feet of the two figures remain (fig. 7c). While the identity of the king remains uncertain, it might be noted that both Ptolemy VI and Ptolemy VIII carried out other work at the site. They built the first and second phases of the site’s Chapel D,14 with Ptolemy VI’s first phase in a bold raised-relief style not unlike that of the jamb in the Contra-Temple.15 Ptolemy VI was possibly represented by some of the decoration of the Mut Precinct’s Propylon.16 A small chapel in the Mut Temple’s second court bears his name,17 and he was definitely responsible for some of the sunkrelief decoration of the gate in the Mut Temple’s First Pylon18 and for at least one raised relief associable with the site’s Temple A.19 The Brooklyn Museum Expedition was able to restore a block to the east wall of the door between Rooms Y and Z. In this scene, of which only the lower legs are preserved, the king faces “in” to the room and is embraced by a goddess (fig. 8d).

8 M. Benson, J. Gourlay, and P. Newberry, The Temple of Mut in Asher. An account of the excavation of the temple and of the religious representations and objects found therein, as illustrating the history of Egypt and the main religious ideas of the Egyptians (London, 1899), 70-71, and 282. Their pl. V (opp. p. 60) illustrates the great amount of debris that buried this structure; their pl. XXVIII illustrates the two statues of Sekhmet they found and re-erected before its entrance; and their plan of the Mut temple (opp. p. 36) shows their partially correct plan of the Contra-Temple. Their labeling of the rooms as X, Y, and Z is followed in the present article. In 1990, the expedition dismantled the side walls of the first room, which were crumbling to sand, and rebuilt them, restoring several of the displaced blocks of these walls to their original positions. The façade and its jambs were also consolidated as needed. The funding for this undertaking was a gift to the expedition from the Long Island Chapter of the Archaeological Institute of America. 9 Some of the results of our work were published in R. Fazzini and W. Peck, “The 1982 Season at Mut,” NARCE 120 (Winter, 1982), 37-58, esp. 41-42. Unfortunately, during the printing process two illustrations were lost: the plan of the Contra-Temple and the illustration of the frieze of Hathor heads found in the building. The plan is reprinted here as fig. 1a, and the Hathor heads are illustrated as figs. 13a-b. 10 PM II2, 258-259. 11 R. Fazzini, “Some Aspects of the Precinct of the Goddess Mut in the New Kingdom,” in Leaving No Stones Unturned: Essays on the Ancient Near East and Egypt in Honor of Donald P. Hansen, ed. E. Ehrenberg (Winona Lake, Indiana, 2002), 68, fig. 5 and p. 70. 12 PM II2, 259, (18) and pl. xxv. 13 C. de Wit, Les inscriptions du temple d’Opet, à Karnak, Bibliotheca Aegyptiaca 11 (Brussels, 1958), 18, 20, 21, 26, 27. 14 For Chapel D see PM II2, 274 ff.; R. Fazzini and J. Manning, “Archaeological Work at Thebes by The Brooklyn

Museum under the auspices of the American Research Center in Egypt, 1975–1977,” NARCE 101/102 (Summer/ Fall, 1977), 24 and figure 6 on p. 25; R. Fazzini, “Report on the 1983 Season of Excavation at the Precinct of the Goddess Mut,” ASAE 70 (1984-1985), 301; M. Minas, “Die Dekorationstätigkeit von Ptolemaios VI. Philometor und Ptolemaios VIII. Euergetes II an Ägyptischen Tempeln (Teil 1),” OLP 27 (1996), 65, no. 6.7. Work on Chapel D and its partial reconstruction is still in progress and will be published by J. van Dijk and R. Fazzini. 15 R. Fazzini, “Two Images of Deified Ptolemies in the Temple Precinct of the Goddess Mut at South Karnak,” in Egypt, Israel, and the Ancient Mediterranean World: Studies in Honor of Donald B. Redford, ed. G. Knoppers and A. Hirsch, Probleme der Ägyptologie 21 (Leiden and Boston, 2004), 297-301 and figs. 4-6. 16 S. Sauneron (with the collaboration of S. Cauville and F. Laroche-Traunecker), La porte ptolémaïque de l’enceinte de Mout à Karnak, MIFAO 107 (Cairo, 1983), 2 n. 3, where the cartouche in question is attributed to Ptolemy VI or IX. 17 In a personal communication B. Bryan, who will publish this construction, has identified it as a wabet. 18 This king figures prominently inside the gateway in the bottom register of decoration on both sides. The gateway, its texts and decoration will be published by J.-C. Goyon, H. te Velde, J. van Dijk, W. Peck and R. Fazzini. 19 This block, found in the ruins of that structure’s Third Pylon, is inscribed for Ptolemy VI Philometor and mentions the construction of “his monument for his mother, Mut,” with this one of the elements of evidence for Temple A’s having become a mammisi. Other evidence for this is mentioned in R. Fazzini and W. Peck, “The Precinct of Mut During Dynasty XXV and early Dynasty XXVI: A Growing Picture,” SSEAJ 11 (1981), 122 and 124; R. Fazzini and W. Peck, “Excavating the Temple of Mut,” Archaeology 36 (1983), 20-21.

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Figs. 2a-b. Façade of the Contra-Temple: (a) west and (b) east wings. The re-used block showing statues of female offering bearers is visible at the lower right side of the east wing.

Fig. 3a. Reveal of the east wing of the Contra-Temple’s entrance, with the partial cartouche of Nectanebo II at the top of the right-hand column. Fig. 3b. Reveal of the west wing of the Contra-Temple’s entrance.


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Fig. 4c. Fragment of a cornice with the remains of a double crown and the title nbt-pt (1MWB.191) that may belong to the inner lintel of this doorway.

Figs. 4a-b. Room X, south wall (rear of the façade): (a) east and (b) west sides.

Of the scene on the west wall, only one leg of the king is preserved (fig. 8c). The north face of the restored block is the more interesting side, as it contains part of a column of text in the same style as the other Mentuemhat inscriptions from 20

This is discussed and illustrated in R. Fazzini and P. O’Rourke, “Aspects of the Mut Temple’s Contra-Temple, Part I,” 142 and 145.

the room and is in situ.20 On the dais around the rear of Room Z traces of blue paint remain, perhaps emphasizing the relationship between the Contra-Temple and the site’s sacred lake, named Isheru, for which see more below.

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Fig. 5. Room X, west wall.

Fig. 6. Room X, east wall.


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Fig. 7b. Detail of Ptolemy VIII cartouche on the wall of Fig. 7a .

Fig. 7a. Room X, north wall: west side of the doorway to Room Y.

The graffito on the rear wall of Room Z and the texts of Mentuemhat (of which only the one on the restored block is in situ) are this room’s only preserved decoration. Fortunately somewhat more is preserved of the decoration of Rooms X and Y. The dado of the walls on the west half of the Room Y are adorned with a papyrus and lotus frieze (figs. 8b, c and fig. 9), but in the east half of the room the plant frieze was never begun. This discrepancy is presumably related to the plant friezes being latter additions to the room. Above the dado on the west wall of Room Y are representations of an enthroned god followed by a goddess and a mummiform god (presumably Amun, Mut, and Khonsu) that face south towards an array of offerings (fig. 9). The mummiform Khonsu is rendered in more or less incised lines, as are the food offerings toward which all the deities face, but the figure of the enthroned god and standing goddess are carved in relatively deep sunk relief with detailed modeling of the toes. The horizontal border lines below them have also been transformed into sunken strips rather than the incised-line drawings before and behind them. This suggests that these figures were recarved at some point, perhaps when the plant frieze was

Fig. 7c. Room X, north wall: east side of the doorway to Room Y.

added; what remains of the figure of Khonsu and the offering seem to have been left untouched. All that is left of the scene on the east wall of the room is the lower portion of the offerings at the front of the scene, which are slightly more carefully carved than their western counterpart, and the shallowly incised horizontal strips above the blank dado (fig. 10). The decoration of the east and west walls of Room X (figs. 5, 6) is similar to the corresponding walls in Room Y. At the south end of the wall are offerings, including a stand with vessels. Facing them are two striding gods, each holding a scepter that has a pronged terminal (probably a wasscepter) in his far hand and an ankh in his near

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Figs. 8a-b. Room Y, south wall: (a) east and (b) west sides of the doorway to Room X.

Figs. 8c-d. Room Y, north wall: (c) west and (d) east sides of the doorway to Room Z.


Fig. 9. Room Y, west wall.

Fig. 10. Room Y, east wall.

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hand. Behind them on each wall is a goddess also holding a scepter with pronged terminal in her far hand. On the east side she holds an ankh in her near hand and may have done the same on the now more damaged west side. The goddess’s scepter, at least, has been recarved. Aside from the apparent construction of the three-room Contra-Temple as a single unit and the Mentuemhat decoration of Room Z, another reason for attributing the side walls of Rooms X and Y to Dynasties 25-26 is the style of those parts of its decoration that appear unaltered. These figures have variants of strongly muscled legs that are most associated with Dynasty 25 art of Pi(ankh)y and later.21 Parallels for this aspect of the legs in the Contra-Temple’s reliefs can be found in many reliefs of that period.22 However, they have pre-Kushite Egyptian harbingers that may have helped inspire certain aspects of Kushite art.23 In addition to their major representations, the side walls of Room X bear a number of interesting graffiti. The only one on the east wall is an inscription behind the second striding god that reads Ammōnios24 (fig. 11a). On the west wall of Room X are several graffiti, described here from north to south. Just in front of the terminal of the scepter held by the goddess is a small human head or tp sign facing away from the scepter (fig. 11b). A bit higher

and a bit more in front of the goddess’s scepter is a striding male figure holding a staff in his far hand (fig. 11c). Two gouges above his head could be a depiction of feathers. Between the legs of the god immediately to the south of the goddess is what appears to be a hieroglyphic writing of Dd mdw (?) in front of a more deeply carved representation of a leaping animal identified as a gazelle (ancient Egyptian gHs(t)) (fig. 11d). The v-shaped mark below the gazelle could be an accidental damage, although it is not the only such mark on this wall, and the nature of the representation by the prong of this god’s staff (both visible in fig. 5) is uncertain. Scratched into the space between the legs of the southernmost god is a man facing north (opposite the god and the other graffiti) and holding a wasscepter (fig. 11e). He has curly hair and what may be a short beard. In this he resembles some figures in Egyptian funerary art ranging in time from at least the Macedonian Period well into the Roman Period.25 Unfortunately, such parallels do not help us identify the figure as other than male, perhaps a priest associated with the Mut temple, or a man, king, or god as perhaps seen in a temple ritual.26 There is also a graffito on a slab of sandstone we found on the floor of Room X in a position that seems to not be accidental (fig. 11f). It represents two feet or sandals,27 one of which preserves

21 See, e.g., W.S. Smith, The Art and Architecture of Ancient Egypt, 3rd ed., rev. with additions by W. K. Simpson (New Haven, 1998), 232. Dr. Timothy Kendall once informed me that it is present in reused blocks of Piy at Gebel Barkal. 22 E.g., R. Parker, J. Leclant, and J.-C. Goyon, The Edifice of Taharqa by the Sacred Lake of Karnak, Brown Egyptological Studies 8 (Providence, 1979), pls. 7-11, where, unless it is the lighting, they vary in the depth of their musculature. For similar legs in the reign of Shabaqo, see K. Myśliwiec, Royal Portraiture of the Dynasties XXI-XXX (Mainz am Rhein, l988), pls. XXVIII-XXIX. 23 See, e.g., R. Fazzini, “Some Reliefs of the Third Intermediate Period in the Egyptian Museum, Cairo,” in Egyptian Museum Collections Around the World: Studies for the Centennial of the Egyptian Museum, Cairo 1, ed. M. Eldamaty and M. Trad (Cairo, 2002), pl. I; and R. Fazzini, “The Chapel of Osiris Ruler-of-Eternity and the Art of the Third Intermediate Period,” in The Twenty-Third Dynasty Chapel of Osiris Ruler of Eternity at Karnak, ed. G. Kadish and D. Redford (Mississauga, Ontario, forthcoming). 24 For this name and some references to it, see: G. Heuser, Die Personennamen der Kopten I (Untersuchungen) (Leipzig, 1929), 77 (on Greek names); and F. Preisigke, Namenbuch (Amsterdam, 1967), col. 26. I wish to thank Dr. Paul O’Rourke for help with the reading of the name and the references. 25 See, e.g., C. Riggs, The Beautiful Burial in Roman Egypt: Art, Identity, and Funerary Religion (Oxford and New York, 2005), 92, fig. 38, (a late Ptolemaic to Roman Period painted shroud in the Brooklyn Museum); pl. 8 (a mummy shroud

of the mid-first century AD in the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts); and p. 167, fig. 79 (a first century AD funerary stela in the Liverpool’s School of Archaeology, Classics and Archaeology). This writer will take this opportunity to note that Riggs’ fig. 112 on p. 225, of which she says “Present location unknown,” is Brooklyn Museum 75.114 and was published by R. Bianchi in “Collecting and Collectors,” The Art Gallery 22 (December/January, 1979), fig. on p. 103. The present writer will also note B.V. Bothmer’s observation that a fashion for a full head of hair and beard in Egyptian art is attested in the reliefs of the tomb of Petosiris at Hermopolis and a relief in Hildesheim and that they became common in the later Ptolemaic Period: Egyptian Sculpture of the Late Period, 700 B.C. - A.D. 100 (Brooklyn, 1960), 174. In fact, as the tomb of Petosiris has since been attributed to the Macedonian Period, the fashion began before Ptolemaic times. For the tomb of Petosiris, see now N. Cherpion, J.-P. Corteggiani, and J.-Fr. Gout, Le tombeau de Pétosiris à Touna el-Gebel, Relevé photographique, BiGen 27 (Cairo, 2007). I owe knowledge of this book to Laurent Coulon. 26 H. Jacquet-Gordon, The Graffiti on the Khonsu Temple Roof at Karnak: A Manifestation of Personal Piety, OIP 123 (Chicago, 2003), 3 and 7, divides the graffiti into two basic types. Her second type is those that depict a great variety of subjects such as persons, deities, animals, plants, and miscellaneous objects, with some she believes to be inspired by what the artists observed during the frequent religious festivals. 27 For such graffiti in general, from Egypt but also some from Near East and Greek and Roman sites, see L. Castiglione, “Vestigia,” Acta Archaeologica Academiae Scientiarum


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d

a

b e

c

f

Fig. 11. Graffiti, numbered from top left. Graffito of Ammonios (a) is on the east wall of Room X. The rest are on the west wall as follows: (b) head; (c) striding man with feathers(?); (d) gazelle with hieroglyphs in front of it; (e) curly-haired, bearded man with staff; (f) graffito of sandals. (Photographs are not to scale.)

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the writing Hm nTr tpj—there are traces of this on the other foot—but no remains of a name of the high priest. In the Khonsu Temple, no priests or officials of comparable status are represented in the graffiti, including the foot or sandal graffiti. This was among the evidence that led Helen Jacquet-Gordon to conclude that the foot/sandal, her first type of graffiti and sometimes known as “pilgrims’ feet,” belonged to the ranks of the lesser clergy of the temple—the wab priests and divine fathers—who probably did not have the means or possibly even the right to place statues of themselves in the sacred precinct and settled for such a lesser device to help insure their immortality.28 However, a graffito of a pair of feet inscribed for the Dynasty 21 High Priest of Amun Menkheperre exists in the court of the Tenth Pylon of Karnak.29 The graffito of a high priest was also found near a paving of baked bricks in the center of Room X that appears to raise this area of the floor up to the level of stone paving at the east side of Room X. The bricks vary in size from 33 x 16 x 7 cm to 28 x 14 x 5 cm to 31 x 15 x 5 cm. The baked bricks in the wall of baked brick and mud brick that runs around the Mut Temple are of similar size (31 x 16 x 8 cm) just to the east and west of the Contra-Temple, and it is possible that the floor was repaired when that wall was built, presumably in the late Ptolemaic or, more

probably, in the early Roman Period as noted elsewhere.30 The side walls of the Contra-Temple are partially built of reused decorated blocks that are Thutmoside in date. All but two of them and the New Kingdom blocks reused in the stone constructions along the south edge of the Mut Temple will be published in another article as a follow-up to a previous publication of New Kingdom decoration from the Mut Precinct.31 The two exceptions have already been mentioned in print. One of them, a block showing two women and the trace of a third (visible in fig. 2b), was dated by Jean Leclant to Dynasty 25 or 26 and identified as two Divine Consorts.32 This identification was later corrected by Charles Van Siclen III33 to that of images of statues of royal women and offerings of the Thutmoside Period that were part of a two-register representation of royal statues. As Van Siclen also noted, his proposal was confirmed by another block reused at the south end of the topmost preserved course of the structure’s east wall (fig. 12)34 that shows priests bearing royal statues. One statue is identified as Thutmose III and another is a queen whose cartouche, unfortunately, is illegible. As several Egyptologists have noted, the blocks with images of statues mentioned in connection with Mut’s Contra-Temple have parallels in the Amun Precinct’s Akhmenu,35 although as Van Siclen

Hungaricae, Budapest 22 (1970), 95-132. In his conclusions (pp. 120-129) he stresses that: (1) None are known earlier than the New Kingdom, with there being a connection between the popular religiosity of this period and the origins of the custom. (2) Almost all the prints are of natural sizes— which is true of the Contra-Temple graffito—and always occur in pairs. (3) In later times the prints seem to have been partly replaced by representations of the feet, with toenails and sandal straps, as seen from above. (4) Most representations are horizontal, i.e., they represent feet in a normal situation. (5) Since they occur inside the temples, they will have been made by the temple personnel, laymen not being allowed to enter. (6)The inscriptions accompanying them prove their purpose to be the continuation of the presence of the maker in the nearness of the deity. (7) They are not a symbol of pilgrimage, as usually suggested. 28 H. Jacquet-Gordon, The Graffiti, 3. She writes this is true of all the Khonsu Temple graffiti but accepts the fact that graffiti made by casual travelers “certainly exist elsewhere.” In his recent review of Jacquet-Gordon’s book in JNES 66, no. 2 (2007), 128, E. Cruz-Uribe indicates that an extensive discussion of Jacquet-Gordon’s commentary on the interpretation of her graffiti will be found in chapter 2 of his Hibis Temple Project, vol. 3, Graffiti from the Temple Precinct (San Antonio, Texas, in press). 29 M. Römer, Gottes- und Priesterherrschaft in Ägypten am Ende des Neuen Reiches: ein religionsgeschichtliches Phänomen und seine sozialen Grundlagen, ÄAT 21 (1994), 571, no.

48. J.-C. Goyon, “Une dalle aux noms de Menkheperrê, fils de Pinedjem I, d’Isetemkheb et de Smendès (CS X 1305),” Centre franco-égyptien d’étude des temples de Karnak, Cahiers de Karnak VII: 1978-1981 (Paris, 1982), 275-280, where it is argued (p. 278) that it could have been part of the court’s paving. 30 R. Fazzini and W. Peck, “The 1982 Season,” 48, n. 24, with ref. to A.J. Spencer, Brick Architecture in Ancient Egypt (Warminster, 1979), 80 and 120. See also R. Fazzini, “Some Objects Found before the First Pylon of the Mut Temple,” in The Archaeology and Art of Ancient Egypt: Essays in Honor of David B. O’Connor 1, CASAE 36, ed. Z. Hawass and J. Richards (Cairo, 2007), 280 with notes on p. 286, where it is noted that this writer still finds it tempting to associate this wall with those of Augustus and Tiberius mentioned on some stelae concerning work at Mut. 31 R. Fazzini, “Some Aspects of the Precinct of the Goddess Mut in the New Kingdom,” 63-76. 32 J. Leclant, Recherches sur les monuments thébains de la XXVe dynastie dite éthiopienne, BdE 36 (Cairo, 1965), 115, §32, C, and pl. LXXI A. 33 C. Van Siclen III, “A Block of the Divine Adoratrices Reconsidered,” VA 1 (1985), 151-156, with fig. 1 on p. 152. 34 The block is 78 cm in length, 50 cm in height, and 78 cm in depth. 35 PM II2, 123 (426), where there is a reference to a treatment of their inscriptions: P. Barguet, Le temple d’Amon-Rê à Karnak; Essai d’exégèse, RAPH 21 (Cairo, 1962), 179-182.

aspects of the mut temple’s contra-temple at south karnak, part ii noted, it seems unlikely that the Contra-Temple blocks came from there. He made the interesting suggestion that they might have come from the originally Thutmoside Kamutef Temple, just north of the ultimate Mut Precinct, since the cult of Min, with whom Kamutef was closely associated, involved processions of statues, and the temple’s many small chapels might be repositories for such statues.36 He may be correct. However, the block with the remains of three female figures also mentions Ipet/Opet, surely part of Amenemopet as Van Siclen suggested. We now know that Temple A, which lies northeast of the Mut Temple, was only incorporated into the Mut Precinct in Dynasty 25. In the New Kingdom, the area in which it stands was known as Ipet/Opet,37 and so the present writer wonders if the Thutmoside blocks reused in the Contra-Temple might have come from Temple A, which was also extensively rebuilt during Dynasty 25. To return to the graffito of a gazelle already mentioned, Ian Shaw and Paul Nicholson have written that “...a connection seems to have been made by the ancient Egyptians between water and antelopes and the goddess Satet could be represented as an antelope or by a specific type of antelope: the gazelle (oryz gazella).”38 The identification of this graffito as a gazelle, and the existence of this graffito as a counterpart to such images in the relief of the Mut Temple and Isheru

36

“A Block of the Divine Adoratrices,” 156, n. 6. For a recent treatment of representations of statues, including some of those already mentioned, see C. Loeben, Beobachtung zu Kontext und Funktion königlicher Statuen im AmunTempel von Karnak (Leipzig, 2001), 30 (Dok. A.5.1); 142, 222 (Dok. B.6.1); 223-225, 229, and 230-233 (Dok. B.7.1). Citing M. Eaton-Krauss in connection with private statuary (The representations of statuary in private tombs of the Old Kingdom, ÄA 39 [Wiesbaden, 1984]), Loeben questions whether any of the scenes discussed represent reality and calls them metaphors for “statue transport.” 37 R. Fazzini and W. Peck, “Mut Temple Expedition,” NARCE 112 (1980), 39; R. Fazzini, “Report on the Brooklyn Museum’s 2005 Season of Fieldwork at the Precinct of the Goddess Mut at South Karnak,” ASAE (forthcoming). In 2003, with the agreement of the Mut Expedition and the SCA, the Centre franco-égyptien d’étude des temples de Karnak removed the two alabaster stelae that Rameses II had erected before Temple A to Karnak’s Open Air Museum. There the CFETK has reassembled the chapel of Amenhotep II, of which the stelae’s alabaster slabs had originally formed part of the walls. The southern stela, discovered by the Mut Expedition in 1979, describes the construction of a “temple of millions of years” for Rameses II, presumably Temple A, before which the stela stood. With the restoration of the Amenhotep II chapel, we were able, with the kind help of François Larché of the CFETK, to confirm that the stela’s text refers to the building that Rameses II enlarged as being in a place called

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in the Ramesside Period tomb of Khabekhenet, is the work of the late Agnès Cabrol and Claude Traunecker. It is some of the evidence cited by them to re-open the question of whether the Isheru and Mut Temple are the mArw mentioned in an inscription of King Amenhotep III.39 If Cabrol and Traunecker are correct, and whether or not the Mut Temple and the Isheru are to be identified with Amenhotep III’s mArw, Mut’s Contra-Temple is oriented towards the Isheru. Most who have investigated the site agree that it was probably reached from the lake by a flight of steps40 now completely missing due to the erosion of this shore of the lake. And, as indicated in figs. 1a-b, Brooklyn’s work also brought to light remnants of stonework outside the Contra-Temple that included the remains of two column bases with column bottoms (dia. of base 75 cm; dia. of bottom of column 48 cm) somewhat similar to the single column base with column bottom (dia. of base 75 cm; dia. of bottom of column 54 cm) preserved in Room Y, probably one of a pair. Although it is possible that the stonework projecting south from the late baked-brick and mudbrick wall west of the Contra-Temple may have functioned, as Benson and Gourlay suggested, as piers to support this part of the late wall around the Mut Temple, they could have been built earlier and served other functions. As discussed by Françoise Laroche and Claude Traunecker, one

Ipet. This stela will be published by Betsy Bryan. For Ipet/ Opet as a generic term and Amun-Re sometimes called xnty ipwt.f “qui préside à ses ipet,” see J. Quaegebeur, “Aménophis, nom royal et nom divin; questions méthodologiques,” RdE 37 (1986), 104 and 105. 38 The Dictionary of Ancient Egypt (New York, 1995), 34. 39 A. Cabrol and C. Traunecker, “Une représentation de la tombe de Khâbekhenet et les dromos de Karnak-sud: nouvelles hypothèses,” Centre franco-égyptien d’étude des temples de Karnak, Cahiers de Karnak X: 1995 (Paris, 1995), 53-54, esp. n. 83. The proposal was made in the past by L. Manniche, “The Maru built by Amenophis III—its significance and possible location,” in L’Égyptologie en 1979: axes prioritaires de recherches 2, ed. J. Leclant (Paris, 1982), 271-273. For other opinions concerning the location of Amenhotep III’s mArw, see, e.g., B. Geßler-Löhr, Die heiligen Seen ägyptischer Tempel: Ein Beitrag zur Deutung sakraler Baukunst im alten Ägypten, HÄB 21 (Hildesheim, 1983), 187, 190, and 401-424. On p. 414 Geßler-Löhr says that the image in the tomb shows the Isheru fed from its south side by a canal which presumably linked it to the Nile. However, no indication of such a canal has been uncovered by the Johns Hopkins University excavations in this part of the Mut Precinct, and the Isheru is fed by ground water. To be sure, this does not preclude processions by boat on the lake, such as the one represented in the tomb of Khabekhenet. 40 Fazzini, “Report on the 1983 Season,” 298, where it is noted that what now looks like a staircase was manufactured

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Fig. 12. Re-used block in the topmost preserved course of the south end of the east wall. The scene shows a procession of priests carrying statues of royalty, including, in the lower row, a statue of Thutmose III (right) and a queen (center) whose name is illegible.

such possible use would have been in connection with ritual processions, by foot or boat, around the temple.41 Laroche and Traunecker also raised the possibility that such processions included the temporary placement of an image of the temple’s deity in his/her Contra-Temple, and this would suit what we know of Mut’s Contra-Temple in late times. On the other hand, given the structure’s link to Mentuemhat in its first phase of existence, the writer wonders whether it may originally have held a statue of Mentuemhat, perhaps even the statue from which came the famous bust (Cairo CG 647) of an is-priest, and presumably begging statue,42 of (all but certainly) Mentuemhat found

reused in a pier next to the Contra-Temple.43 To be sure, one might expect an is-priest’s statue to be situated near the front of a temple, and we have uncovered evidence for at least two chapels of Mentuemhat against the enclosure wall opposite the east wing of the First Pylon of the Mut Temple, in addition to the long-known “crypt” in the Mut Temple. The ruins of the Dynasty 25 and Ptolemaic East Porch of the Mut Temple have yielded parts of a striding statue of Mentuemhat dated to the reign of Taharqa, dressed in priestly leopard skin, and one of the largest statues known of the famous man.44

by Benson and Gourlay, who assumed that there was a stairway and searched for blocks that could have been parts of it. People had indicated its existence even before the time of Benson and Gourlay, e.g., Nestor L’Hôte’s reconstruction drawing of 1838-39 in H. Ricke, Das Kamutef-Heiligtum Hatschepsuts und Thutmoses’ III in Karnak, BÄBA 3 (Cairo, 1954), pl. I. Given that the Contra-Temple could not then have been visible, it is not surprising that L’Hôte makes the entire Contra-Temple a staircase to the Isheru. However, as the writer has said elsewhere, L’Hôte’s drawing did convey an accurate impression of, among other things, the long porches before the Mut Temple and, as SCA excavations have demonstrated, the sphinx avenue running west from before the Mut Temple continuing westward past the sphinx avenue running to the Luxor Temple. 41 F. Laroche and C. Traunecker, “La chapelle adossée,”

167-196, esp. p. 194, with mention of such activities in connection with the Mut Temple, at least in late times. 42 For the begging pose with hand open palm upward before the mouth, see E. Bernhauer, “Der Bittgestus in der Privatplastik,” GM 186 (2002), 17-26. On p. 22, n. 26 she indicates that this could be the type of statue of CG 647. 43 See, e.g., Leclant, Montouemhat: quatrième prophète d’Amon, prince de la ville, Doc. 16, pp. 97-104, and pls. XXVXXVIII; J. Clère, Les chauves d’Hathor, OLA 63 (Leuven, 1995), Doc. M, pp. 153-157, with fig. 56 and pl. XXII. 44 This statue has been mentioned in her publication of another statue of Mentuemhat in the same garb by B. Fay, “Another Statue of Montuemhat,” GM 189 (2002), 23-31, esp. 29. The Mut statue and Mentuemhat chapels will be published by R. Fazzini, Aspects of the Art, Iconography and Architecture of Late Dynasty XX-early Dynasty XXVI (with


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The stones we are able to see reused in these “piers” are of the New Kingdom and could certainly have been reused prior to Dynasty 30 or even later.45 In addition, we found that the late baked- and mud-brick wall that meets each side of the Contra-Temple rests atop a mud-brick foundation that, on the west at least, extends north and retains the sand of the foundations of the Mut Temple’s south wall. The pier shown in fig. 1 extends south from this wall.46 Returning to the Contra-Temple proper, its façade is adorned with a dado of plant friezes (figs. 2a-b). Many parts of Egyptian temples had symbolic cosmic and creation meaning, especially in the New Kingdom and later. Aquatic plant forms on lower walls and columns served to help the structure symbolize the primordial, marshy landscape of creation just before or at the moment of creation, marked by the coming of the sun and light and life. However, the prominence of such dados in the Contra-Temple is perhaps also a reflection of the Isheru and its religious associations. Temples’ sacred lakes were normally square or rectangular, but the lakes called “Isheru” are associated with temples dedicated to potentially dangerous goddesses, identified with the Eye of Re, who could take a leonine form. Such lakes sometimes partially surrounded the temple. Mut’s is the only Isheru preserved, and when it was first created, it enclosed the entire east, south, and west sides of the temple. As the late Serge Sauneron noted,47 one text relevant to Mut’s Isheru relates it to the extinguishing of her flame and her pacification by Nun, the primordial one of the Two Lands, who was both the Isheru’s creator and the primordial ocean within which the universe was created and re-generated. It is perhaps worth stressing that this makes the temple and the lake a dramatic symbol of both the appeasement and protection of the goddess and of creation and recreation. The decoration of the façade above the dado on each side (figs. 2a-b) consists of two or possibly three registers (less likely given the size of

the structure), each showing a king (name not preserved) facing “in” towards a god and goddess who, in at least one instance, are Amun and Mut, holding staves and granting benefices to the king. These shallow sunk reliefs are too poorly preserved to permit their definite stylistic attribution to a king or a dynasty. On the one hand, their style could help indicate that the façade was decorated in Dynasties 25-26. For example, the female figures are relatively tall and thin, without the heavier proportions sometimes found in Dynasty 30 and later. And their long feet with delineated toes also have parallels in Dynasties 25 and 26. In addition, the figures of gods on both sides of the façade have emphasized musculature around their knees, which certainly survives Dynasty 25 into Dynasty 26.48 However, variants of the features just mentioned can sometimes occur in reliefs of Dynasty 30, including the reign of Nectanebo II,49 with some of their faces having relatively heavy shapes that could be a basis for the damaged face of the goddess on the façade. It can also be noted that strong knee muscles can be found in the Ptolemaic Period in both raised and sunk relief.50 The reveals of the doorway in the façade each bear a single column of text oriented into the temple (figs. 3a-b). The text on the east jamb contains the partially preserved cartouche of Nectanebo II; on the west jamb only the lower portion of the inscription remains. A plant frieze was begun but never finished on both reveals. Following this inscription into the temple one does not find, as one would expect from the normal orientation of figures in Egyptian temples,51 an image of a king facing “in” to the temple. Instead, what one finds on the interior walls of the façade, once described as “Jambs, King facing doorway,”52 are scenes of a female figure facing in and embraced by a male figure facing out (figs. 4a-b). Given that he is facing “out” and holds an ankh, he is more likely a god (presumably Amun) rather than a king. With no name or attribute, it is not possible to identify the female figure with certainty. She is not likely to be a queen, but if

Special Emphasis on the Temple Precinct of the Goddess Mut at Karnak), in progress. 45 The blocks will be treated in the forthcoming publication mentioned in connection with n. 31, above. 46 Fazzini, “Report on the 1983 Season,” 297. 47 S. Sauneron, Villes et legendes d’Égypte, 2nd ed., BdE 90 (Cairo, 1983), 78-79. 48 L.-A. Christophe, “Trois monuments inédits mentionnant le grande majordome de Nitocris, Padihorresnet,” BIFAO 55 (1955), pl. II; Leclant, Recherches sur les monuments thébains, 106-108, §29C.

49 Cf., e.g., G. Steindorff, “Reliefs from the Temples of Sebennytos and Iseion in American Collections,” Journal of the Walters Art Gallery 7-8, 1944-45 (1945), fig. 2 with pp. 41and 46; fig. 3 with pp. 42 and 48; fig. 4 with pp. 43 and 47-48. 50 E.g., G. Robins, The Art of Ancient Egypt (London, 1997), fig. 293: raised relief of Ptolemy VIII at Kom Ombo. 51 See, e.g., H.G. Fischer, The Orientation of Hieroglyphs 1: Reversals, Egyptian Studies 2 (New York, 1977), 41-47. 52 PM II2, p. 259 (g) and (h).

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these reliefs date to Dynasties 25 or 26, the female figure could be either a God’s Wife of Amun, who occasionally wears the double crown,53 or a goddess. This writer still thinks the latter is the most likely interpretation of the figure, and it is certainly the correct identification if the reliefs are post Dynasty 26 in date. If she is a goddess, she is presumably Mut. A worked block found in the southwest corner of Room Y (Expedition No. 1MWB.191) supports this latter attribution. It is part of a doorway whose lintel is adorned with a winged disk and the remains of a figure wearing a double crown and facing away from the doorway (fig. 4c). Its sunk relief cannot belong with the raised relief doorway between Rooms X and Y, but it could conceivably be the uppermost-preserved part of the goddess embraced on the east side of the interior of the façade. To be sure, Sekhmet came to wear the double crown in the Third Intermediate Period54 and in late times its use was extended to a significant number of other goddesses.55 Moreover, a significant number of goddesses could be described by the title “Mistress of Heaven” above the head of the figure in the lintel. However, given the provenance of the lintel, it seems most reasonable to accept the identification of its goddess as Mut,56 represented entering the Contra-Temple from a procession on the lake. As the Isheru was used for processions of the goddess in connection with various festivals, this

iconography could have served well on numerous occasions, at least one being the return of Mut, as the appeased Eye of Re, to her Isheru and her temple. Moreover, as the many seated figures of Sekhmet represent both the potentially angry side of the goddess and this anger as controlled,57 it should be noted that the Sekhmet statues Benson and Gourlay found and erected before the Contra-Temple58 could have been symbolic of both the protection of the structure and the return and appeasement of Mut. Among the most recent and interesting commentaries on matters related to rituals of return and appeasement are those stemming from The Johns Hopkins University’s work in the Mut Temple, directed by Betsy Bryan, who uncovered the remains of a “Porch of Drunkenness” built by Hatshepsut.59 Because this porch was dismantled before the end of the reign of Thutmose III, its discoverer expressed the opinion that Mut’s Festival of Drunkenness was short-lived, only being revived in Ptolemaic times, as inscriptions on structures at the site demonstrate. Such a long hiatus in the main festival of drunkenness has been doubted.60 More importantly, there is evidence that drunkenness played a significant role in the cults of at least some goddesses after the New Kingdom and before the Ptolemaic Period. It is to Jacobus van Dijk that I owe knowledge of a recent article by Ludwig Morenz61 that deals with Herodotus on the Feast of Bastet. It

53 For a seemingly unique example of a God’s Wife of Amun wearing two double crowns, see G. Legrain, “Le temple et les chapelles d’Osiris à Karnak. Le temple D’OsirisHiq-Djeto,” RecTrav 20 (1900), 131, and D. Redford, “An Interim Report on the Second Season of Work at the Temple of Osiris, Ruler of Eternity, Karnak,” JEA 59 (1973), 23. 54 See, e.g., W.M.F. Petrie, The Palace of Apries (Memphis II), BSAE 15 (London, 1909), pl. 19: time of Siamun. 55 R. Fazzini, “Some Aspects of the Precinct of the Goddess Mut in the New Kingdom,” 71, n. 27. 56 As H. te Velde has noted (“Towards a Minimal Definition of the Goddess Mut,” JEOL 26 [1980], 5-6), it is interesting that Mut is not known to wear the double crown until the reign of Hatshepsut, a woman who also wore it. To be sure, even thereafter Mut could be shown wearing various headdresses, including the red crown: e.g., N. de Garis Davies, The Temple of Hibis in El Khargeh Oasis, vol. 3, The Decoration, Metropolitan Museum of Art Egyptian Expedition 17, ed. L. Bull and L. Hall (New York, 1953), pl. 2, reg. III. For crowns worn by Mut here, see also N. Wahlberg, “Representations of Hathor and Mut in the Hibis Temple,” in Current Research in Egyptology III: December 2001, ed. R. Ives, D. Lines, C. Nauton, and N. Wahlberg, BAR International Series 192 (Oxford, 2003), 69-75, esp. 71-73. Either of the two goddesses shown wearing a red crown in the Mut Temple’s so-called “Crypt of Taharqa” or “Crypt of Mentu-

emhat” (see note 4, above) could also be Mut. For interesting recent comments on the red crown’s wide range of associations, how a “symbolic level” can be added to a signifier (i.e., an object such as a crown) and what she calls her theory of “Cultural Relativity,” see K. Goebs, “Profile: Katje Goebs,” SSEA Newletter (Summer, 2007), first three un-numbered pages. 57 For a summary of data concerning Sekhmet and her statues at the Mut Precinct, see R. Fazzini in Mistress of the House, Mistress of Heaven: Women in Ancient Egypt, ed. A. Capel and G. Markoe (Cincinnati, 1996), cat. 65, pp. 134136 with notes on pp. 207-208. 58 See n. 8, above. 59 B. Bryan, “The Temple of Mut: New Evidence on Hatshepsut’s Building Activity,” in Hatshepsut: From Queen to Pharaoh, ed. C. Roehrig, with R. Dreyfus and C. Keller (New York, New Haven, and London, 2005), 181-183. 60 E.g., A. Dodson in “Sex and booze figured in Egyptian rites,” in http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15475319/page/2/. Since the present article was written, this writer has heard an important lecture by Prof. Bryan on as-yet-unpublished research in which she has examined the significance of Feasts of Drunkenness in tomb paintings of the entire 18th Dynasty as well as in inscriptional material of later periods. 61 L. Lorenz, “ »..wobei mehr Wein getrunken wird als im ganzen Jahre«. Altägyptische Weingefäß im Licht Herodots


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includes the line Morenz translates as “Wenn sie in Bubastis angekommen sind, feieren sie das Fest und bringen große Opfer, wobei mehr Wein getrunken wird als im ganzen Jahre.” Morenz characterizes feasts, drunkenness, and sexuality as being closely linked in Egypt. He points out that among the evidence for the Bastet Festival is a Phoenician jar found in Spain, and he also believes that Egyptianizing motifs on a Phoenician silver plate and Phoenician ivories reflect the Bastet Festival. In an article on Turin Papyrus 55001, Dieter Kessler argued that both sections of the papyrus— that with animals in human roles and that with people engaged in sexual activities—are anchored in the events of the royal New Year festival.62 In a relatively recent article, Alexandra von Lieven accepts Kessler’s basic linking of the papyrus with the New Year Festival and cult of the goddess.63 She also argues that the hairdo of the priests in the Turin papyrus can be used to associate them with the “chauves” of Hathor, who were significant individuals and intermediaries of sorts with the dangerous goddess. And so it might be noted that many of the statues of “chauves” were sistrophoroi, with the sistrum a symbol of the musical pacification of the goddess. Whether or not it had a sistrum, the bust from the statue all but certainly of Mentuemhat mentioned above bears a text in which Mentuemhat says that he was one who “...poussa des cries de joie lorsqu’il rejoint la souveraine, sans cesse, chaque jour.”64 And the Ptolemaic inscriptions on the gateway in the First Pylon of the Mut Temple have sections that continue in a seemingly related and similar vein.65

In general, alcohol appears to have long played a significant role in the worship of some goddesses even if it sometimes fell out of use for a time in certain temples, and their worship may have influenced Egyptianizing iconography outside of Egypt. The kind of beliefs and symbolism under discussion is also related to some of the stray blocks that we found within Mut’s Contra-Temple. Two of these are adorned on one side with Hathor heads (figs. 13a-b). Their Expedition numbers are 6MWB.96a-b,66 with 6MWB.96a having been found in the doorway between Room X and Y and 6MWB.96b in the southwest corner of Room Y. Hathor heads in relief and Hathor-headed columns became symbols of temples dedicated to a goddess and of the goddess appeased, and so they were at home in a great many temples. 67 As Dieter Arnold has observed, this was especially true of the Late Period, when “one can clearly observe a hitherto unexplained shift to temples for female deities.” He also observes that “somehow connected with the preference for female deities is the appreciation of youthful gods such as Harsomtus, Harpokrates, Harpare, and Khonspakhered, whose cult generated the temple type of the birth house.”68 However, it should also be noted that the harbingers for this can already be detected by late Dynasty 20, while the Third Intermediate Period saw the evolution of what has been called a “veritable theology of birth” and “mammisiac religion,” with an increase in the role of child gods and women. The development of Mut’s mammisi took place during this period.69

kontextualisiert,” CdE 81 (2006), 45-61, esp. 49 and 58-59. Another recent and important publication is J.-C. Goyon, Le Rituel du sHtp sxmt au changement de cycle annuel: d’après les architraves du temple d’Edfou et textes parallèles, du Nouvel Empire à l’époque ptolémaïque et romaine, BdE 141 (Cairo, 2006). 62 D. Kessler, “Der satirisch–erotische Papyrus Turin 55001 und das «Verbringen des schönen Tages»,” SÄK 15 (1988), 171-196. 63 “Wein, Weib und Gesang—Rituale für die Gefährliche Göttin,” in Rituale in der Vorgeschichte, Antike und Gegenwart: Studien zur Vorderasiatischen, Prähistorichen und Klassischen Archäologie, Ägyptologie, Alten Geschichte, Theologie und Religionswissenschaft; Interdiszipinäre Tagung vom 1.-2. Februar 2002 an der Freien Universität Berlin, ed. C. Metzner-Nebelsick, Internationale Archäologie Arbeitsgemeinschaft, Sympoisum, Tagung, Kongress 4, eds. C. Dobiat and K. Leidorf (Rahden, Westphalia, 2003), 47-55. 64 See above with note 41; Clère, Les chauves d’Hathor, 155. 65 J.-C. Goyon, H. te Velde, J. van Dijk, W. Peck, and R. Fazzini, The Brooklyn Museum Archaeological Expedition to the Precinct of the Goddess Mut at South Karnak, II: The Gateway in the First Pylon of the Mut Temple, its Architecture,

Religious Texts and Representations (forthcoming). The texts in question include the following: “. . . without a single instant therein lacking joy”; “assuredly, for him the night is (spent) playing music [from] dusk until dawn;” and “...one makes jubilation for her according to the greatness of her flame, in order to appease her Majesty in the midst of the lake-Isheru, great being the drinking cup consecrated to drunkenness.” 66 The dimensions of 6MWB.96a are max. length 85 cm; height 36 cm; and depth 31 cm. Its faces are 27 cm from the necklace to the top of the modius. The width at the ears of the right-hand face is 24 cm and that of the other faces is 21-22 cm. The dimensions of 6MWB.96b are max. length 76 cm; height 36 cm; and depth 24 cm. Its faces are 28 cm from the necklace to the top of the modius. The widths of the faces at the ears are 21-23 cm. 67 For Hathor-head capitals in general, see E. Bernhauer, Hathorsäulen und Hathorpfeiler: Altägyptische Architecturelemente vom Neuen Reich bis zur Spätzeit (Wiesbaden, 2005). For comments on their religious associations, see pp. 34-35. 68 D. Arnold, Temples of the Last Pharaohs (New York and Oxford, 1999), 309. 69 For general summaries of this with references, see Fazzini, Egypt, Dynasty XXII-XXV, 8-13; R. Fazzini, “Four

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Figs. 13a-b. Two fragments of Hathor frieze (6MWB.96a-b) found in Room Y.

As noted, the widths of 6MWB.96a and b are 85 cm and 76 cm, which makes the total preserved length of the architrave parts 161 cm. The building’s façade is ca. 4.3 m wide. Its doorway and the doorway between Room X and Y are each about 1.6 m wide, which means that the original architrave could have fit over either doorway. A comparison of 6MWB.96a-b with the publications of Hathor-head capitals does not provide decent stylistic parallels until Dynasty 25 and

later.70 However, the closest parallel in style and type I have found for an architrave with a row of Hathor heads is from the Satet Temple at Elephantine. These Hathor heads help support some of what we have said about Mut’s Contra-Temple, as they have been dated to the time of Ptolemy VIII Euergetes II, viewed as being in a tradition linked to Ptolemy VI Philometor, and related to the relationships between Satet, Anuket, and the returning goddess.71 This brings us back to the functions and also

Unpublished Ancient Egyptian Objects in Faience in the Brooklyn Museum of Art,” SSEAS 28 (2001), 57-61; Fazzini, “Some Reliefs of the Third Intermediate Period in the Egyptian Museum, Cairo,” 351-362. For mammisi in the New Kingdom, see H. De Meulenaere, “Isis et Mout du mammisi,” OLA 13 (1982), 25-29.

70 E. Bernhauer, “Hathorstützen der Spätzeit,” GM 207 (2005), 7-21, with Abb. 3, 6, and 7-9: faces from Dynasty 25, the reigns of Ptolemy VI and VIII and the early Roman Period showing variants of Hathor faces related to those from Mut’s Contra-Temple. 71 E. Laskowska-Kusztal, Die Dekorfragmente der ptole


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the types of contra-temples, which vary considerably. For example, Khonsu’s Contra-Temple72 had a small porch, while the Contra-Temple of Karnak’s Ptah Temple is basically a relief that appears to have been equipped with a protective structure of wood.73 The Eastern Temple in the Amun Precinct74 has a complex of rooms spreading across its front and is related to an approach from the east. Somewhat closer in appearance to Mut’s Contra-Temple is the later and relatively distant Contra-Temple at Ismant el-Kharab.75 The publishers of the Khonsu Temple’s Contra-Temple, which they identify with an inscription mentioning a sacred sbxt, propose that it, and perhaps most contra-temples, were not used for popular worship or oracles but played an important role in the complete cult of their temple.76 To be sure, their opinion has not eliminated the opinion that contra-temples were associated with popular worship.77 Indeed, in a recent publication involving

the subject, Peter Brand78 has described the erection of contra-temples and lean-to shrines against the outer walls of the great temple as being created in Egyptian temples of the New Kingdom and later for lay cult practices, by permitting members of the lay public, who could not enter the temple’s sanctuary itself, access to the god near his/her shrine on the other side of the wall. Given the multifaceted nature of most Egyptian religious beliefs, the writer will say that one might expect contra-temples to have served various functions, not only at different times in their history but also at the same time. In the case of Mut’s Contra-Temple it would seem that soon after its rear-wall graffito was finished, it expanded into a structure that both housed a sort of cult for Mentuemhat and came to celebrate the Theban Triad and various processions of Mut, including those related to the return of the angry goddess and her pacification.

mäisch-römischen Tempel von Elephantine, Elephantine 15, AV 73 (Mainz, 1996), 78, pl. 35 and pl. 102, with comments on p. 75. 72 Laroche and Traunecker, “La chapelle adossée,” 175, fig. 5. 73 D. Wildung, Imhotep und Amenhotep: Gotterwerdung im alten Ägypten, MÄS 36 (Munich and Berlin, 1977), 201206. 74 PM II2, 215-218. 75 J. Dobrowolski, “Remarks on the Construction Stages of the Main Temple and Shrines I-II,” in Dakhleh Oasis Project: Preliminary Reports on the 1994-1995 to 1998-1999 Field Seasons, ed. C. Hope and G. Bowen, Dakhleh Oasis Project, Monograph 11 (Oxford and Oakville, 2002), 121-123, with figs. 1-3 on p. 123. 76 Laroche and Traunecker, “La chapelle adossée,” 194. 77 E.g., W. Guglielmi, “Die Funktion von Tempeleingang und Gegentempel als Gebetsort. Zur Bedeutung einiger

Widder– und Ganstellen des Amun,” in Ägyptische TempelStruktur, Funktion und Programm (Akten der Ägyptologischen Tempeltagungen in Gosen 1990 und in Mainz 1992), ed. R. Gundlach and M. Rochholz, HÄB 37 (Hildesheim, 1994), 55-68; and D. Arnold, The Encyclopedia of Ancient Egyptian Architecture (trans. S. Gardiner and H. Strudwick (London and Princeton, 2003), 5: “Addorsed chapel, Addorsed temple (chapelle adossée).” In this entry, which includes a reference to Laroche and Traunecker, “La chapelle adossée,” he defines it as “a cult structure built on the outside of a temple and attached to the rear wall, which enabled the deity in the sanctuary to be addressed by people standing outside the temple.” 78 P. Brand, “Veils, Votives, and Marginalia: The Use of Sacred Space at Karnak and Luxor,” in Occasional Proceedings of the Theban Workshop: Sacred Space and Sacred Function in Ancient Thebes, ed. P. Dorman and B. Bryan, SAOC 61 (Chicago, 2007), 60-61.

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a god’s head in heidelberg

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A GOD’S HEAD IN HEIDELBERG Erika Feucht Ägyptologisches Institut der Universität Heidelberg

In the catalogue of the Heidelberg University Collection, I could only give a short description and a front view of a head made of quartzite. I dated it in the era of Thutmose IV.1 Although it has been greatly damaged, its high quality can still be seen. Therefore I should like to present a detailed analysis with a new interpretation to the specialist of Egyptian statuary, hoping for his approval. Inv. no.: 300; height: 21 cm; width: 17 cm; brown silicated sandstone (i.e., brown quartzite); Bought by Hermann Ranke in Cairo, 1912.

Description The head is enclosed by a tripartite wig, its side strands falling behind the ears down to the breast (figs. 1-2). The left strand is broken off. On top of the head, a uraeus forms a symmetrical recumbent figure shaped like an eight. Its hood, above the head’s front, is broken off, and its tail runs out between two protruding round remains of a former headdress, which gradually rose from the wig (fig. 3). Widening at the sides, the remains of the headdress begin in the middle of the peruke above the ears and curve toward the hind part of the head, which has been broken off. The delicately modeled face, with its full cheeks, tapers toward the chin, thus gaining the shape of a heart. The hairline of the wig is pulled deep into the brow. Rising from the root of the nose, the arching eyebrows continue in broad cosmetic bands parallel to the cosmetic lines extending out from the outer corners of the eyes well into the

1 E. Feucht, Vom Nil zum Neckar (Berlin, Heidelberg, and New York, 1986), 69-70, no. 185. After her lecture on the statuary of Thutmose IV at the Fourth International Congress of Egyptology in Munich (abstract in: S. Schoske, Fourth International Congress of Egyptology, Munich, 26 August– 1 September 1985 [Munich, 1985], 34) I pointed out to Betsy Bryan an unpublished head at the Heidelberg collection that

temples. Below them, the elongated lightly incised almond-shaped eyes with their fine rims scarcely recede. The lower lid of the fully preserved right eye, slightly tilted at the nose, runs straight in its first third, then rises towards the temples in the following two thirds, thus gaining an impression of obliqueness. Separated only by the raised edge of the upper lid, the slightly bulging eyeball leads on to the upper lid and continues across the brows to the low forehead. The eye scarcely stands out between the lids. The cheeks fall back below the lower lid to rise again toward the cheekbones, set at the height of the nasal alae. The remains of the fully damaged nose show that the nasal alae were not very wide. The lips turn upward into a smile toward the drilled corners. A line seems to show the rim of the upper lip lowered at the philtrum. But since this line descends before the corners of the mouth, it might only be a vein in the stone having the form of a lip line. Two lines slanting sideways from the lower lip mark off the chin. A rounded beard has been mostly hewn off by a blow from the left side, which spared remains at the chin and along the throat. The straps holding it are incised up to the ear. The round upper shell of the ear is pushed forward by the wig. The slim earlobes cling to the temples. The auricle is formed like a pretzel tilting towards the auditory canal. The inner part of the auricle is scarcely formed out.

Date The soft modeling of the face, with the high arching brows, reminds one of the sphinx’s head in

she did not know. On the tour through the German museums after the congress, she had the opportunity to take a look at the head and agreed with my dating it to the reign of Thutmose IV. In her publication on Thutmose IV, she mentions it as “Heidelberg. Rd. Gr. Head of goddess. Uninscribed” (B.M. Bryan, The Reign of Thutmose IV [Baltimore and London, 1991], Appendix II: Statuary, p. 212).

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Fig. 1. Heidelberg Inv. no. 300, frontal view.

Fig. 2. Heidelberg Inv. no. 300, side view.

Fig. 3. Heidelberg Inv. no. 300, top view from behind. Fig. 4. Munich Inv. no. 500: Amenhotep II. Courtesy Staatliche Sammlung Ägyptische Kunst, München.

Munich, convincingly attributed to Amenhotep II (fig. 4).2 But, the slant of the slender almondshaped right eye, resulting from the regular ascent from the inner corner to the middle of the upper lid, points to a later period. The upper lid of Amenhotep II ascends in its first eighth to full height.3

However, the eye has not yet gained the size of the eye of Amenhotep III. This makes an attribution to the reign of Thutmose IV probable, which can be confirmed by reliefs of this ruler.4 The profile line, which falls straight downward from the brow only to recede lightly at the chin, can be

2 Inv. no. 500. H.-W. Müller, “Ein ägyptischer Königskopf des 15. Jahrhunderts v. Chr.,” MJBK 3rd series, Bd. 3-4 (1952-53), 67ff., especially Abb. 1 and 17. Müller, Staatliche Sammlung Ägyptischer Kunst, 2nd ed. (Munich, 1976), 85 with other literature. 3 Müller, “Ägyptischer Königskopf.”

4 K. Myśliwiec, Le portrait royal dans le bas-relief du Nouvel Empire, TCAM 18 (Varsovie, 1976), especially fig. 122; cf. also figs. 117-119, 121, 126. Cf. Bryan, “Portrait Sculpture of Thutmose IV,” JARCE 24 (1987), 18, fig. 25 and p. 7, bark shrine of Thutmose IV.

a god’s head in heidelberg found on reliefs of this pharaoh.5 A comparison with the statuary of Thutmose IV shows a striking resemblance to the over-life-size standard bearer from Cairo (figs. 5-6).6 Both are made of quartzite. As on the wig of the Heidelberg head, the uraeus rises above the nemes headcloth, which is pulled low into the brow, and forms a recumbent figure eight just before the top of the head. In both faces, the eyebrows start at the root of the nose and run parallel to the eyelids and the cosmetic lines of the eyes into the temples. The slim, almond-shaped eye is slanting, and the flat part below the eyes leads to the cheekbones at the height of the nasal alae. These similarities can also be noticed on the head of Thutmose IV from Alexandria,7 and the bust of the same ruler from Medamud shows a lesspronounced slant of the right eye and the recumbent figure eight of the uraeus.8

Interpretation In 1986 I suggested attributing the head in Heidelberg to the god Atum. Whether this interpretation can be upheld will be shown in the following lines. The three-stranded wig, worn by women and gods, and the rounded form of the beard point to a god, defined by the broken-off symbol on its head. To name a certain god, more criteria have 5 Myśliwiec, Portrait royal, figs. 116-118, 127. This form of the ear can be found beside others during the period of Hatshepsut to Amenhotep III: ibid., figs. 44 (Hatshepsut), 92 (Thutmose III), 121 (Thutmose IV), 131, 149, 153 (Amenhotep III). The uraeus coiling to form an eight above the hood is well attested during the 18th Dynasty until Amenhotep III (H. G. Evers, Staat aus dem Stein 2 (Munich, 1929), 27 §173). 6 Cairo JE 43611. Cf. Bryan, Reign of Thutmose IV, pl. XV, fig. 41b. I thank Mohamed Saleh and the Cairo Museum for the photos and the permission to publish them. 7 Alexandria 25792 (ibid., fig. 41a). 8 Louvre E 13889. Bryan, “Portrait Sculpture,” 13, fig. 16. 9 E.g., 38.021. G. Daressy, Statues de Divinités, Catalogue général des antiquités égyptiennes du Musée du Caire (Cairo, 1906), pl. II. Other examples, pl. I. 10 J. Baines, “A Bronze Statuette of Atum,” JEA 56 (1970), 135ff.; the foot of the crown on the tripartite wig of a statue of Atum from Herculaneum: K. Myśliwiec, Studien zum Gott Atum 2, HÄB 8 (Hildesheim, 1979), no. 24, pls. XIII, XIV, XVb, XVIb. It can neither be Nefertem nor Khepre. In case of Nefertem, traces of the menit falling down from the lotus flower to the peruge should be seen (G. Roeder, Ägyptische Bronzefiguren [Berlin, 1956], §13-14), and the clypeus of Khepre should show four outward bends. The body of a scarab is also slimmer than the remains of a crown on the Heidelberg head (CG 38.103: Daressy, Statues de Divinités, 35 and pl. VIII).

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to be found. Certain gods can be excluded because of the two adjoining rounded remains at the front of the headdress. Those cannot be included in the high tolos with the sun disk in front of the high feathers worn by Amun-Re,9 nor in the double crown of Atum10 or the conical white crown worn by Osiris, either plain or enclosed by two feathers.11 Neither can those remains be connected to the pair of high feathers covering the whole width on the tripartite wig of the primeval god,12 nor to the moon disk enclosed by the sickle placed at the back of the tripartite wig of the moon-god Iah or Osiris-Iah.13 The rounded remains placed in front of the crown can only belong to a pair of ram’s horns projecting to both sides. A little bronze figure shows Osiris mummified wearing the tripartite wig and the sun disk in front of the high feathers above the ram’s horns. Incribed on it is a plea to Osiris for a long life for NN.14 On a relief in the temple of Sety I in Abydos, the king, as well as Osiris, is depicted wearing the atef crown above the tripartite wig and the rounded beard worn by gods (fig. 7).15 In the chapel of Osiris, Sety appears mummified like Osiris, holding the heka and the flagellum in his crossed hands and wearing the pair of high feathers and the sun disk with two uraei on top of the ram’s horns above the tripartite wig. Thoth is raising the ankh sign to his nose.16 This shows that this kind of headwear was 11 CG. 38.237 et al., Daressy, Statues de Divinités, pls. XIV-XXI, and The Brooklyn Museum Annual 8 (1966-67), fig. p. 33. 12 CG 38.068 = Daressy, Statues de Divinités, pl. VI. While Dietrich Wildung and Matthias Seidel think of a primeval god, possibly Amun-Re, because it was found in Karnak (Propyläen Kunstgeschichte, vol. 15, Das Alte Ägypten, ed. C. Vandersleyen [Berlin, 1975], no. 18 and p. 246), Hermann Schlögel sees in it the god Tatenen (Der Gott Tatenen, OBO 29 [Freiburg, 1980], 99-104 and figs. 9 and 14. For the crown, cf. p. 99ff.). 13 Roeder, Bronzefiguren, §244-248; CG 38.029-35 and 38.040-43 = Daressy, Statues de Divinités, pls. III-IV and XXIV. 14 Bronze figure, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston 27.982 = Roeder, Bronzefiguren, 210f. §248, fig. 25. Cf. p. 30, §48 and the horizontal mummy with the tripartite wig and the ram’s horns with the pair of high feathers in front of which the sun disk is set: CG 38.424, Daressy, Statues de Divinités, pl. XXIII. 15 The king: A.H. Gardiner, ed., The Temple of King Sethos I at Abydos 4 (Chicago, 1957), pl. 44 (second Hypostyle Hall, east wall). Osiris: ibid., vol. 1 (Chicago, 1933), pl. 3 (chapel of Osiris). 16 K. Lange and M. Hirmer, Ägypten (Munich, 1955), pl. 210.

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Fig. 5. Cairo JE 43611 Thutmose IV, frontal view. Courtesy Egyptian Museum, Cairo.

Fig. 6. Cairo JE 43611 Thutmose IV, side view. Courtesy Egyptian Museum, Cairo.

Fig. 7. Sety I in Abydos, Chapel of Osiris.

a god’s head in heidelberg not reserved for gods, but could also be worn by the king or pharaoh who has been transformed into Osiris.17 A bronze figure of the Late Period, for example, shows the god dressed like the king, wearing a kilt. He is holding the flagellum in his right hand, and like the gods mentioned above, he wears a plaited beard of a god and the same headdress above the tripartite wig.18 Thus it is also possible to attribute the Heidelberg head to a figure of the king transformed into Osiris, wearing the atef crown on top of the ram’s horns. On the reliefs of the temple of Karnak, the king is often depicted with the pair of high feathers or the atef crown above the ram’s horns. On the obelisk of Hatshepsut in the Hypostyle Hall of Karnak, we can see Thutmose III with the feathers on top of the ram’s horns.19 Thutmose too is often depicted with this crown, sometimes enlarged by the uraeus wearing the sun disk. But he wears it above the round wig or the nemes headcloth.20 A statue of Amenhotep II also shows the king with the nemes and the atef crown, from which the rams’s horns extend to both sides.21 A dyad in Copenhagen depicts Rameses II beside a god (fig. 8).22 The two figures are not totally in the round. Both lean against a slab. Above the nemes, the ruler wears the high feathers with the uraeus in front of the sun disk. The god at his left side is shown with the sun disk in front of the high feathers above the tripartite wig. Above an inscription on the back side of the slab stela, there are two depictions of Rameses II offering to a god. On the right side, the god wearing the double crown is named Atum, while the god on the left side, who wears the same crown as the statue in front of the stela, is called Ptah-Tenen. The upper part of a similar dyad leaning against a slab stela belongs to a private collector in Basel (fig. 9).23 While the king wears the high feathers above the ram’s horns on his round wig, they top the tripartite wig of the god, a uraeus rising at its front. The tail of the serpent runs straight backwards across the head. The ram’s horns are 17 The head of a king that Jack Josephson tentatively attributes to Nectanebo II, with a question mark, probably wore the same crown above the nemes (J. Josephson, Egyptian Royal Sculpture of the Late Period, 400-246 B.C. [Mainz 1997], pl. II b). 18 CG 38.069 = Daressy, Statues de Divinités, pl. VI. 19 Paul Barguet, Le Temple d’Amon-Rê à Karnak, RAPH 21 (Cairo, 1962), pl. XIII D. 20 Myśliwiec, Portrait royal, pls. 125-128 and 121. Bryan, Reign of Thutmose IV, pl. VII, fig. 16 (with the sun disk in the cow’s horns in front of the pair of feathers on the ram’s horns). Horemheb wears them on top of the round wig

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Fig. 8. Copenhagen ÆIN 1483. Dyad of Rameses II and Atum.

(Barguet, Temple d’Amon-Rê, pl. XXXIV A). 21 Bryan, Reign of Thutmose IV, fig. 17. Barguet, Temple d’Amon-Rê, pl. XIV D. 22 ÆIN 1483= O. Koefoed-Petersen, Catalogue des statues et statuettes égyptiennes (Copenhagen, 1950), 34, no. 58 and pl. 6 ; Schlögel, Tatenen, no. 9. Cf. M. Eaton-Krauss, “Ramesses-Re Who Creates the Gods,” in Fragments of a Shattered Visage, ed. E. Bleiberg and R. Freed, MIEAA 1 (Memphis, 1991), 20ff. 23 H. Schlögel, Geschenk des Nils (Basel, 1978), 59, no. 186. Schlögel, Tatenen, fig. 14.

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Summary Date The almond-shaped eyes of the Heidelberg head differ in form from those of Amenhotep II and have not reached the size of the eyes of Amenhotep III. The well-preserved oblique right eye of the Heidelberg head compares well with the eyes of Thutmose IV in relief and plastic. Like the eyes of the standard-bearer from Karnak, now in the Cairo Museum, it has a slant expressed by the lower eyelid ascending towards the side. Both faces show the uraeus forming a recumbent figure eight, the low forehead leading over to the highset eyes and the flat part below the eyes ending in the cheekbones at the height of the nostrils.

Fig. 9. Basel, private collector. Dyad.

situated in the middle of the wig, like the remains on the Heidelberg head. Unfortunately, I had no opportunity to see the statue in Basel with my own eyes. But the photo clearly shows an elevation below the ram’s horns at the same spot as on the Heidelberg head. As Schlögel has shown, this crown, the feathers on top of the ram’s horns, is often worn by Ptah-Tenen.24 Now it is possible to explain the fracture at the back of the head of the Heidelberg piece. The head once leaned against a slab stela, from which it has been hewn off. It belonged to a figure of the god Ptah-Tenen, who once stood at the side of Thutmose IV, both leaning against a stela.

24 Daressy calls the figure of a god without inscription Tatenen because the feathers with the sun disk rise above the ram’s horns (Tatenen, pl. VI, CG 38.069).

Interpretation On the top of the head, remains of a mounting can be seen at the right side and two small rounded parts in the middle of the front side. They once belonged to a crown. The two rounded parts can only be interpreted as the remains of rams’ horns once carrying the high feathers, with or without the sun disk in front of them. Though this crown can be worn by kings as well as Osiris and PtahTatenen, the king is very seldom shown with the tripartite wig and the rounded beard. A close look at the back of the head makes it clear that it must have been hewn off from a support, a back pillar or stela. Comparing it with a statue group now in Basel showing a king and Ptah-Tatenen leaning against a stela, the remains on the head are so much alike that we can attribute the Heidelberg head to a group showing Ptah-Tatenen standing beside Thutmose IV.

reconstructing a statue from a head

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RECONSTRUCTING A STATUE FROM A HEAD Rita E. Freed Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

With great pleasure I dedicate this article about an enigmatic Egyptian head to Jack Josephson, a scholar, a friend, and an extraordinary human being. Like a teacher, he has challenged our assumptions, guided us in looking at Egyptian sculpture, and set a standard for connoisseurship that extends well beyond the Egyptological sphere. I thought long and hard about what would constitute a suitable contribution to a man of Jack’s interests and stature. In the end, I chose something that I believe is rare or even perhaps unique in Egyptian art, just as Jack’s combination of expertise, warmth, and drive sets him apart from others. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston 1980.29 is a granodiorite head, measuring about half life-size (figs. 1- 4). Only its right ear is exposed, while the left remains covered by the wig, a most unusual feature, given the strong preference for symmetrical compositions throughout the dynasties. Clearly the deliberate exposing of just one ear was done with a purpose in mind. In this paper, I will explore its possible meanings and attempt to reconstruct the rest of the statue. In view of the lack of inscription, findspot, or other identifying information, only art-historical analysis can shed more light on the head. The subject wears a wig parted in the center and decorated with vertical incised wavy lines and broader horizontal grooves imitating natural curls and waves. At the back and sides, the wig ends at the nape of the neck, where several narrowly spaced incised lines merge, creating the appearance of thick, tight curls (figs. 3-4). Had the wig been cut straight, one would expect to see the same thicker curls in the front, since the neck break is approximately even. Instead, the thinly spaced lines continue on the

front, suggesting that the hair was longer on the chest. There is no trace of a back pillar. The face of the one-eared individual is round and, except for the area around the eye, smooth and devoid of modeling. The forehead is low, particularly on the proper-left side, where the wig dips slightly more than on the right. This small naturalistic detail, a response to the way hair unobstructed by an ear would normally fall, bears testimony to the artist’s keen observation. The brows arch slightly over small, broadly spaced, and naturalistically rendered three-dimensional eyes, whose almond shape is enhanced by an incised line. Heavy upper eyelids make the eyes appear to glance downward. From the midpoint of the nose to the chin, the features are damaged. The blow that caused this must have been administered from right to left (and by a right-handed person), based on the angle of the break. As a result, the left nostril and the left corner of the mouth may still be seen. What appears to have been straight lips end in a small circular depression. The underside of the chin on the right side has also sustained damage. The ear is naturalistically carved and has a shallow, diagonally oriented, oval nick on the lobe (fig. 2), suggestive of a pierced ear. The details described above offer clues to the gender and date of the anonymous head, as well as the type of sculpture from which it came. Vertically incised and horizontally modeled wigs are found in both sculpture and relief beginning at the end of the 18th Dynasty,1 but are particularly common in the Ramesside Period.2 Although both men and women wore similarly curled wigs in the 19th Dynasty, only masculine wigs ended at neck level in the back but were longer in the front.

1 For example, the statue of the General Horemheb, NY, MMA 23.10.1, illustrated in P. Dorman, P. Harper, and H. Pittman, The Metropolitan Museum of Art: Egypt and the Ancient Near East (New York, 1987), 67. 2 Sculpture: Cairo CG 751 and Vienna Kunsthistorisches

Museum 5910, both depicting Sety I and illustrated in V. Solia, “A Group of Royal Sculptures from Abydos,” JARCE 19 (1992), figs. 26-27. Relief: Berlin 7291, illustrated in Staatliche Museen zu Berlin: Ägyptisches Museum und Papyrus Sammlung (Mainz, 1991), 143.

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Fig. 1. Head of a man, frontal view. Egyptian, New Kingdom, Dynasty 19, 1295-1186 BC, Granodiorite, Height: 16 cm (5 5/16 in.) Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Museum Special Purchase Fund, Photograph ©2009 Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. 1980.29.

Fig. 2. Head of a man, three-quarters view. Photograph ©2009 Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. 1980.29.

Fig. 3. Head of a man, proper-right view. Photograph ©2009 Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. 1980.29.

Fig. 4. Head of man, back view. Photograph ©2009 Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. 1980.29.

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Women’s wigs were of even length and extended at least to mid-chest.3 The form of the wig strongly suggests that the subject is male. Asymmetrical wigs are rare. Women occasionally are depicted with the right lappet,4 or a part of the right lappet,5 falling to the back while the left hangs straight on the chest. Regardless of how the lappet is arranged on these examples, it still covers both ears. I know of no other instances, female or male, where only one ear is exposed.6 All the examples of asymmetrical wigs seem to date to the years between Amenhotep III and Dynasty 19, a time of particularly full and elaborate hairstyles. Accordingly, this occasional variant may be another way of enhancing feminine beauty. Clearly this was not the case with the Boston male head. The Boston head’s facial features are also consistent with an attribution to early Dynasty 19. A round face with plump cheeks and small, threedimensional eyes is characteristic of sculptures of the time of Sety I7 and Rameses II (fig. 5).8 Indented earlobes were also common at that time.9 Can anything be said about the statue from which the one-eared head originated? In this case, the destruction provides more information than what is preserved. Smoothly worn edges imply that the damage is ancient. The break at what appears to be the base of a short neck is clean and nearly horizontal,10 suggesting that the head was severed from the body in a single blow. A break of that nature would have resulted if the body had

been a heavy, compact mass, not subject to easy breakage. The most likely candidate is a block or cuboid statue. Part of the Egyptian artist’s repertoire since the beginning of Dynasty 12, the block statue exploded in popularity during the Ramesside Period. One estimate suggests that fully half the private statues deposited at Karnak at the time were block statues.11 The nature of the destruction to the face provides a clue to the type of block statue from which it came. Although the head from nose to neck, including the mouth, suffered damage, the middle of the mouth still projects outward unnaturally, giving it a slightly odd appearance. In one relatively rare variant of a block statue that originated in the Ramesside Period, the subject cups his right hand to his mouth, a pose which may signify that the subject is begging for offerings from his god (fig. 6).12 It is possible that the Boston head originally displayed such a gesture. The desire to destroy not only the face, but also the cupped hand forwarding a plea to the god, would explain the diagonal orientation of the blows, the protruding area where the hand touched the lips, and the breaks to the underside of the chin where the palm of the hand would have rested. The beginning of the Ramesside Period was both a reflection of what came before and a harbinger of the future. On the Boston head, the individuality manifest in the single ear on the right side and the deeper dip to the hair on the left recalls the naturalism and creativity of the Amarna Period. It is likely that artists from Akhenaten’s court or

3 For an exceedingly long and lovely wig on a woman contrasted with the wig of her husband, see the statue of Maya and Merit, Leiden AST 3, illustrated in R.E. Freed, Y.J. Markowitz, and S.H. D’Auria, eds., Pharaohs of the Sun: Akhenaten, Nefertiti, Tutankhamen (Boston, 1999), 279. 4 Examples are Kofler-Truniger Collection K 44 W III, illustrated in W. Seipel, Bilder für die Ewigkeit (Konstanz, 1983), 52, no. 87; a statuette the Museo Civico Archeologico in Bologna, Italy, illustrated in H. Fechheimer, Kleinplastik der Ägypter (Berlin, 1921), 65; and another in the Pushkin Museum, Moscow. 5 The Dutch Expedition at Saqqara recently discovered the statue of Meryneith and his wife, where only part of the right lappet of her hair falls behind her head. 6 Presently the famous head of Queen Tiye in Berlin exhibits an exposed left ear, but it is clear that it was once covered by a wig. For the fascinating construction of this head, see D. Wildung, “Metamorphosen einer Königin: Neue Ergebnisse zur Ikonographie des Berliner Kopfes der Teje mit Hilfe der Computertomographie,” Antike Welt 26 (1997), 245-249. 7 H. Sourouzian, “Statues et representations de statues royales sous Séthi I,” MDAIK 49 (1993), pls. 46-50. 8 For example Boston, MFA 89.558 from Bubastis,

illustrated in R.E. Freed, L.M. Berman and D.M. Doxey, Arts of Ancient Egypt, MFA Highlights (Boston, 2003), 163, or Cairo JE 44668 from Armant, illustrated in R. Freed, Ramesses II: The Great Pharaoh and His Time (Memphis, 1987), 133, both certainly originally made for Rameses II. 9 Solia, “Group of Royal Sculptures,” 111, and Sourouzian, “Statues et representations,” 245. 10 The slightly raised, semi-circular area on the right side would have surrounded the right shoulder. 11 R. Schulz, Die Entwicklung und Bedeutung des kuboiden Statuentypus 2 (Hildesheim, 1992), 774. 12 J. Vandier, Manuel d’Archéologie Égyptienne 3 (Paris, 1958), 458, and Schulz, Kuboiden Statuentypus 2, pls. 2c-d, 23, 24, 51a-b, 93a, 105a-b, 133b. Schulz comments (p. 600) that this statue type comes only from the early Ramesside Period, and that of all early Ramesside block statues, this type accounts for only 7.6%. Occasionally the same hand gesture is seen on other types of offering statues. See Museo Egizio di Torino. Civiltà degli Egizi: Le Arti della celebrazione (Turin, 1989), fig. 262, and British Museum EA 501, in E. Russmann, Eternal Egypt: Masterworks of Ancient Art from the British Museum (London, 2001), no. 95. (For the last reference, I am grateful to Professor Robert Ritner.)

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Fig. 5. Rameses II from Bubastis, Boston, MFA 89.558. Granite, H. 137 cm, w. 72.5 cm (H. 53 15/16 in., w. 28 9/16 in.). Gift of the Egypt Exploration Fund. Photograph ©2009, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Fig. 6. Block statue of Sedjememwaw from Terenuthis, Avignon, Musée Calvet A 35.

their influence was still present in both Thebes and Memphis, the religious and political capitals respectively. The Ramesside Period also witnessed the rise of personal piety,13 possibly a response to religious upheaval of the Amarna Period.14 This represented a philosophical change in the relationship between man and his god, and it is apparent in both art and literature. It gave rise to some of the most moving examples of both that Egypt ever produced. It is understandable that during Akhenaten’s reign, the closing of temples and absence of state religious festivals, which provided the general populace with close access to state gods, would have encouraged the average man to develop a more direct relationship with the gods who con13

The first to discuss the concept was James Henry Breasted, in Development of Religion and Thought in Ancient Egypt (New York, 1912), 348ff. 14 H. Brunner, “Persönliche Frömmigkeit,” in LÄ 4, 951.

trolled his personal world. Small-scale votive offerings, stelae, and ostraca addressing different gods with personal needs and wishes have been found throughout Egypt, but particularly at Deir el-Medina. In one especially moving example on a stela in the Turin Egyptian Museum, the draftsman Piay exclaims, Oh august, beloved, merciful god, Who hearest him that prays, Who hearest the entreaties of him that calls upon thee, Who comest at the voice of him that utters thy name!15

15

Turin no. 309, as translated by B. Gunn, “The Religion of the Poor in Ancient Egypt,” JEA 3 (1916), 91.

reconstructing a statue from a head The reference to hearing prayers is frequent at Deir el-Medina and elsewhere. “Amun of the Hearing Ear” and “Ptah of the Hearing Ear” are but two of a number of deities who are so addressed.16 Stelae featuring ears singly or in multiples of over one hundred17 and ear-shaped votive offerings18 were often placed in temples during the Ramesside Period.19 The showing of only one ear on the Boston head draws special attention to that ear and the act of hearing. Perhaps it signifies that the subject was listening for the god’s instructions to him. In summary, the points outlined above allow for not only a theoretical reconstruction of the Boston Man with One Ear but also a guess about its meaning. The overall shape of the face and its features suggest that it dates to the Ramesside Period; the wig terminating at shoulder level leaves no doubt that a man is represented; the absence of any signs of recarving and the slightly deeper dip of the hair on the proper-left side indicate that the original intention was to show only one ear; the thick neck and horizontal break make it likely that the statue was a cuboid, or block statue; and the damage to the facial features, including the fact 16

G. Pinch, Votive Offerings to Hathor (Oxford, 1993), 252, and A. Sadek, Popular Religion in Egypt during the New Kingdom (Hildesheim, 1987), 249ff. 17 Sadek, Popular Religion, 250. 18 Pinch, Votive Offerings, 246-247 and Sadek, Popular Religion, 245-246. 19 Pinch, Votive Offerings, 149. 20 Schulz, Kuboiden Statuentypus 1, 140.

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that the mouth still protrudes unnaturally in spite of it, suggests that the subject originally cupped his right hand under his chin. Continuing with an even more tentative reconstruction, seven of eight of the block statues with hands cupped at the mouth display a sistrum on the vertical surface formed by the squatting legs. (The eighth statue was severely damaged by water, so surface decoration has not survived.20) Based on these statistics, is likely that the Boston head also displayed a sistrum. Five of the seven inscribed statues mention Hathor21 and two mention Mehit,22 an alternate designation for Hathor. In terms of provenance, three originate from Deir el-Medina’s Hathor temple,23 one from the Thutmose III temple at Deir el-Bahri,24 and one from the Osiris temple at Abydos.25 The findspot of the remaining statues is either vague or not known. None is known to have come from a domestic or funerary context. Based on this, it seems likely that the Boston head was created for a temple, as were most block statues. It may well have come from western Thebes,26 perhaps even the Deir elMedina Hathor temple.

21

Ibid., nos. 4, 57, 60, 240 and 311. Ibid., nos. 105 and 207. 23 Ibid., nos. 57, 60 and 311. 24 Ibid., no. 240. 25 Ibid., no. 105. 26 Russmann, Eternal Egypt, no. 95, states that nearly all the known statues with the “begging gesture” come from the area of Thebes. 22

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the stela of djehutynefer, called seshu

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THE STELA OF DJEHUTYNEFER, CALLED SESHU G.A. Gaballa Cairo University

According to the records of the Museo delle Antichità Egizie di Torino, this remarkably well-preserved stela, Inv. Cat. No. 1639, was once a part of Bernardino Drovetti’s collection.1 It is round topped, made of fine limestone, and measures 56.5 cm in height, 37.5 cm in breadth, and 7.5 cm in thickness. Its original provenance is unknown. The same records date the stela to Dynasty 18, and specifically to the reign of Thutmose III. The grounds on which this precise date is based are not given.

Bibliography P.C. Orcurti, Catalogo Illustrato dei Monumenti Egizii del R. Museo di Torino (Turin, 1855), 43-44, no. 68. C. Vidua, Catalogue de la collection d’antiq. de monuments le chev. Drovetti, a 1822 (Florence and Rome, 1880), 233, no. 156. A. Fabretti, A. Rossi, and R.V. Lanzone, Regio Museo di Torino. Antichità Egizie (Turin, 1882), 180, no. 1639. G. Maspero, “Rapport sur une mission en Italie,” RecTrav 4 (1833), 127-128.

Description The Scene The upper portion of the stela, which has a pale brown background, is occupied by a funerary

1 Dr. Eleni Vassilika, Director of the Museo Egizio, kindly gave me a picture of the stela and the permission to publish it; to her I wish to express my gratitude.

scene and texts. On the right, facing left, is a seated Osiris, whose face, neck, hands, and collar are colored green. His eyes and ears are engraved, while his eyelids, pupils, and eyebrows are painted black. He wears his white robe and atef crown and holds his was scepter, heqa crook and neheh flail. His low-backed throne with its white cushion is painted red and rests on a green mat with red lashings. Part of the throne and the lashings appear to have been repainted. Behind him stands a tall green and white fan. In front of Osiris, facing right, stands Djehutynefer, brown colored, raising his hands before his face in a gesture of adoration. He wears a short black wig and a green wesekh collar. His long white robe covers a short white kilt. Behind him stands his elegantly slim wife Byma, with her long, tightly fitted white dress that reaches down to her feet and covers her left shoulder. Her face, arms, and feet are painted brown. Like her husband, she wears a green wesekh collar, but her black wig is long and covers her right shoulder. With her left hand she holds a sistrum. Behind Byma stands Mahu, their son, with his long white robe over a short white kilt. Like his parents, he is painted brown. His left hand holds five lotus flowers and five birds tied together, while his right holds five geese, also tied together.

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Texts A. Scene

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Before and above Osiris: (1) Wsir nb pt HqA Dt di.f TAw nDm (2) n mHyt n kA n sS (A) %Sw (1) Osiris, Lord of Heaven, Ruler of Eternity, may he give the sweet breeze (2) of the North to the ka of the scribe (3) Seshu. Before and above Djehutynefer and Family: (1) rdit iAw n Wsir sn tA (2) n nb Dt di(.i) n.k iAw n Hr.k (A) nfr swAS.i nfrw.k in (4) sS Hsb iHw Apdw (5) [n Imn +Hwty nfr Dd n] (6) .f %Sw snt.f nbt pr By (7) –ma sA.f (8) sanx rn.f sS MHw

4

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2

١

1

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give you praise to your beautiful face (3), may I applaud (a) your beauty; by (4) the Scribe of Counting the Cattle and Fowl (5) [of Amun, Djehutynefer, called] (6) Seshu, his sister, Lady of the House, Byma, and his son who (7) makes his name live, the scribe, (8) Mahu. Note: (a) The sign sign .

is replaced in Maspero by the

B. Main Text The main text occupies 13 lines, the uppermost four of which are not colored, whereas the lower nine are colored blue.

(1) Giving praise to Osiris, smelling (kissing) the ground (2) before the Lord of Eternity. May I

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the stela of djehutynefer, called seshu

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10 11

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(1) rdit iAw n Wsir sn tA n Wnn-nfr in saH Ax n nb.f mH ib aA m pr nswt (2) sS Hsb iHw n Imn +Hwty nfr r Dd n.f %Sw Dd.f ii.n.i xr.k Wnn-nfr mAA (A) .i tw dwA.i nfrw.k iw Sms.n.i nTr nfr n HD.i wDw.n.f nbt pr.n.i Xr Hswt n (4) Hsy.f n Hsy xbd.n.f ink bAk Ax n nb.f mH ib n imy aH xpr nxn.i (5) r bw Xr Hm.f ir Ddt nb.f Wsir sS Hsb iHw %Sw Dd.f I Wsir nTr aA nTrw nbw tA-Dsr sDm n (6) .i iw.i Hr aS n.k pXr ib.k n sSA n.k nn nTr smx ir.n (7) .f Hr ntt TAw.k n anx aq r Xt.i mHyt.k nDmt r fnd.i mk wi m mAa (8) xrw nfr n xrt ib Hswt.i m pr nsw m Xrt-hrw iw Sms.n.i HqA r nmtt.f n ir.i (9) sp Xsy m sxrw.f nb n Dd rmT r.i ptr.n.f nn wnyw (10) nn btA.i n xpr sxd.i n iw grg HA.i Dr mswt.i wpw Hr irt (11) mAat n nb tAwy ink is wAH-ib xr nTr ii.n.i Hr mTn nfr n aq ib n mrwt swDA awt nb ix anx bA.i (12) nTry Ax.i mnx rn.i rsy m r n nryt m tn ii.n.i m tA pn n anxw bAw r wnn Hna. tn m tA Dsr (1A) ink wa im.tn bwt.f isft nist.i xr.tn m Xrt-hrw in sA.f sanx rn.f sS MHw (1) Giving praise to Osiris, smelling (kissing) the ground before Onnophris by the dignitary, the one useful to his master, the great confidant in

the royal palace, (2) the Scribe of Counting the Cattle of Amun, Djehutynefer, called Seshu. He says: “I have come before you Onnophris, (3) I behold you, I worship your beauty, I serve (a) the perfect god. I never disobeyed any command of his (i.e., the king). I came out with the favors of (4) his praise; what is not favored was detestable to him. I was a servant useful to his master, confidant of him who was in the palace. My childhood was spent (5) in the royal palace (b), doing whatever his master said.” Osiris, the Scribe of Counting the Cattle, Seshu, he says: “O Osiris, great god, O gods, Lords of the Sacred Land, hearken to (6) me when I call upon you (c). May your heart turn toward what you need, because the god does not forget what he has done, (7) and because your breath of life enters my body and your sweet (d) northern breeze my nose. Behold I am true of (8) voice, good in desires; my praises are in the royal palace daily. I followed the ruler in his journeys (e). I was (9) never feeble in carrying out all his plans. No one (e) ever said about me: ‘What has he done?’ There

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Fig. 1. Stela of Djehutynefer, called Seshu. Museo delle Antichità Egizie di Torino, Inv. Cat. No. 1639.

the stela of djehutynefer, called seshu was no (10) blame and no fault of mine; no error of mine occurred; falsehood (f) never followed (g) me since my birth (h), but I did (11) what was right for the Lord of the Two Lands. I was indeed well disposed under the god. I have come (i) on the good road of uprightness and love, intact (j) in all (my) limbs. (Therefore) my (12) divine soul and glorious being shall live. My name shall be entirely excellent in the mouth(s) of the people. Behold, I have come into this land of the living souls to be with you in the sacred land. (13) I am one of you, whose abomination is falsehood. I invoke your offerings every day.” It his son who makes his name live, the scribe Mahu. Notes: (a) Cf. Sinuhe B 171-2 Sms.i nbt r Dr “May I serve the Mistress of All.”2 for (b) (c) The suffix pronoun .k refers to Osiris. between and is super(d) The fluous. , not three (e) Three grains of sand , as in Maspero. strokes (f) Read grg. not , as in Maspero. (g) (h) Read mswt. is superfluous. (i) The second (j)

not

, as in Maspero.

Commentary The name Djehutynefer was not uncommon during the New Kingdom, particularly during the first half of Dynasty 18. There was the Overseer of the Treasury and Royal Scribe Djehutynefer, who owned two Theban tombs, nos. 80 and 104, both at Sheikh Abd el-Qurna. He thrived in the reign of Amenhotep II.3 To the early 18th Dynasty belonged another Djehutynefer, who was a Royal Scribe and Chief Lector in the Good House. He

2 A.M. Blackman, Middle-Egyptian Stories (Brussels, 1932), 31; M. Lichtheim, Ancient Egyptian Literature, vol. 1: The Old and Middle Kingdoms (Berkeley, 1975), 229. 3 PM I2, part 1, 157-159; 217-218. 4 Ibid., 450. 5 Ibid., 449. 6 Ibid., 390. 7 Ibid., 712.

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owned tomb A.10 at Dra Abu el-Naga.4 A third Djehutynefer, called Seshu (like ours), was an Overseer of the Marsh Lands of the Lord of the Two Lands. His tomb, A.6, was found also at Dra Abu el-Naga, and was dated to Dynasty 20.5 The fourth one, whose tomb is no. 317 at Sheikh Abd el-Qurna, was Scribe of the Counting of Corn in the Granary of the Divine Offerings of Amun. He may have been contemporaneous with Thutmose III.6 The name Djehutynefer appears also on a wooden stela from Deir el-Medina, now in the Turin Museum, no. 305. He was the son of the Scribe Nebanen. The date is not certain, probably Dynasty 19.7 The same name shows up again on a 19th Dynasty stela from Thebes, now at Ny Carlsberg Glyptothek Copenhagen, ÆIN 1676.8 A Builder named Djehutynefer is represented on the Theban stela no. 8440 at the Ägyptisches Museum, Berlin. The general date given to it is the New Kingdom.9 The same name recurs on a reused coffin that was found in the cache of royal mummies at Deir el-Bahri in 1881, and is now in the Cairo Museum. It is dated to Dynasty 21.10 Finally, the name was given also to females, like the case of lady Djehutynefer, mother of Simut, the Overseer of the Works of Amun-Re at Karnak, and owner of the Theban tomb no. 142 at Dra Abu el-Naga. Both may have lived during the reigns of Thutmose III and Amenhotep II.11 It may have been noticed that all the objects bearing the name Djehutynefer came from the Theban necropolis. Unfortunately, none of them belongs to our Djehutynefer, nor was I able to find any other mention of him anywhere. On the other hand, our stela belonged to Drovetti’s collection. It is well known that Drovetti was actively collecting Egyptian antiquities, particularly from Thebes, during the first half of the nineteenth century.12 All of this might indicate a link that connected Djehutynefer of our stela to Thebes. Djehutynefer’s son Mahu bore the title “Scribe.” This shows that, in typical Egyptian fashion, the son was following in the footsteps of the father.

8

Ibid., 803. Ibid., 797. 10 Ibid., 659. 11 Ibid., 255. 12 E. Uphill, Who Was Who in Egyptology, 2nd ed. (Oxford 1972), 90; A. Siliotti, The Discovery of Ancient Egypt (Cairo, 1998), 134-139. 9

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the production of the book of the dead

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OBSERVATIONS ON COPYING AND THE HIEROGLYPHIC TRADITION IN THE PRODUCTION OF THE BOOK OF THE DEAD Ogden Goelet, Jr. New York University

Although many studies have appeared recently on writing, authorship, and the Sitz im Leben of literature in ancient Egyptian society, it is my opinion that more attention should be paid to a far less intellectual, but undoubtedly more practical, aspect of the scribal occupation—the copying of documents of all sorts, literary and otherwise. Copying was the initial and most essential step in scribal education, to be sure, but was thereby also the first step in learning to read. Without copying, ancient literature would not have survived.1 It is rare to read a discussion of Egyptian literature without encountering the word “copy” or “copyist” several times. In this vein, Jan Assmann has usefully noted that Egyptian religious literature in particular often went first through a productive stage, followed by a reproductive stage, when a

text became canonical and innovations were no longer introduced.2 We instinctively realize that the dissemination of certain types of information such as royal decrees could not have been done unless the professional scribes were well trained in reproducing texts from master copies. As intriguing as the problem of copying and disseminating multiple versions of a hieroglyphic inscription might be, my main focus in this study will instead be how scribes were trained to produce and copy hieroglyphic texts on papyrus, particularly the most common of all Egyptian afterlife books, the mass-produced afterlife texts known as the Book of the Dead. Nearly four decades ago, Shafik Allam investigated the possibility that a large proportion of the non-literary ostraca from Deir el-Medina might actually be drafts used in the final preparation of more polished, or “fair copy,” versions on papyrus.3 This issue, as well as some broader questions of scribal training and practice, has been extensively re-examined by K. Donker van Heel and Ben J.J. Haring with a focus on Deir el-Medina.4 The need to compose documents, whether religious texts, literary works, or financial records, from a variety of draft materials, then to collate the whole into a “fair copy,” was hardly confined to the Ramesside Period. For instance, as far back as the Old Kingdom, some of the more complex administrative papyri among the Abusir archive could not have been so neatly prepared unless the scribes had been using stored papyri as format models. Once the complex layout of the document had thus been achieved, the final archived copies were probably produced by carefully transcribing

1 Stephen Quirke has recently emphasized the need to recognize the centrality of copying, not only in its obvious role in the preservation of literature and archives, but also in the development of the practice of reading in ancient Egypt; see Quirke, Egyptian Literature 1800 BC: questions and readings (London, 2004), 44-47. 2 J. Assmann, Egyptian Solar Religion in the New Kingdom:

Re, Amun and the Crisis of Polytheism, trans. A. Alcock (New York and London, 1995), 1-11. 3 S. Allam, “Sind die nichtliterarischen Schriftostraka Brouillons?” JEA 54 (1968), 121-128. 4 K. Donker van Heel and B.J.J. Haring, Writing in a Workmen’s Village: Scribal Practice in Ramesside Deir elMedina, EgUit 16 (Leiden, 2003).

A Festschrift, by its very name, implies a festive occasion, so I would like everyone reading this volume to imagine momentarily that we are all gathered for one of those many generous gatherings at Jack and Magda’s apartment when we have honored a colleague’s achievements. It’s about time that we turned the tables on Jack and toasted him for his contributions to the field. Now, having raised my virtual glass to Jack, I am afraid that I have chosen a somewhat lugubrious subject for his Festschrift that is quite unlike the tone of his parties—aspects of the production of the Book of the Dead and the use of retrograde writing. I hope he will indulge me.

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material from more informal, temporary records.5 Another example of sophisticated copying of complex material in the earliest times is provided by the Pyramid Texts, whose similarity between parallel versions from monument to monument could hardly have been achieved unless there had been a well-tested procedure for copying sections of the corpus on papyrus, editing them, and finally formatting them into the columnar wall inscriptions. This tradition continued throughout Egyptian history with the production of other afterlife texts, first with the Coffin Texts inscribed on the sides of coffins, then eventually the Book of the Dead on papyri. From the New Kingdom onward, copying of the Book of the Dead was doubtlessly an important source of income for some specialized scribes working in funerary workshops.6

The Role of Copying in Scribal Training The Book of the Dead, like most religious papyri, may have been written in cursive hieroglyphs, yet the scribes—more accurately scriveners in this role—who wrote out these texts were first trained extensively in the hieratic script, the form of writing employed in the transactions of everyday life. We have several indications of how important learning the art of accurate transcription was within the scribal curriculum of the Ramesside Period. Given the abstract nature of hieratic forms, the vast repertoire of signs, and the numerous ligatures employed, much of the initial training certainly involved imitation of the

5 Ibid., 6; O. Goelet, “Accounting Practices and Economic Planning in Ancient Egypt before the Hellenistic Era,” in Creating Economic Order: Record Keeping, Standardization, and the Development of Accounting in the Ancient Near East, ed. M. Hudson and C. Wunsch, International Scholars Conference on Ancient Near Eastern Economics 4 (Bethesda, 2004), 235-246. 6 R. Parkinson, “The History of a Poem: Middle Kingdom Literary Manuscripts and their Reception,” in Kon-Texte: Akten des Symposions “Spurensuche—Altägypen im Spiegel seiner Texte.” München 2. bis 4. Mai 2003, ed. G. Burkard et al. (Wiesbaden, 2004), 61. 7 The conscious imitation of the master’s handwriting should serve always as a cautionary note when we attempt to ascribe documents to certain scribes, as pointed out by J.J. Janssen, “On Style in Egyptian Handwriting,” JEA 73 (1987), 161-167. A model example of how handwriting attributions might be done can be found in H. Van den Berg and K. Donker van Heel, “A Scribe’s Cache from the Valley of Queens? The Palaeography of Documents from Deir elMedina: Some Remarks,” in Deir el-Medina in the Third Millennium AD: A Tribute to Jac. J. Janssen, ed. R.J. Demarée and A. Egberts (Leiden, 2000), 9-49.

teachers’ writing7 and rote learning of words as sequences of strokes rather than groups of individual characters. Developing skill with a brush and a neat flowing hand were the primary objectives at this stage of scribal education. Some of the more cultivated members of the Deir el-Medina literate community, such as Qenher-khepeshef, were clearly motivated by a combination of interest in the past and pride in their status as the intellectuals of their village to collect literary and other materials, so we should be cautious in associating any given literary ostracon or papyrus as a didactic exercise.8 Yet, it would not be overstating things to say that during the Ramesside Period, the genre of texts we confidently identify as “literature” was intimately connected with scribal training, an activity in which a far less lofty spirit prevailed than the one we normally would associate with “belles lettres.” As noted above, the first step in scribal training entailed writing by conscious imitation of the master’s script.9 Eventually, students would gain enough skill so that they progressed beyond producing something akin to a facsimile to the point where they were actually copying manuscripts with ease. The very table of contents of Gardiner’s publication of student manuscripts known as The Late-Egyptian Miscellanies alone provides evidence of the pervasiveness of copying as an instructional method. The Miscellanies contain quite a number of didactic exercises that are closely similar from version to version as they appear on the several papyri, an indication that the scribal schoolmasters had a standard repertoire of texts that the students

8 Among the reasons for copying a literary work, we should certainly not exclude delight in language and literature. For an overview of the various motives for copying literary materials, see J.J. Janssen, “Literacy and Letters at Deir elMedîna,” in Village Voices, ed. R. J. Demarée and A. Egberts, CNWS Publications 13 (Leiden, 1992), 81-94; F. Hagen, “Literature, Transmission, and the Late Egyptian Miscellanies,” in Current Research in Egyptology 2004: Proceedings of the fifth annual symposium which took place at the University of Durham, January 2004, ed. R.J. Dann (Oxford, 2006), 84-99, esp. 86, with references; and Hagen, “Ostraca, Literature and Teaching at Deir el-Medina,” in Current Research in Egyptology 2005: Proceedings of the sixth annual symposium which took place at the University of Cambridge, 6-8 January 2005, ed. R. Mairs and A. Stevenson (Oxford, 2007), 38-51. 9 See Janssen’s remarks on the pitfalls posed by handwriting similarities among the scribes who wrote the Late Ramesside Letters, “On Style in Egyptian Handwriting,” 162 and 165; O. Goelet, “Writing Ramesside Hieratic: What the Late-Egyptian Miscellanies Tell us about Scribal Education,” in Servant of Mut: Studies in Honor of Richard A. Fazzini, ed. S. D’Auria, ProblÄg 28 (Leiden, 2008), 102-110.


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were made to copy, most likely by transcribing the material verbatim from the teachers’ models. With shorter excerpts, such as those found on ostraca, another possibility was that a passage of several lines was first committed to memory and written down when the student felt confident of the text. As a final step, the student would then check his work against the teacher’s model.10 Hellmut Brunner,11 Günter Burkard,12 and Wolfgang Schenkel13 have convincingly shown that previous theories proposing that masters read out this instructional material to their students in the manner of a French classroom “dictée” seem improbable in most instances.14 Nevertheless, it remains likely that the ability to write down an orally delivered text may have had some minor role in scribal education, most likely taking place only at the stage when the student had achieved a high degree of proficiency. The importance of transcription and copying also reveals itself in the division of the scribal curriculum at Deir el-Medina into instruction in two different dialects. The Miscellanies and The Satirical Letter together represented the more practical component of the curriculum, since these were written in the Late Egyptian dialect that the students spoke in their daily lives, albeit in a somewhat more formal style than what appears in actual letters. These latter two didactic works have been preserved mostly on papyri, but whether this choice of medium should be interpreted as an

indication of the final stages of training—papyrus supposedly being too expensive a material to waste on exercises of this nature—remains debatable.15 In any case, the fluid ductus that occasionally rises to elegance in the handwriting of some Miscellanies papyri, and ostraca as well, leaves one with the impression that these student scribes had become skilled in the act of writing per se.16 At the same time, however, the frequency of errors, particularly in Late Egyptian orthography (if such can be said to really exist), reminds us that advanced novice scribes, not practiced professionals, had written these exercises. The frequency of mistakes was yet even higher in the other, Middle Egyptian portion of the curriculum, which involved copying passages from great “classics” of the past, such as The Tale of Sinuhe, The Instruction of Merykare, The Loyalist Instruction, The Kemyt, and several others.17 Our knowledge of Egyptian literature would be quite scanty indeed were it not for the numerous Ramesside copies of these literary texts on papyri and ostraca. Once again, we should be cautious in ascribing much of an intellectual and “literary” spirit to the underlying activity. The Ashmolean Ostracon of Sinuhe that preserved nearly the entire text of the great classic tale of Middle Egyptian is the most striking proof of the importance of instruction in that dialect at the workmen’s village.18 In a recent article,19 Jochem Kahl has been able to show convincingly that this over-

10 Memorization of short passages seems more likely in the case of didactic ostraca rather than for the longer excerpts encountered the Miscellanies papyri. In the case of the papyri, the trainees seem to have written several exercises at a time, and in some instances a few days may have elapsed between sessions. Some of the student scribes already bore the title Xry-a “assistant” at the time when they wrote the papyri and might have been already transcribing actual documents for their masters. On these points, see Hagen, “Literature, Transmission, and the Late Egyptian Miscellanies,” 84-99; and A. G. McDowell, “Teachers and Students at Deir el-Medina,” in Deir el-Medina in the Third Millennium AD: A Tribute to Jac. J. Janssen, 56-64; and Hagen, “Student Exercises from Deir el-Medina: The Dates,” in Studies in Honor of William Kelly Simpson 2, ed. Peter Der Manuelian (Boston, 1996), 601-608. 11 Hellmut Brunner has proposed the most probable scenario, whereby beginning students learnt to copy whole words and sentences; see “Anfänger-Schreibunterricht: Ganzheitsmethode” in Altägyptische Erziehung (Wiesbaden, 1957), 66-69. 12 G. Burkard, Textkritische Untersuchungen zu ägyptischen Weisheitslehren des Alten und Mittleren Reiches, ÄA 34 (Wiesbaden, 1977). 13 W. Schenkel, “Kritisches zur Textkritik: Die sogenannten Hörfehler,” GM 29 (1978), 119-126. 14 For further on the steps in Ramesside scribal instruction,

see J. Baines and C. Eyre, “Interactions between Orality and Literacy in Ancient Egypt,” in Literacy and Society, ed. K. Schousboe and M.T. Larsen (Copenhagen, 1989), 92-97. I would disagree, however, with the authors about the order in which the Middle and Late Egyptian dialects were taught to Ramesside students, since it seems much more probable that they would have been instructed in the contemporary Late Egyptian dialect first. 15 For two viewpoints on this topic, see R.A. Caminos, “Some comments on the reuse of papyrus,” in Papyrus: Structure and Usage, ed. M. L. Bierbrier (London, 1986), 43-61, and J.J. Janssen, “The Price of Papyrus,” DE 9 (1987), 33-35. 16 For example, A.H. Gardiner, Late-Egyptian Miscellanies, BiAe 7 (Brussels, 1937), xv, notes one scholar’s estimation of the handwriting on pAnastasi IV as “a beautiful and distinct hand.” Gardiner, on the other hand, pointed out numerous deficiencies in the text’s accuracy. 17 For a list of the most important and common texts used for instructional purposes appearing on Deir el-Medina ostraca, see A. Gasse, “Les ostraca hiératiques littéraires de Deir el-Medina: Nouvelles orientations de la publication,” in Demarée and Egberts, eds., Village Voices, 52-53. 18 J.W.B. Barns, The Ashmolean Ostracon of Sinuhe (Oxford, 1952). For an estimation of the quality and accuracy of the text on this remarkable object, written as it was several hundred years after the two chief Middle Kingdom papyrus

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sized ostracon, once compared to a blackboard in a modern classroom,20 was definitely used as a model text for students to consult. As with the writing on the Miscellanies papyri, the hieratic script appearing on student ostraca containing excerpts from the various Middle Egyptian texts follows contemporary Ramesside forms. The writing is equally confident and clear, showing little of the awkwardness that one might expect from student scribes. There are many indications that students may have had only a vague idea of the full shape of the hieroglyphic characters underlying the script until they were fairly well along in their training. This unfamiliarity lies at the heart of many of the so-called “orthographical errors” and “corruptions” that Gardiner noted in the Miscellanies.21 In all likelihood, only those individuals who were charged with producing inscriptions on funerary objects and papyri were ever taught the hieroglyphs in a systematic manner. Normally, this lack of familiarity would mean that only a few scribes ever became well-enough acquainted with hieroglyphs to produce (or reproduce) texts in this form. In the case of the literate members of the Deir el-Medina community,22 however, there would have been an unusually high proportion who were conversant with the hieroglyphic forms of the written language. After all, these scribes derived their livelihood from the vast funerary “industry,” both royal and private, that dominated life on the west bank of Thebes.

The Hieroglyphic Tradition at Deir el-Medina and Afterlife Texts Deir el-Medina has also yielded numerous hieroglyphic ostraca, which is to be expected in light of the community’s involvement with royal tombs

exemplars, see J.L. Foster, “Cleaning up Sinuhe,” SSEAJ 12 (1982), 81-85. Although the text was in the Middle Egyptian dialect, the script was standard Ramesside literary hieratic. 19 J. Kahl, “‘Es ist vom Anfang bis zum Ende so gekommen, wie es in der Schrift gefunden worden war’: Zur Überlieferung der Erzählung des Sinuhe,” in “Und Mose schrieb dieses Lied auf.” Studien zum Alten Testament und zum Alten Orient: Festschrift für Oswald Loretz zur Vollendigung seines 70. Lebensjahres, ed. M. Dietrich and I. Kottsieper, AOAT 250 (Münster, 1998), 383-400. 20 Parkinson, “History of a Poem,” 61. 21 On this point, see my recent study, Goelet, “Writing Ramesside Hieratic,” 102-110, esp. 110-113. 22 As A. Dorn has shown in a discussion of a group of model letters from the Valley of the Kings, the evidence

in the Valley of the Kings, as well as the decoration of other tombs and temples elsewhere on the Theban west bank. Unsurprisingly, many of these hieroglyphic ostraca appear to contain fragments of instructional material as well, but of a rather limited sort. Instead of using selections from literary texts comparable to what is found on the hieratic ostraca, when students were learning the hieroglyphs, they began by practicing short lines of titularies and other types of inscriptions apt to be used in tomb decoration or on funerary equipment. As might be expected from beginners making the transition from hieratic to hieroglyphic script, the great majority of these practice ostraca preserve fragments of horizontally oriented text. On one particularly interesting hieroglyphic ostracon, the well-known scribe and draftsman Qen-her-khepeshef produced a remarkable imitation (or sketch) of a funerary stela that included texts in vertical and horizontal formats and with the inscriptions running in the canonical right-toleft direction, as well as the less common left-toright fashion.23 The content of the inscription is unusual and difficult to understand, since the texts are arranged in a somewhat unorganized manner. Although it is far more probable that this object was a trial piece for an actual stela rather than a teacher’s model, the script reveals the high level of familiarity with hieroglyphs that one of the village’s most experienced scribes might possess. In the nearby tombs at Deir el-Medina, we can see further confirmation of this familiarity in the extensive use of hieroglyphic texts, many of which were chapters of the Book of the Dead accompanied by the relevant vignette. A number of magical, medical, and religious texts also occur among these hieroglyphic ostraca, several of which were written in a more cursive form of hieroglyphs and were likewise not likely to be connected with the educational process. There is heavy use of red ink

indicates that the preponderance of instruction was in Late Egyptian by the middle of the 20th Dynasty; see “MAA-nxt. w=f, ein(?) einfacher Arbeiter, schreibt Briefe,” in Living and Writing in Deir el-Medine: Socio-historical Embodiment of Deir el-Medine Texts, ed. A. Dorn and T. Hofmann, AH 19 (Basel, 2006), 67-85. The fact that a crew member who was otherwise just a simple workman should be learning to write model letters in hieratic suggests that the literacy rate at Deir el-Medina may have been much higher than previously estimated; ibid., 85. However, the proportion of literate individuals also conversant with hieroglyphs remains an open question. 23 Jaroslav Černý, “A Hieroglyphic Ostracon in the Museum of Fine Arts at Boston,” JEA 44 (1958), 23-25.


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among these examples, which would be in keeping with their arcane subject matter. Unsurprisingly, the corpus of hieroglyphic materials on ostraca included a few fragments of the Book of the Dead and Coffin Texts as well. The “bridge,” so to speak, between instruction in hieratic and in hieroglyphs appears to have been formed by the Kemyt, an odd composite text that is part model letter and part narrative.24 Its use as a didactic work might at first seem rather strange and impractical, since the Kemyt was partially based on epistolatory formulae dating to the early Middle Kingdom that were certainly obsolete by the Ramesside Period. The model letters in Miscellanies, by contrast, sought to instruct scribes in greetings and conventions that were in keeping with contemporary practices and employed standard Ramesside hieratic. More importantly, the columnar format of the Kemyt ostraca, as well as their distinctive writing, makes them stand out markedly from all other student materials at Deir el-Medina. The script follows an obsolete style and character set that is reminiscent of the 11th Dynasty or even the First Intermediate Period and whose overall visual impression is that the writing is closer to cursive hieroglyphs than hieratic.25 Unlike the student ostraca written in contemporary Ramesside hieratic, the texts on Kemyt ostraca are almost entirely free of ligatures, and in most cases it is easy to recognize the

hieroglyphic forms underlying the script, yet it leaves one with the impression of rather clumsy and ill-formed writing. In many instances, there was actually little difference between the Kemyt “hieratic” and the cursive hieroglyphic form of a character.26 It is not surprising that this script often was awkward and studied, literally speaking, as if the students were struggling to reproduce a text consisting of characters in unfamiliar shapes. During the Ramesside Period, furthermore, the combination of cursive hieroglyphs and columnar textual format had been relegated largely to tomb inscriptions, religious texts, and other arcania.27 Judging from the uneven size of the signs and the difficulties of maintaining uniform vertical text, we can sense that the unusual columnar format posed particular difficulties for the students. Several examples, in fact, have roughly drawn vertical lines provided as columnar guidelines for the text. In the examples that Georges Posener collected from Deir el-Medina, at least, there seems to have been a division of the text into standardized segments.28 These textual units were usually demarked by short horizontal lines, normally in contrasting red ink. Less commonly, the red grH signs (Sign-list D41) or the red “verse points” that were employed as division markers in the Miscellanies papyri occurred for the same purpose in these Kemyt ostraca. Following Nikolaus

24 For a description of the Kemyt, its contents, and its place within the Ramesside instructional curriculum, see R. Parkinson, Poetry and Culture in Middle Kingdom Egypt: A Dark Side to Perfection, Athlone Publications in Egyptology and Ancient Near Eastern Studies (London and New York, 2002), 322-323; and S. Quirke, Egyptian Literature 1800 BC : questions and readings (London, 2004), 52-54. A convenient translation of the text is also available in E.F. Wente, Letters from Ancient Egypt, SBL Writings from the Ancient World Series 1 (Atlanta, 1990), 15-16. 25 On the nature of the script, see the description in Quirke, Egyptian Literature, 52. This is particularly visible in the rendering of the Gardiner A1 determinative (Möller 33). The forms of A1 that appear in the Kemyt ostraca are distinctly closer to those of the Dyn. 11-MK forms in the first volume of G. Möller, Hieratische Paläographie 1 (Leipzig, 1927), 3 (#33) and H. Goedicke, Old Hieratic Paleography (Baltimore, 1988), pl. 1a/b, than the contemporary Ramesside literary hieratic shown in Möller, Hieratische Paläographie II, 3 (#33). 26 Parkinson has made similar observations on the nature of the Kemyt’s script and its relationship with hieroglyphic inscriptional material; see Poetry and Culture, 323. The script apparently was unfamiliar enough to students that some rare Kemyt ostraca were first written out by the teacher so that the student could trace over some characters, as was done, for example, on the small writing tablet published by C. Barbotin, “Une nouvelle attestation de Kémit,” RdE 48 (1997),

247-250. Traced signs appear as well on some student ostraca now in Turin; see E. Leosopo and A. Roccati et al., eds., La scuola nell’antico Egitto (Turin 1997), 73, Ostracon Turin CGT 57545 + 57546, whose script M. Betró described as “testo ieratico.” However, other examples, such as CGT 57060 (ibid., 71), CGT 57549 (ibid., 75), and CGT 57448 (ibid., 76), she described as “testo geroglifico corsivo.” 27 For some remarks on the association of cursive hieroglyphs with magico-medical texts and other arcania, see M.S. Ali, “Die Kursivehieroglyphen. Eine paläographischen Betrachtung,” GM 180 (2001), 11-12. Cursive hieroglyphs’ association with religious arcania probably can be traced back to their use in many Coffin Texts in the early Middle Kingdom. An interesting example showing the connection between cursive hieroglyphs and “restricted materials,” generally speaking occurs in the tomb of the early 12th Dynasty Theban tomb of Senet, the wife of the vizier Intef-iker. In this case, retrograde cursive hieroglyphs perhaps may have been chosen to write a hymn to Hathor as a means of conveying that it had been copied from a temple papyrus; see L.D. Morenz, Beiträge zur Schriftlichkeitskultur im Mittleren Reich und in der 2. Zwischenzeit, ÄAT 28 (Wiesbaden, 1996), 62-74. 28 G. Posener, Catalogue des ostraca hiératiques littéraires de Deir el Médineh 2, fasc. 1: Nos. 1109 à 1167. DFIFAO 18, 1 (Cairo, 1951), pls. 1-25, with his remarks in Posener, Catalogue des ostraca hiératiques littéraires de Deir el Médineh 2, fasc. 2: Nos. 1168 à 1213. DFIFAO 18, 2 (Cairo, 1972), i-ix.

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Tacke’s observations about the “verse points,” all such notations were most likely inserted after the main text had been written out.29 What, then, would have been the reason for so much effort in training students to reproduce this peculiar text in an antique format? Once again, the answer most likely can be found in the most common contemporary text having both a columnar format and the somewhat similar cursive hieroglyphs—the Book of the Dead. After all, The Book of the Dead represents the reproductive stage of Egyptian religious texts par excellence, even if the New Kingdom versions, the so-called “Theban Recension,” had not achieved the stability of text and vignette of the “Saite Recension.”30 In addition to their use in this important religious text, the hieroglyphs, cursive and standard alike, written into a columnar textual format were still the standard mode for tomb decoration and employed extensively on all types of funerary equipment. Viewed in this light, training in the Kemyt would fit a rather pressing need among the student scribes at the workmen’s village, for this was the very type of material that the more skilled among the literate members of the gang might be expected to produce.31 Some rare examples among the hieroglyphic ostraca show that other commonly used didactic texts were also employed as exercises in hieroglyphic transcription.32 Additionally, a few hieratic excerpts from The Book of the Dead written in horizontal text format have come to light,

When it came to selecting among the several Egyptian script forms for an afterlife text, the choice was always influenced by considerations of prestige, register, and expense. As a rule, elaborately painted or sculpted hieroglyphs such as those found in the elite tombs of the 18th Dynasty were at the top of the hierarchy of scripts. These signs were obviously quite time-consuming and therefore expensive to produce.34 It is no wonder that Gardiner chose these beautiful signs as the primary models for the font in his Egyptian Grammar.35 In addition, hieroglyphs were more formal and therefore associated a text more closely with ancient traditions. At the opposite end of this scale of prestige stood the hieratic script, which, due to its close association with everyday life, was likely considered too profane for most religious and afterlife texts, particularly in funerary contexts. Of course, there were exceptions to these generalizations. For example, some of the most important divine hymns of the New Kingdom are preserved only on hieratic papyri.36 Several of the earlier Dynasty 18 Books of the Dead, for example, were written in hieratic before the cursive hieroglyphs

29 N. Tacke, Verspunkte als Gliederungsmittel in ramessidischen Schülerhandschriften, SAGA 22 (Heidelberg, 2001), 137-145. The short horizontal red lines, in particular, often seem to be squeezed in between signs. 30 For instance, it would be possible to make complex “version genealogies” for some of the more popular chapters like Chapter 17, as has been done by U. Rößler-Köhler, Kapitel 17 des ägyptischen Totenbuches: Untersuchungen zur Textgeschichte und Funktion eines Textes der altägyptischen Totenliteratur, GOF 10 (Wiesbaden, 1979), in the chart “Stemma der Textzeugen von Kapitel 17 Tb” that faces p. 124. 31 Goelet, “Writing Ramesside Hieratic,” 106, with n. 2; Goelet, “Ancient Egyptian Scripts—Literary, Sacred, and Profane,” in Semitic Papyrology in Context: A Climate of Creativity: Papers from a New York University conference marking the retirement of Baruch A. Levine, ed. L. H. Schiffman, Culture and History of the Ancient Near East (Leiden, 2003), 20-21; A. McDowell, “Teachers and Students at Deir el-Medina,” in Demarée and Egberts, eds., Deir el-Medina in the Third Millennium AD, 217-233, esp. 231-232. 32 A most interesting example is Deir el-Medina 1175; G. Posener, Catalogue des ostraca hiératiques littéraires de Deir el Médineh, Nos. 1109 à 1167, DFIFAO 18, 1 (Cairo, 1951), 19 with pl. 26a. On the recto is an excerpt from the Satire on the Trades in carefully executed hieroglyphs in columnar format, while on the verso is an excerpt from the

Instruction of Amenemhat I, but done in a different and far less expert hand. Not only did the second scribe have difficulties with the columnar format, but the text has occasional hieratic intrusions in the hieroglyphic text—the work of a teacher and his student? 33 Deir el-Medina ostracon 1608, written on a piece of pottery, has several lines from the beginning of BD Chapter 137B in hieratic with red “verse points” placed at the natural semantic units, i.e., in the same manner as in a literary didactic text; see see G. Posener, Catalogue des ostraca hiératiques littéraires de Deir el Médineh 3, fasc. 3: Nos. 1267 à 1675, DFIFAO 20, 3 (Cairo, 1980), pl. 58/58a. This ostracon was either used for scribal training or to transfer the text to a papyrus. 34 H.G. Fischer, “Archaeological Aspects of Epigraphy and Palaeography,” in Ancient Egyptian Epigraphy and Palaeography, by R.A. Caminos and H.G. Fischer (New York, 1976), 39-44. 35 A.H. Gardiner, Egyptian Grammar, 3rd ed., rev. (Oxford, 1957), 438. 36 Two examples of lengthy hymns of the New Kingdom that were written in hieratic are: pLeiden I 344 verso, J. Zandee, Der Amunhymnus des Papyrus Leiden I 344, Verso., 3 vols., Collections of the National Museum of Antiquities at Leiden 7 (Leiden, 1992); and pBerlin 3048, G. Möller, Hieratische Papyrus aus den königlischen Museen zu Berlin 2 (Berlin, 1905), pl. 37ff.

showing that more than one method was used to familiarize scribal students with this important corpus of texts.33

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became the standard script for the genre. 37 Several afterlife “books” in the Valley of the Kings from the same period employed cursive hieroglyphs,38 even though expense could hardly have been a consideration in decorating the royal tombs. As mentioned above, hieroglyphs in a style quite similar to cursive hieroglyphs became the standard script for inscriptional use in the subterranean portions of Deir el-Medina tombs.39 Since much of the written material in these Deir el-Medina monuments consisted of chapters from the Book of the Dead, one might make some useful paleographic comparisons between these and contemporary Books of the Dead. It is significant that the preferred script for many religious texts from the Saite period onwards reverted to hieratic, because by that era the demotic script was now the writing form employed in everyday life, whereas hieratic had finally become truly “hieratic,” i.e., a script employed almost exclusively for “priestly” material. The cursive hieroglyphs merit some discussion and description at this juncture, inasmuch as they were an intermediate script between hieratic and the fully formed hieroglyphs. Cursive hieroglyphs first appeared in the Old Kingdom in both funerary and documentary contexts. Among the Abusir Papyri, large cursive forms were occasionally

used in headings to provide characters that had a larger, fuller, and more formal appearance in some column labels alongside the more abstract hieratic documentary entries below.40 Cursive hieroglyphs in ink appeared in the hypogeal sections of one Giza tomb as the captions to some similarly inked stick figures. However, in this instance it is unclear whether these figures and their accompanying cursive texts represented sketches to be finished later in a more formal manner, or whether these were intended as the final form of decoration.41 One might say that cursive hieroglyphs came into their own in the Coffin Texts, where they were employed almost exclusively for the texts incised into the wood surfaces of the coffin walls.42 During the Middle Kingdom, cursive hieroglyphs were used for religious43 and medical44 papyri, almost always in retrograde columns. From that period onwards, the association of cursive hieroglyphs with arcania seems to have been firmly established. At approximately the same time that the cursive hieroglyphs were being introduced, another, related form of hieroglyphic script was being developed. These were the solidly formed hieroglyphs that appear much like painted versions of the incised hieroglyphs without interior detail that had been used during the Old Kingdom on stone

37 I. Munro, Untersuchungen zu den Totenbuch-Papyri der 18. Dynastie: Kriterien ihrer Datierung (London and New York, 1988), 190-192. In the 21st Dynasty, hieratic became the standard script employed for the Book of the Dead. 38 The text accompanying the royal afterlife books in the Valley of the Kings was predominantly in cursive hieroglyphs until the reign of Amenhotep II, after which fully formed characters were preferred. From the reign of Thutmose IV onwards, cursives occur rarely, usually as the still-visible “draft” form of signs underlying normal hieroglyphs in unfinished inscriptions, e.g., in Horemheb’s tomb; see E. Hornung, The Valley of the Kings: Horizon of Eternity, trans. D. Warburton (New York, 1990), color plate 17. There seems to have been at least a partial return to the older practice in the tomb of Rameses IX, see ibid., color plate 69. 39 The painted hieroglyphs used at Deir el-Medina and in many of the elite tombs elsewhere in the Theban necropolis are solid in form, preserving the outline, seldom with any interior detail. A typical example would be the tomb of Sennedjem (TT 1), whose hieroglyphs are the subject of a detailed study, B.J.J. Haring, The Tomb of Sennedjem (TT1) in Deir el-Medina: Palaeography, Paléographie Hiéroglyphique 2 (Cairo, 2006), 7-8 for a general description of these monumental hieroglyphs. Even though they mostly likely derive from hieratic (see note 34, above), their overall appearance might fairly be described as a painted form of a common style of hieroglyphs incised on stelae and other stone surfaces that similarly have little or no interior detail; see Fischer, “Archaeological Aspects,” 41 (fig. 4, column 2). In the case of a high proportion of the sign repertoire in Theban tombs of the New Kingdom, something very close to the resulting

hieroglyphic forms could be achieved simply by imitating the incised, sculpted hieroglyphs in solidly painted forms. 40 P. Posener-Kriéger and J.-L. de Cenival, The Abusir Papyri, Hieratic Papyri in the British Museum, Fifth Series (London, 1968), in many of the larger accounts papyri, e.g., pls. 1-3. In this case, the relationship of cursive to hieratic script is clearly intended as a conscious imitation of the format of a hieroglyphic royal decree on a stone stela. Fischer, “Archaeological Aspects,” 40, calls this script “semi-cursive” or “book-script.” 41 One of the first examples of cursive hieroglyphs appears on the walls of the hypogeum in a 6th Dynasty tomb at Giza; see H. Junker, Gîza IV (Vienna and Leipzig, 1940), pls. 9, 10. The scenes in the rest of the chamber are not only complete, but in places they are colorfully executed; compare, for example, color plate VIII. 42 Both incised and inked forms were employed; a few coffins employed inked hieratic instead; see E. Hornung, The Egyptian Books of the Afterlife, trans. David Lorton (Ithaca and London, 1999), 8-9. Balat in the Dakhla Oasis has yielded some clay didactic tablets employing incised cursives; see G. Soukiassian, “A Governors’ Palace at ‘Ayn Asil, Dakhla Oasis,” EA 11 (1997) 15-17, a site where papyrus was undoubtedly hard to acquire. 43 pRamesseum VI; see A.H. Gardiner, “Hymns to Sobek in a Ramesseum Papyrus,” RdE 11 (1957), 43-56. 44 For example, see Ramesseum V, which is a Middle Kingdom medical papyrus written in cursive hieroglyphs and a retrograde, columnar format; see A.H. Gardiner, The Ramesseum papyri: plates (Oxford, 1955), pls. XV-XVII.

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stelae, tomb walls, and occasionally on wood surfaces. Although it is difficult to make a definitive statement on the matter, it is unlikely that the cursive hieroglyphs may have developed from these solid forms45—unlike the incised forms and the related painted variety, true cursives never faced towards the left. Starting with the First Intermediate Period, the solid painted hieroglyphs quickly became popular as a rapid and cheaper means of inscribing stone and wood surfaces, whereas the more outlined forms developed into a “book script” that was largely relegated to papyri. What many publications of the New Kingdom may describe loosely as hieroglyphic inscriptions are actually the solid cursives instead of the detailed painted forms used in a few private monuments. Solid cursives were commonly used in the captions to scenes in elite tombs at Thebes and, as noted above, became the almost exclusive form of text in the private tombs of Deir el-Medina. In a few cases, the less elaborate outlined cursives were employed as the preliminary step for inscriptions that were to be finished by using the more elaborate solid or even painted detailed hieroglyphs, but this practice appears to have been largely confined to the higher-prestige tombs elsewhere in the Theban necropolis.46 The appearance of the more linear cursives in the underworld “books” in the Valley of the Kings, however, has nothing to do with either speed or expense, but rather is probably best explained as deliberate attempts to imitate ancient “secret” papyri spread out on the walls of the royal tombs. Another important factor in text register was the presentation format. From the beginning of the New Kingdom onwards, the use of a columnar format became one of the most distinctive ways in which a scribe or a sculptor could indicate that a text was connected with ancient traditions or primordial antiquity. At some point in the latter third of the 12th Dynasty, texts on papyri, as well as inscriptional material, had switched from a predominantly vertical to a predominantly horizontal format. Thereafter, columnar text was largely

limited to funerary and tomb contexts, captions accompanying temple scenes, and occasional royal inscriptions on stelae and temple walls, usually on the outer, more “public” areas of the building— the very same contexts generally in which hieroglyphic text tended to appear. As typical examples of what might be called the monumental genre, we might cite many of the large war narratives of Rameses III at Medinet Habu. For most other usages, particularly those associated with daily life, columnar format was rather uncommon, except as a framing device and then usually confined to a few lines. In fact, from the beginning of the 18th Dynasty onwards, there was a very strong correlation between columnar format and hieroglyphic script generally.

45 Notably, this orientation is a feature that true cursives share with hieratic, which also consistently faces rightward, see Haring, Tomb of Sennedjem, 10. 46 For illustrations of the stages in creating an elaborate hieroglyphic inscription in a royal tomb, see Hornung, Valley of the Kings, color plate 17. The red signs underlying the black “final” sketches owe their forms more to cursive hieroglyphs than to hieratic. 47 A. Niwinski, “The problem of retrograde writing and the direction of reading of the Book of the Dead in the New

Kingdom,” in Studies on the Illustrated Theban Funerary Papyri of the 11th and 10th Centuries B.C., OBO 86 (Freiburg and Göttingen, 1989), 13-17, and M.A. Chegodaev, “Some Remarks Regarding the So-called ‘Retrograde’ Direction of Writing in the Ancient Egyptian ‘Book of the Dead’,” DE 35 (1996), 19-24. H.G. Fischer, “L’écriture retrograde,” in L’écriture et l’art de l’Égypte ancienne: Quatre leçons sur la paléographie et l’épigraphie pharaonique, Essais et Conférences, Collège de France (Paris, 1986), 105-130.

Retrograde Writing and its Contexts The most striking manner in which a text could be connected with primordial times and the most secret, restricted knowledge was to write it with a retrograde orientation. Briefly defined, a retrograde text was one in which the text was read in the same direction in which the signs faced, contrary to the normal practice of the Egyptian language. With few exceptions, retrograde writing was connected with columnar format and involved texts in hieroglyphs, cursive or otherwise. The most common exception to this rule of thumb would be the few hieratic examples of the Book of the Dead that were also normally written in retrograde columns. The reason for this close relationship between retrograde writing and arcane subject matters is unclear,47 but a plausible explanation is that the Egyptians believed that anything connected with the gods, afterlife existence, magic, and any other secrets that only a few earthly beings might be privileged to know would be expressed in ways radically different from everyday practice. In the case of afterlife literature, another frequently advanced explanation is that a retrograde text would simply be


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following the same backwards west-to-east direction of the solar demiurge as he and his entourage moved though the Duat and the lower sky towards rebirth at dawn. In the case of the Book of the Dead, this analogy is carried out to such an extent that the scroll itself was unrolled so that one held its beginning in one’s left hand and then moved the unfurled remainder towards the right. In effect, a Book of the Dead would thus be an upside-down book in Egyptian eyes.48 Naturally enough, such general rules of text format and sign usage were by no means rigidly applied to the Book of the Dead throughout its development. In the early part of the 18th Dynasty, for instance, a few examples were written in hieratic, and retrograde writing was not consistently employed.49 Even among the most elaborate (and expensive) Books of the Dead, exceptions occurred. The Papyrus of Ani (BM EA 10.470) is surely among one of the most extensive and beautifully illustrated of all Ramesside exemplars of the Book of the Dead. Despite its splendid visual impression, pAni, like a number of other lengthy Book of the Dead papyri, was actually a composite roll created by pasting together a number of sheets that had been pre-inscribed by several different copyists.50 Perhaps the most telling proof of pAni’s composite nature is provided by its two widely separated copies of Chapter 18, both done

by the same scribe and having a virtually identical text, sign for sign, but each with a different arrangement of text and vignettes. There are many more Books of the Dead that were produced in workshops or though the close cooperation of two or more scribes than is generally realized, but that is a subject far beyond the scope of this paper.51 Although retrograde text orientation prevails, pAni has several sheets where the text follows the canonical right-to-left orientation of text columns and signs.52 When we take into consideration that scribal training was strongly focused on the practical communications of everyday life, it is no wonder that retrograde writing was the source of errors when copying the Book of the Dead. Even if we put aside the antique language and the strangeness of the content of the chapters they were transcribing, the copyists were working in a scribal environment that was unusual in every respect—the standard script was archaic, yet had to be rendered as calligraphically as possible; the columnar text format was likewise recherché; finally, the sign orientation and columnar sequencing were the reverse of what was used in normal scribal practice. These factors combined to make it rather difficult at times to place text into a given place on a papyrus and to transcribe it into a correct format.

48 J. Černý, Paper and Books in Ancient Egypt (London, 1947), 29, with n. 156, remarked that two 21st Dynasty Books of the Dead in Berlin had the notation “top” on the top outer edge of their verso, so that someone removing the papyri would know how to hold the rolls and not unroll them upside down. 49 On both these points, see Munro, Untersuchungen zu den Totenbuch-Papyri, 198-201. Even in Books of the Dead that are carefully executed in cursive hieroglyphs, some hieratic signs are occasionally employed; ibid., “Liste 19,” 254-257. For another example of an early Book of the Dead in hieratic, see R.B. Parkinson and S.G. Quirke, “The Coffin of Prince Herunefer and the Early History of the Book of the Dead,” in Studies in Pharaonic Religion and Society in Honour of J. Gynn Griffiths, ed. A.B. Lloyd (London, 1992), 37-51. 50 A close examination of pAni reveals four to five different hands in the text and probably at least two different vignette artists; see my remarks in the commentary to the plates in The Egyptian Book of the Dead: The Book of Going Forth by Day, ed. E. von Dassow (San Francisco, 1994), 154-170 passim, esp. 160. Furthermore, in the photographic reproduction edited by E. Dondelinger, Papyrus Ani: BM 10.470: vollständige Faksimile-Ausgabe im Originalformat des Totenbuches aus dem Besitz des British Museum (Graz, 1978), one can readily see that the double-banded border at the top and bottom of the roll changes its color, width, and even its style at several points, further indications that groups of different pre-existing template sheets had been pasted together to create the whole.

51 There are several features that can be employed as indications that a work might be a composite work in which the work of several scribes was gathered to form a whole: the presence of several distinct handwritings in the body of the text; variances in the width of the textual body and vignette size; the repetition of a chapter within the scroll; variations in the style and/or color of the border bands; and different artistic styles in the vignettes. These and some other features were all present in pAni. 52 In pAni, the canonical right-to-left sequence of text flow and sign orientation is limited to divine hymns and a few scenes in which the deceased was shown praying or adoring a deity; see Munro, Totenbuch-Papyri, 201. Although the reason for this is unclear, one might suggest that the normal orientation was chosen in cases where the content was not considered to be necessarily associated with a mortuary or afterlife context. The signs on the sheets in pAni containing such hymns not only were usually executed in a far more elaborate and careful hand than what appears on the great majority of other sheets. These elaborately executed hymns therefore are written in a true “book script,” which is an indication of the work of a master scribe or scribes. An exception to this rule of thumb is the odd use of the canonical direction of text columns in the rubric to Chapter 125, which in any case has been erroneously put underneath the vignette that normally accompanies Chapter 126; see E. von Dassow, Book of the Dead, 168.

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Errors in Retrograde Writing and the Scribal Mindset The Papyrus of Ani has an amusing example of the pitfalls that could await copyists who forgot what they were producing and slipped into the mindset of their normal scribal practices that they had absorbed while training on literary and documentary papyri. As a composite and template Book of the Dead, one of the final steps in making the final product was pasting together pAni’s prefabricated sheets, most likely after the blank spaces provided for the names and titles of Ani and his wife, Tutu, had been filled in.53 This latter task was left mostly to an inexperienced scribe, judging from a few omissions and the coarse appearance of his handwriting in comparison with the more elegant hands of the original copyists. This is not to say, however, that the more experienced scribes did not occasionally blunder as well. As mentioned previously, the nearly identical versions of pAni’s Chapter 18 contain the same peculiar error—each left out the beginning of the chapter, and began instead with the rubricized gloss to that omitted material. It seems unlikely that the scribe realized that he was starting the text with a non sequitur in the literal sense of the term. As we know from manuscripts of the Late Period in particular, the normal practice was to truncate a Book of the Dead chapter at its end, not the beginning. Then, why should this same mistake have occurred—twice, no less? Of course, the error may have happened in the workshop when the model for the text was created, long before pAni’s sheets were inscribed. In either case, I believe that the chief reason for this error probably lies in the retrograde, left-to-right, direction in which the text proceeds. Conceptually, this text orientation was distinctly awkward for scribes who not only normally wrote only in the hieratic script of everyday material, but, left to their own devices would have naturally conceived the blank sheet before them as something to be filled in the canonical right-to-left direction. However, there were two more factors that complicated their task. The scribes working on the Ani papyrus were copying a columnar text, a writing format which by that time was confined almost entirely to funerary texts like the Book of the Dead and other arcania.

53 On this point, see my remarks in von Dassow, ed., Egyptian Book of the Dead, 141-142.

As a rough comparison, imagine what it would be like for us today to copy a document in which each sentence began at the period and proceeded word-by-word backwards towards its beginning. However, retrograde writing was not the only complication that made the Book of the Dead a rather specialized task, far removed from normal scribal practices. In addition, the scribes inscribing text in this awkward manner also had to use the specialized cursive hieroglyphs of Book of the Dead text, which had become an artificial book script by the early Ramesside Period. On top of this, they had to copy material that was written in an archaic dialect and thus likely to have been largely incomprehensible. The result is that the Ani papyrus may possess splendid vignettes, but the accuracy of its text is often rather inferior to other contemporary papyri. In each version of Chapter 18, the copyist had to fit a text that was longer than the space available on the prepared sheet. Can we blame the scribe if his attention momentarily slipped and he counted off the columns as they stood on his master copy, moving in a right-to-left direction instead of remembering that the text before him was retrograde with a left-to-right progression of the columns? After all, the Book of the Dead, for all of its obscurities, probably did not make much sense to that unfortunate scribe, either backwards or forwards. As my illustration below explains, an error of this sort would result in the text being truncated at its beginning, rather at its end. Whether the mistake arose while creating this particular papyrus, or whether it was due to an error in creating the original model on which the Ani version of the spell was based, the scribe either did not notice or else he may have adopted an ancient Egyptian version of our modern cynicism, “close enough for government work.” Above all, this example reveals how firmly embedded the orientation, in every sense of that word, of their normal scribal environment was in the minds of the scribes who copied these funerary texts.

An Explanation of the Inadvertent Truncation of Chapter 18 in Papyrus Ani Note: In the description below, we are momentarily assuming that the textual model contained

the production of the book of the dead the complete text. Of course, this may not have been have been so. In that event, the explanation below would show instead how the faulty model was created.

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The complete text, including the introduction, proceeds from left to right in retrograde columns—signs facing to right—as is characteristic of Book of the Dead material.

Step 1 Complete Master Copy with retrograde column format. Introduction to

Rubric to Intro.

columns

columns

columns

terminal columns

retrograde text

retrograde text

retrograde text retrograde text

Chapter 18 several columns of

Columns

retrograde text

retrograde text

Step 2 Columns columns columns columns columns

Scribe-copyist wishes to fill a blank template sheet that has fewer columns available.

Step 3 Having mistakenly counted off columns on the Master Copy in the normal right-to-left direction of non-religious material, the scribe-copyist Rubric to Intro.

columns

columns

thus does not begin copying at the correct point and therefore inadvertently truncates the text at its beginning (the Introduction), not its end, as is usually the case with truncated chapters in the Book of the Dead.

columns

terminal columns

Columns

Copying in Inscriptional Hieroglyphic Texts Although the focus of this study has been the Book of the Dead, it is merely the most pervasive example of the importance of copying texts in the hieroglyphic script. Much more has yet to be learned about the mechanics of making these copies, especially the difficulties in planning a Book of the Dead, choosing the chapters, and estimating how to fit texts into the space required (or to be allotted) for the various spells. How the scribes took into consideration such factors as the 54

See, for instance, the proposed reconstructions of the process by E. Graefe, “Papyrus Leiden T3 oder: Über das Kopieren von Texten durch altägyptische Schreiber,” OMRO 73 (1993) 23-28, with the response by M. Heerma van Voss at the end. 55 The process of copying from a presumed papyrus-

number or columns, the size of vignette, and the difficulties of dealing with retrograde text is a subject that would require a study vastly greater than the present paper.54 I would like to close with a few words on another genre of copied material. Skill in hieroglyphs was not solely connected with funerary materials, even though the most complete and exacting examples of parallel hieroglyphic inscriptions derive from royal funerary contexts, such as the Pyramid Texts and the afterlife “books” found on tomb walls in the Valley of the Kings.55 Royal inscriptions, religious manuscript model to the spaces on royal tomb walls, illustrated or otherwise, is even less understood and often poses more difficult questions; for example, see the conflicting views in H. Altenmüller, “Zum Beschriftungssystem bei religiösen Texten,” in XVIII. Deutscher Orientalistentag, Verträge I, ZDMG Supplementa 1 (Wiesbaden, 1969), 58-67;

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and otherwise, were also frequently copied, but we know far less about the processes involved, mainly because we have almost no evidence concerning the intermediary steps.56 To the large corpus of religious texts, we can add a number of less well-preserved hymns, royal decrees, and historical inscriptions of the New Kingdom, many of which were ideological or “rhetorical” texts created for the sake of what we loosely term “royal propaganda.” In such instances, we might speak of the “dissemination” mode of text production. The closeness and accuracy of these parallel texts are often rather impressive. As is the case with closely similar relief scenes, we assume that some form of papyrus records or “copy books” was

employed, but actually we know virtually nothing of the intermediate steps involved. Largely due to accidents of preservation, the Theban region once more provides the preponderance of the evidence, but there are a number of examples from the reign of Rameses II in Nubia as well. Undoubtedly, many important Theban decrees had counterparts in Memphis, which was, after all, the northern administrative capital. Indeed, it is probable that most royal inscriptions were composed first at Memphis, and then “republished” at other sites like Thebes. It is likely that the most skilled scribes from the Deir el-Medina community and the Theban temples on both banks of the river were employed in such work.

H. Kees, “Ein alter Götterhymnus als Begleittext zur Opfertafel,” ZÄS 57 (1922), 92-120; F. Mauric-Barberio, “Copie des textes à l’envers dans les tombes royales,” in G. Andreu, ed., Deir el-Médineh et la Vallée des Rois: La vie en Égypte au temps des pharaons du Nouvel Empire. Actes du colloque organisé par le musée du Louvre les 3 et 4 mai 2002 (Paris, 2003), 173-194.

56 To my knowledge, few articles have attempted to describe the hypothetical procedures; see W. Helck, “Das Verfassen einer Königsinschrift,” in Fragen an die altägyptische Literature, ed. J. Assmann, E. Feucht, and R. Grieshammer (Wiesbaden, 1977), 241-256.

a group of art works in the amarna style

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A GROUP OF ART WORKS IN THE AMARNA STYLE Tom Hardwick Worcester College, University of Oxford

Curators and collectors must exercise caution when contemplating proposed acquisitions. I hope that this brief discussion of a group of purportedly Egyptian objects will be of interest to Jack, to whose hospitality I have often been indebted. This note is also intended to provide information regarding material that may yet appear on the art market. The Acquisition of the “Amarna Princess” by Bolton Museum1 In January 2002, the Keeper of Egyptology at Bolton Museum was asked by a Mr. George Greenhalgh, from the Bolton suburb of Bromley Cross, to look at a “statue.” The piece (figs. 1-4) was 51 cm high and carved from a creamy, semi-translucent stone. Mr. Greenhalgh stated that his great-grandfather, a mill owner, had acquired the statue in 1892 at the sale of Silverton Park in Devon, the seat of the fourth Earl of Egremont (1785-1845), and produced a copy of the sale catalogue to corroborate this. The statue was part of lot 201, “eight Egyptian figures.” He had no idea what the statue was, and had been offered a negligible sum by an antiques dealer for it as a garden ornament. The statue depicted a woman wearing a clinging, pleated garment that covered the body and left arm from the shoulders 1 Unless otherwise stated, information comes from the author’s personal experience; discussions of the case with members of the Art and Antiques squad of the Metropolitan Police; and the relevant correspondence and object files at Bolton Museum. The photographs reproduced here as figs. 5-12 and 14-16 were taken by the author thanks to the courtesy of the Metropolitan Police. 2 Philadelphia, University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology E14349, a headless limestone figure of a clothed princess with upraised left hand and long sidelock: PM VIII, 801-670-270; Do. Arnold, The Royal Women of Amarna: Images of Beauty from Ancient Egypt (New York, 1996), hereafter Royal Women), 124, cat. 37; R.E. Freed, Y.J. Markowitz, and S.H. D’Auria, eds., Pharaohs of the Sun: Akhenaten, Nefertiti, Tutankhamun (Boston, 1999, hereafter Pharaohs of the Sun), 219, cat. 50. Paris, Louvre E 25409, a headless red quartzite figure of a clothed princess with pendant right arm: Royal Women,

down. The figure’s head, right arm, left forearm and hand, and calves and feet were missing; the stump of a sidelock of hair was preserved on the right shoulder. The left leg was slightly advanced, and a rectangular slab of negative space occupied the area beneath the left buttock. The object was identified as an Egyptian alabaster figure of a royal woman from the Amarna Period, citing parallels in Philadelphia and Paris;2 the breakages to the left-hand side of the body indicated that it came from a group of several figures. As such, it was acquired by Bolton Museum through the auction house Christie’s in September 2003 for £439,767, the equivalent of £500,000 (c. $800,000) after tax breaks designed to encourage outstanding works of art to stay in Britain. The statue was purchased with £75,000 given by the private charity The National Art Collections Fund, and £360,767 by the government-funded National Heritage Memorial Fund; the statue received assessments for both groups.3 The remaining £4,000 was given by the Friends of Bolton Museum and another Bolton trust. The statue, dubbed the “Amarna Princess,” was displayed in 2003 at an exhibition celebrating the centenary of the National Art Collections Fund, and returned to Bolton in January 2004. The Keeper of Egyptology retired in 2005 and was succeeded by the author at the end of that year.4 24-25, cat. 12; Pharaohs of the Sun, 218, cat. 49; C. Barbotin, Les statues égyptiennes du nouvel empire: statues royals et divines 1 (Paris, 2007), 79-81, cat. 36. 3 M. Bailey, “How the Entire British Art World was Duped by a Fake Egyptian Statue,” The Art Newspaper, May 2006, 4; National Art Collections Fund, 2003 Review: The Annual Report of the National Art Collections Fund in its Centenary Year (London, 2004), 14, 66. 4 Bailey, “Fake Egyptian Statue”; the statue was acquired too late to be published in the catalogue of the exhibition “Saved! 100 Years of the National Art Collections Fund,” but was briefly discussed in J. Fletcher, The Search for Nefertiti (London, 2004), 258, identified as a possible image of Mutnodjmet. For convenience, the title “Amarna Princess” is used here to refer to the Bolton statue, even though formal titles are rarely used to identify Egyptian objects and the statue is not of the Amarna Period.

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Figs 1-4. Bolton Museum 2004.7, the “Amarna Princess”: frontal, profile, and rear views. Images courtesy Bolton Council.


3

4

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Doubts Raised About, and Examination of, the Amarna Princess In February 2006, the author received a message from the Art and Antiques squad of the Metropolitan Police to the effect that the trustworthiness of the Greenhalgh family had been called into question. They had offered a group of Assyrian reliefs to the British Museum for assessment and possible sale. Like the Amarna Princess, these too were said to have come from the 1892 Silverton Park sale, and one even appeared to be a piece drawn by its excavator and subsequently lost, but their examination had revealed a number of stylistic errors and the use of materials inconsistent with an Assyrian, or even Victorian, dating.5 The police requested that the Amarna Princess should be re-examined. The attribution or authentication of artworks is a matter of careful observation and deduction, but it is not an absolute process.6 Two individuals may hold divergent opinions on the ascription or age of an object on the basis of the same evidence. Scientific or technical analysis can often provide invaluable assistance in attribution or dating, but it is optimistic to expect that it can always offer certainty. A holistic study of an object using stylistic and technical data, which aims to investigate and reconstruct the manufacture, use, and subsequent treatment of an object up to the present day, gives the greatest possible return of meaningful information. The Amarna Princess was studied with this methodology in mind.

The appearance of the statue was initially promising: it bears a generic resemblance to the Philadelphia princess but resembles the Paris figure more closely in pose and body shape. The degree to which this close relationship is close enough (i.e., drawing from a similar tradition) or too close (i.e., copied from the piece) is subjective; at any rate, the ways in which the Amarna Princess diverges from the Paris statuette (the angle of the left arm, the figure’s slightly increased steatopygia, and the unusual back pillar) can be argued to be within the bounds of normality for Amarna art.7 The apparent contrapposto of the figure, with its right hip thrust outwards, was a result of its mounting and vanished when it was tilted a little counterclockwise. Four lesser stylistic oddities were, however, very suspicious. 1) The knot of the garment under the figure’s right breast is inexpertly formed. In undoubted examples, such as the figure in the Louvre, care has been taken to carve the knot accurately; it was a vital part of the figure’s outfit, and the integrity of the garment depended on the knot’s being rendered clearly and correctly.8 This is not the case on the Bolton figure. 2) The tassels of the end of the knot are depicted with wavy lines rather than straight ones, as is the case on (for example) the Louvre piece. While wavy lines were often used to denote the pleating of semi-transparent linen in New Kingdom paintings,9 and very rarely in relief,10 this treatment is unparalleled in statuary. Furthermore, on figures of unquestioned authenticity, the hem

5 I. MacQuisten in Antiques Trade Gazette 1818 (7th December 2007). 6 The entire oeuvre of a modern artist could in theory be documented and a definitive catalogue raisonné produced, but attributions in all other areas can at most offer the bestinformed consensus at the time. This is well illustrated by the changing attributions of pictures studied by the Rembrandt Research Project over 40 years. The latest volume contains both numerous reattributions of paintings studied in previous volumes, and also a “disclaimer,” prepared with the assistance of Dutch and American law firms, stating “it should be understood that forming an opinion as to the authenticity of a work of art purporting to be by Rembrandt is often very difficult and will in most cases depend on subjective criteria which are not capable of proof or absolute certainty. Therefore the conclusions expressed … are only opinions and not a warranty of any kind … Anyone is free to disagree with the opinions expressed in these volumes”: E. van de Wetering et al., eds., A Corpus of Rembrandt Paintings IV: The Self-Portraits (Dordrecht, 2005), vi. 7 The angle of the left arm is paralleled on the Philadelphia figure and a small alabaster figure of a princess, now Berlin, Ägyptisches Museum 17951: Pharaohs of the Sun, 217, cat.

47. Steatopygia is visible on the colossal sandstone figures from the Gempaaten at Karnak: Pharaohs of the Sun, 54, and on relief representations of royal women, such as the fragment of a boundary stela, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston 1992.18: Pharaohs of the Sun 214, cat. 38. Unusual back pillars and negative spaces can be seen on the Philadelphia figure and UCL 002, a brown quartzite torso of a princess: Royal Women, 109, cat. 16. 8 The importance of the knot at this period can be seen by the fact that it was carved on representations of princesses in the tomb of Kheruef (TT 192), while the rest of the robe completely lacks carved detailing: Epigraphic Survey, The Tomb of Kheruef: Theban Tomb 192, OIP 102 (Chicago, 1980), pl. 47. 9 E. Mackay, “The representation of shawls with a rippled stripe in the Theban tombs,” JEA 10 (1924), 41-43. See also the paintings from the Theban tomb of Nebamun, now in the British Museum: R.B. Parkinson, The Painted Tomb of Nebamun (London, 2008), passim. 10 The over-kilt of Meryre in a block from his Memphite tomb, now Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum ÄS 5815, is carved with slightly wavy pleats: A.P. Kozloff and B.M. Bryan, Egypt’s Dazzling Sun: Amenhotep III and his World (Cleveland, 1992), 293, cat. 59.

a group of art works in the amarna style at the neckline of the figure is often depicted with a series of loops, part of the weft selvedge of the piece of cloth, while the hem under the left breast is fringed with tassels formed from the warp threads.11 On the Bolton figure, the neckline hem is finished with loops, while the edge of the garment under the left breast is depicted with loops and tassels; both methods are used at the same time. This is unparalleled in Egyptian sculpture and also reflects a misunderstanding of the makeup of the garment. 3) The remains of the left arm show that it was mis-carved, being extremely flat and thin to the point of anorexia. This lack of proportion is unparalleled in high-quality royal representations. 4) The pleated streamer running down the lefthand side of the body continues on to the slab of negative space by the left leg (fig. 5). Negative space is by definition not part of the figure represented. It may be carved in relief with inscriptions, secondary figures, or (rarely) entire pieces of regalia, but the demarcation between the main figure and its negative space is always kept clear, and items do not move from three-dimensional to relief representation in the same depiction. The Bolton figure blurs this division by the inclusion of a piece of costume onto the negative space. Furthermore, the streamer is confidently carved and detailed with pleats on the body, but very tentatively carved on the negative space. This suggests that this mistake was made by someone with insufficient knowledge of Egyptian art, someone who had a begun carving a streamer on the body but did not know where to put it when the side of the body was obscured by the negative space. Scrutiny of the physical makeup and apparent ageing of the statue revealed inconsistencies with a proposed manufacture in antiquity.12 The first anomaly is in the appearance and quality of the stone. Egyptian alabaster can vary in color from a rich yellow to a near white, but the homogeneous pale translucent quality of the material of the Bolton figure is atypical. An unexpected result of the examination of the statue was the discovery that its stone is soft enough to be damaged easily by a thumbnail (Mohs hardness 2.5). This indicates that the statue is not made from Egyptian alabaster/travertine/calcite/calcium 11 G. Vogelsang-Eastwood, Pharaonic Egyptian Clothing (Leiden, 1993), 111. 12 This was carried out by the author and Dr. Andrew Shortland of Cranfield University. 13 On the composition and geological terminology for the

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Fig. 5. Bolton Museum 2004.7, the “Amarna Princess”: detail showing carving of streamer (highlighted) on the leg and negative space of the statue. Author’s photograph; drawing by Pablo Perez d’Ors.

carbonate (Mohs hardness 3),13 which would be unusual for a purportedly ancient Egyptian object. The second anomalous feature was the appearance of the surface. In spite of the extreme delicacy of the carved pleated surface, it has remained in almost pristine condition for over 3,300 years. The only areas where the stone surface is significantly weathered are its broken edges: at the neck, on the upper right arm, and down along the figure’s left-hand side, where the arm is missing and the negative space is broken. These breaks appear worn; their rough edges are smoothed down. This wear initially seems compatible with an ancient dating, as the worn breaks are partly covered with a chalky deposit suggesting long burial. However, it is inconceivable that the broken edges weathered away while the carved surface remained pristine. This suggests that the broken edges were stone conventionally called “alabaster” or “Egyptian alabaster” by Egyptologists, see B. Aston, J. Harrell, and I. Shaw, “Stone,” in Ancient Egyptian Materials and Technologies, ed. P. T. Nicholson and I. Shaw (Cambridge, 2000), 59.

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deliberately worn down, and an artificial patina was applied to provide the appearance of antiquity. The chalky deposit suggesting long burial is also visible on inconspicuous areas of the figure, such as the lower legs and back. Close examination of these areas showed air bubbles and vertical striations consistent with the deposit having been applied by brush—i.e., a false patina rather than a naturally formed surface. The third anomaly relates to the mounting of the figure. On the back of the sculpture, three drill holes are visible on the back of the negative space on the left-hand side, next to a broad, fuzzy, whitish vertical line (see fig. 4). These features have no ancient Egyptian parallels, and they were said to have been left over from an older mounting of the figure; a vertical mount had been fixed to the figure by the drill holes, and over some time the rubbing of its edge against the statue had gradually produced the line. The holes, however, showed no sign of having held pins or screws in the past. They contained fresh, easily dislodged stone dust. The vertical line was made up of a large number of small scratches roughly aligned in the same direction. These looked as though they had been drawn individually by a sharp point, rather than all having been made by a single process. The holes and line seemed to have been created to give an impression of the presence of an old mount, and thus to imply a prior history for the figure. The use of a non-Egyptian stone and the deliberate antiquing of the figure, added to the stylistic errors in the execution of the piece, argue conclusively that the Amarna Princess was not made in ancient Egypt. When was it made? The possibility remained that it had indeed been purchased by a Greenhalgh ancestor at Silverton Park in 1892, but that it was a nineteenth century forgery. This can be easily dismissed. Little interest was taken in Amarna art before the early twentieth century, and the prospect of the statue having been made before 1845 to be bought by the third Earl of Egremont, or made to be included in an obscure country auction in 1892, is remote. The Louvre 14 Bibliography in Barbotin, Statues égyptiennes du nouvel empire, 79-81. 15 The case has attracted a great deal of media interest. In addition to international newspaper and magazine reportage of the case, two British television programs have so far been made about the forgery of the Amarna Princezss. 16 Approximately £400,000 was confiscated from the Greenhalghs and returned pro rata to Bolton and some other purchasers of bogus material. Christie’s refunded its £25,000 commission on the sale of the Amarna Princess to Bolton as

statuette, the model for the Bolton statue, was acquired in Egypt in 1956 and was not published until 1958.14 The combination of models, public interest, and financial reward did not exist to enable and justify the manufacture of the Amarna Princess for sale in the nineteenth century; it was abundantly present in 2002.

The Arrest of the Vendors of the Amarna Princess With the inauthenticity of the Amarna Princess thus established, it was removed from display at Bolton Museum in March 2006, on the eve of a police raid on the Greenhalgh family house. A large quantity of incriminating material was recovered, and members of the family were arrested, questioned, and charged. All eventually pleaded guilty. In November 2007 Shaun Greenhalgh, George Greenhalgh’s 47-year-old son, who had received no formal artistic training, was sentenced to four years and eight months for conspiracy to defraud. He admitted making the objects. George Greenhalgh was given a suspended sentence of twelve months on account of his age (84) and apparent ill health; his main role was apparently that of the front man and vendor. Olive Greenhalgh, George’s 83-year-old wife, also received a suspended sentence of twelve months.15 Another son, George Greenhalgh Jr., received a suspended sentence of nine months for acquiring property with the proceeds of crime.16 The material found in the Greenhalgh house, added to extensive research work carried out by the Department of Prehistory and Europe at the British Museum and in auction houses in London and America, established a considerable body of suspicious and outright bogus material originating from the Greenhalgh household over a period of at least 17 years before their arrest.17 This had been offered for assessment or sale to numerous institutions, in some cases successfully.

a “goodwill gesture,” while admitting no liability in its assessment and sale of the statue. The amount made and spent by the forgers is impossible to assess; although the family’s living arrangements were described as “Dickensian” and “squalid,” certain activities, such as compulsive gambling, would dispose of unlimited funds with little visible result. 17 The earliest extant piece of Greenhalghiana is an Anglo-Saxon silver reliquary with a nielloed inscription of Eadred, King of the West Saxons, said to have been discovered by George Greenhalgh when metal-detecting in a riverside


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The Other “Egyptian” Objects Made by the Vendors of the Amarna Princess

In addition to the Egyptian objects discussed in detail below, this material included RomanoBritish and later metalwork; sculptures by Paul Gauguin, Barbara Hepworth, Constantin Brancusi, and the nineteenth century American sculptor Horatio Greenough; and paintings by the Scottish Colourist Samuel Peploc, Picasso, and the Lancastrian artist L.S. Lowry. Other material clearly related to the manufacture of the objects included a small furnace; modeling clay; receipts for the purchase of quantities of stone;18 pieces of glass; and auction catalogues and books on hieroglyphs, Egyptian and Assyrian art, and Old Master drawings. A few small and inexpensive antiquities such as brooches, coins, and intaglio gems, with descriptions and price tags written by the forgers, were also seized. Notable among the metalwork created by the Greenhalgh family was the Risley Lanx, a rectangular silver plate with raised-relief decoration of hunting scenes purporting to be of the fourth century AD. The original Lanx had been found in Risley Park in Derbyshire in 1729, and had been broken into pieces by its finders for the bullion value. Some of the fragments had been published, with drawings, by the antiquary William Stukeley in 1736, and a re-assessment of the Lanx from this source had been published in the Antiquaries Journal in 1981. Eleven years later, a complete version of the Lanx was bought for the British Museum from the Greenhalghs, who stated that it had been in family possession since the eighteenth century. Inconsistencies in the metallurgical analysis of the Lanx favored its identification as an eighteenth century or later cast made from the original fragments, but it was acquired as an important document of late Roman plate.19

The story of the Lanx typifies the careful, antiquarian approach of the Greenhalghs to forgery. A “lost” object was identified from a relatively obscure source, re-created, and furnished with a convincing provenance.20 The Egyptian objects found at the forgers’ house did not match any descriptions of known “lost” material, but nevertheless can be seen as a coherent group by virtue of their material and proposed dating. The first piece (figs. 6-8) was a standing figure of a woman wearing an elaborate pleated garment, and made out of a creamy semi-transparent stone, 63 cm tall. Her upper arms lie flat against her body and are broken just below the elbows, but her missing forearms seem to have been depicted bent forward and slightly outward, as though she was holding a large object in front of her. Her head is bald, with a recessed wedge-shaped area on the right-hand side and a recess underneath on her right collarbone, suggesting a now-missing inlaid sidelock. The eyes and eyebrows are similarly recessed for inlays, also missing, and the right-hand side of the face has been damaged by what might have been malicious attack.21 Her skin is painted red-brown. The back pillar is recessed, broken at top and bottom, and inscribed faintly and inaccurately with the name and filiation of Meritaten. The left leg is broken at the knee, and a plaster restoration attaches the leg to a turned wooden plinth; a rusted metal rod supports the statue at the back. The modern nature of this piece is obvious, both stylistically (the proportions of the body with over-small shoulders, the confused garment,

park in Preston in autumn 1989: D. Hill, “The Eadred Reliquary: the Riddle in the Park,” Manchester Archaeological Bulletin 6 (1991), 5-11. A Romanesque lead Corpus Christi figure, mounted on an inscribed piece of vellum giving its provenance as the tomb of King John in Worcester Cathedral, opened in 1797, was sold at auction in 1998 (European Sculpture, Christie’s London, 7th July 1998, lot 28). A study of the Anglo-Saxon Greenhalgh productions by Leslie Webster is forthcoming. 18 The “Egyptian alabaster” of the Amarna Princess and some of the other Egyptian objects listed below is in fact Florentine alabaster from Volterra, purchased from a British supplier and also used for the Assyrian reliefs. This is a geologically true alabaster, a form of calcium sulphate, rather than the calcium carbonate of Egyptian alabaster/travertine. It can be distinguished without chemical analysis by its relative softness and different color and texture. The supplier stated that the forgers had also made enquiries about sourcing imperial porphyry and Egyptian alabaster; in the latter

case it is likely that they had realized that the alabaster previously used for their Egyptian objects was the wrong one. I owe this information to Ian MacDonald of McMarmilloyd Ltd. 19 C. Johns and K. Painter, “The Risley Park Lanx: Bauge, Bayeux, Buch, or Britain?” in Orbis Romanus Christanusque ab Diocletiani aetate usque ad Heraclium: travaux sur l’antiquité tardive rassemblés autour des recherches de Noël Duval (Paris, 1995), 175-185. Many of the Greenhalgh metal objects seem to have been made from melted coins of the relevant period to provide convincing results from metallurgical analysis. 20 Similarly, a Roman gold legionary ornament, purporting to come from a hoard discovered at Wincle in Cheshire in the 1870s, re-published in 1981 and subsequently lost to sight, was offered unsuccessfully to British museums and the auction house Christie’s in 1999. 21 The whiter damage to the nose visible in the photographs occurred after the piece’s confiscation.

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7 Figs. 6-8. Figure of a second Amarna princess: front, right profile, and rear views. Author’s photographs.


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the ambiguous pose, the look of the face, and the shoddy inscription) and technically (the use of the same incorrect stone as the Amarna Princess, the applied patina). The pose is reminiscent of offering statues, discussed with the next piece, but also of a statue of Nefertiti wearing the cap crown, now in Berlin.22 The second piece (figs. 9-12) was made of the same stone and depicted a striding clad female, 29 cm high. Her forearms, now largely missing, are extended, and she was depicted holding something before her. The arms are painted red-brown, and the figure is secured to a turned wooden mount (similar to the one on which the Amarna Princess was acquired). The head and neck had been recently sawn off, and a drill bit is stuck in the cut area. The separately mounted head, 14 cm high, is that of a young woman with a bald head, save for a wedge-shaped sidelock with a depression into which a clasp of a different material may have been inlaid. Her eyes are recessed for inlay. The inscribed back pillar of both pieces, read together, gives the name and filiation of Meritaten. As with the other statue, its recent origin is clear. Style and physical makeup are inconsistent with an ancient date. The model for the pose of this figure is likely to be a statue of Nefertiti making an offering,23 but some thought has gone into the design of the heads of both princesses. The wedge-shaped sidelock present on the second figure and formerly inlaid on the first is unusual. In statuary, Amarna royal children are usually depicted as bald,24 with a long straight sidelock that touches the shoulder,25 or with a short straight sidelock with a recessed/tasseled end;26 these three styles are all shown in relief as well. The wedge-shaped sidelock of the forged figures is known from several examples in relief,27 but there are no extant examples in statuary. The transformation of a two-dimensional prototype into three dimensions is proof of the forgers’ interest in creating something out of the ordinary (i.e., not a direct copy) but which nevertheless aimed to be 8 22

Berlin 21263, Royal Women, 79-81, cat. 4. British Museum EA 935: Pharaohs of the Sun, 231, cat. 88. 24 e.g., Cairo JE 44870: Pharaohs of the Sun, 217, cat. 45. 25 e.g., Philadephia E 14389 (see above, note 2). This sidelock is likely to be the one copied for the Amarna Princess. 26 e.g., Kansas, Nelson-Atkins Museum 47-13: C. Aldred, Akhenaten and Nefertiti (Brooklyn, 1973), 131, cat. 53. 27 e.g., Cairo JE 48035, sculptor’s model of a princess eating a duck: Pharaohs of the Sun, 221, cat. 56; Copenhagen, 23

Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek ÆIN 1776, a head of Kiya reworked for Meritaten: Pharaohs of the Sun, 221, cat. 57. Was the recessed inscription of Meritaten on the first figure deliberately intended to suggest that it had been re-worked from a figure of Kiya? Bolton Museum has a significant collection of re-worked stone fragments from the Maru-Aten at Amarna: A.P. Thomas, “Some palimpsest fragments from the MaruAten at Amarna,” CdE 57 (1982), 5-13. Were these known to the forgers, and if so did they suggest the idea of producing an “usurped” statue? Or if the forgers’ capacity for taking

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9 Figs. 9-10. Head of a third Amarna princess: front and right profile views. Author’s photographs.

plausible as an ancient piece. A sketch recovered from the house (fig. 13) appears to show the forgers’ thought processes—a measured drawing of princess’s head from a composite statue, with a long tenon for attachment to a body, has two different wedge-shaped sidelocks overlaid. A second sketch (fig. 14) depicts the outline of a woman’s torso seen from the front and the side. The front view appears to be a sketch for a composite pains was underestimated at the time the Amarna Princess was considered for purchase, is it now being exaggerated?

statue, with the right arms, both hands, and a foot attached to the body with tenons. No objects like this have so far come to light, and the status of the drawing—working sketch or abandoned doodle— remains uncertain. The two princess figures were found inside the house; in a garden shed, covered with moss and spider webs, was the third piece (figs. 15-16). Carved of a beige sandstone with a purple wash,


11

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12 Figs. 11-12. Torso of a third Amarna princess: front and right profile views. Author’s photographs.

and 35 cm high, it depicts the head and shoulders of a king wearing the white crown. A hole in the crown indicates that a uraeus was once inlaid, while streamers hang down the back pillar, and the pleated upper part of a highwaisted kilt is preserved on the right-hand side of the back. The thin back pillar is uninscribed. This bust appears to represent Akhenaten but is manifestly not ancient. In addition to the

material, which may have been intended to imitate the purple quartzite used for royal statuary and relief in the Amarna Period, the proportions of the face, shoulders, and crown are all unparalleled in ancient examples. The likely sources for the Akhenaten bust can be identified. The large, pierced earlobe, big lips, and drooping chin find a parallel in a sculptor’s trial piece now in Berlin;28 the long neck and meager chest in a fragment of boundary stela showing the king 28

Berlin 14512: Pharaohs of the Sun, 219, cat. 51.

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Fig. 13. Detail of a sketch of the head of an Amarna princess, with added sidelocks. Image courtesy the Metropolitan Police.

Fig. 14. Detail of a pencil technical sketch of an Amarna royal female torso. Author’s photograph.


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16 Figs. 15-16. Bust of Akhenaten. Author’s photographs.

adoring the Aten with both arms raised and his chest shown in profile;29 and the elongated crown and streamers in a balustrade from the Great Palace at Amarna.30 No statues with a white crown survive from the Amarna Period, but a three-dimensional parallel for the crown, and the shape of the uraeus, exists from the late reign of Amenhotep III.31 The last Amarna object found at the forgers’ house was a small ring made of a polished opaque yellow stone, possibly a soapstone. This had a raised bezel in the shape of a cartouche inscribed with the prenomen of Akhenaten, while the side of the bezel was inscribed with the name and titles of Princess Meketaten. Shape, material, and palaeography were all inconsistent with an ancient dating.32 29

Nelson-Atkins 44-65: Pharaohs of the Sun, 214, cat. 37. Cairo TR 30/10/26/12: Pharaohs of the Sun, 226, cat. 72. 31 Cairo JE 59880: Pharaohs of the Sun, 204, cat. 11. 32 A possible source of inspiration for this may be the 30

One object was represented by two poor-quality photographs (fig 17). These were of a rectangular slab, made of an unknown stone (although probably the same alabaster as that of the princesses and the Assyrian reliefs), with the number 761 stenciled on the reverse. This corresponds to lot 761 of the Silverton Park sale—“two stone reliefs”—the lot number also used for the Assyrian reliefs. The slab, carved in the sunk relief characteristic of the Amarna Period, shows Akhenaten as a human-armed sphinx wearing the khat headdress and offering a vessel to the Aten. The slab is of a familiar type, of which several examples are known and widely published,33 but the shoddy layout and writing of the inscriptions and the over-exaggerated facial features are a clear sign of modern manufacture. glass ring with cartouches of Ankhesenamun and Ay, now Berlin 34316: Pharaohs of the Sun, 94. 33 Of the five pieces listed by Aldred, Akhenaten and Nefertiti, 99, cat. 13, the modern piece is closest to Hanno-

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Fig. 17. Photographs of a stone slab carved with a relief of Akhenaten as a sphinx. Image courtesy the Metropolitan Police.

ver, Kestner-Museum 1964.3: Pharaohs of the Sun, 231, cat. 90. The addition of the names of the Aten to the body of the sphinx, the major departure from the Hannover piece, might have been inspired by comparison with statuary such as the Karnak colossi or the indurated limestone statues from the Great Temple at Amarna; two of the latter are illustrated in Pharaohs of the Sun on the opposing page to the Han-

nover slab, so would have been readily available sources of inspiration. Since a copy of Pharaohs of the Sun was found at the forgers’ house, and many of the possible sources (listed in previous footnotes) are illustrated, discussed, and referenced there, it is likely that it served as the major sourcebook for their Amarna creations.


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The relief itself was not found at the forgers’ house, nor were many of the non-Egyptian works known to have been offered by them over the previous 17 years. While many of the forgeries made of precious metal could have been recycled by being melted down, the stone and painted material had no bullion value. The forgers stated that they had sold many of the objects at flea markets or to junk shops, presumably alongside the genuine minor antiquities recovered by the police at their house. While the pieces are unlikely to stand up to serious scrutiny, they may well appear in the future being offered in all innocence by their new owners. Of the group of Egyptian objects, the Bolton figure is undoubtedly the most visually appealing and plausible looking. Faces and inscriptions are the parts of an artwork where analysis most quickly reveals inconsistencies, so by its nature the uninscribed and headless Amarna Princess was more likely to succeed than the other Amarna pieces. Headless and anepigraphic objects are generally less valuable than intact and inscribed pieces, but the popularity of the sensuous female form in Western culture and the glamour attached to the Amarna Period nevertheless meant that the Bolton figure could be sold profitably. The chronology of these other Amarna pieces is unclear. First seen early in 2002, the Amarna Princess was presumably made between 1999 and 2001, apparently taking Shaun Greenhalgh only three weeks to make. The stained wooden bases of the other statues are similar to that of the Amarna Princess. The other statues are stylistically less convincing (so perhaps made before the Amarna Princess?) but are more ambitious in scope and more thoroughly aged in appearance (so perhaps made afterwards?). The stenciled lot number on the back of the Akhenaten sphinx relief relates it to the Assyrian pieces that surfaced in 2005, and the drawing of an Amarna female torso (fig. 14) has a scale outline drawing of an Assyrian figure on the reverse, implying that some of the Amarna and Assyrian pieces were in simultaneous production. It is uncertain whether the Greenhalghs recognized that the remaining Amarna pieces were unlikely to succeed as ancient objects and therefore declined to launch them on the market,

or whether they were merely biding their time before attempting to sell them.

34 Nearing Camp, Evening on the Upper Colorado River, a large landscape in oil, fully documented since 1882, was purchased by the Museum in 1998, and a large collection of prints by Moran and his family was purchased in 2007.

35 The pieces were studied by Fiona Salvesen, then Keeper of Art at Bolton Museum; Gary Webster, art technician; and the author.

The Greenhalgh Family and Bolton Museum In the course of the police investigation, it was revealed that the Greenhalgh family had previously offered material for sale or assessment under Olive Greenhalgh’s maiden name Roscoe, and Bolton Museum correspondence was searched for occurrences of this name. A watercolor and a pencil drawing by the nineteenth century American landscape artist Thomas Moran entered the museum in 1993, the first purchased from, the second given by, a Mr. George Roscoe of Bolton. These were not random acquisitions for Bolton Museum. Thomas Moran was born in Bolton in 1837 and emigrated to the USA in 1844. Moran’s presence on the US Geological and Geographical Survey of 1871 gave him an opportunity to study and paint virgin wilderness, and his landscape paintings and prints were key in forming the idea of the great American landscape. Works by Moran are rare outside the United States; in 1993 Bolton Museum owned only two small paintings by him.34 The Morans offered by Mr. Roscoe were accompanied by an interesting provenance. Thomas Moran returned to Bolton in 1882 for a selling exhibition of his work. The Roscoe works were apparently given by Moran to the then-Mayor of Bolton on the occasion of his return; the Mayor gave them in turn to his children’s nursemaid, a Roscoe ancestress. Study of the technical makeup of the works revealed that marks of foxing on the paper had been applied with brown ink, as were also the lines of acid burn from a wooden frame. The edges of the watercolor had been covered by a mount that had protected them from fading. These colors, which one would suppose should be closest to the original appearance of the whole piece, were overdark, muddy and unappealing: the apparently faded image was more convincing and attractive. These are obvious signs of recently made works having been treated to give the appearance of age.35

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Two specialists on Thomas Moran were consulted and shown digital images of the pieces. One stated that they were undoubtedly forgeries, citing poor composition, an incorrect signature for the period, and wrong handwriting. The second stated, even knowing the dubious nature of the vendors, that they were genuine: they were probably connected to a group of drawings and watercolors executed by Moran on the occasion of his visit to the UK in 1882, which had appeared on the market in the mid- to late-1990s. This divergence of stylistic analyses of the drawings—which Shaun Greenhalgh admitted to making—sheds an interesting light on the way in which forgeries can muddy scholarship. Another Roscoe offering has a more significant bearing on the Amarna material. In autumn 1993, a Mrs. O. Roscoe of Bolton sent the museum’s Keeper of Egyptology a photograph of an object in her possession, asking for an identification.36 This (fig. 18) was a slate relief “almost 3 ft. tall” of Sety I wearing a nemes headdress and triangular kilt with sporran, standing atop a row of lotus flowers within a shrine topped by a uraeus; the other side of the relief was also carved with “a similar picture…with the same writings.” The provenance of the piece, like that of the Roscoe Morans, was unusual but plausible. Mrs. Roscoe’s letter (quoted in its original spelling) said: My husband’s grandfather was given it by the Duchess of Hamilton some time after the First World War. He was the kepper of the Hamilton family mausoleum, which at that time was sold to the Town of Hamilton as a war memorial. He told us that when the dukes caskets were removed for burial. He was given this panel which stood by one of the Dukes who was entombed in a stone mummy case that had belonged to the daughter of a Egyptian pharho. The mummy case was buried in the cemetery in the Hamilton family grave.

Fig. 18. Relief of Sety I. Photograph courtesy Bolton Council.

The story of the 10th Duke of Hamilton’s interment in an Egyptian sarcophagus has been published many times,37 and need not arouse any suspicion. The presence of another Egyptian

antiquity by his Egyptian coffin would not be improbable. Even judging from a photograph, the tablet itself, however, was manifestly not ancient Egyptian. The material is incorrect; its manufacture as a fragment bounded by the curve of the uraeus is inconsistent with an ancient origin; the clumsy appearance of the figure itself does not

36 It is a mistaken commonplace of forgers’ justifications that it is not a crime to sell a bogus piece at the purchaser’s (deceived) assessment. 37 Most recently by A. Dodson, “Legends of a Sarcophagus,” in Egyptian Stories: A British Egyptological Tribute to Alan B. Lloyd, ed. T. Schneider and K. Szpakowska, (Münster, 2007), 21-27. Mentions of the ducal sarcophagus before 1993, and therefore potential sources for the forgers, include M. Bierbrier, The Tomb-Builders of the Pharaohs (London, 1982), 135; P. Conner, ed., The Inspiration of Egypt: Its Influence on British Artists, Travellers and Designers (Brighton and

Manchester, 1983), 90-91, cat. 191; and W. R. Dawson, “Pettigrew’s Demonstrations upon Mummies,” JEA 20 (1934), 181. Both Conner and Dawson cite a contemporary description of the interment stating that the sarcophagus “originally contained the body of an Egyptian queen or princess,” a statement lacking in Bierbrier but seemingly taken up by the forgers. The statement that the mausoleum was transformed into a war memorial is erroneous. A visit to the exhibition “The Inspiration of Egypt,” which was shown in nearby Manchester, might have sown the seed for this particular creation ten years later.


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accurately reflect the refined artistic style of Sety I; the serpent floating underneath the figure’s extended arm is meaningless; and the only piece of damage on the plaque occurs on the kilt, where the animal-headed corner has been attacked in a way that successfully obscures its form, as though its carver was uncertain what it should look like. The Keeper replied that the piece appeared to be nineteenth century in origin, and there the matter rested. Since the Roscoes did not enter into further correspondence about the piece, it seems likely that it was written off as a failure; like the Akhenaten sphinx relief and the other untraced pieces mentioned above, it too may have been sold as a “curio” and may yet surface again. The fact that Bolton Museum was targeted as the potential purchaser of the Roscoe Egyptian forgery and Moran drawings, while other material was sent to museums and dealers elsewhere in the UK, suggests a degree of malice aforethought by the Greenhalghs. This was present in the creation and sale of the Amarna Princess from Silverton Park. Both object and provenance were tailored with Bolton Museum in mind as the victim.38 Bolton Museum has few outstanding pieces of Egyptian sculpture but possesses an important group of domestic archaeological material, deriving from British excavations at Amarna. In 1999, the museum lent a number of objects to the international touring exhibition “Pharaohs of the Sun”; the forgers owned a copy of the fully referenced and well-illustrated exhibition catalogue (which also featured many of the objects used as models for the forgeries). This may have suggested that an Amarna creation would be doubly enticing to Bolton, allowing a gap to be filled in the museum’s sculpture collection while building on the strengths of the Amarna material. The Silverton Park connection is more subtle. The Bolton-born soap magnate Lord Leverhulme bequeathed his art collection, which included a small group of Egyptian antiquities, to the Lady Lever Art Gallery in his model village of Port Sunlight, a suburb of Liverpool. The Egyptian collec-

tion was deemed incompatible with the displays at Port Sunlight and deposited on long-term loan to Bolton Museum in 1968, although over the following years some of the more aesthetically pleasing objects were reclaimed for the Lady Lever Art Gallery. One of these was a Third Intermediate Period cartonnage body-case. It was acquired by Lord Leverhulme in a Georgian wooden case with a placard stating that it had been purchased for the third Earl of Egremont in Rome in “MDXXI,” presumably a mis-writing for a late eighteenth or early nineteenth century date. The only published reference to the case before 2002 mentions it in connection to Petworth House, the family seat not inherited by the fourth earl,39 rather than Silverton Park, but any genealogical reference book would be able to provide references to the fourth earl’s occupation of Silverton Park. It is likely that knowledge of the publication of the Leverhulme cartonnage, coupled to the availability of the Silverton Park catalogue, with its conveniently vague lot descriptions, may have suggested Bolton Museum as a potential purchaser of further Egremont-related objects. The possible connection between the Leverhulme cartonnage and Silverton Park was subsequently published at the time of the purchase of the Amarna Princess:40 it could well have occurred to the forgers beforehand.

38 Shaun Greenhalgh stated that “any embarrassment caused to Bolton Museum and Art Gallery is greatly regretted and was never my intention” (The Bolton News, January 28, 2009). 39 A.P. Thomas, “Lever as a Collector of Archaeology and as a Sponsor of Archaeological Excavations,” J Hist Collections 4, no. 2 (1992), 269, n. 24. The third earl died in 1837. 40 http://www.nemes.co.uk/briefnotes6.htm, accessed September 2008. 41 A general overview provided by H.G. Fischer, “Ancient

Egypt: Forgeries,” in Grove Dictionary of Art 10, ed. J. Turner (London, 1996), 85-89. A more recent publication is J.-J. Fiechter, Faux et faussaires en art égyptien, MonAeg 11 (Turnhout, 2005), to which add reviews by M. EatonKrauss, “The Berlin Goddess,” GM 211 (2006), 21-23, and M.J. Raven, BiOr 64/5-6 (Sept.-Dec. 2007), 632-634. 42 The numerous modern interpretations of the Amarna Period are discussed by D. Montserrat, Akhenaten: History, Fantasy and Ancient Egypt (London, 2000).

Conclusions: The Forgery of Works of Art in the Amarna style, and the Motivations of the Forgers The Amarna Princess and her siblings can now be placed in a long tradition of forgeries of ancient Egyptian objects.41 The site of Tell el-Amarna, the attractive objects found there, and the story of the “heretic” Akhenaten, his “beautiful” wife Nefertiti, and the “frail” Tutankhamun, have inspired twentieth and twenty-first century audiences to flights of orientalizing and mythologizing fancy that often bear little relation to the evidence.42 Exhibitions and television programs have brought

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the material culture of this period to a wide audience, and have thus made the “Amarna” or “Tut” label a premium brand at point of sale. It is not surprising that the Greenhalghs, like other forgers, chose the Amarna Period as a likely source for remunerative inspiration.43 Another advantage of the short-lived Amarna Period to the forger is that statuary and reliefs of this period are unlikely to have survived intact following the destruction of the state buildings of Amarna after the death of Akhenaten: genuine fragmentary objects are common, so forgeries can legitimately be made lacking “difficult” areas, like the head of the Amarna Princess. Where the Greenhalghs seem to differ from other documented forgers of Egyptian art is in their eclecticism. They forged not only Egyptian objects, but also Assyrian, Japanese, Roman, Saxon, and modern material, paintings, drawings, metalwork, and clay and stone sculpture. This diversity in media and cultures had allowed the Greenhalghs to spread their products widely and to avoid detection for a long time: even if one group of specialists suspected them, they would be unlikely to raise their suspicions with colleagues at different institutions specializing in different material. It is noticeable, considering the Greenhalgh forgeries and the ways in which they were presented as a whole, that there is very little stylistic or technical development from the earlier objects and their provenances to the later ones. The forgers’ modus operandi and technical ability remained much the same for the 17 known years of their activity. Having found a method that was occasionally successful, they stuck with it throughout. Their attempts to avoid detection through the use of aliases were unsophisticated but apparently successful for some time: this must also have been due to the variety of their productions, and thus the range of authorities to whom they were submitted. Considered from the forgers’ perspective, there was little reason for them to restrict their production to within modern disciplinary boundar-

ies. The specialized training required to analyze and interpret an ancient Egyptian object has no connection with the completely different talents needed to make an object that looks ancient Egyptian. The Greenhalgh productions (and common sense) show that someone skilled and unscrupulous enough to copy one artistic style is likely to be skilled and unscrupulous in copying others, but detailed studies of forgers generally only reflect the perspective of a single discipline. If the diverse Greenhalgh productions are typical of other forgers’ work, it will be necessary for specialists in different areas to collaborate and share their knowledge to gain full understanding of the scale and nature of the forgery of works of art. The forgers of today operate at a disadvantage compared to their predecessors of 50 years ago or earlier. For ethical and legal reasons, museums and collectors are now increasingly unwilling to purchase objects that lack a full or satisfactory collection history. In addition to creating a visually and physically convincing piece, a forger now needs to create a provenance that will also satisfy potential purchasers. With the Risley Lanx and the Assyrian reliefs (for example), the Greenhalghs took care to recreate known objects that had subsequently been lost. The Amarna Princess, the sphinx relief, and the Assyrian reliefs were identified with brief and uninformative entries in an obscure sales catalogue,44 while the assembly-line production of Amarna material by the Greenhalghs suggests that they may have entertained hopes of creating a body of Amarna sculpture that could have been interpreted as a coherent stylistic and “found” group: the long-lost remnants of an early traveler’s lucky delving at Amarna. Newspaper articles and television programs like The Antiques Roadshow have long accustomed both the public and specialists to expect masterpieces to be found in the least likely of settings.45 Added to this, a great number of Egyptian objects are recorded in nineteenth and early twentieth century auction sales but have since been lost to sight. The surfacing of the Amarna Princess and

43 On this see R.S. Bianchi, “On the Nature of Forgeries of Ancient Egyptian Works of Art from the Amarna Period,” Source 20, no. 1 (Fall 2000), 10-17. 44 The forgers’ careful preparation of the Silverton Park provenance for the Amarna Princess stretched to purchasing genuine, inexpensive objects—two Burmese Buddha statuettes and a tin of Roman coins—which were then identified with other items from the Silverton Park sale to lend credence to the provenance of the Egyptian figure.

45 In Britain alone, a quartzite lintel of Senwosret III was discovered in the rockery of a garden, perhaps inspiring George Greenhalgh’s claim that an antiques dealer had offered to buy the Amarna Princess to be a garden ornament. The lintel is now British Museum EA 74753: R. Verdi, ed., Saved! 100 Years of the National Art Collections Fund (London, 2003), 242, cat. 180; S. Quirke, “The Quartzite Lintels of Senusret III, King of Egypt,” British Museum Magazine 23 (Winter 1995), 16-17.


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her companions in an insalubrious area of a small town would be no less likely or dramatic than many genuine rediscoveries of lost or forgotten objects. 46 The provenances of the Sety I slab, the Risley Lanx, and the Silverton Park objects are just within the bounds of plausibility, but are also striking and interesting. Besides offering corroborative evidence for the authenticity of the objects, the provenances were meant to show the Greenhalgh/ Roscoe family in an exciting light. Greenhalgh/ Roscoe ancestors are revealed as people of note to whom interesting things happened, as well as connoisseurs of no mean ability.47 Family aggrandizement, as well as financial gain, was clearly an objective of the forgeries. George Greenhalgh’s dissatisfaction with his status was revealed in another area. He possessed a large collection of service medals documenting an improbably busy World War II spent in numerous fields of combat, and explained his poor health at his sentencing as the result of having been “shot in the head in Italy”:48 one

of the television documentaries subsequently revealed that he had actually been interned as a deserter for part of the war, and his medals had been fraudulently obtained. An aura of fantasy hovers over the whole case: until matters came unstuck, the national heritage was augmented, the Greenhalghs were enriched, and their family history gained luster. Following their exposure, however, the Greenhalghs have still succeeded in one respect: they (and the Amarna Princess) will probably enjoy greater prominence through their exposure than they would have had their forgeries remained undetected.49 This prominence came at the price of public notoriety, repayment orders, and prison sentences.

46 The implications of the Bolton forgers’ modus operandi on the future acquisition of “surfacing” objects for museums, and the notion of a “good” or “reliable” provenance, may potentially be significant. 47 The catalogue of the Silverton Park sale, purchased to give a provenance for the Amarna Princess and the Assyrian reliefs, contains spurious hand-written annotations (e.g., “Romanesque”) against numerous lots, thus emphasizing the “eye” of the nonexistent ancestor at the sale, and presumably also preparing the way for these objects to turn up in the future. 48 The Bolton News, January 29, 2008. 49 The Amarna Princess is at the time of writing in a police store, but it is hoped that it will be put on display in Bolton

in the future; an internet poll of January 2009 revealed that a majority of voters wanted to see the statue back in the Museum (The Bolton News, January 29, 2009). On an anecdotal level, the author can state that Boltonians have displayed far more interest in the piece since its exposure as a forgery than beforehand. The Greenhalgh case looks set to conform to the paradigm of the ordinary man cocking a snook at the art world. Shaun Greenhalgh wrote to The Bolton News from prison protesting at the media portrayal of himself and his parents. His letter ended “I fully intend to speak in relation to my dealings over a long period of time with the art establishment, dealers and others—but I think this is not yet the time or place.” (The Bolton News, January 27, 2009).

Addendum (June 2009). At the proof stage of this article, I discovered that Jack himself had discussed the Bolton Amarna Princess, in the context of the record price of $51,000,000 achieved for an antiquity at auction in 2007: “A tale of two antiquities,” IFAR Journal 10/1 (2008), 2-3.

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sexually transmitted diseases in ancient egypt

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SEXUALLY TRANSMITTED DISEASES IN ANCIENT EGYPT W. Benson Harer, Jr. California State University San Bernardino and Western University of Health Sciences, ret.

It gives me special pleasure to present these thoughts, which I believe are new to the literature of Egyptology, in a volume honoring my friend Jack Josephson. Jack has contributed much to support the work of other scholars while generously sharing his own extensive insights into ancient Egyptian art. Recent advances in medicine now permit identification of three previously unrecognized sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) in ancient Egypt. The trio are Genital Herpes, Human Papilloma Virus (HPV), and Chlamydia trachomatis. Older Egyptological literature centers on Gonorrhea and Syphilis, neither of which existed there prior to Columbus’s discovery of the New World. Sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) probably evolved along with the human species. Evidence for them in ancient Egypt has been scant and relies on interpretations of depictions, descriptions in papyri, and the study of human remains. Most STDs affect only the soft tissues and do not leave good clues in human remains. Until recently, study of the latter has been confined to analysis of bones and thus sheds little information. The early promise of DNA testing has been disappointing, as we have found that DNA deteriorates with time. Nevertheless, there is still hope that newer techniques that isolate DNA fragments to prevent inaccurate recombination may still yield some results. A virus is essentially a single protein molecule with the ability to enter a cell and induce that cell to replicate it. Viral diseases are thus less-evolved structures than bacteria and probably arose much earlier. We will consider them first. The Ebers Papyrus case #813 describes treatment for a woman in whom there is “eating” on her uterus and in whose vagina ulcers have appeared. Case #817 similarly provides a remedy

1 2

P. Ghalioungui, The Ebers Papyrus (Cairo, 1987). American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists

for the woman in whom disease has arisen in the lips of her vulva. Case #818 treats the “kmj.t” disease in the uterus, painful ulcers having appeared in her vagina. The hieroglyphic depiction of a knife is used as a determinative to indicate the nature of the cutting pain experienced.1 I believe these cases describe Genital Herpes, and that Herpes equates with the “kmj.t” disease. When herpetic ulcerations occur inside the vagina or on the cervix, there is some discharge, but little or no discomfort. However, women who have experienced the lacerating pain of vulvar and labial herpes can readily attest to the discomfort fitting that description. Other ulcerative genital diseases are much less painful or even painless.2 Furthermore, nine more treatments for the “kmj.t” disease follow in Ebers prescriptions ##819-827. When there are ten treatments for the same disease, it is reasonable to conclude that no one of them is very good. Each of these prescriptions contains from two to six ingredients blended and applied locally to the afflicted area. Some of the ingredients defy accurate identification, and none that we can identify would be likely to do more than buy time for the outbreak to run its natural course. This plethora of therapies further implies that the “kmj.t” disease is not only painful enough to demand attention, but also is fairly common or recurrent or both. Significantly, these are characteristics of Genital Herpes that are not shared by any other disease of the vulva, whether or not sexually transmitted. Therefore, it is reasonable to feel secure in identifying the “kmj.t” disease as Genital Herpes. Uterine cancer probably occurred in ancient Egypt and would fit the description of disease “eating” the uterus, as in Ebers case #813. It could also fit Kahun Papyrus #2 for the unidentified

(ACOG), 2007 Compendium of Selected Publications (Washington, DC, 2007), 1084-1090.

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w. benson harer, jr.

Fig. 1. Histology of the papilloma that Dr. A. T. Sandison found on a mummy. Courtesy of Cambridge University Press.

“nemsu” disease, which is characterized by the body’s smell of roast meat,3 presumably from the genital area. This is compatible with the odor of the bloody discharge experienced by women with invasive genital cancer. If indeed these women had genital cancer, the odds are overwhelming that it would be a carcinoma of the cervix. All the other uterine cancers occur in women of more advanced ages than the typical life span of about 35 years in ancient Egypt. The term “nemsu” is not found in any other medical papyrus, which leaves the interpretation somewhat in doubt, but as Nunn observed, “one could hardly deny that ‘eating’ is not a graphic description of advanced malignancy.”4 Today, cervical cancer is recognized as an STD caused by the Human Papilloma Virus (HPV).5 This virus also can be carried with no symptoms and is readily transmitted by sexual contact. Immune response is quite variable. Most young women acquire the virus early in their coital experience, but the majority will develop an enduring

3

J.F. Nunn, Ancient Egyptian Medicine (London, 1996),

81. 4

Ibid. ACOG, 2007 Compendium, 1101-1114. 6 American Cancer Society, Cancer Facts and Figures, 2007, http://www.cancer.org/docroot/STT/content/STT_1x_ Cancer_Facts__Figures_2007.asp 5

immunity. In those who fail to develop an immune response, the virus causes dysplasia. This abnormal transformation of the cells can progress to invasive cancer. This is readily transmitted by sexual contact and induces cancer at an early age in women who fail to develop immunity. Certain strains of HPV are more likely to cause warts on the genitalia or skin of other body parts. In addition, HPV is now also recognized as a cause of anal, vulvar, penile, and oral-pharyngeal carcinomas.6 I have been unable to identify a description of warts in the ancient texts, but Dr. A.T. Sandison did identify a typical papilloma wart on a mummy that he autopsied, and he published the histologic section to confirm it (fig. 1).7 Dr. Sandison died suddenly in 1982. His records and the skeletal material, consisting of two dismembered mummies, tissue specimens, and slides from his office, went to The Burrell Collection in Glasgow. However, there was little documentation. A search of these items failed to find the papilloma or the slide or even an image of it.8

7 A.T. Sandison, “Diseases in Ancient Egypt,” in Mummies, Disease, and Ancient Cultures, ed. A. and E. Cockburn (Cambridge, 1980), 29-44. 8 S. Eccles, Senior Curator, The Burrell Collection, personal communication, May 2008.

sexually transmitted diseases in ancient egypt Dr. Sandison’s old laboratory has now evolved into one of the United Kingdom’s most sophisticated centers for DNA research. With the current advanced technology, it might be possible to identify the virus from that tissue. Unfortunately, they also have been unable to shed any light on the fate of the papilloma.9 At the time of Sandison’s discovery, the connection between HPV and cervical cancer was not known. In 1998, Dr. Eddie Tapp, who has done outstanding work in mummy histology, revised that chapter for the second edition of the book. The illustration of the papilloma was deleted, and the possible connection of the papilloma with HPV as an STD was not noted.10 Nevertheless, publication of the histology confirming Sandison’s identification of this papilloma serves as an important link for HPV causing cervical cancer in ancient Egypt. Trachoma, which if left untreated can lead to blindness, has been endemic in Egypt for centuries. Authorities such as B. Ebbell,11 Wolfhart Westendorf,12 Paul Ghalioungui,13 and J.F. Nunn14 are in accord that the “nehas” disease in Ebers ##350, 383, and 407 is Trachoma. What they did not realize is that the organism causing that blindness is an STD that can also cause pneumonia in newborn babies and genito-urinary disease in adults. Just as in the case of cervical cancer, Trachoma is now recognized as an STD. The causative agent, Chlamydia trachomatis, was only identified late in the twentieth century. The three prescriptions cited above provide for local application of combinations of bile, acacia, carob, ground-up granite, and both red and black eye paint. It is unlikely that they would provide any benefit. Chlamydia appears to have a unique elemental coccal form, with a growth cycle that distinguishes it from all other known bacteria. It passes to the partner during coitus, and the bacteria attach to the new host cells, which are induced to ingest them. Once in the cell, it goes through a 48-hour life cycle before rupturing the cell to release new infectious particles. Most people develop 9

B. Gusterson, Division of Cancer Services, Dept. of Pathology, Western Infirmary, Glasgow, personal communication, May 2008. 10 A. T. Sandison and E. Tapp, “Disease in Ancient Egypt,” in Mummies, Disease and Ancient Cultures, 2nd edition, ed. A. and E. Cockburn and T. A. Reyman (Cambridge, 1998), 51. 11 B. Ebbell, The Papyrus Ebers (Oxford, 1937), 69, 130. 12 W. Westendorf, Erwachen der Heilkunst: die Medizin im alten Ägypten (Zurich, 1992), 32.

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immunity, which limits the damage of the disease, but women may carry it for years and then have a devastating infection. In milder cases, it is a common cause of infertility.15 During childbirth, the baby may become infected with Chlamydia while passing through the birth canal. This can cause a pneumonia, which may be fatal if untreated, or an eye infection, which can cause blindness. However, for most children the conjunctivitis usually resolves spontaneously within a couple of weeks. Perhaps this is from maternal antibodies in the babies’ circulation. As a result, most cases of blindness occur in late teens or adults. Chlamydia causes blindness when transmitted from the hand to the eye after digital-genital contact and often affects only one eye. It also can be transmitted by a fly landing on an infected eye and then carrying the infection to another person. It causes a chronic conjunctivitis with intense irritation, redness, and swelling. The latter primarily affects the lower lid, which swells outwardly, ultimately causing the eyelashes to roll back into the eye. This condition is called entropion. When the lashes turn inward enough, called trichiasis, they abrade the cornea, causing intolerable pain that is only relieved by removing the offending eyelashes. Evidence of such treatment is shown on Fayum portraits, which further show evidence of ancient physicians’ surgery to alleviate the condition.16 The mummy portrait of a young man illustrated in fig. 2 portrays the effects of a Chlamydia infection, which doubtless destroyed vision in his right eye. The inversion of the lower lid would cause his eyelashes to scrape his cornea, causing intolerable irritation. We can see a healed transverse incision across the lower lid, where a skilled ancient physician excised a thin wedge of tissue to remove the portion of the lid from which the offending lashes grew—a wonderful example of ancient plastic surgery, justifying the esteem with which the Egyptian physicians were held in the ancient world. The papyrus Ebers has an extensive section on ophthalmic disorders, which extends from remedies #336 to 431. This emphasizes the frequency 13

Ghalioungui, Ebers Papyrus, 106, 114. Nunn, Ancient Egyptian Medicine, 13. 15 J.H. Stein, ed., Internal Medicine, 5th ed. (St. Louis, 1998), 1534-1538. 16 J.P. Allen, The Art of Medicine in Ancient Egypt (New York, 2005), 37-38. 14

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Fig. 2. Fayum portrait, AD 190-210, showing results of partial excision of lower eyelid to treat Trachoma. Image © The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

and importance of such problems. Remedies #424-429 clearly apply to trichiasis, a cardinal marker of Trachoma. In these six remedies, the treatment is to pull out the offending lashes and then apply the medicine to prevent regrowth of the lashes. As with depilation of any part of the body, if the root is extracted with the shaft of the hair, it will not regrow. Repeated extraction ultimately is effective. Rx #424 is the simplest, being the application of blood from both a lizard and a bat. It would be innocuous, as long as the bat was not rabid. Blood from five other animals mixed with terebinth and both green and black eye paint are used in #425. Honey and bat’s blood are applied in #426, while a mixture of oil and honey is applied in #427. 17

Ebbell, Papyrus Ebers. Nunn, Ancient Egyptian Medicine, 77. 19 Ibid. 18

Bile from an unidentified bird is the sole ingredient in #428. Finally, #429 uses fly dung and red ochre mixed in urine. As ancient prescriptions go, these have some merit. Fresh blood, bile and urine are sterile. Honey and bile both have some bacteriostatic properties. Once again, the need for six remedies for the same condition indicates it was both prevalent and painful enough to demand attention. Evidence suggestive of Trachoma is seen on some other mummy portraits from the Fayum. The Getty Villa in Malibu has an example, 74.AP.11, which shows chronic inflammation of one eye. The Dumbarton Oaks Museum has another, BZ 1937.32, in which one eye appears noticeably smaller than the other. These could represent Trachoma in an early stage. The quality of the paintings makes it unlikely that these differences are due to a lack of the painters’ skill. The reservoir for this pathogen is primarily the female genitals, but also the male urethra. Chlamydia is also a primitive organism in the evolutionary scale. It is classified as a bacterium, but is only a bit more complex than viruses. It shares the characteristic of viruses in that it can only replicate in living cells. Chlamydia is rarely symptomatic in men, but it may cause a mild urethritis with mucoid penile discharge. This used to be classified as Non-Gonococcal Urethritis. It can also cause severe acute epididymitis. Ebers cases ##684 and 705 were identified as Gonorrhea by Ebbell, but I believe that Chlamydia (unknown to him) is more likely.17 There really is no good evidence that Gonorrhea was present in the Old World prior to Columbus’ voyage to the Americas. The same statement is true for Syphilis. It is hazardous to claim the existence of a disease in the ancient world based on limited data. For instance, the single portrayal of the butler Roma with a withered, shortened leg and a club foot has been cited as evidence of poliomyelitis.18 However, this deformity could occur as the result of a birth defect. The “club foot,” talipes equinovarus, of the pharaoh Siptah is also far more likely to be a congenital defect rather than the result of polio.19 Polio is an epidemic disease affecting many people, so we should expect much more evidence. There is no animal reservoir

sexually transmitted diseases in ancient egypt (carrier), so its existence depends on constant infection passing from infected persons to new victims who lack immunity. I doubt it existed in ancient Egypt. Skin lesions on the mummy of Ramesses V have been declared to be Smallpox, but this is another devastating epidemic disease that would be expected to provide much more substantiation.20 Once again, there is no known animal reservoir, so the epidemiology of the disease requires constant infection of new non-immune people for it to persist. The appearance is so dramatic that it should merit comment in the ancient medical literature if it were present at that time, but there is nothing that applies in the texts. The three postulated STDs share some important common characteristics. All are fairly primitive organisms whose replication is dependent on the intracellular metabolism of the infected person. They cannot grow outside of the human body or living human cells. None have any animal reservoir. Their success, therefore, is dependent on the fact that they can be carried for years without killing their host human, and that a sufficient number of humans carry and distribute the dis20

G.E. Smith and W.R. Dawson, The Egyptian Mummies (London, 1914), 105-106.

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ease at all times. Large percentages of the population carry these diseases without symptoms. In the United States today, the prevalence of HPV in sexually active young women ranges from 17-84%, and at least 10% will have Chlamydia. About 25% of women test positive for antibodies for Herpes Type 2 alone. This indicates they were infected at some point in their lives, even if they were unaware of it.21 It is reasonable to assume that all of these organisms were similarly infectious in antiquity. Since they affect only soft tissue of the genitalia, we cannot expect to find evidence in mummies. The depictions of blind harpers and the examples found in Fayum portraits are good evidence of Trachoma-induced blindness. We would not expect supporting depictions of the genital infections. Therefore, taking into account our current understanding of these diseases, I have relied primarily on the ancient medical literature for sufficiently accurate descriptions to permit identification of Herpes, HPV, and Chlamydia as STDs afflicting the ancient Egyptians, in light of our modern understanding of these diseases.

21

ACOG, 2008 Compendium (Washington, DC, 2008), 8, 1232.

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the tomb of a HAty-a, theban tomb 116

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THE TOMB OF A HAty-a, THEBAN TOMB 116 Melinda Hartwig Georgia State University

Jack Josephson and I have discussed over the years how style can be used as a tool to identify uninscribed statues, reliefs, and paintings and communicates cultural or historical information.1 Painted tombs belonging to anonymous individuals in the Theban necropolis respond well to this type of stylistic analysis. Erasures of figures, names, and titles; later occupants; and environmental damage leave fragmentary evidence of careers, family relationships, and more important, the tomb owner’s identity. One such monument is Theban Tomb 116, belonging to an unnamed HAty-a. Despite the publication of a few beautifully painted scenes,2 the tomb has never been excavated nor scientifically published. In this article, I will examine the available epigraphic, decorative, and stylistic evidence from the tomb to learn more information about the tomb’s owner. TT 116 is cut into the upper promontory of Sheikh abd el-Qurna next to the tomb of Nebamun (TT 90), who was a “Troop Captain for Western Thebes,” to the right of TT 91, and above the tomb of Amenmose Pehsukher (TT 88) who was a “Standard Bearer of the Lord of the Two Lands.” 3 The tomb chapel conforms to Friederike Kampp’s Va,4 a typical inverted T-shape tomb with a transverse front hall and an inner longitudinal hall (fig. 1). The tomb contains a burial with a sloping passage cut into the floor before the southern small wall of the transverse hall, as well as a number of other burials. The tomb was never finished: the rock walls of the chapel were cut and dressed, but only two are plastered and decorated. 1 Broadly defined, style is “the constant form—and sometimes the constant elements, qualities, and expression—in the art of an individual or group” which is expressed by “communicating and fixing certain values of religious, social, and moral life through the emotional suggestiveness of forms.” M. Schapiro, “Style,” in Theory and Philosophy of Art: Style, Artist and Society (New York, 1994), 51. 2 A. Kozloff, “Theban Tomb Paintings from the Reign of Amenhotep III: Problems in Iconography and Chronology,” in The Art of Amenhotep III: Art Historical Analysis, ed. L.M. Berman (Cleveland, 1990), pl. 15, figs. 4-5. 3 TT 90: PM I2, part 1, 183-185; N. de G. Davies, The Tombs of Two Officials of Thutmosis IV (nos. 75 and 90)

Unfortunately, the majority of tomb texts were excised by damnatio memoriae or damaged by environmental factors. The name of Amun appears in several places, which indicates that the tomb was spared destruction during the Amarna Period. However, the image of the tomb owner did not fare well: on the two walls, it was intentionally destroyed by chipping away along his figural outlines. On one wall, this intentional destruction also extended to the figure of his wife. The first scene, PM (1), decorates the near wall, left-hand side of the transverse hall, toward the small wall (fig. 2).5 Here, the deceased (destroyed) and his wife receive a cup from their daughter, behind whom three registers of female guests are arrayed (fig. 3). Below the seated couple is a row of offering bearers bringing gifts, of which only two are preserved (fig. 4). Two captions remain: four vertical registers of the daughter’s speech and three registers of epithets that belong to the deceased and his wife. The caption before the deceased and wife was recorded by Richard Lepsius in the mid-nineteenth century:6 r[-pat] HAty-a, excellent confidant of the Lord of Two Lands, praised by this Perfect God///

Later, Kurt Sethe transcribed the following text from the wall:7 For your ka, HAty-a, excellent confidant of the Lord of the Two Lands, praised by this perfect god, [in the following] of the Lord of Two Lands upon the [southern] foreign lands//// (London, 1923), 19-38, pl. xix-xxxviii. TT 88: PM I2, part 1, 179-181. 4 F. Kampp, Die thebanische Nekropole: zum Wandel des Grabgedankens von der XVIII. bis zur XX. Dynastie 1, Theben 13 (Mainz, 1996), 396-397. 5 PM 12, part 1, 233 (1). 6 LD, Text III (repr. Geneva, 1971-1975), 273, reading: r-pat HAty-a, mH-jb mnx n nb tAwy Hsy jn nfr nTr pn /// 7 Wb-Zettel 952, Sethe 10,55. Reading: n kA n.k HAty-a, mH-jb mnx n nb tAwy Hsy jn nfr nTr pn [m Smsw nb] tAwy Hr xAst [rsyt]////jr hrw nfr m pr.k nfr n nHH st.k n Dt nb anx Htp st,f m-Dt sAt.k mrt.k Mj

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Fig. 1. Tomb Plan TT 116, Friederike Kampp, Die thebanische Nekropole. Zum Wandel des Grabgedankens von der XVIII. bis zur XX. Dynastie, 2 vols. Theben XIII (Mainz, 1996). Courtesy of Friederike Kampp-Seyfried.

Fig. 2. Daughter offering a chalice to tomb owner and wife, near-left wall of the transverse hall, far left, TT 116, PM I2, part I, (1).


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Fig. 3. Female banqueters behind daughter, near left wall of the transverse hall, far left, TT 116, PM I2, part I, (1).

Fig. 4. Offering bearers in the register below the tomb owner and wife, near-left wall of the transverse hall, far left, TT 116, PM I2, part I, (1).

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melinda hartwig Spend a happy day in your beautiful house of eternity, your seat of eternity, with the lord of life resting in (his) place.8 By your daughter, your beloved Mi/////

The deceased’s r-pat title recorded by Lepsius is called into question by Sethe’s reading of n kA n r[-pat], which is supported by the remaining texts on the wall. The k basket (V-31) was quickly painted in blue over the outlined r mouth (D-21), correcting the scribal mistake. The resulting text, n kA n.k was correct, but the k basket has faded over time. When the author viewed the inscription in 1996, n nTr nfr pn was followed by a lacunae extending one register, with only tAwy Hr, part of Xswt, and the rounded tip of rswt visible. Besides the usual honorific titles, the phrase suggests that the deceased was associated with the southern foreign lands. Unfortunately, the title HAty-a is not easy to define in the 18th Dynasty. The title is often interpreted as “count” or “provincial governor,” and is viewed by most Egyptologists as an indicator of rank.9 Wolfgang Helck also believed the title had military connotations,10 which is supported by Pierre-Marie Chevereau, but only on a case-by-case basis.11 The adjacent text describes the offering action of the daughter, of whom only the first part of her name survives (Mj...), within the context of the Valley Festival.12 The style and the treatment of the subject matter in this scene is almost identical to paintings in TT 78, belonging to Horemheb, a similarity that was noted previously as a product of the same group of artisans.13 Based on the texts in

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Meaning “(his) coffin.” For example, A.M. Gnirs, Militär und Gesellschaft: Ein Beitrag zur Sozialgeschichte des Neuen Reiches, SAGA 17 (Heidelberg, 1996), 101, 234; R. Hannig, Grosses Handwörterbuch Ägyptisch-Deutsch: die Sprache der Pharaonen (2800-950 v. Chr.) Marberger edition, Kulturgeschichte der Antiken Welt 64 (Mainz, 2006), 539. 10 W. Helck, Zur Verwaltung des Mittleren und Neuen Reichs, PÄ 3 (Leiden, 1958), 208-209. 11 P.-M. Chevereau, “Contribution à la prosopographie des cadres militaries du Moyen Empire,” RdE 42 (1991), 52, n. 20. 12 M. Hartwig, Tomb Painting and Identity in Ancient Thebes, 1419-1372 BCE, MonAeg 10 (Turnhout and Brussels, 2004), 11-12 with n. 52 for full bibliography. 13 A. Mekhitarian, “Un peintre thébain de la XVIIIe dynastie,” MDAIK 15 (1957), 191-192; Kozloff, “Theban Tomb Paintings,” 58. 14 During these reigns, Horemheb worked in the scribal service for the king. His career can be traced from its beginning as a “Scribe of the King” (sS nsw), to a “True Scribe of the King” (sS nsw mAa), and then as an “Overseer of all Royal 9

the tomb, Horemheb served pharaohs Amenhotep II, Thutmose IV, and Amenhotep III.14 The scenes for comparison appear in the transverse halls of TT 78 and TT 90, both of which were completed during the reign of Thutmose IV.15 Turning back to TT 116, the scene on PM (2) makes it clear that the tomb owner of TT 116 served the kings Amenhotep II and Thutmose IV (figs. 5 and 6). On this wall, a king is seated on a throne placed upon a dais under a canopied baldachin, attended by the now-destroyed figure of the tomb owner, who fans the king. The scene contains a cartouche, in which the name Amenhotep II (Imn-Htp HqA wAst) is painted over with the name of Thutmose IV (DHwtj-msj(w) xaj-xaw), to the right of the figure of the king seated in the kiosk.16 The complete text in the royal-kiosk scene is: [The Perfect God], Son of Re, Thutmose, shining of appearances {over} Amenhotep, ruler of Thebes, living eternally like Re, every day, all health///17

It is curious that the cartouche was over-painted in the tomb, which is not the usual practice in royal-kiosk scenes; the entire scene would have been plastered over and begun again. From this, it can be deduced that the tomb owner served Amenhotep II and died early enough into the reign of Thutmose IV to merit changing the cartouche to the name of that king quickly, without a substantial change to the scene. The figure of the deceased, which is destroyed around its outline, is shown fanning the king. It

Scribes of the Army” (jmy-r sSw nsw nb n mSa). It is through his close personal association with the king that he ascended to the office of “Scribe of Recruits” (sS nfrw), which led him to supervise the manpower of Egypt. Discussion in B. M. Bryan, The Reign of Thutmose IV (Baltimore and London, 1991), 282; biographical tomb text in: A. and A. Brack, Das Grab des Haremhab: Theben Nr. 78, AV 35 (Mainz, 1980), 50-53, text 35, and 83-84. On duties of the sS nfrw: W.J. Murnane, “The Organization of Government under Amenhotep III,” in Amenhotep III: Perspectives on His Reign, ed. E. Cline and D. O’Connor (Ann Arbor, 1998), 197-198. 15 Hartwig, Tomb Painting and Identity, 133-134 with notes 33 and 34. While TT 90 contains the cartouche of Amenhotep III on the shrine in PM (8), the majority of the tomb was completed during the reign of Thutmose IV, as witnessed by the king’s image on PM (4). 16 J-F. Champollion, Notices descriptives, repr., Collection des classiques Égyptologiques 1 (Geneva, 1973-74), 503, originally noted that the cartouche of Amenhotep II was overlaid by Thutmose IV in the kiosk scene. 17 Reading: [nTr nfr] sA Ra DHwty-ms xaj xaw {over} ImnHtp HqA wAst anx Dt mj Ra ra nb snb nb///.


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Fig. 5. King seated in a kiosk, fanned by the tomb owner with wife offering a bouquet, Far-right wall of the transverse hall, far right, TT 116, PM I2, part I, (2).

Fig. 6. Line drawing, Far-right wall of the transverse hall, far right, TT 116, PM I2, part I, (2).

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appears that he stood before the pharaoh, slightly bent forward at the waist, with his head roughly at the height of the woman that follows him. During the reign of Thutmose IV, most of the tomb owners depicted fanning the pharaoh held the titles of “Fan Bearer,”18 or “Royal Herald,”19 or “Fan Bearer to the Right of the King.”20 These fan-bearer titles indicate that the bearer has a close official or a personal connection to the king. During the reigns of Amenhotep II and Thutmose IV, additional carriers of the title were the “King’s Son of Kush,”21 “Tutor,” “Chief Steward of the King,” and “God’s Father.”22 Representations belonging to many of these individuals show the tomb owner holding a long fan with a single feather when he stands before the king. Behind the deceased is a woman holding a menit and offering a bouquet of lotus flowers to the king. Her stature and offering action in the scene are repeated in several Theban tombs dating from the reigns of Amenhotep II and Thutmose IV, and in each case, these women are nurses of the king.23 Her prominence in this scene suggests that she also bore this title.24 Holding the menit, which is found in the hieroglyphic title of nurse, 18

As fan bearer: TT 77, PM (7), tp. Thutmose IV (L. Manniche, The Wall Decoration of Three Theban Tombs (TT 77, 175, 249), CNI Publications 4 [Copenhagen, 1988], 9-11, 23), and perhaps TT 77, PM (4), based on what may be the remains of a fan held in the upraised arm of the excised figure of the deceased; TT 256, A. Radwan, Die Darstellungen des regierenden Königs und seiner Familienangehörigen in den Privatgräbern der 18. Dynastie, MÄS 21 (Berlin, 1969), pl. X,1, tp. Thutmose III/Amenhotep II. 19 The Royal Herald title indicates that the bearer had the authority to speak on behalf of the king in foreign lands, as well as building and renewing monuments. Royal Heralds were often attached to the military in some fashion. A.H. Gardiner, Ancient Egyptian Onomastica 1 (Oxford, 1947), 91-92; S. and D. Redford, The Akhenaten Temple Project, vol. 4, The Tomb of Re`a (TT 201), (Toronto, 1994), 30-32. 20 On the fan-bearer title: I. Pomorska, Les flabellifères à la droite du roi en Égypte ancienne, Académie polonaise des sciences, Comité des études orientales (Warsaw, 1987), 32-35; Helck, Verwaltung, 69, noted that in the second half of the 18th Dynasty, heralds (Sprecher) were given the honorary title “Fan Bearer to the Right of the King,” like Ramose (TT 94) and Re (TT 201). As Fan Bearer to the Right of the King, Hekareshu: TT 64, PM (5) and PM (2), tp. Thutmose IV (Hartwig, Tomb Painting and Identity, pl. 13), text: W. Helck, Urkunden der 18. Dynastie, fasc. 17-22 (Berlin, 1955-1961), 1574. Kenamun: TT 93, N. de G. Davies, The tomb of KenAmun at Thebes, 2 vols., PMMA 5 (New York, 1930), pl. IX (Pehsukher who owned TT 88), Urk. IV, 1401-4; Sebekhotep: TT 63, Urk. IV, 1584. For other 18th Dynasty examples of the “Fan Bearer to the Right of the King” represented holding a fan, see: TT 85, P. Virey, “Le tombeau d’Amenemheb,” in Sept tombeaux thébains de la XVIIIe dynastie, MMAF 5, fasc. 2 (1891), 237, fig. 3. 21 As “Viceroy of Kush” and “Fan Bearer to the Right of

mnat, further reinforces this association. Likewise, the offering of a lotus bouquet, symbolizing eternal life, acts as a visual Htp-dj-nsw, symbolizing the circular relationship of offering to the king, who offers to the gods, thus providing for the needs of the offerer.25 Unfortunately, the wall is unfinished behind the woman, although it was prepared with plaster to receive additional decoration. Thus, an examination of TT 116 offers a number of clues. Only one remaining text in the tomb gives epithets mentioning that the owner was a favorite of the king and in his following “upon the southern foreign lands.” It is harder to reconstruct the meaning of the epithet HAty-a, which may indicate a military background. The presence of the royal-kiosk scene connects him to officials in the military, civil, or palace administrative branches (“state class”), who also displayed the king prominently in their tombs, during the reigns of Amenhotep II and Thutmose IV.26 Likewise, his tomb is nestled amongst the tombs of palace or military officials on the high promontory of Sheikh abd el-Qurna. The excised image of him fanning the king is also found in chapels whose owners had a the King,” Merymose is shown on many of his monuments with a fan in his hand (see list of monuments in: Pomorska, Les flabelliefères, 114-119); and Huy is shown fanning the king seated in his kiosk (Nina de G. Davies and A.H. Gardiner, The Tomb of Huy, Viceroy of Nubia in the Reign of Tutaankhamun (No. 40) (London, 1926), pls. XIX, XXII; C. K. Wilkinson and M. Hill, Egyptian Wall Paintings: The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Collection of Facsimiles (New York, 1983), 134-135, no. 30.4.21. 22 See complete listing in: B. Schmitz, “Wedelträger,” LÄ 6 (1986), 1161-1163. 23 From the reigns of Amenhotep and Thutmose IV, examples of women who are nurses offering to kings in kiosks: TT 85, Amenemhab, PM I2, part 1 (9), 171, with Amenemhab’s wife Baki offering a bouquet of Amun to Amenhotep II; and TT 88, Pehsukher, PM I2, part 1, (4), 180, with Pehsukher and his wife Neith offering a bouquet to Amenhotep II. TT 85 and TT 88 are currently in preparation for publication by Heike Heye. Variant: TT 350, anonymous, PM I2, part 1, (3) I, 417, son[?] offers bouquet (of Amun?) to wife, Nefertwah, suckling prince (Thutmose IV). On nurses, see: C. Roehrig, “The Eighteenth Dynasty titles royal nurse (mnat nswt), royal tutor (mna nswt), and foster brother/sister of the Lord of the Two Lands (sn/snt mna n nb tAwy),” (PhD diss., University of California-Berkeley, 1990); E. Feucht, “Childhood,” in The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt 1, ed. D.B. Redford (Oxford, 2001), 261-262. 24 See n. 27 below. 25 Hartwig, Tomb Painting and Identity, 67-68. 26 For A II, see: M. Gathy, “Theban Tomb Painting in the Reign of Amenhotep II (ca. 1427-1400 B.C.), Study of an Artistic Creation in its Historical and Socio-cultural Context,” PhD in progress, University of Liège, Belgium; and T IV: Hartwig, Tomb Painting and Identity, 33, n. 245 with Table 1.


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close relationship to the king. The style of painting in TT 116, particularly wall PM (2), is nearly identical to that in TT 78, belonging to Horemheb, who served in the military and civil administrative branches. The over-painting of the cartouche of Amenhotep II with the name of Thutmose IV also suggests that his career started with the former and ended with his death in the early years of the latter. In sum, it appears the owner of TT 116 served these pharaohs in the southern region, either on campaign or in office, as a “favorite of the king.” The unnamed woman offering flowers before the royal kiosk is a motif that is found in a few tomb chapels dating to the reigns of Amenhotep II and Thutmose IV. In each case, captions identify the woman as the wife of the tomb owner and a nurse of the king. For example, the tomb of Amenemhab (TT 85) depicts his wife, Baky, who was the nurse of Amenhotep II, presenting a bouquet to the king.27 TT 88 shows the wife of Pehsukher, Neith, offering a bouquet to Amenhotep II, who is seated in a kiosk.28 Interestingly enough, the tombs in which these nurses appear lie below TT 116, in the same region of the Sheikh abd elQurna necropolis. Based on contextual and visual parallels, we can tentatively identify the unnamed woman in TT 116 as the wife of the tomb owner and the nurse of the king. But which king? The original kiosk scene held the figure of Amenhotep II. If one compares the beige in his necklace with the necklace of the woman, the green of the column in the royal kiosk with the green in the nurse’s lotus bouquet, and the blue of the royal necklace with the blue of the menit, all are identical, which indicates that the woman was painted at the same time as the figure of Amenhotep II.29 The style of the two figures is also the same. Therefore, it appears likely that the appearance of Amenhotep II in TT 116 indicates that the woman offering to the king was his nurse.

Seven royal nurses (mnat) can be positively identified for Amenhotep II: Amenemipet, Hunay, Senetnay, Baky, Sherti, and Henettawy, and the anonymous nurse in TT 98.30 Of these women, Baky is depicted prominently in the tomb of her husband, Amenemhab (TT 85), as is Neith in the tomb of her spouse, Pehsukher (TT 88). Amenemipet and Kaemheribsen are depicted in the tombs of their sons, TT 93 and TT 98, respectively. Hunay figures prominently in her son Meri’s tomb (TT 95), in places where the image of his wife would be expected, and Senetnay appears regularly in the tomb of her husband, Sennefer (TT 96). Only two royal nurses are unattested in Theban tombs: Sherti and Henettawy. Sherti was the daughter of Minmose, a royal tutor, and may have never married, since her named monuments only depict her with her family.31 Henettawy is known only from a badly damaged statue in a shrine at Gebel es-Silsila, where she is identified as “the [royal] nurse, who [nurtured] the god, praised of the good god, mistress of the house.” 32 The dating of the shrine to the reign of Amenhotep II, and hence her career, is based on the presence of Usersatet, her husband, the “King’s Son, Overseer of Southern Foreign Lands,” who is well dated to this king’s reign. As discussed above, the owner of TT 116 served in the southern region as a “favorite of the king.” He is depicted fanning the pharaoh who is enthroned in a kiosk, indicating the tomb owner held the title(s) of “Fan-Bearer,” “Royal Herald,” “Tutor,” “Chief Steward,” “God’s Father,” or “King’s Son of Kush.” The linchpin is the representation of the woman, in the position usually given to the tomb owner’s wife, offering to Amenhotep II, which commemorates her position as nurse to the king, based on contemporary parallels. The over-painting of the cartouche indicates that the original royal image in the tomb belonged to Amenhotep II, which later was changed to

27 Radwan, Königs, 9, posed the question of whether the woman in TT 116 was also a nurse to the king and appears before the pharaoh because of her special connection to the palace. 28 P. Virey, “Le tombeau de Pehsukher,” in Sept tombeaux thébains de la XVIIIe dynastie, MMAF 5, fasc. 2 (Paris, 1891), 295-296; Urk. IV, 1460; Radwan, Königs, 5. The tomb is being published by Heike Heye and S. Eisermann. 29 Based on the Munsell color charts. Readings taken between 10:00-11:00 a.m. December 8, 1996. Readings for: necklaces: 5YR 9/2, beige; column/lotus: 10G 7/2; royal necklace/woman’s menit: 10B 6/4. 30 See discussion in Roehrig, Eighteenth Dynasty titles,

111-189, with Appendix 1, 342-343. I do not include the nurse Ia`efib since her association with Amenhotep II, as deduced by Roehrig, is conjectural (ibid., 187). See also B.M. Bryan, “Administration in the Reign of Thutmose III,” in Thutmose III: A New Biography, ed. E. Cline and D. O’Connor (Ann Arbor, 2006), 99. 31 Berlin 822: G. Roeder, Ägyptische Inschriften aus den Staatliche Museen Berlin, vol. 2, Inschriften des Neuen Reichs (Leipzig, 1924), 99; British Museum 2300: H. De Meulenaere, “Le directeur des travaux Minmose,” MDAIK 37 (1981), 315318, pls. 50-51. 32 R.A. Caminos and T.G.H. James, Gebel el-Silsilah I: The Shrines (London, 1963), 34, pl. 25.

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Thutmose IV, probably early in his reign. So the bulk of the career of the tomb owner lay in the reign Amenhotep II. One last point must be made here as well: the image of the tomb owner of TT 116 was excised in an act of damnatio memoriae.33 His wife did not fare much better, with only one representation remaining on PM (2). Taking the image of the nurse in TT 116 as a point of departure, we return to the discussion of Henettawy and the shrine at Gebel es-Silsilah. At the back of Shrine 11 are five engaged statues that remain from their legs down.34 Inscriptions are preserved on the riser beneath the feet of the statues, as well as on either side of the outer edge of the niche. The statues form two groups: Senynefer and Henettawy are one pair, and the second group is comprised of Usersatet seated between his mother35 and Henettawy. Based on close analysis of Shrine 11 in the dissertation of J.J. Shirley,36 the owner was Usersatet, the “King’s Son, Overseer of Southern Foreign Lands.” The family relationships are determined by placement and the orientation of the hieroglyphs: Senynefer and his wife Hatshepsut, their daughter Nenwenhermentes, and her son Usersatet and his wife Henettawy, whose texts face the statue of her husband. The bulk of Usersatet’s career was spent in the service of Amenhotep II. Based on the style of decoration, Shirley dates Shrine 11 from the end of the reign of Amenhotep II to the beginning of Thutmose IV’s. If the shrine was commissioned by Usersatet to commemorate his ancestors, then his career could have extended into the early years of

Thutmose IV. This also would suggest that Henettawy may have lived into the reign of Thutmose IV after her service to Amenhotep II. If Usersatet’s career is examined, he started as a chariot warrior (snny),37 then served as a Royal Herald,38 then a Steward of Meidum,39 and finally, as Viceroy of Nubia.40 On his Amara-West stela, he is called:41

33 Discussion in W.K. Simpson, “Usersatet,” LÄ 6, 901903. A.R. Schulman, “Some Remarks on the Alleged ‘Fall’ of Senmut,” JARCE 8 (1969-70), 36-37. However, note Simpson’s argument that Usersatet’s name and figure remain intact on some of his monuments. 34 Caminos and James, Gebel el-Silsilah I, 33-34, pls. 22, 25. 35 Mother named on a seated granite statue from Deir el-Medina. See: C. Maystre, “Une statue d’Ousersatet, viceroi de Nubie sous Aménophis II,” in Melanges Maspero 2, ed. P. Jouguet, MIFAO 66, 2 (Cairo, 1935-38), 657-658; Urk. IV, 1487.6-11. 36 J.J. Shirley, “The Culture of Officialdom: Attaining Office during the mid-18th Dynasty,” PhD diss. (The Johns Hopkins University, 2005), 229-237. Many thanks to Dr. Shirley for generously sharing with me her discussion on Usersatet from her dissertation. 37 Semna stela (MFA 25.632) in reference to Usersatet’s career, discussed in W. Helck, “Eine Stele des Vizekönigs Wsr-St.t,” JNES 14 (1955), 30-31. 38 Stela from Amara-West (Louvre, E.17341): H.W. Fairman, “Preliminary Report of the Excavations at ‘Amārah West, Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, 1938-1939,” JEA 25 (1939), pl. xvi, 1; Urk. IV, 1484-6.

39 BM 623 in H.R. Hall, Hieroglyphic Texts from Egyptian Stelae, &c., in the British Museum 7 (London, 1925), pl. 34; Urk. IV, 1486-7. Khartoum 32: C. Van Siclen III, The Chapel of Sesostris III at Uronarti (San Antonio, 1982), 38, 47; M. Dewachter, “Une nouvelle statue du vice-roi de Nubie Ousersatet à Khartoum,” Archéologia 72 (July 1974), 54-58. 40 See the excellent discussion of this and the other titles in Shirley, “The Culture of Officialdom,” 216-240. 41 Urk. IV, 1485.10-11, lines 1-4 of the stela. 42 P. Der Manuelian, Studies in the Reign of Amenophis II, HÄB 26 (Hildesheim, 1987), 92-95, 155. 43 Helck, “Stele des Vizekönigs Wsr-St.t,” 31. Uronati statue: Van Siclen, Chapel of Sesostris III, 47 and fig.18; Dewachter, “Nouvelle statue,” 54-55, 58. 44 I. Müller, “Die Verwaltung der Nubischen Provinz im Neuen Reich,” PhD diss (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, 1978), 173. 45 Helck, “Stele des Vizekönigs Wsr-St.t,” 31. Habachi also suggests Qubbet el-Hawa: L. Habachi, “The Graffiti and Work of the Viceroys of Kush,” Kush 5 (1957), 22. 46 Unprovenanced. É. Chassinat, “Petits monuments et petites remarques,” BIFAO 10 (1912), 161. 47 Found in front of the temple at Deir el-Medina. Maystre, “Statue d’Ousersatet”; Urk. IV, 1487-9.

Favorite of the king in southern foreign lands in embellishing/restoring his monuments of eternity (m smnx mnw.f n nHH), King’s Son and Overseer of Southern Foreign Countries.

As a royal herald, Usersatet appears to have accompanied Amenhotep II in Takhsy in year 3, and perhaps on the king’s campaigns of years 7 and 9. On the south wall of shrine 4 belonging to Usersatet at Ibrim, the text accompanying the scene of Amenhotep II inspecting the presentation of Nubian tribute records the “wonders for his army....the expedition” that “brought the tribute of the southern foreign lands.” The text appears to refer to a successful military action in Nubia, perhaps with Usersatet in attendance.42 The text on the back pillar of Usersatet’s Uronati statue supports Helck’s interpretation of Usersatet’s trajectory from Steward of Meidum to “King’s Son and Overseer of Southern Foreign Countries.”43 Usersatet also held the title HAty-a.44 Usersatet’s burial remains an enigma. Helck suggests that Usersatet’s tomb rests along with the other Viceroys of Nubia in Qurna Murai, and Habachi asserts Qubbet el-Hawa as his final resting place.45 However, a shabti46 and a statue47 found at


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Deir el-Medina suggest that Usersatet was buried in Thebes. Could TT 116 be the final resting place of Usersatet? His association with the southern foreign lands and marriage to a royal nurse make him a possible choice. Furthermore, the careful excising of the figure and name in TT 116 indicates damnatio memoriae, which also befell some, if not all, the monuments of Usersatet. 48 TT 116 is prestigiously situated on the upper promontory of Sheikh Abd el-Qurna, nested between the tombs

of two chiefs of the Medjay, TT 90 & 91.49 Admittedly, this assignment is based on circumstantial evidence, thus Usersatet’s identification with the tomb owner of TT 116 is made with caution. In this brief article, the discussion and presentation of the scenes in TT 116 are offered as a point of departure for others to work with the material which, hopefully, will lead to a complete scientific publication of the tomb and, perhaps, a tomb for Usersatet.

48 Helck, “Stele des Vizekönigs Wsr-St.t,” 31; Der Manuelian, Reign of Amenophis II, 158. See also the reassessment of the evidence by Shirley in “The Culture of Officialdom,” 237-240.

49 TT 90: Urk. IV, 1618-1619; TT 91: recorded by Champollion, Notices descriptives, 840.

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a head of rameses ii from tell basta

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A HEAD OF RAMESES II FROM TELL BASTA Zahi Hawass Supreme Council of Antiquities

This article is dedicated to Jack Josephson. I met Jack after he began to date my friend Magda Saleh, the famous ballerina (and now his wife). I must say that Jack and I have had our differences. I have never been to his home in New York, because I swore an oath to myself many years ago that I would never enter a private home where I would see a collection of ancient artifacts—I believe that artifacts belong in museums. In spite of this, however, Jack and I have become good friends over the years. I like him very much as a person, and I respect him highly as an Egyptologist, particularly as a scholar of the art of the Late Period. I have decided that the only way to celebrate this heb sed is to publish the most recent royal head that I have found. It is to Jack that I dedicate this article.

I. Introduction Tell Basta is one of the most important archaeological sites in the Delta, and a great deal of excavation and exploration has been carried out here in the past. Sacred from Early Dynastic through Roman times to the cat goddess, Bastet, the principal remains here are: a great temple dedicated to this feline deity, a number of smaller chapels, and a cemetery for the burial of votive cat mummies.1 The site is located in the middle of the modern town of Zagazig, and thus threatened by modern development (fig. 1). We have recently completed a site-management plan for the area,2 1 See E. Naville, Bubastis (London, 1891); Naville, The Festival Hall of Osorkon II: The Great Temple of Bubastis (London, 1892); H. Gauthier, “Un vice-roi d’éthiopie enseveli à Bubastis,” ASAE 28 (1928), 129-137; Sh. Farid, “Preliminary Report on the Excavations of the Antiquities Department at Tell Basta (Season 1961),” ASAE 58 (1964), 85-98; A. el-Sawi, “Some Objects Found at Tell Basta (Season 1966-67),” ASAE 63 (1979), 155-159; elSawi, “Preliminary Report on Tell Basta Excavations 1969, 1970, 1971,” ZÄS 104 (1977), 127-131; el-Sawi, Excavations at Tell Basta. Reports of the Seasons 1967-1971 and Catalog of Finds (Prague, 1979). For additional bibliography,

and nearby areas that are still unexplored are also protected by Antiquities Law 117 of 1973, which states that any sites that lie within the buffer zone of an archaeological site (as determined by the SCA) must be excavated before being used for any purpose. About a year ago, a man named Mr. Ahmed Fouad Abaza, who had bought a 6-acre piece of land 93 meters south of the great temple of Bastet at Tell Basta from the family of Abdel Magied Sarhan, came to see me because he was planning on using the land. The plot does not belong to the Antiquities Department and had been used as a military camp for the past 20 years. No archaeological features were visible on the surface of the site, but it was muddy and had been used previously for cultivation, so any such remains would have been disturbed in any case (fig. 2). We began excavations in 2008 and worked for 11 months. The work was carried out under the supervision of Nacef Abdel-Wahid.

II. Findspot Excavations began on February 3, 2008. The site revealed remains of a Graeco-Roman-era settlement and necropolis (fig. 3), and a number of scattered artifacts were found at a depth of approximately 180 cm below the surface. Included in these finds were Graeco-Roman terracotta statuettes, lamps, pottery sherds, limestone weights, a long-necked glass vessel, one earring, and gold see http://www.ees.ac.uk/deltasurvey/basta220.html 2 This site-management plan includes safe zoning, restoration of the temples and statues, a visitors’ center, and a site museum, as well as tourist facilities. The plan was designed by the architect Hani Maher and Hamdi Sotouhi, with archaeologist Mohamed Abdel Maksoud, under the author’s supervision. We are planning to create similar plans for the site of San el-Hagar, and are building a site museum at Tell Basta. Thus tourists will be able to make a productive day trip from Cairo, beginning at Tell Basta and the new site museum, then to San el-Hagar.

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Fig. 1. Overview of the site of Tell Basta.

Fig. 2. The salvage site under cultivation.


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Fig. 3. Graeco-Roman settlement remains on the site.

coins (figs. 4-6). On September 21, 2008, the most spectacular piece, and the only artifact dating to earlier than the Ptolemaic Period, a colossal royal head, was found in the eastern part of the site (figs. 7-8). III. Description Material: Red Granite Measurements: Height of head: 91.50 cm Height of face: 74.0 cm Width of the face: 63.0 cm

The head represents a king wearing a short round wig with tight curls, the sides of which are missing. The wig is adorned with a diadem fronted by a uraeus whose coils are arranged in a figure eight with two loops positioned symmetrically, one on either side of the serpent’s body (fig. 9). The wig sits low on the king’s forehead, which is traversed by an incised line. The overall shape of the face is round and full. The eyes are large and almond 3 See J. Vandier, Manuel d’archéologie égyptienne 3 (Paris, 1958); H. Sourouzian, “Standing Royal Colossi of the Middle Kingdom reused by Ramesses II,” MDAIK 44 (1988), 229-254; Sourouzian, “Raccords Ramessides,” MDAIK 54

shaped, framed by cosmetic lines (indicated in very low relief), which extend to the outer ends of the eyebrows (figs. 10-11). The brows are clearly delineated and somewhat plastic, with a slight arch that follows the curve of the upper eyelid from the outer corner, then straightens slightly closer to the center of the face. The king’s nose, although now destroyed, was broad from the bridge to the base. The mouth is only slightly wider than the base of the nose, and slight nasolabial creases are indicated, ending just above the outer corners of the lips. The upper and lower lips are roughly equal in their fullness, and the philtrum notch is not evident. The corners of the mouth are marked by drilled holes (fig. 12). The head is broken off at the level of the king’s chin, most of which is missing (fig. 9). Traces of carved straps on the cheeks indicate that there was a false beard. The features of the statue, with elastic, downward-looking eyes and slightly smiling mouth with deep indentations at the corners, suggest that the head should be attributed to Rameses II.3 (1998), 279-292; Sourouzian, “Les Statues colossales de Ramsès II à Tanis: Un colosse fragmentaire de quartzite, text continued on p. 176

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Fig. 4. Graeco-Roman lamp.

Fig. 5. Long-necked glass bottle.

Fig. 6. Roman coin.


Fig. 7. View of the head in situ.

Fig. 8. Close view of the head in situ.

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Fig. 9. Close-up of the wig, diadem, and uraeus.

Fig. 10. Three-quarter view of the head.


Fig. 11. Frontal view of the head.

Fig. 12. View of the face.

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The original height of the statue, based on the height of the head, would have been between 6 and 7 meters; it thus would have been appropriate as an architectural sculpture for the Great Temple, where parts of other statues in the same material and similar in style and dimensions were discovered by Edouard Naville.4 Based on its similarity to these statues, this head most likely comes from an image of the king as a standard bearer, in which he stands and holds either one staff topped with a divine emblem along his left side, or two divine staves. This type is known in one example from the Middle Kingdom and several examples from the 18th Dynasty, and then becomes popular in the Ramesside era, beginning with Rameses II. In fact, it is from the reign of

Rameses II that the greatest number of such statues (approximately 30) are preserved. They were generally placed along the processional ways leading to temples and in temple courts, apparently so that they would appear along the route the divine barks traveled during major festivals.5 Other statues in red granite of Rameses II have been found at Bubastis; these show the king, either seated or standing, with one or two divinities. This colossal head is a masterpiece of Ramesside sculpture. The features have been beautifully carved despite the difficulties of working with such hard stone. The skill of the artist is also apparent in the modeling of the eyes and the natural curve of the eyebrows. The statue from which it comes most likely stood in the Temple of Bastet at Tell Basta, and was discarded when the temple was destroyed.

remploi du Moyen Empire (Blocs N 1471-1486),” in Tanis: travaux récents sur le Tell Sân el-Hagar 1 (Paris, 1998), 391419. See also the statues of Rameses II from the Great Temple at Abu Simbel. 4 Of the busts found at this time, one is now in the Ägyptisches Museum, Berlin (no. 10835); a second is in the British Museum (EA 1066); a third in the Boston Museum of

Fine Arts (89.558); two are in the Egyptian Museum, Cairo (CG 636 and JE 45193); and others were left in situ, along with some torso and lower-body fragments from the same or similar statues. 5 C. Chadefaud, Les statues porte-enseignes de l’Egypte ancienne (1580-1085 avant J.C.): Signification et insertion dans le culte du Ka royal (Paris, 1982).

IV. Conclusion

r.g. gayer-anderson and his pharaonic collection in cairo

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A PASHA’S PLEASURES: R.G. GAYERANDERSON AND HIS PHARAONIC COLLECTION IN CAIRO* Salima Ikram American University in Cairo

Although many collectors have wandered through Egypt, few have made it their home. One such unusual collector and self-proclaimed Orientalist was Robert Grenville Gayer-Anderson (1881-1945),1 known to his friends as “John,” a soubriquet he earned whilst a student at Guy’s Hospital in London, when the song “John Anderson my Jo” enjoyed a certain popularity.2 Unlike most other collectors, however, he contributed an entire museum, complete with its contents, to Egypt, as well as giving and selling objects to museums in Egypt, Europe, Australia, and the United States, as well as publishing on collecting and on particular objects. Although he had a strong aesthetic sense from an early age, Gayer-Anderson came to collect Egyptian objects by chance (fig. 1.) He was born in Ireland to, as he put it, “gentle folk,” and was the elder of a set of identical twins by 25 min-

utes. Throughout his life, Gayer-Anderson had a preternatural rapport with his twin, Thomas, and frequently referred to their telepathic and psychic “twinness” in letters and his unfinished autobiography.3 He had a nomadic youth, spending time in Kansas, Tennessee, California, Illinois, and Canada, as well as Ireland and England, all of which encouraged his later wanderlust. Life was not easy for the family, and Gayer-Anderson claimed that all the “cheese paring” and economy that marked his early life made him seek comfort in the elegance and refinement of beautiful or unusual objects. His earliest memory of forming a collection of antiquities was during his sojourn in the United States, where, even at the tender age of eight, he and his brother collected Indian flint tools, a group of objects that continued to intrigue him when he went to Egypt and formed a part of his collection there. Indeed, the earliest GayerAnderson collections were of American Indian artifacts: baskets, clay vessels, and figures. Surprisingly, given their later love of research and study, the Gayer-Anderson children had a very haphazard education. First they were subjected to a series of indifferent governesses and tutors, before being sent to school at a rather late date. “John” was educated at Tonbridge School in England. He writes: “It was at school that that Tom and I began our careers as collectors in a very modest way of course, not only of stamp, bird-eggs and butterflies like most schoolboys, but of beautiful old objects, classified under the

* This article is affectionately dedicated to Jack Josephson, a true friend, from whom I have learned, with whom I have argued, who has generously shared his tastes in aesthetics and oenology, and lover of Egypt, both ancient and modern. 1 R.G. Gayer-Anderson was in the process of writing his autobiography, entitled Fateful Attractions, when he died. It was never published, although his twin brother Thomas tried to complete it, albeit unsuccessfully. Much of the information found in this article is derived from this work. I would like to thank R.G. Gayer-Anderson’s grandson, Theo Gayer-Anderson, for information concerning his grandfather, and Kent Weeks for giving me his “spare” copy of the manuscript. I am also indebted to Nicholas Warner (GA Project Director) for involving me

in the Pharaonic section of the Gayer-Anderson House Museum Restoration Project. The work on the Pharaonic antiquities in the museum was made possible by a grant from the Antiquities Endowment Fund of the American Research Center in Egypt and by Dr. B. Mertz. 2 The name Gayer-Anderson was adopted by “John” (the origins of the name “John” are found on p. 44 of Fateful Attractions), his twin brother Thomas, and their older brother D’Arcy by deed poll in 1917 so that all three had an easily distinguished name that would spare their family from unnecessary worry when examining casualty lists. Originally their surname was Anderson (p. 8 of Fateful Attractions). 3 Gayer-Anderson, Fateful Attractions, 319ff. and intermittently throughout the mss.

The name of R.G. Gayer-Anderson is well known in the world of Egyptology as his bequests of Egyptian art form part of several museums’ collections. However, few people know that Gayer-Anderson left a collection of Pharaonic objects in Cairo that are kept in his former house, the Gayer-Anderson Museum, and fewer still the history of the man. This article attempts to serve as an introduction to both.

The Collector: R.G. Gayer-Anderson

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Fig. 1. A painting of Gayer-Anderson by his twin brother, showing him at work with his collection (photograph Francis Dzikowski).

generic terms of ‘curiosities’ in those days.”4 After finishing school, he went on to qualify as a doctor at Guy’s Hospital in London in 1903. Even during this time, he and his twin had an appreciation for fine art, and started collecting European antiques as well as anything exquisite that caught their eye. The collections were on a small scale, no doubt constrained by their incomes, but were definite precursors of things to come. After graduating from Guy’s, “John” GayerAnderson went on to the Royal Army Medical Corps in 1904, and was initially stationed in Gibraltar. He was seconded to the Egyptian army in 1907, and his first posting was in the Sudan. His time in the Sudan gave him an appreciation for the minor arts as well as folk art, and he started to collect ethnographic objects, a habit that stayed with him and later permitted him to lavishly furnish his house in Egypt. His fascination with different aspects of Sudanese culture led him to publish articles dealing with medical anthropology as well 4

Ibid., 327JA. One of his most significant contributions was the article “Medical Practices and Superstitions Among the People of Kordofan,” Third Report of the Wellcome Research Laboratories at the Gordon Memorial College (Khartoum, 1908), 281322. Much of his ethnographic collection from the Sudan, consisting of well over one hundred objects, ranging from 5

as other ethnographic subjects, and resulted in his election to membership in the Royal Anthropological Institute.5 He eventually gave several of the objects that he collected during this time to the Pitt-Rivers Museum of Anthropology and Archaeology at Oxford. Gayer-Anderson returned to Egypt and took up the post of Assistant Adjutant General for Recruiting in the army in 1914, when he was promoted to the rank of Major. This is when his love affair with Egypt, its history, and its people really began. Quite poignantly he writes in his autobiography, “This country of the Pharaohs has become more my own than is my native land—I more of its ‘teen wa tibn’ (sand and chaff), it more of my flesh and blood than is any other part of the earth’s surface.” Indeed, he spent most of his adult life in Egypt, apart from occasional visits to England to see his family, eventually quitting Egypt in 1943 due to ill health. Much of Gayer-Anderson’s early Egyptian collecting was done between 1907 and 1914. His job as recruiting officer caused him to travel twice annually throughout the country, and he became known to antiquities dealers as well as the peasants, or indeed anyone who had objects to sell. This is when he made the bulk of his contacts with dealers, which was to stand him in good stead in the years to come. His later governmental positions helped cement his relationship with dealers and extend his contacts, which he maintained for the rest of his life. From 1930 to 1939, he made annual trips by boat from Cairo to Aswan and back, acquiring a variety of antiquities along the way, most of which were destined for the sale room. Gayer-Anderson rarely purchased very large-scale artifacts, focusing on smaller, easily portable items such as scarabs, pottery, jewelry, seals, figurines, ostraca, and statue and relief fragments. He also collected relatively modern objects not only from Egypt, but also from Persia, and joined his brother Thomas in acquiring things from as far afield as India. Due to the First World War, Gayer-Anderson took a substantial part of his collection to Britain in 1917, and lodged it for safety as a loan at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford until 1925.6 A few baskets to medical implements and amulets, was donated to the Pitt-Rivers Museum in 1926. 6 I am grateful to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and particularly to Marsha Hill, for access to their correspondence between Gayer-Anderson and Albert Lythgoe that is relevant to Gayer-Anderson’s sales.


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of these objects were gifted to that museum later on, notably a bronze figure of Osiris,7 and others were slowly sold or given to different museums over the years. In 1920, Gayer-Anderson resigned from the British army (he had retired from the Egyptian army in 1917), but took up a series of positions in the Anglo-Egyptian government, including Senior Inspector in the Ministry of the Interior (Egyptian Government), and subsequently, Oriental Secretary of the Residency (to Viscount Allenby), finally retiring completely from official service in 1924 in order to pursue his true love—collecting. Gayer-Anderson’s love of Egypt led him to settle there after retiring, returning to England for brief periods in the summer. Over the years, he and his brother had a number of residences in England, but the one that they finally settled in was called “Little Hall,” located in the picturesque village of Lavenham, Suffolk. Despite its very Englishness, Little Hall is strangely enough somewhat reminiscent of his house (now museum) in Cairo not only architecturally, as it too is riddled with secret passageways and hidden doors, but in its eclectic décor, with beautiful objects from around the world. Gayer-Anderson’s retirement was devoted to his collections. He was known for being able to ferret out beautiful and striking items, not just grand objects, but smaller things, often quite prosaic. People came to him with their acquisitions to have them authenticated—or not! He also had a reputation for being a skilled restorer, and many pieces that he acquired left his studio far more beautiful and complete than when they first entered it.8 He associated with the archaeologists who worked in Egypt, and even consulted with them on pieces, as well as questions concerning restoration. Gayer-Anderson’s collections ranged in date from the Predynastic Period onward, and included many objects that would be termed “ethnographic” by museums. He regularly arranged small exhibitions at his various homes, and augmented his governmental pension (often quite significantly) by dealing (it was legal at that time) in antiquities. A letter that he wrote in 1925 to Albert

Lythgoe of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, who was obviously a close acquaintance, provides a catalogue and suggested prices for a selection of these objects. Some of the objects made their way to the Brooklyn Museum, the Portland Museum of Art (1350 objects),9 and the Medelhavsmuseet of Mediterranean and Near Eastern Antiquities in Stockholm, to name but a few. This last museum has the largest collection of Gayer-Anderson material outside of the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, which has the majority of his personal collection of Pharaonic art. During his retirement, he also contributed regular columns on art, archaeology, and local customs to two journals, the Sphinx and the Egyptian Gazette. The subject matter ranged from “How to Buy a Scarab” to “How to Care for Your Oriental Carpet.” In 1939, the Sphinx also published a series of stories that he recorded regarding the house that later became his, which were posthumously collected by his brother Thomas and published as Legends of the Bait Al-kretliya as Told by Sheikh Sulaiman al-Kretli in 1951 by Luzac and Co. of London. These have been republished in 2001 with revised drawings and a new foreword by Theo Gayer-Anderson, and an essay on the house by Nicholas Warner. These tales reflect Gayer-Anderson’s involvement in his neighborhood, its history and people, and underscore his devotion to his adopted land. Over the years artists, writers, travelers, archaeologists, antiquarians, and resident Cairenes passed through the doors of his different abodes, first in downtown Cairo, then Zamalek, and finally the Beit al-Kretliya (see below), making for a lively “salon” atmosphere. Many of Gayer-Anderson’s diverse group of friends rather literally left their impressions with him: he used to make plaster life masks as mementos and display them in his home. Today, the likenesses of the intrepid traveler Freya Stark and the notable scholar of Islamic architecture K.A.C. Creswell are on display, amongst others, in the museum. Gayer-Anderson clearly enjoyed sharing not only his knowledge, but parts of his collection: he also very generously made

7 The Ashmolean felt that an insufficient number of objects had been given to it, as is made clear by D. G. Hogarth in a report of 1925, where he complains that the returns of long-term storage are limited and that the museum should perhaps charge a fee for such a service, or curtail it altogether. My thanks to Drs. Helen Whitehouse and Tom Hardwick for making this information available to me. 8 He writes about keeping spare fragments around so that he could complete broken statues, particularly bronzes, one

of his early passions. Recently, a Roman mummy portrait of a girl (EA: 74719) that came to the British Museum via GayerAnderson was analyzed, and it was found to be enhanced in certain areas. Improving original pieces to raise their value was a common practice among dealers, and one that GayerAnderson was no doubt familiar with and adept at. 9 This collection of scarabs and other objects was sold to Albert E. Doyle, a president of the museum’s Board of Trustees, and passed to the museum upon his death.

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presents of things that guests had particularly liked, admired, or interested them.10 Objects from the collections that Gayer-Anderson made, particularly during this time, are now spread throughout the world. Virtually nothing was inherited by the family. Some items were just given or sold by “John,” others by Thomas, and the majority by both twins. British museums such as the Fitzwilliam Museum, the British Museum, the Liverpool Museum, the Museum of London, the Ipswich Museum, the Hull and East Riding Museum, the Ashmolean Museum, University College London’s Classical Museum, and the Victoria and Albert Museum all contain objects from the Gayer-Anderson collections, as do several museums in the United States, Europe, and as far afield as Australia,11 as well as the Beit al-Kretliya (see below), and the Coptic, Islamic, and Egyptian Museums in Cairo. Clearly Gayer-Anderson was obsessed with perpetuating his name and making a mark for posterity.12

The Cairo Collection One of Gayer-Anderson’s most famous acquisitions was what became his final home in Egypt, the Beit al-Kretliya. During the late 1920’s and early 1930’s, “John” became obsessed by a desire to live in an old Arab house and investigated several possibilities with little success. He became so discouraged that he almost invested in an island in Aswan instead, which would have left us all the poorer. However, in 1935, a twist of fate and friends in the Egyptian government provided him with the opportunity to live in the newly restored 10

One example of this is when the anatomist D. E. Derry visited Gayer-Anderson and consulted him about the use of fossil bones in artifacts. “John” produced an 18th Dynasty mirror handle in such a bone and presented it to Derry, a fact that Derry duly recorded in an article: D. E. Derry, “An Egyptian Mirror Handle in Fossil Bone,” Man 37 (July 1937), 109-110. 11 Near the time of his death, Gayer-Anderson started giving away the residue of his collection that had not remained in Cairo. The largest gift went to the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge in 1943, to be designated in memory of himself and his twin. In addition to Pharaonic objects, all sorts of objects were sold or gifted, including Coptic textiles, Indian and Persian paintings and minor arts, icons, and Classical pieces. 12 Neither of the Gayer-Anderson brothers was keen to marry, but for reasons of perpetuating the name, “John” did marry and fathered a child. For the most part, his wife and son, John, remained in Lavenham, together with his wife’s children from an earlier alliance. Initially Gayer-Anderson had hoped to bring his son to live with him in Cairo. To

Beit al-Kretliya, a house that had taken his fancy as early as 1906, when he had first set foot in Egypt and had visited the area with a guide.13 The house is actually a pair of Ottoman houses (one sixteenth and the other seventeenth century) that are linked together by a bridge (fig. 2). One belonged to a man called Abdel-Qadir al-Haddad, possibly a blacksmith or the descendant of one, and the other first to a rich butcher, and then to a Muslim lady from Crete, who is responsible for the current name of the house, Beit al-Kretliya, or House of the Cretan Woman.14 Gayer-Anderson triumphantly took occupancy of his house on 16th October 1935, fancifully furnishing it with his collections of oriental, occidental, and ancient objects, with the understanding that during his tenure it would be accessible to visitors, and upon his death it would pass to the Egyptian state as a museum.15 The Egyptian government obviously regarded him with respect and admiration to permit such an unusual arrangement. Their regard was further expressed by awarding Gayer-Ander the title “Lewa” or “General” in 1941, which is inscribed on a metal plaque that is proudly set into one of the houses’ courtyards, and making him a Pasha in 1943, a title that made him justly proud.16 Gayer-Anderson left his beloved house late in 1943 due to ill health, returning briefly to sort out bureaucratic matters in 1944, before leaving for good in 1945. Gayer-Anderson died on 16 June of that year and was buried in Lavenham, and the House of the Cretan Woman officially reverted to the Egyptian government and was named the Gayer-Anderson Pasha Museum of Oriental Arts and Crafts.

test this out, young John came out at different intervals to spend time with his father, but on the whole, these visits proved to be infelicitous and trying meetings between father and son, and the idea of their living together in Egypt was abandoned. 13 R.G. Gayer-Anderson Pasha, “Introduction,” in Legends of the House of the Cretan Woman, by R.G. GayerAnderson Pasha et al. (Cairo, 2001), 5-11. 14 N.J. Warner, Guide to the Gayer-Anderson Museum, Cairo (Cairo, 2003); N.J. Warner, “The House of the Cretan Woman,” in Gayer-Anderson Pasha et al., Legends, 17-26. 15 Its charms are such that it is not only used as a museum, but also is a favored venue for filming period dramas. It has also appeared in Western films, the most notable being The Spy Who Loved Me. 16 Egypt was not the only country to shower awards upon Gayer-Anderson. King Hussain Bin Ali of the Kingdom of the Hijaz bestowed the Order of the Al Nahda (Renaissance) Third Class to him in 1922, for military and medical services rendered during the Arab Revolt.


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Fig. 2. A photograph of the Beit al-Kretliya during Gayer-Anderson’s tenure (photograph Francis Dzikowski).

The Gayer-Anderson Museum in Cairo contains all that Gayer-Anderson left behind when he finally returned to England, with objects to feed every interest and excite even the most jaded of palates.17 Until recently, the Pharaonic component of the museum was thought to be relatively small, limited to some coffin boards, a replica of the famous Gayer-Anderson cat that was bequeathed to the British Museum,18 and a few reliefs inserted into the walls in the Museum Room and in a corridor adjacent to it. However, when Nicholas Warner and Theo Gayer-Anderson started a project to restore the house to its former glory, they happened upon a treasure trove of artifacts that had been long forgotten. These are now being recorded, and the majority have been reinstalled in the rediscovered and refurbished Pharaonic Room,19 formerly called Room F, located on the third floor of the house, near the Museum Room. Chronologically, the collection spans the length of ancient Egyptian civilization, containing objects dating from the Archaic through the Graeco-Roman Periods. A majority of the relief fragments and funerary objects date from the New Kingdom and slightly later. The collection contains objects from diverse contexts: tombs, temples, and dwellings. Although there are a few

large pieces, mainly reliefs, the majority are small. Indeed, many objects are fragments of statuettes: arms, ears, feet, horns, uraei, and beards. These are made of stone, wood, and metal. Perhaps many of these were the extras that Gayer-Anderson hoarded for his restorations, although some are quite beautiful pieces in and of themselves, and their very isolation from a larger piece allows one to appreciate them better, and focus on the fineness of carving of the part, rather than be distracted by the entire object. The objects are of uneven quality, and it is possible that not all of the larger pieces are ancient. Despite Gayer-Anderson’s boasts that he had significant knowledge and a considerable “flair” for spotting the authentic, some of the relief fragments, as well as small statuettes that were hidden away in drawers, are dubious in their authenticity, to say the least. This is particularly the case for the relief fragments that were originally embedded in the walls of Room F, and have been extracted and mounted properly now (fig. 3). Perhaps some of these were Gayer-Anderson’s own work or that of copyists, similar to what can be purchased today in Thebes. One such piece shows a figure of Re with a ram’s head standing in a red oval. This is something that one might expect to find in a Ramesside royal tomb, but it does not come from

17 A museum register was compiled in 1943, but sadly in the ensuing years has been misplaced. 18 The original is one of the most visited objects in the British Museum. For the most recent publication see N. Spencer, The Gayer-Anderson Cat (London, 2007).

19 This author is hoping to eventually publish a full catalogue.

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Fig. 3. One of the painted relief fragments before it was released from the wall and put into a new vitrine (photograph Francis Dzikowski).

Fig. 5. A terracotta figurine of Bes, one of many Bes images that Gayer-Anderson collected and kept (photograph Timothy Loveless).

the Valley of the Kings and is of the type of relief that can still be purchased today by local copyists. This would explain why these pieces were embedded into the walls in such a cavalier manner. One relief shows evidence that it was worked on, or at least designed by, Gayer-Anderson himself. The recto shows a couple that is carved in a way that does not quite ring true, while the verso shows two carefully laid out vertical columns of hieroglyphs in pencil, with scribbled notes in English that are clearly the work of Gayer-Anderson. Were stone cutters following his drawings to fabricate pieces for sale, or was this for his own amusement? The latter is more probable, as these never seem to have appeared on the market, and might be related to his restoration activities.

A few pieces that were embedded in the walls are more carefully situated within wooden frames. Two such are clearly fragments of Memphite tombs of late 18th Dynasty or very early 19th Dynasty date. One shows the heads and torsos of a richly attired man and his wife, and is situated beneath the window seat in the Museum Room. The other shows part of the head of a woman and is in a corridor leading away from the Museum Room (fig. 4). The remainders are all in the Museum Room and are unique casts of wall reliefs from the tomb of Ramose in Thebes (TT55). Gayer-Anderson made these painstakingly and illegally in 1919, when he was staying at Chicago House. At the time, he held the position of Inspector of Upper Egypt for the Government, and was thus relatively safe from official reprimand, if not moral censure—something that he mentions in his autobiography. Some of the relief fragments are clearly originals that were set into the walls of Room F, and others that were stored there are clearly originals and date from a variety of periods. Two fragments of monumental inscription that retain their vivid color might originate from the Rameses II temple

20 This might belong to a set of three, two of which are now in the Brooklyn Museum. See S. Ikram, “A Fragment from a Lost Monument of Amenirdis I in the Gayer-Anderson

Museum, Cairo,” in Servant of Mut: Studies in Honor of Richard Fazzini, ed. S. D’Auria (Leiden and Boston, 2008), 126-129.

Fig. 4. A limestone fragment from a Memphite tomb that has been embedded into the wall (photograph Francis Dzikowski).


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Fig. 7. Images of terracotta Harpocrates figurines (photograph Timothy Loveless).

at Abydos. A particularly fine piece of sandstone relief dating to the 25th Dynasty and featuring Amenirdis has been cleaned and restored and is now on display.20 Another notable object is an unfinished stela of Ptolemaic date with offerings being made to Khnum, or possibly Amun—the absence of details makes it difficult to determine which. The groups of smaller complete objects that are now on display include several molded terracotta figurines from the Graeco-Roman Period, particularly images of Harpocrates and Bes. Gayer-

Anderson was clearly very fond of Bes, as stone, faience, metal, and wooden images of that god are in abundance, with many other gifted by him to the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge (fig. 5). Other terracotta objects from that period include several lamps and a splendid large molded female figure, perhaps of a goddess, who retains some vestiges of the paint that no doubt once covered her. The woman’s hair lies in ringlets upon her shoulder and she is bedecked with jewels: bracelets, armlets, a necklace, and little else (fig. 6). During the course of rediscovering the collection, Warner and Gayer-Anderson found drawers discreetly stuffed with a large group of erotic male terracotta figurines that had no doubt been secreted here when the house first became a public governmental museum (fig. 7). Despite Gayer-Anderson’s vast collection of ostraca, few are found in this museum; the majority made their way to the Fitzwilliam and to the Medelhavsmuseet in Stockholm.21 One that remains is particularly enchanting, as the artist has used the natural shape of the stone to advantage, and painted a hand on it.22 Other ostraca include an erotic scene and a lengthy account text. Funerary objects feature amongst the larger items now on display. Two yellow coffin lids of the 21st Dynasty, one belonging to a man, and the other to a woman, that were once mounted in the window embrasure of the Museum Room have been conserved23 and moved to flank the doorway of Room F. Fragments of a Middle Kingdom

21 Due to his friendship with the Danish ambassador to Egypt, and as the museum had purchased several objects from him in the past, Gayer-Anderson made a significant bequest to this museum upon his death in 1945. These are published by B.E.J. Peterson, Zeichnungen aus einer Totenstadt: Bildostraka aus Theben-West, ihre Fundplätze, Themata und

Zweckbereiche mitsamt einem Katalog der Gayer-AndersonSammlung in Stockholm (Stockholm, 1973). 22 F. Haikal, “An Unusual Ostracon from the Beit el Kretleya Museum,” in Hommages à Jean-Claude Goyon, ed. L. Gabolde (Cairo, 2008). 23 This work was carried out by Bianca Madden.

Fig. 6. A terracotta statue of a woman or goddess (photograph Timothy Loveless).

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Fig. 10. Gayer-Anderson in the guise of the enigmatic Great Sphinx of Giza (photograph Francis Dzikowski).

Fig. 8. A painted cartonnage coffin from Thebes that is coated with black resinous oils (photograph Francis Dzikowski).

coffin from Asyut are also on display, together with an almost complete, albeit disarticulated, Ptolemaic Period rectangular wooden coffin. The collection also boasts a fine Roman Period (probably second century AD) plaster head from

a woman’s mummy, with an elaborate hairstyle. A cartonnage coffin of the 21st Dynasty with a gilded face and inlaid eyes that is covered in a black substance, probably a combination of oil, resin, and possibly bitumen, is also on display in the Museum Room. An inscription on the interior of the case records the date when Gayer-Anderson purchased it in Luxor: 20.2.21 (fig. 8). Aside from the Amenirdis relief, the gems of the collection are, without a doubt, an inscribed statue fragment of the Amarna Period, and a

Fig. 9. Gilded protective images of goddesses and amulets from a coffin of the Graeco-Roman Period (photograph Francis Dzikowski).

r.g. gayer-anderson and his pharaonic collection in cairo female torso wearing a broad collar dating to the reign of Tutankhamun or slightly later. Both are of quartzite and must have been part of the large Amarna collections that Gayer-Anderson assembled. It is surprising that these did not make their way to the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, although one cannot help but be glad that they remained in Egypt and are part of the GayerAnderson legacy in Egypt. One further sculptural fragment deserves mention here: a portion of the head and mouth of a monumental black granite scarab. Doubtless this dates to the reign of Amenhotep III and might have been a companion piece to the one at Karnak. It is highly polished and exquisitely modeled. Other objects also jostle for attention: enormous granite toes, offering tables with Demotic 24

Fateful Attractions, 7.

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inscriptions where the liquid offerings cunningly run from one level to the next, an offering basin with the kneeling devotee peering into it from the side, cartonnage mummy cases with gilded faces, charming ceramic canopics, and cartonnage and wood bed-coffin decorations (fig. 9). Despite the fact that these are the “least” of Gayer-Anderson’s acquisitions, this collection remains a vibrant testament to the taste and skill of Gayer-Anderson as collector and his legacy to the country that he loved above all others. As he wrote, “Egypt, the land of my heart’s desire, where meet the crossroads of civilization, has possessed me—has become the land of my adoption—In and around it…has my lot been cast,” and there, surely, he has left his mark24 (fig. 10).

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merenptah’s confrontations in the western desert and the delta

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MERENPTAH’S CONFRONTATIONS IN THE WESTERN DESERT AND THE DELTA Sameh Iskander New York University

It is a great pleasure and honor to participate in this publication dedicated to Jack Josephson, and I wish him life, prosperity, and health! There is a general agreement among scholars that during the reign of Merenptah (1212-1202 BC) the Libyans and the Sea Peoples formed an alliance and attacked Egypt from the Western Desert.1 This joint incursion is seen to have been thwarted in one decisive battle in the Western Desert, where the Egyptians defeated the allied forces in a mere six hours. These conclusions, over a century old, derive mainly from early Egyptologists such as Chabas and Maspero.2 My concern in this article is to address certain inconsistencies in Merenptah’s texts on which the above conclusions are based.3 Specifically, I will argue that the texts refer to major military operations with the Libyans in the Western Desert, and perhaps minor skirmishes with the Sea Peoples in the Delta,4 and further, that the evidence for an alliance between these two enemies is open to question. Instead, the Sea Peoples most likely came to Egypt as a result of repeated skirmishes and counter-attacks with the Egyptians dating back to the time of Rameses II, after which they took up residence in some parts of the Delta. It appears that the texts conflated the clashes with the Libyans and the Sea Peoples in order to give

the impression of one large battle in which the victorious Merenptah won a major and sweeping victory against scores of enemies. References to the commemorations of Merenptah’s great victory occur in all of his surviving six texts, the Karnak text from the Karnak temple, the Kom el-Ahmar text from the Delta, the Cairo and Heliopolis texts from Memphis, the Victory text from Thebes, and the Amada inscriptions.5 Three of the six texts (the Karnak, Kom el-Ahmar, and Heliopolis) contain a Plunder List, rxt HAqw. The data in the Plunder Lists, enumerating the number of combatants captured or killed and the weapons seized, have played a significant role in the interpretation of Merenptah’s confrontations.6 However, close examination of the texts, independent of the Plunder Lists, conveys quite a different impression of the role of these two enemies. Several scholars have argued that the data from the Plunder Lists should be treated with caution and not taken at face value. In his examination of the texts of Thutmose III, Martin Noth suggested that a differentiation be made between the military texts and their Plunder Lists and that the two should be examined separately; that is, the latter should not be taken as a continuation of the narrative accounts, as these two segments of the text constitute two different textual genres.7

1 For a sampling of sources, see J.H. Breasted, A History of Egypt (New York, 1909; reprint, 1937), 466-469; A.H. Gardiner, Egypt of the Pharaohs (London, 1961), 270-272; W. Helck, Die Beziehungen Ägyptens und Vorderasiens zur Ägäis bis ins 7. Jahrhundert v. Chr. (Darmstadt, 1979); C. Aldred, The Egyptians (New York, 1987), 152; D.B. O’Connor, “The Nature of Tjemhu (Libyan) Society in the Later New Kingdom,” in Libya and Egypt c1300-750 BC, ed. A. Leahy (London, 1990), 29-113; K.A. Kitchen, Pharaoh Triumphant (Cairo, 1990), 215; N. Grimal, A History of Ancient Egypt (Cambridge, MA, 1992), 268-269; D.B. Redford, Egypt, Canaan, and Israel in Ancient Times (Princeton, 1992), 24850; C. Vandersleyen, L’Égypte et la vallée du Nil 2 (Paris, 1995), 561-567; and C. Manassa, The Great Karnak Inscription of Merenptah: Grand Strategy in the 13th Century BC (New Haven, 2003), 81 and 94-107. 2 F. Chabas, Études sur l’antiquité historique d’après les sources égyptiennes et les monuments réputes préhistorique (Paris, 1873), 292 ff.; G. Maspero, The Struggle of the Nations:

Egypt, Syria and Assyria (New York, 1897), 432. 3 O’Connor notes that the demands of temple symbolism and royal ideology may render Merenptah and Rameses III historical narratives suspect, but adds, “explicit Egyptian statements must be accepted at face value, at least for now”; see D.B. O’Connor, “The Mystery of the ‘Sea Peoples’,” in Mysterious Lands, ed. D.B. O’Connor and S. Quirke (London, 2003), 120. 4 Merenptah’s military confrontations with the Asiatics and Nubians are excluded from the present discussion. 5 Karnak text, K.A. Kitchen, Ramesside Inscriptions (KRI) IV (Oxford, 1982), 2-15; Kom el-Ahmar text, KRI IV, 20-22; Heliopolis text, KRI IV, 38; Cairo text, KRI IV, 23; Victory Hymn text, KRI IV, 13-18; and Amada text, KRI IV, 33-36. 6 The three Plunder Lists appear in three of the texts listed above: the Karnak text, KRI IV, 8-9; Kom el-Ahmar text, KRI IV, 22; and the Heliopolis text, KRI IV, 38. 7 M. Noth, “Die Annalen Thutmoses III. als Geschichts-

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Indeed, in the Karnak inscription, there are certain linguistic differences between the text and the Plunder Lists, as noted by Anthony Spalinger and Colleen Manassa.8 For instance, in the composition of the Plunder Lists, there is a heavier use of the Late Egyptian possessive adjective, as well as the employment of specialized Late Egyptian vocabulary rarely encountered elsewhere in the text.9 Moreover, there are slight differences in the spelling of the names of the Libyans and Sea Peoples as they appear in the two segments of the texts.10 Bearing this caution in mind, it is useful to examine Merenptah’s texts and their Plunder Lists separately. Let us start with the texts, where most of the narrative accounts are drawn from the Karnak inscription. In the Karnak text, the names of the five groups of Sea Peoples appear at the opening of the text.11

employed in a list format, but not in a narrative format.13 James Allen agrees, but notes that the verb iw may also be taken as stative, which would render the passage narrative.14 Spalinger, on the other hand, posits that the restored iw.tw report later in the text (line 13) rules out the restoration as an introduction, a view disputed by Manassa.15 As the Karnak text is a mixture of various literary genres, the opening passage cannot be ruled out as an introduction, and in this case, it is possible that these ethnonyms represent a list of all the enemies that Merenptah encountered on more than one confrontation. The first confrontation begins with a description of conditions in the Delta, where an unidentified enemy is present (lines 7 through 12).16 […20-24 groups lost ...] tents in front of PerBarset; on the edge of the Ita canal they made a watering place.17 […20-24 groups lost ...] which was not cared for; it was abandoned as pasture for cattle because of the Nine Bows; it was lying waste from the time of the ancestors, (when) every king dwelt in their (sic) pyra[mids …20-24 groups lost…] the […]s of the kings of Lower Egypt opposite their city quarter, shut up in SeshemuTawy for lack of army forces, having no troops to respond for them.

[…...20-24 groups lost (3 courses of masonry lost).….] Mariyu, [son of Didi], the Aqawasha, the Tursha, the Luku, the Sherden, and the Sheklesh and the northerners of all lands who came.

One may argue that the reference to the various groups of the Libyans and the Sea Peoples together at the opening of the text is a proof of their alliance in one battle. This argument is open to question. James Breasted has correctly noted that these ethnonyms represent “with great probability” an opening intended as a list of the enemies of Merenptah.12 This opening is similar to the well-known Qadesh poem of Rameses II, which enumerates the king’s enemies, and is not part of the narrative. Alan Shulman reinforced Breasted’s argument on linguistic grounds: the verb form iw (the walking legs) used with the Sea Peoples, is followed by three strokes, thereby rendering it a participal—that is, an adjective—which is usually quelle,” Zeitschrift des Deutschen Palastina-Vereins 66 (1950), 156 ff; A.R. Schulman, “The Great Historical Inscription of Merenptah at Karnak: A Partial Reapraisal,” JARCE 24 (1987), 22. Redford, however, disagrees with this view; see D.B. Redford, Pharaonic King-Lists, Annals and Day-Books (Mississauga, 1986), 124-125; for doubts about the amounts reported in Thutmose III’s Plunder Lists, see Redford, “The Northern Wars of Thutmose III,” in Thutmose III: A New Biography, ed. E.H. Cline and D.B. O’Connor (Ann Arbor, 2006), 326; see also further discussion below. 8 A. Spalinger, Aspects of the Military Documents of the Ancient Egyptians (New Haven, 1982), 141; Manassa, The Great Karnak Inscription, 57. 9 Examples of the appearance of Late Egyptian elements in the Plunder Lists are the use of the irm (instead of Hna) and constructions such as nty.mn.m-di.w. KRI IV, 8:4-9:8.

The text continues with the king’s reaction to these conditions and his rising up to protect the people: (Now) it happened that […20-24 groups lost ...]. He [occupied] the throne of Horus, he was appointed to sustain the elite, and had risen as king to protect the ordinary folk, (for) there was strength in him to do it, saying, “One is […20-24 groups lost ...] Mabir.” (He is one who) musters his choicest troops and his chariotry on every road, his scouts active, and his instructions in […20-24 groups lost ...] his […]. He does not (even) scrutinize the myriads on the day of marshalling (the troops). 10

Manassa, The Great Karnak Inscription, 57. Karnak stela line 1, KRI IV, 2: 12. 12 See J. H. Breasted, Ancient Records of Egypt 3 (Chicago, 1906-07), 241, nt. a; Qadesh Poem, KRI II, 5.1ff; Manassa, The Great Karnak Inscription, 5-6. 13 Schulman, “The Great Historical Inscription,” 26. 14 J. P. Allen in a personal communication; see A.H. Gardiner, Egyptian Grammar (Oxford, 1982), 235. 15 Spalinger, Aspects, 212-213; Manassa, The Great Karnak Inscription, 5-6. 16 Karnak stela lines 7-12: KRI IV, 3:5-6 through 3:13-15 and K.A. Kitchen, Ramesside Inscriptions, Translated and Annotated. Translations (RITA), vol. IV (Oxford, 2003), 2-3. 17 For SkunA as “watering place,” see J.E. Hoch, Semitic Words (Princeton, 1994), 289, no. 414. . 11

merenptah’s confrontations in the western desert and the delta The text does not identify the enemy camped at Per-Barset in the Delta before the great battle in the Western Desert. Despite the lacunae, there are tantalizing clues that can be extracted upon close examination. The location of Per-Barset has been much debated among scholars. Alan Gardiner, Labib Habachi, Spalinger, Manfred Bietak, and Manassa place it in the eastern Delta.18 Habachi, for instance, equates it with Bubastis, whereas Bietak equates it with the modern town Bilbeis to the east of the eastern branch of the Nile.19 Henri Gauthier follows Breasted in placing Per-Barset in the western Delta.20 Outside the Karnak text, this toponym appears only once in Papyrus Harris I dated to the reign of Ramses III,21 which seems to indicate an eastern Delta location because of the association of Per-Barset with the domain of Bastet. The latter encompasses the cities of Bubastis and Belbeis. It is likely that Per-Barset is linked with a place in the eastern Delta. The text employs the Semitic term ihrw for the tents of the enemy at Per-Barset.22 In Egyptian texts, this term is attested only once outside the Karnak inscriptions in Papyrus Harris I, where ihrw refers to the tents of nomads who penetrated Egypt from Canaan during the reign of Rameses III.23 Merenptah’s texts otherwise employ a different term for the tents of the Libyans camped in the Western Desert, ihw.24 This familiar term appears frequently in Egyptian texts since Thutmose III, and three times in Merenptah’s texts in reference to the tents of the Libyans.25 By employing two different designations for the tents, the Egyptian scribes seem to distinguish between two enemies: the Libyans in the Western Desert, and another enemy in the eastern Delta at Per-Barset. This latter enemy in the eastern Delta was not the Libyans because: (1) the king was informed of 18

A.H. Gardiner, “The Delta Residence of the Ramessides,” JEA 5 (1918), 258; L. Habachi, Tell Basta (Cairo, 1957), 123-125; Spalinger, Aspects, 208, n. 53; M. Bietak, “Respondents,” Biblical Archaeology Today: Proceedings of the International Congress on Biblical Archaeology (Jerusalem, 1984), 216. 19 Bietak, “Respondents,” 216. 20 H. Gauthier, Dictionnaire des noms géographiques contenus dans les texts hiéroglyphiques (Cairo, 1925), 75-76; Breasted, Ancient Records, 242; Schulman, “The Great Historical Inscription,” 21-46. 21 Papyrus Harris I, 62a, line 2 mentions that Per Barset was on the “Water of Re”; see P. Grandet, Le Papyrus Harris I: BM9999, vol. 1 (Cairo, 1994-99), 337. 22 Wb. 1, 119: “Zelt der Nomaden”; J.E. Hoch, Semitic Words, 31, no. 24. 23 Papyrus Harris I, 76, line 10; Grandet, Le Papyrus Harris I, 337.

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the Libyan attack afterwards (line 13 of the Karnak text);26 and (2) geographically, the eastern Delta is not where the Libyans were expected to attack or roam. Manassa has argued that the Libyan forces had crossed the Nile in Middle Egypt and turned north to the eastern Delta, a view doubted by Spalinger.27 There is no data to support this strategy. More likely, the enemy confronted in the eastern Delta was one of two foes: the Sea Peoples or some elements of nomadic foreign groups such as the Shasu. The latter, however, do not seem to be mentioned in the list of enemies at the opening of the Karnak text, and there are no references to the Shasu in any of Merenptah’s royal texts. Furthermore, a border official’s report indicates that the Egyptians had permitted the Shasu and their flocks access to water in Egypt, a sign of relatively peaceful relations.28 The evidence weighs more heavily in favor of the conclusion that the Sea Peoples were the enemy camped in the eastern Delta. The presence of enemies, presumably the Sea peoples, camped in the Delta during the reign of Merenptah following three centuries of victorious military campaigns beyond the borders of Egypt was undoubtedly viewed at the time as painful. The “times of troubles” theme, a literary genre known in ancient Egyptian texts from as early as the Middle Kingdom, generally echoes certain historical conditions of the past.29 Thus, the reference in the Karnak text (line 8) to the presence of the Nine Bows inside Egypt “from the time the ancestors” may refer to historical accounts about the presence of the Sea Peoples in the Delta for a considerable length of time since the early years of the reign of Rameses II.30 This can be gleaned from two texts dated to the early reign of Rameses III. A stela from Tanis mentions that the Sherden 24

Karnak stela line 15; KRI IV, 4: 3; Wb. 1, 118: “Feldlager.”For a discussion of tents in general in ancient Egypt and the terms ihrw and ihw, see J. Hoffmeier, “Tents in Egypt and the Ancient Near East,” SSEAJ 7 (1977), 3-28, esp. 23. 25 Victory Hymn stela line 7; KRI IV, 14:14, Kom elAhmer stela recto line 7, KRI IV, 20:14; and Karnak stela line 15, KRI IV, 4: 3. 26 KRI IV, 3: 15-16. 27 Manassa, The Great Karnak Inscription, 94-103; A.J. Spalinger, War in Ancient Egypt (Oxford, 2005) 245, n. 2. 28 Papyrus Anastasi VI in R.A. Caminos, Late Egyptian Miscellanies (London, 1954), 293-300; J. Černý, A Community of Workmen at Thebes in the Ramesside Period (Cairo, 1973), 293-296. 29 For the topo “times of troubles” in various texts, see Redford, Pharaonic King-Lists, 258-275, and 266-267 for the topo in the Karnak text specifically. 30 KRI IV, 35: 13, 36: 1.

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came in warships from the sea and were defeated by Rameses II.31 Another stela, from Aswan, states that Rameses II, in his Regnal Year 2, defeated the “warriors of the Great Green” in the Delta.32 Returning to the Karnak text, the praise of the king in line 12 mentioned above is followed by the phrase: His soldiers march(ed) forth to return with plunder. (He is) kind while leading the troops against every land.33

Schulman, Kenneth Kitchen, Benedict Davis and Manassa seem to render the passage as historical, a view indicating that there were actual confrontations before the Western Desert battle.34 Since this activity follows the reference to the enemy in PerBarset, it is not unreasonable to assume that the confrontation was in the Delta (although, admittedly, one may argue that the missing sections in this part of the text may refer to a completely different context.) Afterward according to the text, Merenptah’s troops returned victorious, bearing plunder, kf a.35 It seems that this was a minor campaign or a series of small skirmishes, because the reference to the confrontation and the troops’ return with plunder merit only brief mention, about one line. Moreover, the plunder from this “skirmish” is not tallied, in contrast to the detailed Plunder List of the Western Desert battle mentioned later in the text. Allen sees the historicity of this passage is by no means certain, as it may be a continuation of the preceding praise of the king, and does not refer to a historical battle. 36 In this case, the non-historical character of this passage casts further doubts on any significant confrontations between Merenptah and the enemy camped in the eastern Delta, and may support the argument of small-scale skirmishes in the Delta.

31

Rameses II’s rhetorical stela, Cairo Museum, CGC 34510; PM IV, 21 (196); KRI II, 290:1-5; RITA II, 120; K.A. Kitchen, Ramesside Inscriptions, Translated and Annotated. Notes and Comments (RITANC), vol. II (Oxford, 1993-99), 174. 32 Rameses II’s Aswan stela, Year 2, PM V, 245; KRI II, 345:7-9; RITA II, 182 (121); RITANC II, 207-208. 33 Karnak stela line 12; KRI, IV, 3: 13-15. 34 A.R. Schulman, Military Rank, Title, and Organization in the Egyptian New Kingdom (Berlin, 1964), 117; Kitchen, RITA, IV, 3; Manassa, The Great Karnak Inscription, 22, where she interprets the source of this plunder as Merenptah’s campaign in Syria-Palestine. Breasted and Davies’ translations are somewhat different, but also render the passage historical, “his soldiers set forth with the mercenary troops, fair of face, sending the troops against every land”; Breasted, Ancient Records, 242; B.D. Davies, Egyptian Historical Inscriptions of

Let us now turn to the Western Desert confrontation in the Karnak text, which begins with the king’s receipt of a report of the Libyan attack in line 13.37 As correctly restored by Spalinger and Manassa, this line includes an iw.tw construction within the lacuna of 24 groups.38 In restoring the long-missing portion beginning in line 14, we must visualize the impact of the length of the lacuna, which is approximately three courses of masonry. Broad parallels can be drawn from a passage in Merenptah’s Amada text of a report delivered to Merenptah (employing iw.tw construction) about the revolt in Nubia while he was engaged in the north combating the Libyans.39 Line 14 in Merenptah’s Karnak text may be restored as a continuation of the iw.tw report in line 13, somewhat along the lines of the Amada stela line 4, as follows: [One came to say to his Majesty in Year 5, second month of] Shemu: the vile enemy chief of Ribu, Mariyu, son of Didi, has descended upon the land of Tehenu together with his archers, [—when the brave troops of his Majesty had arisen to defeat the Sher]den, Sheklesh, Aqawasha, Luku, Tursha—by taking every single warrior and every runner of his foreign land. He has (even) brought his wife and his children.

The restored portion above would approximately fit the missing 24 groups in line 14. The Sea Peoples would thus be part of an adverbial clause: “when the brave troops of his Majesty had risen to defeat the Sherden, Sheklesh, Aqawasha, Luku, Tursha.” This clause is followed by the continuation of the narrative: “by taking the best of every warrior….” The restoration is admittedly somewhat hypothetical, but a certain measure of speculation is inevitable in interpreting this highly fragmentary

the Nineteenth Dynasty (Jonsered, Sweden, 1997), 155. 35 Wb. 5, 121; for a discussion of the term kfa, see Manassa, The Great Karnak Inscription, 22, n. 111. 36 In a personal communication, J. P. Allen argues that while most of the verbs in lines 11 and 12 may be interpreted as narrative, the form bw Darw.n.f in line 12 is the Ramesside counterpart of the Middle Egyptian n sdm.n.f and the Late Egyptian bw sDm.f or bw jr.f sDm is an atemporal statement, not a narrative one. This, together with the following epithet nfr Hr (which means “kind” or “merciful,” not “fair of face”), indicates that the other verb forms are participles praising the king. 37 Karnak stela line 13, KRI IV, 3:13-15; Spalinger, Aspects 14-15; Manassa, The Great Karnak Inscription, 25-27. 38 Spalinger, Aspects, 14-15; Manassa, The Great Karnak Inscription, 23. 39 Amada stela line 4, KRI IV, 34: 5-9; RITA IV, 1-2.

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text.40 The use of the masculine single pronoun (his) to refer to the warriors of Mariyu confirms that all warriors were Libyans.41 In the next line (14), the same pronoun is employed in reference to the warriors and runners. Once more the use of the masculine singular pronoun demonstrates that every warrior and runner was from Mariyu’s “foreign land,” that is, Libya, suggesting that no Sea Peoples were included. The preparation for the Western Desert battle follows two accounts of divine concern: an oracle and a divine dream. In the former, Amun nodded and “turned his back against the Meshwesh, and he does not even look at the land of Tjemeh.”42 The absence of Sea Peoples from the oracle adds additional support to the reservations about their participation in the Western Desert. The only direct reference to an alliance between the Sea Peoples and the Libyans in all of Merenptah’s texts (excluding the Plunder Lists) occurs once in each of the Heliopolis and Cairo inscriptions. This reference to alliance is contrasted by the absence of the Sea Peoples from the Plunder List of the Heliopolis inscriptions—the Cairo text does not contain a Plunder List. Of the Sea Peoples mentioned in the Heliopolis and Cairo columns, only one group, the Sheklesh, is mentioned. The exclusion of the other four groups of the Sea Peoples in these two texts is perplexing, as it contradicts the references in the Karnak text to their participation in the confrontations. Lack of space may have been the reason for the omission in the Cairo column, but this is not the case in the Heliopolis column, where there is ample space to inscribe all five groups.43 These inconsistencies further cloud the argument for the participation of the Sea Peoples in the Western Desert battle. The evidence discussed so far points in favor of the conclusion that the main thrust of Merenptah’s texts (excluding the Plunder Lists) is the victory over the Libyans in the Western Desert battle. The amount of space in all of Merenptah’s texts accorded to the Sea Peoples outside the Plunder Lists is sparse and significantly less than that allocated to the Libyans; the former occur only

four times (as a group), whereas the latter appear thirty-eight times.44 Turning to the data of the Plunder Lists, we find that the tallies clearly express a different impression than the rest of the texts about the participation of the Sea Peoples in the battle. In terms of the number of enemy captured or slain, the Sea Peoples represent about one-third of the total. The data can be appreciated better when laid out in diagrammatic form, as in table 1:

40 The challenges of interpreting Merenptah’s fragmentary texts are noted by O’Connor, “The Nature of Tjemhu (Libyan) Society,” 109. 41 Manassa, The Great Karnak Inscription, 25 and n. 127. 42 Karnak stela line 26, KRI IV, 5:6-7.

43 O’Connor, “The Mystery of the ‘Sea Peoples’,” 120; for photographs of the columns, discussion of their functions, and relevant references, see S. Iskander, The Reign of Merenptah (PhD diss., New York University, 2002), 158161. 44 Each collective appearance in the texts of groups of the Sea Peoples or the Libyans is counted as an occurrence.

Table 1. Occurrences of Sea Peoples and Libyans in Merenptah’s texts Text

Plunder Lists

Text, excluding Plunder Lists

Sea Peoples

Libyans

Sea Peoples

Libyans

Victory

No list

No list

0

11

Karnak

1/3 of 2/3 of 2 combatants combatants

13

Kom el-Ahmar

1/3 of 2/3 of 0 combatants combatants

6

Heliopolis

None

All 1 3 combatants Sheklesh only

Cairo

No list

No list

1 Sheklesh 2 only

Amada

No list

No list

0

3

It is remarkable how few are the occurrences of the Sea Peoples outside the Plunder Lists (fourth column) compared to those of the Libyans (fifth column.) It is the appearance of the Sea Peoples in sizable numbers in the Karnak and Kom elAhmar Plunder Lists that gives the impression that these groups participated in the Western Desert battle. There are also certain discrepancies within these lists. According to the Heliopolis Plunder List, 9,376 Libyans were slain or captured in the battle, while no Sea Peoples are mentioned in the list. The same number appears

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in the Karnak and Kom el-Ahmer Plunder Lists as a total, which included Libyans as well as Sea Peoples.45 Noteworthy also is the inclusion of the Sea Peoples in the Kom el-Ahmar Plunder List, although they are absent from the main text. This absence is, however, not certain, as one may argue that the text is highly fragmentary (about half of the inscription is lost). Several scholars have raised doubts about the accuracy of the figures in the Plunder Lists, since these records are written by the victor and therefore liable to great distortion. For instance, Schulman has argued that “the Plunder Lists in general present a problem for the historian because the disparate figures of the enemy contained are often not recorded for historical purpose but are rather intended to emphasize the prowess of the king.”46 Furthermore, Jac. J. Janssen, Elmar Edel, and Peter Der Maneulian have noted clear discrepancies in the Plunder Lists of Amenhotep II’s two campaigns in Asia.47 In the first campaign (Year 7) he went north as far as Nukhasse, and in the second campaign (Year 9) he went only as far as the area around Megiddo. The Plunder List of the second campaign shows clearly exaggerated items and figures in that it includes plunder from the first campaign. Pictorially, the conflation of plunder from various confrontations is to be found in various wall-relief battle scenes in tombs and temples of ancient Egypt. One example is the Memphite tomb of Horemheb,48 where the Libyan, Asiatic, and Nubian prisoners are shown being presented to the king as a group, while a military scribe records the plunder. The impression is that of a single major military event against scores of enemies, though it is highly unlikely that Horemheb campaigned on all these fronts at the same time.

Such distortions illustrate the unreliability of the figures reported in the Plunder Lists accompanying royal inscriptions. Thus, the number of Sea Peoples enumerated in Merenptah’s Plunder List should be used with the greatest of caution in the reconstruction of historical narratives. The data of the Plunder Lists, however, provides indirect clues that point to the absence of the Sea Peoples from the Western Desert battle. According to the lists, the weapons seized were bows, quivers, and arrows (weapons usually associated with the Libyans), as well as swords. The Karnak list includes 9,111 “copper (Hmt) swords of the Meshwesh” (a term that does not appear elsewhere in any text). The Heliopolis text lists 9,268 swords.49 Despite the small discrepancy of 57 items, it is reasonable to conclude that the two lists refer to the same plunder of swords. As the translation of the term Hmt as “copper” is certain,50 it is more likely that the Meshwesh copper swords mentioned in the lists belonged to the Libyans rather than to the Sea Peoples. In the Late Bronze Age—the date of this confrontation—it is reasonable to assume that the Sea Peoples used bronze swords, rather than copper, as gleaned from the archaeologically known weapons of the eastern Mediterranean peoples at the time.51 About thirty years later, the Libyans appear in relief scenes in Medinet Habu’s Rameses III Libyan war Year 11 brandishing long swords, an indication that they used “their” swords in battles without the participation of the Sea Peoples.52 Furthermore, the absence of spears or shields in the Plunder Lists indicates that the weapons of the Sea Peoples were not included in the plunder.53 On the other hand, as O’Connor has noted, the Sea Peoples may of course have used the Libyans’ weapons (Meshwesh swords, or arrows); however, there is no data elsewhere to support this.54

45 For a discussion of the figure of 9,376 casualties in the Merenptah Plunder Lists, see O’Connor, “The Nature of Tjemhu (Libyan) Society,” 41; Manassa, The Great Karnak Inscription, 59. 46 Schulman, “The Great Historical Inscription,” 22. 47 J. J. Janssen, “Eine Beuteliste von Amenophis II. und das Problem der Sklaverei im alten Ägypten,” JEOL 17 (1963), 141-147; E. Edel, “Die Stelen Amenophis’ II. aus Karnak und Memphis mit dem Bericht über die asiatischen Feldzüge des Königs,” ZDPV 69 (1953), 97-176, and ZDPV 70 (1954), 87; P. Der Manuelian, Studies in the Reign of Amenophis II (Hildesheim, 1987), 76 ff. 48 G.T. Martin, The Hidden Tombs of Memphis (London, 1991), 70-71. 49 Heliopolis text line 4; KRI IV, 38: 5. 50 Wb. 3, 99; Breasted, Ancient Records, 250; J.R. Harris,

Lexicographical Studies in Ancient Egyptian Minerals (Berlin, 1961), 50 and 55-56; Davies, Egyptian Historical Inscriptions, 165; RITA IV, 9; Spalinger, War in Ancient Egypt, 238. 51 Spalinger also doubts that the copper swords belonged to the Sea Peoples; see Spalinger, War in Ancient Egypt, 238; for swords in the Late Bronze Age, see Drews, The End of the Bronze Age, 192-208; N.K. Sandars, The Sea Peoples: Warriors of the Ancient Mediterranean (London, 1978), 72-77, and 91-110. 52 W.F. Edgerton and J.A. Wilson, Historical Records of Ramses III. The Texts in Medinet Habu 2 (Chicago, 1936), pls. 68, 70, 71, 72. 53 R. Stadelmann, “Seevölker,” in LÄ 5 (1975), 814-822; O’Connor, “The Nature of Tjemhu Society,” 56. 54 O’Connor, “The Nature of Tjemhu (Libyan) Society,” 56-57.

merenptah’s confrontations in the western desert and the delta One interpretation of the absence of the Sea Peoples’ weapons from the Plunder List of the Western Desert battle is that they did not carry weapons. However, there is no reasonable explanation for a large number of unarmed combatants to have joined the Libyans in the Western Desert. Another interpretation based on the possible historicity of line 12 of the Karnak text (discussed above) suggests that the Sea Peoples in the Plunder Lists may have been those captured or slain in the earlier Delta campaign and incorporated in the Plunder List of the Western Desert battle. The absence of their weapons indicates that they were unarmed or lightly armed squatters overtaken by Merenptah in the earlier campaign in the Delta. This argument echoes Drews’ conclusion that the Sea Peoples depicted in Medinet Habu in the campaign of Rameses III in Year 8 were “nomadic squatters or fugitive villagers.”55 Each of the above arguments may not be entirely conclusive by itself, but taken together, they allow us to derive a general impression of the role of the Libyans and Sea Peoples. The texts, in their totality, appear to have been written primarily in commemoration of a great victory over the Libyans in the Western Desert. This battle may have been preceded by minor confrontations, presumably in the Delta, with the Sea Peoples, who had come steadily to Egypt over a long period, from the time of Rameses II, although no battle with them is 55

Drews, “Medinet Habu,” 166. For the nature of the alliance of the Sea Peoples during the reign of Ramses III, see B. Cifola, “Ramses III and the Sea Peoples: A Structural Analysis of the Medinet Habu 56

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specifically mentioned in Merenptah’s texts. They were likely unarmed squatters roaming the Delta, as evidenced by the absence of their weapons from the Plunder Lists. Because they had traveled long distances and came from a variety of places, it is inconceivable that they, as a group of five loosely related peoples, had managed to unite, let alone with five additional Libyan tribes from far away with a different language and culture.56 The logistics of coordinating a coalition comprised of five groups from the eastern Mediterranean together with another five groups from Libya may not be a great challenge to present-day invaders, equipped with advanced electronic communications, but would seem to overtax the capacities of the people of the thirteenth century BC. In order to convey the impression of a larger battle with a multitude of enemies, the texts conflated the Libyan battle with the separate confrontations with the Sea Peoples. The texts thus serve to portray the king as the ultimate victor over both the Libyans and Sea Peoples depicted as numerous enemies (ten enemies, five components each of the Libyans and Sea Peoples) converging on Egypt as a manifestation of the Nine Bows. This ideological motif appears pictorially throughout the Egyptian history in the image of the pharaoh smiting a band of enemies of Egypt while holding them by the hair.

Inscriptions,” Orientalia 57 (1988), 275-306. Cifola concludes that the Sea Peoples cannot have represented a coherent force or body and that they were not united in a true alliance.

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a contemplation of the late period

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A CONTEMPLATION OF THE LATE PERIOD T.G.H. James The British Museum (emeritus)

When William Stevenson Smith’s The Art and Architecture of Ancient Egypt was published in 1958, I complained in a review that the author had devoted such a small part of his book to the Late Period. Of the 254 pages of his main text, 24 only were devoted to this period, in which he included everything after the end of the 20th Dynasty; further, as a generous part of those 24 pages considered Kushite and Meroitic art, it needs no special argument to convince that in that otherwise most admirable book, the last 700 years of Egyptian art got rather short shrift. It provides an indication of how recently have the interest in and appreciation of the art of the Late Period developed. In 1958 most Egyptologists tended to concentrate interest in the art of earlier periods of Egyptian history, and believed that after the early 20th Dynasty it was downhill all the way. A handful of well-known pieces of sculpture might have been invoked—Mentuemhat, perhaps, and the Berlin green head. My own negative attitude to the last dynasties was most surely modified by the annual visits to the British Museum by Bernard Bothmer. I cannot remember precisely when they began, but the pattern was well established by the mid-1950s; then, year after year the galleries and reserves of the museum were ransacked for late sculptures. My own view of Late Period sculpture was modified, and I am sure that my criticism of Bill Smith’s treatment of this period was based on a heightened understanding that the later dynasties had more to offer than was generally believed. Fuller understanding came with the Brooklyn Museum exhibition in 1960-61, “Egyptian Sculpture of the Late Period.” In a review of the exhibition catalogue, I drew attention to the period covered by the exhibition, 700 BC to AD 100, and noted that this was a definition of the Late Period that some Egyptologists might wish to contest. I remain somewhat troubled by the chronological definition of the Late Period. It has, I suspect, always been something of an elastic term. Bill Smith included everything

from the end of the 20th Dynasty down to the conquest of Alexander in 332 BC, incorporating what is now commonly called the Third Intermediate Period—a term I am given to dislike. So there seems to be the possibility of including within the Late Period the whole stretch of time from the beginning of the 21st Dynasty down to the end of the first century AD, well over a millennium. Let us, therefore, for this paper, think of it as a somewhat flexible term; perhaps not so flexible as to stretch from about 1070 BC down to about AD 100, but encompassing at least the 25th to 30th Dynasties. The period may seem to consist of four parts which in general correspond with dynastic divisions: 1. The Kushite 25th Dynasty. 2. The 26th Dynasty with native Egyptian kings. 3. The Persian 27th Dynasty. 4. The final native dynasties, 28th to 30th, followed by a brief second Persian domination, abruptly concluded by the arrival of Alexander the Great. These divisions do not represent a time of regular progression in the political sense. Yet in very general terms, Egypt operated throughout the period as a single political entity. When Egypt was united politically, it maintained cultural and artistic standards that allowed the production of work that may be characterized as being Egyptian in the best sense. From the artistic point of view, this aspect of Egypt in the Late Period has often been ascribed to archaizing, to a conscious return to ancient forms, stimulated perhaps by a desire to find inspiration in the past. It is worth considering how the undulating course of Egyptian history, with its attendant cultural developments, displays an often-interrupted but surprisingly regular advance from the primitive to the developed. The thread that keeps the sequence on a proper path is one that remains to be satisfactorily analyzed and explained; it may be called Egyptianism—the quality of being Egyp-

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tian. How tiresome it is to be told that Egyptian art looks the same whether it is of the Old Kingdom or of the Ptolemaic Period! One does not need much knowledge and perception to be able to distinguish between, shall we say, a relief in a mastaba at Saqqara and a relief in the temple of Edfu, a funerary sculpture of the 18th Dynasty and a votive piece of the Late Period. Nevertheless, we may all recognize the quality of being Egyptian that characterizes most things Egyptian, which in sculptural terms is not just a matter of the canon or of an undefined quality to be discerned in a face or an attitude. In considering what happened in Egypt to spark off the extraordinary flowering of the socalled renaissance in the 25th and 26th Dynasties, it may be profitable to glance briefly at earlier times when comparable revivals took place, in particular the periods of reunification of Upper and Lower Egypt after the First and Second Intermediate Periods. On both occasions, the process of reunification seems to have been accompanied by a return to normality of life in all its aspects, which apparently required little conscious effort on the part of the ruling houses. It is as if the people of Egypt, from Elephantine to the Delta, were all standing in the wings waiting to resume a way of life that had been suppressed in the meanwhile. Egyptianism bounces back. There is still much to learn about what actually happened in Egypt, both in the important political centers and in the countryside, during the two early Intermediate Periods. For the First Intermediate Period there are some documents, including tomb texts, which suggest that the times were hard throughout the land. A few literary texts reinforce this impression, and there is further evidence from religious texts and practices that a kind of turmoil had overtaken Egypt. Yet much of what was best of the past had been kept alive, so that from the moment of reunification in the reign of Nebhepetre Mentuhotep, political institutions were quickly made normal—in strict Egyptian terms—and, for example, royal reliefs began to be executed in the fine style and with a competence of craftsmanship that could be associated not with the Theban region of the Old Kingdom, but with Memphis. How was it done? We do not know. Equally we do not know how things returned to normal after the upsetting events of the Second Intermediate Period. There are interesting texts that tell something of the political moves that enabled the Theban rulers to re-establish control

over the whole country. Again it would seem that a central administration was able to organize itself and secure a stability and confidence that enabled life in all its Egyptian richness to be reconstituted throughout the land. Again, however, a severe lack of good evidence prevents a proper estimation to be made of what precisely happened in the towns and villages of Egypt. By good evidence, I here mean in particular written evidence. We may rightly admire the burning compulsion of the ancient Egyptians to put things down in writing on papyrus, and ostraca, but it is a sad fact that for many periods of Egyptian history, the surviving bodies of written secular material are woefully small. When texts survive in quantity from a single site, we are properly excited and tend to over-interpret their contents, as from Kahun for the late 12th and early 13th Dynasties, or Deir el-Medina for Thebes in the New Kingdom. Such texts tell us much about very specialized communities that were in no way typical of Egyptian communities in general. The almost complete absence of non-religious, nonliterary, non-monumental texts for the early 12th and the early 18th Dynasties prevents the student of Egyptian history and culture from obtaining more than a very superficial idea of how ordinary Egyptians managed their daily lives. But there is enough evidence of other kinds to establish that those two periods were times of great cultural efflorescence. With these examples, even precedents, in mind, let us turn to the 25th Dynasty and to its preceding period, the 300 years known as the Late New Kingdom, or the Third Intermediate Period. Strict parallels cannot be drawn between the usurpation of the Egyptian dual kingship by rulers from Kush and the domestic Egyptian movements that led to the establishment of the Middle and New Kingdoms. But some strikingly similar elements may be detected in the later and earlier movements. The progression of events preceding the confirmation of Kushite supremacy in Egypt cannot be represented as a clean-cut sequence. The start of the so-called Third Intermediate Period, set conventionally at the beginning of the 21st Dynasty in about 1070 BC, is marked by no general deterioration in the internal circumstances in Egypt. It is true that power was effectively divided between the royal line, with its new capital in Tanis in the northeastern Delta, and the High Priests of Amun, established at Thebes. This situation was not new; Thebes had not significantly been capital

a contemplation of the late period of Egypt for hundreds of years. From early in the 19th Dynasty, the Delta Residence of Piramesse had been the royal seat, and the principal center of administration had been Memphis. Thebes remained the most important religious center of Egypt, and along with most of Upper Egypt operated virtually as an independent state. Yet the royal status of the Tanite rulers was recognized within the Theban principality and remained so for much of the subsequent period down to the time of the Kushite conquest, and even thereafter. The Theban administration was dominated at first by the High Priest of Amun, and later by the remarkable figure of the God’s Wife of Amun with her adopted daughter and “crown-princess” the Adorer of the God, supported by a civil administration of almost hereditary character. The kings of the 22nd and 23rd Dynasties stemming from Bubastis, but of ultimate Libyan origin, continued the dual nature of control in Egypt down to the time of King Osorkon III towards the end of the ninth century BC. The dynastic feuds, which included disputes involving the appointments of High Priests of Amun at Thebes, led to a virtual disintegration of political cohesion in northern Upper Egypt and the Delta. In a sense, Egypt had finally relapsed into an Intermediate Period state of affairs with an archaic character, and not entirely dissimilar to that which obtained, at least in the Delta, during the Second Intermediate Period. The intervention of the Kushite kings from the middle of the eighth century BC should have ended this confused political situation; but matters did not turn out as neatly as might have been the case if the intervention had been led by a native Egyptian with a determination to become King of Upper and Lower Egypt. No serious effort seems to have been made by the Kushite kings to secure a proper reunification of the whole of Egypt. In fact they behaved politically with a strange naïveté, failing to understand that unity in Egypt could not be simply a titular matter. In spite of the overall weakness of political control throughout the 25th Dynasty, its rulers and their officers and agents, most of whom were undoubtedly Egyptian, not Nubian, succeeded in stimulating a cultural shift in Thebes and the Memphite region, which expressed itself in many ways. New building was encouraged; religious institutions and purposes were fostered; there was a remarkable revival in private-tomb construction, especially for senior officials. There

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was also a significant advance in scribal activity, which was marked in particular by the proliferation of legal documents, notable from the time of the reign of Shabaqo. It was to take an even more significant step forward from the time of the early 26th Dynasty, when the distinctive demotic script began to be used in Lower Egypt. It is difficult to account satisfactorily for much of what resulted from this cultural shift. Temple buildings are easily explained; the concern shown by Shabaqo for the preservation of the ancient text known as the Memphite Theology, by having it transcribed on a great basalt slab, may indicate true royal piety; it may, however, have been a more calculated political act. Nevertheless some concatenation of circumstances produced, with the right stimulus, the remarkable renaissance—it is scarcely improper in this case to use this heavily loaded word—in the late eighth and seventh centuries BC. Let us consider sculpture as a relatively concrete field in which to test ideas of new purpose, renaissance, general stimulation. It becomes clear from the outset that we may be treading on very shaky ground. Who may have gone into the sculptors’ workshops and announced the arrival of a new age? Did Harwa or Mentuemhat issue specific instructions to craftsmen to produce series of personal pieces in very different styles? “Let some of them be rather conservative.” “Use different kinds of stone.” “Try your hand at something new and special.” “See what you can do to breathe new life into some of the old, admired, forms of the past.” We may further ask: how did Egyptian sculptors know about good early pieces, worthy of copying and adapting? It is known that tombs of the Old and Middle Kingdoms in particular were selectively examined and used to provide exemplars for reliefs in Late Period burials. The best straight plagiarism—if that is the right word, rather than pious reproduction—is shown by the scenes in the tomb of Ibi in the Theban necropolis (no. 36), where the source of much of the decoration is the tomb of Ibi of the early 6th Dynasty at Deir-elGabrawi. Here the intention to invoke something from the past is wholly explicable. Still we have little idea of how precisely it was carried out. Ancient Egyptian craftsmen could work artistic miracles in stone, producing conventional forms, variants on well-established forms, and remarkable and unparalleled new inspirations. But nothing much would have been done without orders and directions. It seems unlikely that an ancient

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carver in stone would have sat down and conceived and carved a fine piece unless someone had told him to do so. I do not suggest by this comment that the ancient craftsman was devoid of artistic purpose, sensibility, and even initiative. No good, well-trained, run-of-the-mill carver could have made pieces that so strikingly demonstrate the artistic feeling and loving care in execution that transcend simple, but good, craftsmanship. A very good sculpture, however, is not invariably a masterpiece. Nevertheless, like the great earlier periods, which produced undoubted masterpieces, the Late Period can be credited with many outstanding works that give the lie to the belief that it was a time just of pastiche and derivative work. My intention in this paper has been to suggest reasons why Egypt, in its last great period of essentially domestic rule, did succeed in retrieving much of its ancient purpose and consequent achievement. The thread runs right through from the 25th Dynasty, by way of the stable, although often politically inept, 26th Dynasty, to the foreign-dominated time of the 27th Dynasty, to the last years of native rule. The changes that took place in Egypt subsequent to Alexander’s conquest are much more clearly distinguishable in artistic, cultural, and political terms, than those of the Late Period. They are entirely understandable in the context of the radical change in the kind of royal house that had then assumed authority. The Macedonian Greeks were firmly established in Egypt. They had nowhere else to retire to, and in consequence had every reason to settle down and make the best of life in Egypt on their own Hellenizing terms. To the contrary, the Kushites soon enough withdrew to their heartland when the going became tough in the land they had chosen to rule over. Similarly the Persians, whose base was far from Egypt, never attempted to make Egypt more than a satellite satrapy of their empire. The absence of cultural domination by an external power before the Ptolemaic Period allowed Egypt to enjoy and promote within its indigenous population the spirit of Egyptianism which I have already mentioned. There were, of course, many areas of life that became affected by foreign influences. The introduction of new ideas from abroad was nothing new for Egypt, especially in matters technological. But the immigration of foreigners of different nationalities and races had much intensified from the seventh century onwards. Foreign enclaves— almost true colonies—were established throughout

Egypt, particularly in the Delta, but even as far south as Elephantine. The city of Memphis was probably as cosmopolitan a place as could be found anywhere in the ancient world before the foundation of Alexandria. There is not a great deal of evidence to show how welcoming the indigenous inhabitants of Egypt were to the arrival of foreigners. Egypt has always shown itself to be accommodating to individual foreigners. Integration for small numbers was always possible; but the satisfactory and acceptable movement was always towards the Egyptianizing of the foreigner, to absorption rather than to the continuance of a non-Egyptian identity. As the Late Period advanced, however, the scale of immigration outpaced the capacity to assimilate. It was in a place like Memphis, the largest metropolitan district in Egypt, that tensions were greatest. But again, it was in places like Memphis that the presence of foreign communities not only brought new influences to Egyptian life and culture, but also stimulated what might now be described as cultural backlash. Egyptianism needed to be maintained and sustained in spite of relentless pressures from external influences. Positive steps were needed to perpetuate, as far as possible, things Egyptian in all areas. One form taken by this desire to extend the Egyptian past into an uncertain future was the demonstration of family tradition and history by the placing of genealogies on votive statues and other inscribed objects. It may also account for the development of animal cults and the accompanying practice of animal mummification. The last was particularly Egyptian. In the distressing time of Persian occupation, some comfort could be found in parading Egyptianism; it had been displayed culturally in abundant manner during the 26th Dynasty, and the practices of craftsmanship and artistic skills developed during that exceptionally lively period were still in good shape for further exploitation when sadder times arrived. The return to earlier forms, especially in sculpture, was a characteristic of Egyptianism from early times. Any national setback was countered by a searching for a kind of cultural security in conservatism and in wellestablished forms. The retrospective tendency of the Late Period was one aspect only of the vigorous cultural drive of the times. Even more striking were the technical skills of the craftsmen of the period. Nothing seemed to be too difficult; no form too complicated; no stone too hard; no

a contemplation of the late period detail too fine for expression in an intransigent medium. This paper has become, as its title suggests, a contemplation on the Late Period. Much remains to be done on its study. Demotic scholars have already accomplished wonders in deepening our understanding of the period. Art historically, the pioneering work of Bernard Bothmer made

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Egyptologists aware of the importance and high achievement of the period. Among his students none has more seriously advanced his work than Jack Josephson, who even in Bothmer’s lifetime had the temerity and confidence to question the conclusions of the master. His independence of spirit and true connoisseurship continue most admirably the good work.

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the offering table of the king’s mother nefret (mma 22.1.21)

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“HE IS THE SON OF A WOMAN OF TASETY . . .”  THE OFFERING TABLE OF THE KING’S MOTHER NEFRET MMA 22.1.21 Peter Jánosi Institute of Egyptology, University of Vienna Neferti, the fictitious sage living under King Snefru, not only predicted the advent of a successful ruler—Amenemhat I—who would restore peace and order in the land, but also openly admitted the king’s humble origin. Without mentioning her name, Neferti simply stated that the king’s mother was a woman from the first Upper Egyptian nome (tA-sty).1 Historians are in general agreement concerning Amenemhat I’s descent from that part of Egypt as well his plebeian origin.2 While no contemporary monuments referencing Amenemhat I’s father have survived, the mother, Nefret, is recorded on an offering table discovered in the pyramid precinct of her son at Lisht-North (figs. 1, 2).3 Despite the recognition by archaeologists4 of its historical implications and repeated mention in scholarly literature since its discovery,5 the

object has never received the proper discussion it deserves. It is my great pleasure to dedicate this essay on the offering table to Jack A. Josephson in appreciation for his tremendous connoisseurship in Egyptian art and his abiding friendship. The offering table was found in secondary position in one of the houses of the later settlement period (Second Intermediate Period or New Kingdom) at the southwest corner of Amenemhat I’s pyramid.6 Because of the altar’s later reuse, the surface shows considerable wear in certain parts. The upper-left corner is lost, and on the left side, heavy abrasion obscures the line of text. Numerous holes and grooves in the limestone indicate that the piece was exposed to water or was used for holding liquids for a considerable period of time. The overall current condition of the object is

1 W. Helck, Die Prophezeihung des Nfr.tj (Wiesbaden, 1970), 49, XIIIb; W. K. Simpson, ed., The Literature of Ancient Egypt (New Haven and London, 1972), 239. The text goes on to say of Amenemhat I that “he is a child of Khen-Nekhen” (i.e., Upper Egypt). Consequently, a supposed Nubian origin, absent the king’s mummy, remains doubtful, since neither the peculiar facial features noted in Amenemhat I’s reliefs—see H. Junker, “The First Appearance of the Negroes in History,” JEA 7 (1921), 124 n. 2—nor his mother’s origin necessarily allow us to infer African roots. See G. Posener, Littérature et politique dans l’Égypte de la XIIe dynastie (Paris, 1956), 47f.; T. Säve-Söderbergh, Ägypten und Nubien: Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte altägyptischer Aussenpolitik (Lund, 1941), 64; L.M. Berman, Amenemhat I (PhD diss., Yale University, 1985), 10. 2 As the king’s father, a “God’s Father” (jtj nTr) Senwosret is postulated, of whom nothing is known. His name and title appear after those of Kings Mentuhotep-Nebhepetre and Mentuhotep-Seankhkare in an incomplete list dating to the time of Amenhotep I. See H. Chevrier, “Rapport sur les travaux de Karnak (1937-1938),” ASAE 38 (1938), 601, pl. 4; L. Habachi, “God’s Fathers and the Role They Played in the History of the First Intermediate Period,” ASAE 55 (1958), 185-190; E. Blumenthal, “Die ‘Gottesväter’ des Alten und Mittleren Reiches,” ZÄS 114 (1987), 22f. Neferti also does not mention the father’s name, simply calling the king “the son of a [distinguished] man” and thereby cleverly disguising the father’s status and origin. See Posener, Littérature, 49f.; E. Blumenthal, Untersuchungen zum ägyptischen Königtum des Mittleren Reiches I, Die Phraseologie (Berlin, 1970), 151 (D 1. 10); Blumenthal, “Die Prophezeihung des Neferti,” ZÄS 109 (1982), 11 n. 89. 3 I thank Dr. Dorothea Arnold, Lila Acheson Wallace Chairman, Department of Egyptian Art of The Metropolitan

Museum of Art, New York, for very kindly giving me permission to publish this piece and to make extensive use of the Department’s archive. My thanks are also due to Liza Majerus, who skillfully prepared the line drawing (fig. 2), and Bill Garret, for his professionally produced photographs (figs. 1, 3-4). For corrections of the English text, I am indebted to Elizabeth Powers. 4 A.C. Mace, “Excavations at Lisht,” BMMA 17, no. 12 (Dec. 1922), pt. II, 12, fig. 11. 5 PM IV, 1934, 81; W. K. Simpson, The Pyramid of Amenem-het I at Lisht: The Twelfth Dynasty Pyramid Complex and Mastabehs (PhD diss., Yale University, 1954), 91f., pl. 56c; W.C. Hayes, The Scepter of Egypt, Part I: From the Earliest Times to the End of the Old Kingdom (New York, 1990), 177; Berman, Amenemhat I, 11; H. G. Fischer, “Some Early Monuments from Busiris in the Egyptian Delta,” MMJ 11 (1976), 14 n. 43; D. Franke, Das Heiligtum des Heqaib, SAGA 9 (1994), 8 n. 1; S. Roth, Die Königsmütter des Alten Ägypten von der Frühzeit bis zum Ende der 12. Dynastie, ÄUAT 46 (2001), 218-220, 432, fig. 99. 6 This was during the Museum’s last (7th) season at LishtNorth (1921-22). See Mace, “Excavations at Lisht,” 4-18. The exact findspot of the piece was not recorded, and the tomb cards reveal only “radim, S.W. corner of Pyramid.” The archaeological map of that area shows a dense cluster of small mud-brick buildings and compounds completely covering the area between the pyramid’s southwest corner and the mastaba of Rehuerdjersen. As to the houses and different settlement layers at the pyramid site, see F. Arnold, “Settlement Remains at Lisht-North,” in House and Palace in Ancient Egypt, ed. M. Bietak, International Symposium in Cairo, April 8. to 11. 1992, Untersuchungen der Zweigstelle Kairo des Österreichischen Archäologischen Institutes 14 (Vienna, 1996), 13-21.

Fig. 1. The offering table of the King’s Mother Nefret (MMA 22.1.21)(Photo: Bill Garret).

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Fig. 2. The offering table of the King’s Mother Nefret (MMA 22.1.21) (Drawing: Liza Majerus).

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fair, but enough remains to appreciate its original appearance (figs. 1-2). The shape of the offering table—a rectangular block with four tanks and a spout on one side— conforms to a characteristic type of altar widely known during the Middle Kingdom.7 The piece was made of fine limestone and measures 48 x 39.5 cm. The thickness varies between 7.5 and 8.2 cm. The 8-cm-wide spout protrudes for 7.5 cm. The sides of the altar are not straight but slant inward, and their crudely dressed surfaces indicate a later workmanship. The underside shows a projection of 39 x 35 cm, which was originally at least 2 cm high and most likely fitted into a corresponding groove of a base. While the surface of the surrounding ledge has been carefully smoothed, the irregular workmanship of the projection’s surface suggests later reuse, probably when the block was installed in one of the settlement houses. Faint traces, still visible in some parts of the better-preserved surface area, show that the offering table, or at least its upper side, was once painted red8—most probably to imitate red granite. The upper side of the altar shows a symmetrical pattern consisting of four tanks of varying sizes and depths. While two tanks arranged in the middle are connected by a channel leading through the spout, the two tanks at both sides have no connection with the other. The panel at the top shows a loaf of bread carved in low relief. The peculiar form of the bread, with its corners connected to the text panel above, thus enclosing two half-moon-shaped depressions within, is

encountered on only a few altars of that period.9 Although badly eroded, the surface of the bread still shows traces of its former decoration in low relief: an offering table with short and stylized reeds arranged symmetrically (figs. 2-3).10 Below the table, the heads of a fowl and an ox are shown, conforming to the old pattern of this genre.11 Above the reeds are depicted a goose and the foreleg of an ox. Filling the space to the left are the faint outlines of a piece of meat or ribs. As is characteristic of many Middle Kingdom offering tables,12 a narrow text panel forms a frame around the edges of this altar and contains the offering formula for the benefit of the king’s mother. The text, in symmetrically arranged sunken hieroglyphs, starts in the center opposite the spout. The inscription gives the conventional offering formula addressed to Osiris (left) and Anubis (right).13 Despite the similarities of the two sides, a few details in the text call for further scrutiny.

7 As to this form, see R. Hölzl, Ägyptische Opfertafeln und Kultbecken: Eine Form- und Funktionsanalyse für das Alte, Mittlere und Neue Reich, HÄB 45 (2002), 16, 24 (Old Kingdom: „Typ B+C, Varianten“), 27-30, 34-37 (Middle Kingdom: „Typ B+C“), 71-73. Concerning the date of appearance of altars with spouts already at the end of the Old Kingdom, see the review remarks by K. Martin in JEA 91 (2005), 217. 8 According to the “Metropolitan Museum of Art Objects Conservation Department and Research Laboratory Examination and Treatment Report” by C. Cleveland, from March 1982, the pigment found was of “red and brown earth color.” 9 For example: BM EA 990, CG 23067, CG 23068, Hölzl, Opfertafeln, 36; A. Bey Kamal, Tables d’offrandes 1, Catalogue général des antiquités égyptiennes du Musée du Caire, nos. 23001-23256 (Cairo, 1909), 57f. 10 This form of stylized representation is known from the 5th Dynasty onward, L. Klebs, Die Reliefs des Alten Reiches (2980-2475 v. Chr.): Materialien zur ägyptischen Kulturgeschichte (Heidelberg, 1915), 131-134; Ch. E. Worsham, “A Reinterpretation of the So-called Bread Loaves in Egyptian Offering Scenes,” JARCE 16 (1979), 7-10, M. Bárta, “Archaeology and Iconography: bDA and aprt bread moulds

and ‘Speisetischszene’ development in the Old Kingdom,” SAK 22 (1995), 21-35. 11 Klebs, Reliefs, 128-132; P. Der Manuelian, Slab Stelae of the Giza Necropolis (New Haven and Philadelphia, 2003), 147-153, 227-236. The depiction of offering tables on the bread sign of Middle Kingdom altars is rare and in most cases omits the loaves of bread; see CG 23007 (MentuhotepNebhepetre, Karnak), Karlsruhe Museum H416 (late 11thearly 12th Dynasty, provenance unknown), and CG 23.016 (12th Dynasty, provenance unknown). Even rarer are the cases with the deceased sitting next to the offering table, usually seen on the panels of false doors; see M. Mostafa, “Eine Opfertafel aus dem Museum Leiden,” GM 69 (1983), 63-67. 12 Hölzl, Opfertafeln, 81f. 13 The text will be be dealt with by James P. Allen in his forthcoming volume II of the Funerary Texts from Lisht. I thank Dr. Allen for kindly sharing his information concerning this object with me and, in particular, pointing out D. Franke’s recent article on the offering formula, “The Middle Kingdom Offering Formulas—A Challenge,” JEA 89 (2003), 39-57.

Text right: Htp dj nswt Inpw tpy Dw=f jmj wt nb tA Dsr dj=f Hnot t snTr n jrj pat.t mwt-nswt Nfrt mAa-xrw Text left: Htp dj nswt Wsir nb ©dw [prt-xrw] Apdw kAw [Ssr?] mnxt xt nb[.t] n jrj pat.t mwt-nswt Nfrt mAa-xrw nb.t jmAx Text right: “An offering which the king has given and Anubis, he who is on his mountain, he who is in the mummy-wrappings, lord of the Sacred Land: may he give beer, bread, and incense to the

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Fig. 3. Detail of the offering table (MMA 22.1.21) showing the interior design of the bread loaf (Photo: Bill Garret).

Hereditary Princess, the King’s Mother Nefret, justified.” Text left: “An offering which the king has given and Osiris, lord of Busiris: [an invocation offering consisting of] fowl, cattle, [linen] and clothing, all good things to the King’s Mother Nefret, justified, the possessor of honor.” Despite the worn condition of the altar’s surface, a close inspection of the signs reveals that the text displays excellent craftsmanship. The interior design of some signs shows detailed carving and delicate treatment of the outlines (figs. 2, 4a-b). It is clear that the artist who accomplished this work was well aware of the owner’s status, which is also exemplified in the determinative of Nefret’s name. The image of the seated woman is adorned with

the vulture headdress. This particular headgear, exemplifying the status of the owner as the mother of a king, is attested since the 4th Dynasty.14 Apart from the fine workmanship, the text displays another remarkable feature that concerns the orientation of some of the signs within the text. Arranged symmetrically and conforming to the usual pattern of texts on Middle Kingdom altars, and in keeping with the logic of reading the text, the signs for the most part face toward the center. In the right panel and in the panels on either side of the spout, however, some curious reversals occur.15 In the line to the right of the spout (fig. 4a), in which the signs are oriented to the right, the second word “mother” (mwt) faces in the wrong direction, i.e., toward the owner’s name. Thus, the

14 Mycerinus’ mother, Khamerernebti I, is the first royal woman exhibiting this garment. See Roth, Königsmütter, 86, 279-83. 15 On the problem of the orientation of texts near the

spout on Middle Kingdom altars, see H. G. Fischer, L’écriture et l’art de l’Égypte ancienne: Quatre leçons sur la paléographie et l’épigraphie pharaonique, Essais et Conférences, Collège de France (Paris, 1986), 121-124.


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b Fig. 4a-b. Details of the inscription on the offering table (MMA 22.1.21) (Photo: Bill Garret).

expression “the king’s mother” (mwt-nswt) was divided, allowing a disproportionate gap between the two words. As there is no obvious reason for this separation of Nefret’s most important title, it seems likely that the artist tried to maintain the symmetry of the left side (fig. 4b), where the word for mother is at the bottom of the vertical panel. It faces the beginning of the horizontal line that starts with the mother’s name. Thus, the words face each other because of the corner. Another reversal occurs at the end of both horizontal lines: the sickle-sign (mA, Gardiner Sign List U1) faces in each case in the wrong direction.

This form of reversal can be traced back into the Old Kingdom16 and was probably a simple and common error by the artists due to the ambiguous form of the sign.17 The text in the right vertical panel exhibits a more serious reversal based on an actual error. As can be gathered from the orientation of the signs nTr, s, and T, the word for “incense” (snTr)18 is reversed and faces the opposite direction for no apparent reason. A probable explanation might be found in the expression above it. In the dj=f Hnot phrase, the two commodities usually mentioned in a fixed arrangement are bread and beer (t and

16 See H. G. Fischer, “Rechts und Links,” in LÄ 5, 189; Fischer, Varia Nova, Egyptian Studies III (New York, 1996), 33. 17 It could also be argued that the artist, following the arrangement of signs in the left-hand panel, simply copied

the wrong orientation of the sign on the right side. 18 The writing of snTr with the folded cloth (Gardiner Sign List S 29) is rare in the Middle Kingdom, but does occur occasionally. The sign commonly used in that period is the two-barbed spear head (sn, Gardiner Sign List T 22).

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Hnot). Probably due to their small size and similar shapes, the two signs were interchanged,19 and the artist—accustomed to the “normal” orientation of Egyptian writing—followed this arrangement by continuing to write the signs facing to the right. Only at the bottom of the line did he realize his mistake and give the a-sign (Gardiner Sign List D 36) the correct orientation. Since the altar’s discovery, it has been correctly concluded that its inscription must refer to the mother of Amenemhat I, thus corroborating her common origin as “predicted” by Neferti’s prophecy.20 The two titles “Princess” (sA.t nswt) and “King’s Wife” (Hm.t nswt) are missing, an omission that cannot be explained by a simple mistake on the artist’s part; an offering table was a too-important item for the afterlife. Apart from “King’s Mother,” the inscription records only the title jrj pat.t. Signifying a certain rank within the Egyptian hierarchy, jrj pat.t has no bearing on the origin of the owner, since the title—usually translated as “hereditary princess” or “noblewoman”—was bestowed upon queens, princesses, and non-royal ladies alike.21 Strange as it may seem, Nefret’s situation was not unique in Egyptian history. A number of royal women were commoners on entering the royal household and becoming queens.22 More unusual is the fact that Nefret was obviously not married to a king, thus clearly making Amenemhat I an “outsider” with no hereditary rights to the throne. Being affiliated with the 11th Dynasty only through office,23 Amenemhat I from the beginning was forced to

build up his claim to the throne and secure his new dynasty through more practical methods.24 Nefret’s offering table not only provides a glimpse into a period lacking in historical records, but also offers some insight into burial customs of the time. It testifies to the fact that, within Amenemhat I’s royal precinct, a tomb, or at least a place of veneration of the king’s mother, has to be looked for. Under normal circumstances, i.e., during uninterrupted successions within a dynasty, kings’ mothers were usually buried near their royal husbands.25 Since there was no royal husband in Nefret’s case, her son must have felt it necessary to have her buried near his tomb rather than in a remote location (as far as Elephantine ?) not in accord with her status.26 Thus far no tomb structures—pyramids, mastabas, or shafts— have been found or positively identified as belonging to Amenemhat I’s female entourage at Lisht-North. In fact, the king’s pyramid complex is so unique in many respects that it is hazardous to rely on Old Kingdom concepts in searching for the burials of the female members.27 Generally, it has been assumed that the double row of 22 shafts flanking the western side of the royal pyramid were the tombs of princesses and their households.28 Alas, this identification rests on feeble ground. The only object providing support for this assumption is the upper part of a weight made of red granite displaying the title and name of a “Princess Nefru[-sheri?],” which was found in the debris near those shafts.29 No remains of any architecture related to the shafts

19 This “mistake” was not uncommon with similar groups of signs, as H. G. Fischer has pointed out, The Orientation of Hieroglyphs, Egyptian Studies II, Part I: Reversals (New York, 1977), 112. 20 Mace, “Excavations at Lisht,” 12; Hayes, Scepter I, 177; Berman, Amenemhat I, 11. 21 Roth, Königsmütter, 204f. 22 The mothers of Amenemhat I’s predecessors, Mentuhotep II and Mentuhotep IV, are known only as “king’s mothers,” albeit one has to bear in mind that our records of those persons are as scanty as those from the beginning of the 12th Dynasty; see Roth, Königsmütter, 426, 432. 23 It is generally assumed that the founder of the 12th Dynasty was identical with the vizier of the last ruler, Mentuhotep IV, of the previous dynasty. See D. Franke, “Amenemhet I,” in The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt 1, ed. D. B. Redford (Oxford, 2001), 68. 24 Strictly speaking, this holds true already for the 11th (“Theban”) Dynasty whose founder, King Intef I, assumed the royal titulary without any hereditary or mythical background. Even some of the most celebrated periods of the Old Kingdom have obscure origins, thus rendering as fictional myth at best the idea of the “ideal” succession in Egyptian kingship.

25 R. Stadelmann, “Königinnengrab und Pyramidenbezirk im Alten Reich,” ASAE 71 (1987), 251-260; P. Jánosi, “The Queens of the Old Kingdom and Their Tombs,” BACE 3 (1992), 51-57; Jánosi, Die Pyramidenanlagen der Königinnen. Untersuchungen zu einem Grabtyp des Alten und Mittleren Reiches (Vienna, 1996), 72-76; Roth, Königsmütter, 315-320, 372. 26 Considering the king’s long reign of thirty years, it is not impossible, but probably unlikely, that Nefret was still alive when Amenemhat I started building his pyramid complex at Lisht-North. 27 A. Dodson, “The Tombs of Queens of the Middle Kingdom,” ZÄS 115 (1988), 126-130; cf. Jánosi, Pyramidenanlagen, 52-54. On the many private tombs within the king’s pyramid precinct, see Dieter Arnold, Middle Kingdom Tomb Architecture at Lisht, PMMA 28 (New York, 2007), 63-88. 28 A.C. Mace, “Excavations at Lisht,” BMMA 16, no. 11 (Nov. 1921), pt. II, 4-19, 15f., fig. 8; Mace, BMMA 17, 12; Hayes, Scepter I, 177; Simpson, Amen-em-hat I, 83-94. 29 MMA 22.1.785 (measurements: 5[+x] x 5.9 x 0.3 cm). The exact findspot was not recorded. Mace, BMMA 17, 1922, 1, states only that the object was “found loose in the debris above.” Hayes seems to have been misled by the uncertain reading of the weight’s inscription and erroneously stated


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were detected at the time of discovery, and the re-investigation of three of them by The Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1991 did not provide further evidence of their original use.30

In summation, the tomb of Amenemhat I’s mother, as well as that of his wife,31 must be considered as not yet discovered or identified and offer a goal for future research at Lisht-North.

that there were two stones, coming from different pits, both bearing the name of Neferu. See Scepter I, 176f. Two more fragments with inscriptions found in the precinct—one belonging to an offering stand, the other a re-carved relief— provide queens’ titles (both are unpublished). 30 Some of them were obviously reused during the 13th

Dynasty (personal communication, Dieter Arnold). See J. Leclant and G. Clerc, “Fouilles et Travaux,” Or 62 (1993), 212f. 31 Neferitatjenenet (?), according to an inscription of a statue formerly housed in the Louvre, is believed to have been Senwosret I’s mother. Roth, Königsmütter, 220-224.

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theban tomb 46 and its owner, ramose

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THEBAN TOMB 46 AND ITS OWNER, RAMOSE1 Nozomu Kawai Waseda University, Tokyo

I. Debate on the Date of TT46 In the Topographical Bibliography, TT46 is described as the tomb of Ramose, dating to “the time of Amenhotep III (?).”2 This was first recorded by John Gardiner Wilkinson,3 and his manuscript is the most comprehensive document concerning this tomb. Later, Alan Gardiner4 and Arthur Weigall visited TT46 and dated it to the time of Amenhotep III with a query.5 Porter and Moss supported this.6 Wolfgang Helck dated the tomb to the early part of the reign of Amenhotep IV, and he noted some of Ramose’s titles in his Urkunden.7 In Norman de Garis Davies’s unpublished manuscript, he dated TT46 to the time somewhere between Amenhotep III and Amenhotep IV.8 The reason for this dating was that Ramose held titles associated with both the cults of Amun and Aten at the same time.9 In 1979, Erhart Graefe discussed the title containing the reference to the mansion of the Aten, and also studied Wilkinson’s manuscript and the titles attributed to Ramose by Helck and Porter and Moss.10 Graefe refrained from speculating about the date of the tomb, but was inclined to 1 A version of this paper was originally read at the Annual Meeting of the American Research Center in Egypt in Baltimore in 2001. I would especially like to express deep gratitude to former Secretary General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, Prof. Dr. Gaballa Ali Gaballa, for granting me permission to work at Theban Tomb 46. I am grateful to Professors Betsy M. Bryan and Richard Jasnow for their invaluable suggestions. I am also indebted to Dr. W. Raymond Johnson, Dr. Briant Bohleke, Dr. Richard Fazzini, and Dr. Jacobus van Dijk for providing me invaluable information. Finally, I would like to acknowledge the American Research Center in Egypt for my research grant-in-aid by the Samuel H. Kress Fellowship in Egyptian Art and Architecture. I wish to dedicate this article to honor Jack Josephson, who has always encouraged my study in Egyptology since I was a graduate student at the Johns Hopkins University. 2 PM I2, 86-87. 3 J.G. Wilkinson, MS V, 74-75. (Griffith Institute, Oxford). I would like to acknowledge Dr. Jaromír Málek for permission to examine the archive at the Griffith Institute, Oxford. 4 I would like to thank Professor Betsy M. Bryan for allowing me to see her copy of Gardiner’s manuscript.

regard Ramose as identical with an official mentioned on a stela from Giza from the reign of King Ay. However, he believed that the identification of the royal cartouche was the key to the date of the tomb owner. In 1991, Briant Bohleke assumed that Ramose’s career and tomb should date to the reigns of Tutankhamun and Ay, and perhaps the first year of Horemheb.11 In 1998, Friedericke Kampp described the history of the tomb and its architecture in her comprehensive study, Die Thebanische Nekropole.12 She dates TT46 to the reigns of Amenhotep III and Amenhotep IV, with Ramose as the usurper of a tomb originally constructed for someone who lived from the end of the 17th Dynasty to the beginning of the 18th Dynasty. This article aims to discuss the date of the tomb and its owner on the basis of my own first-hand research within the tomb.

II. Theban Tomb 46 TT46 is situated approximately in the middle of the hill of Sheikh abd al-Qurna (fig. 1). The tomb 5 S.R.K. Glanville, “Some Notes on Material for the Reign of Amenophis III,” JEA 15 (1929), 6, n.1. 6 PM I2, 86-87. 7 Urk. IV, 1995, 10-14; W. Helck, Zur Verwaltung des Mittleren und Neuen Reiches, PÄ 3 (Leiden, 1958), 390-391, 500. Helck, however, noted that the same Ramose is identified on the year 3 stela of Ay from Giza. 8 Davies, MSS 11, 1. I would like to thank Dr. Jaromír Málek for permission to read Davies’s archive at the Griffith Institute, Oxford. 9 This was probably assumed to be the time of the coregency of Amenhotep III and Amenhotep IV by the scholars who believe in the coregency. 10 E. Graefe, “Bemerkungen zu Ramose, dem Besitzer von TT 46,” GM 33 (1979), 13-15. 11 B. Bohleke, The Overseer of Double Granaries of Upper and Lower Egypt in the Egyptian New Kingdom, 1570–1085 B.C., PhD diss., Yale University (Ann Arbor, 1991), 244249. 12 F. Kampp, Die thebanische Nekropole, zum Wandel des Grabgedankens von der XVIII. bis zur XX. Dynastie, Theben 13 (Mainz am Rhein, 1996), 244-247.

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Fig. 1. TT 46 and its vicinity (After F. Kampp, Die Thebanische Nekropole, Plan III: Sh. Abd el-Qurna, Teil II [Upper enclosure]).

of the vizier Useramun, who served Thutmose III, is nearby. The tomb entrance of TT46 consists of a portico with six pillars and two half-cut pillars hewn into the bedrock, but the entrance portico was later sealed by mud brick and mud plaster. The tomb has a transverse hall on a north-south axis and an inner hall in the center. The inner hall possesses eight pillars, one of which is unfinished. There is a niche in the center of the back wall of the inner hall, and the shaft is cut at the southwest corner of this hall. There still remain some heaps of debris inside the tomb, and the tomb has not been excavated. As Kampp has rightly pointed out, TT46 was probably originally executed in the late 17th or early 18th Dynasty, and the original plan was composed of the portico with six pillars and two

13

Ibid., 244-246. Ibid., 21-23, 111-116. 15 This type is early represented by such tombs as that of 14

half-cut pillars, transverse hall, and inner hall without pillars (fig. 2).13 The second phase of the tomb is the time when Ramose reused and enlarged it. The inner hall was extended, with an attempt to construct eight pillars on both sides of the hall. Ultimately, seven pillars were cut, but the eighth pillar was left unfinished in the middle. Kampp suggested that the inner hall with pillars is common in the Ramesside Period and categorized it as Type VIIc.14 TT46 belongs to this category, which starts from the time of Amenhotep III, continuing throughout the Ramesside Period.15 The decoration of TT46 is badly preserved. In the portico, only the north face of the westernmost pillar retains painted decoration, and there are remains of a relief scene on the west wall of the

the vizier Ramose (TT55), the tomb of Amenhotep Surero (TT48) and the tomb of Kheruef (TT192).


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Fig. 2. The plan of TT46 (Slightly modified from F. Kampp, Die Thebanische Nekropole, Teil I, Fig. 143).

southern edge of the transverse hall. Very close to the ceiling of the center of the transverse hall, there survives a kheker frieze surmounted with the sun disk, and zigzag patterns can be seen on the ceiling.16 Each pillar of the inner hall is generally decorated on three sides, leaving undecorated the side facing the wall of the hall. On the niche, there are partial remains of painting, and it shows some kind of decorative pattern that usually can be found in the canopy of a bed or shrine. As for the wall of the inner hall, only the west wall on the right side of the niche is decorated with the motif of Ramose offering to Osiris. The wall paintings in the tomb maintain a tradition from the early 18th Dynasty, represented

by either a white background with blue-colored inscriptions or white background with polychrome inscriptions.17 The ceiling of the inner hall between the pillars has a yellow background with blue inscriptions.18 However, the sun-disk kheker frieze near the ceiling can be seen in the late 18th Dynasty and afterwards in such tombs as that of the vizier Ramose (TT55)19 and the tomb of Horemheb in the Valley of the Kings.20 The images of Ramose and his family display features of Amarna art. Ramose has a long head and bears two characteristic lines on his neck. He is dressed in an elaborate pleated kilt, and his belly is exaggerated with some wrinkles. When compared to the human figures in the tombs of

16 This type of frieze and the ceiling pattern can be seen in the tomb of Neferhotep (TT 49), dating to the reign of Ay. See N. de G. Davies, The Tomb of Neferhotep at Thebes (New York, 1933), vol. 1, pl. L, vol. 2, pl. VII. 17 Cf. E. Dziobek and M. Abdel Raziq, Das Grab des Sobekhotep: Theben Nr. 63 (Mainz am Rhein, 1990), pls, 5, 6, and 14. 18 Cf. Dziobek, Das Grab des Ineni: Theben Nr. 81 (Mainz

am Rhein, 1992); Dziobek and Raziq, Das Grab des Sobekhotep, pl. 15-b. 19 N. de G. Davies, The Tomb of the Vizier Ramose (London, 1941), pl. LII. 20 Cf. T.M. Davis et al., The Tombs of Harmhabi and Touatânkhamanou. Theodore M. Davis’ Excavations, Bibân el Molûk 6 (London, 1912), pl. XXXVI.

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Kheruef (TT192),21 Ramose (TT55), and Parennefer (TT188),22 dated to the early part of Amenhotep IV’s reign, the figures of these tombs appear to have maintained the style of Amenhotep III. However, these tombs are decorated in relief, and it is not easy to compare them with painted decoration. Among the few post-Amarna decorated tombs, the paintings of the tombs of Amenhotep Huy (TT40) and Neferhotep (TT49), dated to the time of Tutankhamun and Ay respectively, are similar to those of TT46. For example, each of the three daughters of Ramose shown on one side of the pillars has a diadem on her head, wears a pleated dress, holds a sistrum in her right hand, and prays with her left upraised hand. The girl who seems the eldest is depicted as largest, then the height of the daughters is gradually decreased. This strongly corresponds to the way in which the daughters of Akhenaten are depicted in the rock tombs at elAmarna.23 The stylistic features of these daughters are quite similar to those of the ladies shown in the tomb of Neferhotep (TT49) as well.24 The scene of Ramose presenting offerings to Osiris (fig. 3) also implies a post-Amarna date. Nigel Strudwick noted that Osiris became prominent immediately after the Amarna Period, probably due to the reaction against Akhenaten’s cult, which rejected or preferably ignored most deities, Osiris among them.25 The offering piles in front of Osiris increased in their complexity and embellishment. Burnt offerings shown in front of Osiris in TT46 are an influence of the Amarna Period, exemplified in the tomb of Meryre I at el-Amarna.26

1. The Career of Ramose Here I list all his titles and epithets identified in TT46, in order to clarify when Ramose was living.

21 Epigraphic Survey, The Tomb of Kheruef: Theban Tomb 192, OIP 102 (Chicago, 1980). 22 N. de G. Davies, “Akhenaten at Thebes,” JEA 9 (1923), 132-152. 23 Cf. N. de G. Davies, The Rock Tombs of El Amarna 2 (London, 1905), pl. V; Davies, The Rock Tombs of El Amarna 4 (London, 1906), pl. XXXI. 24 Davies, Tomb of Neferhotep 1, pls. III, XXXVI, XXXVII, L, LII. 25 N. Strudwick, “Change and Continuity at Thebes: The Private Tomb after Akhenaten,” in The Unbroken Reed:

1. sS nsw mAa mry.f

True royal scribe whom he loves

2. sS nsw

Royal Scribe

3. TAy xw Hr wnm nsw

Fanbearer on the Right of the King

4. imy-r pr

Steward

5. imy-r pr m tA Hwt pA Itn

Steward of the Temple of Aten

6. Hm-nTr tpy n Imn m Mn-st

High Priest of Amun in Menset (Mortuary temple of Ahmose Nefertari)27 7. imy-r ssmwt n nb tAwy Overseer of the Horses of the Lord of the Two Lands 8. imy-r Snwty Overseer of Granary 9. imy-r Snwty nw rsy Overseer of Double mHw Granaries of Upper and Lower Egypt Epithet Hsy n Hmt-nTr Iah-ms Nfrt-iry

Praised of God’s Wife Ahmose Nefertari

Notably, Ramose held the titles of the “Steward of the Temple of Aten,” as well as the “High Priest of Amun in Menset” simultaneously. It is evident that he was an official when veneration of both deities coexisted peacefully. Norman de Garis Davies left a note in his manuscript that a title of Ramose “imy-r pr m tA Hwt pA Imn nb-nTrw (Steward in the Temple of Amun, Lord of the Gods)” was changed to “imy-r pr m tA Hwt pA Itn (Steward in the Temple of Aten).”28 The inscription in question, however, does not show any remains of an alteration to the title. My observations of this title revealed that in fact the name of Amun was not even inscribed. To the contrary, the name of

Studies in the Culture and Heritage of Ancient Egypt in Honour of A.F. Shore, eds. C. Eyre, A. Leahy, and L.M. Leahy (London, 1994), 326, 328-330. This phenomenon can be seen not only in the Theban necropolis, but also in the New Kingdom Memphite necropolis; see J. van Dijk, The New Kingdom Necropolis of Memphis (Groningen, 1993), 196, 202. 26 Davies, The Rock Tombs at El-Amarna 1, pl. XXII. 27 Cf. M. Gitton, L’Épouse du dieu Ahmes Néfertary (Paris, 1975), 18-19, 76-73. 28 Kampp, Die thebanische Nekropole, 31-32.


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Fig. 3. Ramose presenting offerings to Osiris on the right rear wall of the chapel. Photo by Nozomu Kawai.

Aten was expunged. This inscription is located on the west wall of the southern part of the transverse hall. This reads Hsy n nTr nfr n kA n sS nsw mAa mry.f imy-r pr m tA Hwt pA Itn, Ra-ms, mAa-xrw, Hsyt @wt-Hr, SmAyt n (Imn Nfrt-xaw), “praised of the perfect god for the ka of the true royal scribe whom he loves, the Steward of the Temple of Aten, Ramose, the justified; praised of Hathor, Chantress of Amun (Nefertkhau)” (fig. 4). If Ramose was an official associated with the new religion as the steward of the temple of Aten, why was not Amun’s name expunged? Another inscription painted on the north wall of the eastern edge shows “imy-r pr m tA Hwt pA///////” (fig. 5). Here the name of the god is completely chiseled out. On the left of this inscription, the High Priest of Amun in Menset follows. However, the name of Amun 29

Cf. P. Der Manuelian, “Semi-Literacy in Egypt: Some erasures from the Amarna Period,” in Gold of Praise: Studies in Honor of Edward F. Wente, ed. E. Teeter and J. Larsen (Chicago, 1999), 285-298. 30 Aten is worshiped in the “Hymn to the Sun God” in the tomb of Pay, dating to the reign of Tutankhamun. See M. J. Raven, The tomb of Pay and Raia at Saqqara (Leiden and London, 2005), 44, pls. 73-74. 31 The temple of Aten (tA Hwt pA Itn) in Memphis was mentioned in the Papyrus Rollin 213. See G. Löhr,“Ahanjati in Memphis,” SAK (1975), 146-147.

was not damaged at all. Thus, it is most likely that the name of the god coming after “imy-r pr m tA Hwt pA” was Itn (Aten). Amun’s name, of course, was erased throughout Egypt and Nubia during the reign of Akhenaten. Many Theban tombs bear the “standard” erasures of Amun’s name.29 After the reign of Akhenaten, Aten’s cult seems to have functioned at least until the early 19th Dynasty.30 It is known that the temple of Aten in Memphis existed until the reign of Sety I.31 Recently discovered New Kingdom tombs at Saqqara provide evidence that there were some officials who held titles associated with the temple of Aten after the reign of Akhenaten.32 If Ramose was an official who served after the reign of Akhenaten, Amun’s name did not need to be erased. Instead Aten’s name had to be expunged when the destruction 32

Cf. H.D. Schneider, “The Tomb of Iniuia: Preliminary Report on the Saqqara Excavations, 1993,” JEA 79 (1993), 7-8. Iniuia, “Overseer of the Cattle of Amun” under Tutankhamun, has two sons who held the title “Scribe in the Treasury of the temple of Aten.” The tomb of Meryre/Meryneith, the High Priest of Aten from the time of Akhenaten to Tutankhamun, has been discovered in Saqqara by a Dutch expedition. See M. Raven, “The Tomb of Meryneith at Saqqara,” EA 20 (2002), 26-28.

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Fig. 4. Relief decoration of Ramose and his inscriptions on the north wall of the western part of the transverse hall. Photo by Nozomu Kawai.

of Aten’s cult started. Therefore, I would suggest that the erasure of Aten’s name was carried out from the time of Horemheb onward. This implies that Ramose was not the official under Amenhotep III and Amenhotep IV, but the person in the post-Amarna Period. Furthermore, it is impossible that this Ramose held the title “Overseer of Double Granaries of Upper and Lower Egypt” in the later reign of Amenhotep III. In fact, this position was held by Khaemhat, the owner of TT57 in Sheikh abd al-Qurna. Khaemhat participated in Amenhotep III’s second sed festival in year 34, and in the third sed festival in year 37.33 It has been suggested that Amenhotep III died in year 38 or 39.34 Khaemhat must have served until the end of Amenhotep III’s reign. Instead, a certain Ramose, who bears the title “Overseer of Double Granaries of Upper and Lower Egypt” on a stela from Ay’s reign, which was originally erected at the chapel of the temple

33 Hieratic dockets bearing the name of the “Overseer of Double Granaries of Upper and Lower Egypt,” Khaemhat, with the year dates 34 and 37, were found in the palace of Amenhotep III at Malkata. See W.C. Hayes, “Inscriptions from the Palace of Amenhotep III,” JNES 10 (1951), fig. 12, nos. 160-161; fig. 11, no. 140.

of Isis, located in front of the southernmost queen’s pyramid at the Giza pyramid of Khufu,35 seems to have been the same person as the owner of TT46.

2. Family of Ramose The wife of Ramose is Nefertkhau (Nfrt-xaw), and she held the titles “Chantress of Amun” and “Mistress of the House.” She also had the epithet “praised of Hathor.” She must have been his only wife, since there is no mention of other wives in the tomb. There were two sons and three daughters of Ramose and Nefertkhau. The (Iw) and his titles first son is named Iu are the “True Royal Scribe, whom he loves (sS nsw mAa, mry.f )” and “General of the Lord of the Two Lands (imy-r mSa n nb tAwy).”36 The second son is

34 Cf. L. Berman in A. Kozloff and B.M. Bryan, Egypt’s Dazzling Sun: Amenhotep III and His World (Cleveland, 1992), 59. 35 C.M. Zivie, Giza au deuxième millénaire (Cairo, 1976), 177-182, pl. 13.


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Fig. 5. Painting on the north side of the easternmost pillar of the transverse hall. Photo by Nozomu Kawai.

(Iy). His titles are the “True named Ay Royal Scribe, whom he loves (sS nsw mAa, mry.f )” and “the Hm-nTr Priest of Amun (Hm-nTr n Imn).”37 He is depicted as a priest dressed in a leopardskin garment decorated with star patterns. This garment is usually worn by the second prophet of Amun.38 It should also be noted that Amun’s name in his title is not expunged at all. If his father Ramose was an official under Amenhotep IV, it seems curious that the son Ay served the god who was rejected. Thus, the fact that one of the sons of Ramose held a priestly title of Amun supports the theory that Ramose was an official after the Amarna Period. Only two names of Ramose’s daughters can be identified. The clearest name is (&y), the third daughter. She held the Tiy titles “Mistress of the House” and the “Chantress of Amun (Smayt n Imn).” The second daughter was named Tuy be read.

(&wy), but the title cannot

36 According to Ranke’s PN, there are only two references of this name in the Old Kingdom and Middle Kingdom respectively. See PN 1, 16, no. 8. 37 There is a certain Ay who was the Second Prophet of Amun under Tutankhamun and Ay. This person is not identical with our Ay, son of Ramose, since his parents are different. See T.G.H. James, Corpus of Hieroglyphic Inscriptions in

The faces of Ramose and his family are intentionally erased throughout the entire tomb. This suggests that they suffered a damnatio memoriae, probably due to Ramose’s association with the Aten temple.

3. Conclusion Ramose, the owner of TT46, was an official in the post-Amarna Period, most probably under Tutankhamun and Ay, and served as the “Overseer of Granaries of Upper and Lower Egypt,” “Steward of the Temple of Aten,” and “High Priest of Amun in Menset.” Therefore, his title provides the evidence from Thebes that the temple of Aten was still functioning even after the Amarna Period, supplementing the contemporary evidence from the Memphite necropolis. Ramose and his family seem to have suffered a damnatio memoriae, probably because of Ramose’s connection to the Aten temple.

the Brooklyn Museum: From Dynasty I to the End of Dynasty XVIII (New York, 1974), 172, no. 425, pl. LXXXIV. 38 Cf. a statue of Aanen, the Second Prophet of Amun under Amenhotep III, who wears the same garment. Turin 1377. J. Vandier, Manuel d’archéologie égyptienne 3 (Paris, 1958), pl. 168, no. 1.

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a unique sphinx of amenhotep ii

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A UNIQUE SPHINX OF AMENHOTEP II Peter Lacovara Michael C. Carlos Museum

This article is dedicated to Jack Josephson, a unique scholar who is a master at deciphering the riddles of Egyptian sculpture. The great temple complex at Gebel Barkal yielded many Egyptian statues and fragments of sculpture. Many of these monuments seem to have been transported from elsewhere in Nubia, such as the temple of Amenhotep III at Soleb.1 However, some may have been designed specifically for the temple, as was the case with the famous Gebel Barkal stela.2 Sculpture, of course, can be just as propagandistic as a bombastic royal text, as is graphically shown by the piece considered here. Unlike the earlier excavators who worked at Gebel Barkal, George Reisner and the Harvard University-Museum of Fine Arts Expedition to the Sudan employed painstaking methods of recording and collection, which allow us still to make exciting discoveries even after nearly a century. The expedition was careful to gather together all fragments of worked stone from throughout the site, no matter how unprepossessing they may have appeared. One small, inscribed fragment published by Dows Dunham in Barkal Temples3 provided a clue to the restoration of a unique sculpture.4 The fragment was described as “Granite fragment: left paw of a sphinx (or lion) with part of an incised cartouche of Amenhotep II. L. 0.210 m(eters). From the debris in Area 502 Ex.2. Not in Boston.”5 In fact, the fragment was in Boston, along with a great many other sculpture fragments from the site.6

In studying the black granite fragment, one could plainly see the cartouche running parallel to the outstretched legs of the creature, as one would expect on a couchant sphinx or lion (fig. 1). However, under the paw was an irregular area with what appeared to be a wig of the

1 Cf. E. Russmann, Eternal Egypt: Masterworks of Ancient Art from the British Museum (London and New York, 2001), 130-131. 2 G.A. Reisner, “Inscribed Monuments from Gebel Barkal, Part II: The Granite Stela of Thutmosis III,” ZÄS 69 (1933), 35-133. 3 D. Dunham, The Barkal Temples (Boston, 1970), 25, no. 3, and 26, fig. 18. 4 I would like to thank Dr. Rita E. Freed, John F. Cogan, Jr. and Mary L. Cornille Chair, Art of the Ancient World, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston for permission to publish this piece, and particular thanks also to Jean-Louis Lachevre for

his insights and suggestions on the restoration and generous assistance in preparing this article. I am most grateful to Nina West for her drafting and correcting the illustration of the reconstruction of the sphinx and to Joyce Haynes for her help in checking the accession numbers of the fragments. 5 Dunham, Barkal Temples, 25, no. 3, and also published in G.A. Reisner, “Inscribed Monuments from Gebel Barkal, Part I,” ZÄS 66 (1933), 81, no. 4. 6 Dunham, Barkal Temples, 25. In fact, it was in Boston but had never been catalogued; it was rediscovered by the author in doing an inventory of fragments in storage.

Fig. 1. The inscribed fragment of a sphinx, 16-3-314, from Barkal Temples, fig. 18.

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b a Figs. 2a-b. Leg and paw fragment of sphinx, Egyptian, reign of Amenhotep II, 1427–1400 BC, Findspot: Nubia (Sudan), Gebel Barkal, Debris between 600-1000, Granodiorite, 24.5 x 11.8 x 14.5 cm (9 5/8 x 4 5/8 x 5 11/16 in.), Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Harvard University-MFA Expedition, 16-3314. Photograph ©2009, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

b a Figs. 3a-b. Sculpture fragment, Egyptian, reign of Amenhotep II, 1427–1400 BC, Findspot: Nubia (Sudan), Gebel Barkal, between D500 and curtain wall 1000, Black granodiorite with sparkly inclusions, 13.8 x 17.8 x 9 cm (5 7/16 x 7 x 3 9/16 in.), Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Harvard University-MFA Expedition, 16-4-275b. Photograph ©2009, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

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a

b Figs. 4a-b. Head fragment of sphinx, Egyptian, reign of Amenhotep II, 1427–1400 BC, Findspot: Nubia (Sudan), Gebel Barkal, D-500 2 and circular wall B1000, Granodiorite, 23.5 x 25 x 16.5 cm (9 ¼ x 9 13/16 x 6 ½ in.), Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Harvard University-MFA Expedition, 16-4-275a. Photograph ©2009, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

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Fig. 5. Reconstructed side view of sphinx and Nubian prisoners (drawing by Nina West).

“Nubian” type (figs. 2a-b). The author, noting this, began to search for pieces amongst the black granite fragments recovered from the 1919 campaign that might join this fragment. Soon a number of bits of similar stone turned up, which, when put together, formed a sphinx, not couchant, but rearing, and with three bound Nubians under its front paws. These included a fragment of the chest of a captive Nubian with hands upraised and cuffed and wearing a necklace with a heart pendant flanked by two flies, and beside it another raised, cuffed hand from another prisoner (figs. 3a-b).7 There was another fragment of a hand and shoulder, possibly from the third figure.8 In addition, the proper-right side of a face of one of the Nubian captives was also preserved,9 and the nemes headdress of the king, the face battered away (figs. 4a-b).10 The shoulder and end of the nemes lappet, which joined the inscribed fragment with the paw, were also recovered,11 along with the other paw12 and the pigtail from the back of the nemes.13 A number of other fragments were discovered that must also belong to the bodies 7

MFA no. 16-4-275b. MFA no. 19-1-357. 9 MFA no. 19-12-70a. 10 MFA no. 16-4-275. 11 MFA no. 16-3-314. 12 Eg. Inv. 11803. 13 MFA 20-1-35. 14 These include MFA nos. 19-12-162, perhaps part of the costume of one of the prisoners; 16-3-186; 16-4-122; 16-4223.1; 20-1-225; 16-4-263.4; and Eg. Inv. 11804. 8

of the Nubian captives and of the sphinx, but no direct joins were evident.14 Undoubtedly, there are other unidentified fragments in the Museum of Fine Arts storerooms, and perhaps more in storage at the site. In attempting to reconstruct this sculpture, Jean-Louis Lachevre noted that the angle of the back must have been oblique in order for the fragments to properly join. This would give the sphinx the appearance of rearing up and holding the prisoners under its paws (fig. 5). Given the fragmentary nature of the sculpture, it is difficult to determine what its overall dimensions would have been, but it could have stood well over one meter in height. While such subjugated groups of captives crushed under the paws of a sphinx are well known from relief sculpture and painted representations, and rearing, squatting, or couchant lions are sometimes found in sculpture,15 this would appear to be a unique example of a threedimensional sphinx in this attitude.16

15 Cf. U. Schweitzer, Löwe und Sphinx im Alten Ägypten (Glückstadt and Hamburg, 1948), pl. 22. 16 A related type of sculpture showing a king with a subjugated prisoner is seen in the depiction of Ramesses IV and a Libyan from the Karnak cachette; M. Saleh and H. Sourouzian, The Egyptian Museum Cairo: Official Catalogue (Mainz, 1987), cat. no. 227. Fragments of another statue similar to this, but depicting a Nubian captive, were also recovered from Gebel Barkal.

a unique sphinx of amenhotep ii Given the awkwardness of the composition, as is shown in the reconstruction, it is not a surprise that this invention was probably never repeated. Nevertheless, the finished piece would have made a powerful political statement of Egyptian dominance over the south. The Nubians are identified not only by their hairstyles and facial characteristics but also by the fly pendants they wear about their necks. One might have expected a Nubian and an Asiatic or posited the existence of a companion piece, with the king dominating the northern foes of Egypt, as would be expected in the standard Egyptian thematic program. However, there is no evidence of a companion piece, and

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one might suggest that this sphinx stood alone as a testament to Egypt’s dominance over its southern boundary. The fact that the faces of the Nubians are intact, while the features of Amenhotep II are completely and deliberately obliterated, might suggest how the later Nubian overlords of the temple regarded this expression of Egyptian occupation. The main fragment was found just to the local north outside the inner court of B 500, the great New Kingdom Temple of Amun. The court was later extensively remodeled in the 25th Dynasty, so it may have been that it was at this time that the sphinx was destroyed.

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the international campaign to preserve the monuments of nubia, 1959-68

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RAMESES RECROWNED: THE INTERNATIONAL CAMPAIGN TO PRESERVE THE MONUMENTS OF NUBIA, 195968 Sarwat Okasha Former Vice Prime Minister and Minister of Culture, Member of the British Academy, Cairo, Egypt It gives me sincere pleasure to offer this contribution to the Festschrift honoring my friend Jack Josephson. His erudite scholarly dedication to the art of Egypt’s ancient civilization has provided many absorbing topics for discussion, from which I have derived both knowledge and enjoyment. His keen insights regarding many diverse subjects of interest in our world, past and present, have enlivened and enriched our wide-ranging conversations over the past decade and a half of our acquaintance, since his marriage to Egypt’s Ballerina, Magda Saleh.

I recollect his delighted response to my tale of the fateful encounter with the American Ambassador and the Director of the Metropolitan Museum. This meeting proved the catalyst so urgently needed to set in motion a train of events, more fully recounted elsewhere,1 leading to the unprecedented international campaign to preserve the monuments of Nubia. I present this abbreviated English-language version to my friend Mr. Josephson, knowing he will appreciate learning how matters unfolded to their happy outcome.2

1 S. Okasha, Insan al ʿAsr Yutawig Ramsis (Cairo, 1971), subsequently published in 1974 by UNESCO in a French translation as Ramsès Recouronné: Hommage Vivant au Pharaon Mort; and Okasha, Mudhakirati fi al siyasa wa al thaqafa (Cairo, 1990), 7-97, and rev. ed., Insan al ʿAsr Yutawig Ramsis. Massirat al-hamla al-dawliyya li’inqadh aathar al-Nuba (Cairo, 2008); Mankind Crowns Ramses. The International Campaign for the Safeguard of the Monuments of Nubia, trans. Aida al Bahgoury (forthcoming). 2 I have in this essay endeavored to render the full scope and extent of our daring undertaking. I must not omit mention here of some of the many without whose unshakable faith in the project and its inestimable value to the cause of human culture, to the preservation of the icons of civilization and its common heritage, and to the noble ideal of international cooperation and mutual understanding, the impossible dream could never have become reality. First among these are the three UNESCO Directors General, foremost among them René Maheu, that great human being with whom I stood side by side for 13 years, who was devoted to the principles of the international organization. He never wavered, despite the often vicious attacks to which he was subjected. Next is his predecessor Vittorino Veronese, who unhesitatingly embraced the project in 1959 and ushered it through its initial steps, going where another might have feared to tread. And finally is their successor, Amadou-Mokhtar M’Bow, who saw the final phase of the project—the rescue of Philae— through to its completion. Brazilian Ambassador Paulo de Berrêdo Carneiro, who chaired both the International Action Committee and the Executive Committee for the International Campaign to Save the Monuments of Nubia, was a loyal ally and devoted supporter. He instantly adopted the project and was steadfast in his support thereafter. Nor can I forget Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan, who worked on our behalf his worldwide network of influential connections; or Mme Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt, the UNESCO consultant, with her passionate love of Egypt and its antiquities, her enthusiasm and boundless energy. She was a prime mover in the documentation endeavor, the salvage of Amada

Temple, and the organizer of the exhibition of Tutankhamun in Paris. A stellar contingent of Egyptian archaeologists, engineers, and administrators have earned the gratitude of the nation: the capable engineer Dr. Hassan Zaki, former Minister of Irrigation and chairman of the Advisory Council for the Abu Simbel project; Dr. Anwar Shukri, earlier Undersecretary of State for Antiquities; Mr. Abdel Moneim el Sawi, Deputy Chairman of the Fund for the Rescue of the Monuments of Nubia from September 1962 to September 1966 during my absence from the ministry; Dr. Abdel Moneim Abu Bakr, former Professor of Egyptology at Cairo University; Dr. Gamal Moukhtar, the senior Egyptologist at the Center of Documentation, then Undersecretary of State for Antiquities and the first Chairman of the EAO; engineer Mohammed Mahdi, earlier Director of the EAO; the chemist Dr. Zaki Iskander; engineer Taha el Shaltawi, former Deputy of the EAO; engineer Mohammed Abdel Mo’ti Amer, the Director of the Engineering Bureau; Dr. Ahmed Qadri, General Director of the Nubia Fund; and Dr. Shehata Adam Mohammed, Director of the General Administration for the Rescue of the Monuments of Nubia. Before all these, and to the legions of anonymous foot soldiers, workmen, engineers, archaeologists, restorers, technicians, and artists who tirelessly participated in this endeavor, civilization itself must bow in respect and gratitude. Nor do we forget the High Dam Ministry for its aid, for out of its services budget came Egypt’s contribution to the fund for the salvage of Abu Simbel, to the amount of L.E. 5,000,000, with another L.E. 1,000,000 for the salvage of the other temples. Then there are the myriad institutions; universities; archaeological, scientific and cultural institutes and centers; the scholars and experts; the project’s international committees; the engineering firms and companies; all our partners in the endeavor. To them Egypt was but the birthplace of civilization, a name they yearned for in dreams, exalting her in their noblest thoughts. What better reward for all than the survival of the monuments that they strove to save, speaking to future generations of the genius of those past?

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September 22, 1968, dawned upon Egypt, a day of joy and celebration, the joy of daunting challenges overcome and an impossible dream come true, the successful culmination of a decade of unwavering endeavor to preserve the monuments of our ancient civilization from oblivion. Five hundred guests of Egypt gathered before the magnificent temples of Abu Simbel—myself as host representing President Gamal Abdel Nasser, with the Director General of UNESCO René Maheu, the organization’s former head Vittorino Veronese, Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan, a throng of UNESCO representatives, the ministers charged with the organization’s affairs from the 50 nations participating in the Abu Simbel project and their ambassadors in Cairo, together with their counterparts from the Arab world, the Egyptian ministers involved in the rescue of the Nubian antiquities, a number of eminent Egyptian personalities, and a cluster of intellectual and literary figures, artists, and members of the media. The international campaign to salvage the imperiled monuments of Nubia in Egypt and the Sudan, during which many hands had joined the world over, united in a spirit of true cooperation and a profound faith in the timeless value of the achievements of human culture, was brought to a triumphant conclusion. Decades earlier, in his impassioned book The Death of Philae, the French writer Pierre Loti had decried the drowning of that splendid temple by the waters of the first Aswan Dam (built in 1902), bewailing this symbolic death of ancient Egypt and calling upon Egyptians to rally in defense of their immortal patrimony. He vividly imagined a bemused Isis staring at her reflection in the inexorable rising tide. Loti’s anguished, despairing cry was movingly echoed by our Prince of Poets, Ahmed Shawqi, in eloquent verse. After the July 23, 1952 revolution, concern over the fate of the monuments surfaced in a report submitted by the Director of the Egyptian Antiquities Service,3 Mostafa Amer, to the Minister of Education, Kamal el Din Hussein, and a fact-finding mission was dispatched to Nubia for ten days in December 1954. A detailed study of the endangered sites and proposals for solutions was published in Arabic, French, and English in

the Report on the Monuments of Nubia Likely to be Submerged by Sudd-el-Ali Water (June 1955). It included engineer Osman Rostem’s proposal to erect three cofferdams encircling Philae. Recommendations were limited to undertaking a comprehensive documentation of endangered monuments and sites, and preservation of two handily relocatable temples. Copies were distributed to scientific institutions abroad with an invitation to participate in excavations; it elicited scant response. A significant event took place in May 1955, with the signing of a protocol of cooperation between UNESCO and Hussein’s Ministry of Education, establishing the Center of Documentation and Study on the History and Art of Ancient Egypt4 (usually referred to simply as the Center of Documentation). The impetus for this important step proceeded from growing anxiety at home and abroad over the increasingly deleterious impact of climate and human activity on the monuments, notably in Upper Egypt, where a rising water table was leading to flooding, erosion, and irretrievable loss. Documentation as a meticulous permanent record and future resource for researchers was perceived as the only realistically feasible response. In 1958, the newly minted Ministry of Culture and National Guidance, which I established at the behest of the President, was assigned the task of oversight of national heritage, a symbol of the Revolution’s powerful emphasis on a vigorous national cultural policy. A mere eight months later, in November 1958, I received a visit from the Ambassador of the United States in Cairo, Raymond A. Hare, accompanied by the Director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, Mr. James Rorimer. Without preamble, this gentleman announced that he had come to negotiate the purchase of “one or two temples” threatened with submersion under the waters of the projected High Dam at Aswan. The vast man-made lake that would form behind this massive structure, foreseen to extend southward approximately 300 km within Egypt and another 187 km in the Sudan, would flood Egyptian and Sudanese Nubia and all its monuments forever. I was frankly affronted by this casual offer to purchase our ancestral

3 Later the Egyptian Antiquities Organization and now the Supreme Council of Antiquities; abbreviated EAO hereafter. 4 Markaz Tasjil el-Athar al-Misriyah. I must here pause to pay tribute to the dedicated efforts of Dr. Ahmed Badawi,

then Director of the Center of Documentation, and the doyen of Egyptologists, Dr. Gamal Moukhtar, and Mme Desroches-Noblecourt, chief curator of Egyptian art at the Louvre Museum and UNESCO consultant to the Center of Documentation.


Fig. 1. Transferring the head of Rameses II during the synthesis of the main temple at Abu Simbel.

Fig. 2. Dr. Okasha (at left) with Mrs. Kennedy during the opening of the exhibition in Washington in 1961.

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Fig. 3. Dr. Okasha, President Nasser, and UNESCO head Vittorino Veronese.

Fig. 4. Synthesis of the main temple of Abu Simbel in the new site.

the international campaign to preserve the monuments of nubia, 1959-68 heritage, rather than a proposal of scientific and technical aid in preserving it for Egypt. The High Dam confronted the Egyptian leadership with a bewildering quandary: it represented both crucial hope of prosperity for Egypt’s people and the threat of obliteration for a cherished patrimony. But should future economic success be purchased at the cost of the legacy of the past? Plans for the construction of the High Dam were advancing apace, and the urgency of our plight became ever more acute. Haunted by the threat of appalling loss, I deemed it the duty of the Ministry of Culture to plan the salvation of the threatened monuments. History would never forgive a failure to protect this charge. I had explored all means and venues available to a heavily burdened government to forestall a day when we must bid our past farewell, only to be confronted with frustrating obstacles at every turn. The brief meeting with the visiting Americans spurred my determination to act. As an initial step, to acquaint myself with the threatened monuments, I flew to Wadi Halfa on Egypt’s southern border, accompanied by the Director of the Center of Documentation, Dr. Ahmed Badawi, and engineer Mohammed Mahdi, then Director of the Engineering Department at the EAO. Proceeding north by boat on a two-week trip to Aswan, we visited all the temples and other monuments of the area between Wadi Halfa and Aswan, and inspected the excavations underway. To my dismay, the only work being undertaken was the recording and documentation of temples, and some site survey. I stood before the temples of Abu Simbel and Philae, contemplating the unthinkable. In a torment of distress I imagined, as in a vision, a gigantic hand scooping the magnificent edifices off their foundations and depositing them on the nearby summits, leaving those drowning waters to lap where they would. Preserving our treasures for posterity became the imperative, and I determined then that the impossible should be possible. Casting about for inspiration, I recalled that during my three-year service as military attaché in Paris I had intently followed reports of activities at the newly established UNESCO, that organization born of the United Nations whose charter sanctions the protection of monuments of historical significance to humanity’s cultural heritage. I soon became convinced that this was the only door open to us, and resolved to initiate contact with the Director General. A chance visit brought

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to my office the UNESCO consultant to the Center of Documentation, Mme Christiane DesrochesNoblecourt. I surprised her with my decision to discuss with the Director General of UNESCO the project to save the temples of Nubia, intending to ask him about the possibility of cooperation between UNESCO and the Egyptian Ministry of Culture to save those great monuments. She then suggested a meeting with the UNESCO Deputy Director General, René Maheu, who was about to finish his mission in Addis Ababa in early January 1959, so I invited him to pass by Cairo on his way back to Paris. I duly met M. Maheu at the Cairo airport and escorted him to my office in Abdin Palace. During our three-hour meeting, I found in M. Maheu a man of sincere goodwill coupled with a piercing intellect. Convinced that I had found an ally in my quest, I pressed into his hands as a parting gift the 1907 copy of Loti’s Death of Philae that had accompanied me on my trip to Nubia, expressing the hope that together we might write an epilogue, the “Resurrection of Philae.” M. Maheu departed at 1 a.m., and my trust was vindicated when, only 12 hours later, he called from Paris to put the Director General, M. Vittorino Veronese, on the line. Expressing full support, M. Veronese promised to present the project to the UNESCO Executive Board upon receipt of an official request by the Egyptian government! In a formal communication at the end of January 1959, René Maheu informed me of UNESCO’s consent to a feasibility study and requested further detailed, specific information on the required aid. My actions thus far had been undertaken on my personal initiative and at the prompting of my conscience, but I must now obtain the sanction of the President of the Republic, to whom I hastened with my proposal. Nasser listened at length to my arguments. Citing my absolute faith in an unwavering UNESCO, I eventually overcame his concern that the stormy international political currents swirling around Egypt might become a potential deterrent to international cooperation. I then suggested a one-third contribution to costs by Egypt, to underscore the seriousness of our government’s intentions. His approval was followed in short order by that of the EAO. In a letter dated April 6, 1959 (which was a holiday), composed with the assistance of the Director of the EAO, Dr. Mohammed Anwar Shukri, I formally requested UNESCO aid, financial, scientific and technical, for the project, outlining its

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three-part objective: (1) sweeping excavation in Nubia; (2) moving or protecting the temples; and (3) complete documentation of sites. Since it was evening by the time we completed this task, and my office staff had been absent, I asked Mme Desroches-Noblecourt, who arrived suddenly to bid me farewell as she was leaving for Paris the same night, to type out this missive on my small portable French typewriter—how it rang to our hopes!— and hand carry it herself to Paris that same night. This letter included an offer by the Egyptian government to award expeditions participating in Nubian excavation a 50% share of finds, with the exception of unique artifacts, and the opportunity to resume excavation at other sites in Egypt after completion of their work in Nubia. Such activities had long been suspended, terminated, or redirected to other areas of the Middle East, and there was pressing need to resume them. In June of 1959, I received an invitation to present Egypt’s case to the UNESCO Executive Board in Paris. Despite the then-severed diplomatic relations with France, I accepted. My two-hour presentation was greeted by such enthusiastic applause and expressions of unanimous support that I wept for sheer joy and relief. A Board decree authorized the Director General to draw up a complete plan for the enterprise in consultation with the Egyptian government, and to expedite experts to Nubia to study all aspects of the operation. An international conference to debate the issues would then be convened. The preliminary findings were to be submitted to the Board in time for the November 1959 UNESCO General Conference session. I felt confident that we were on the right path at last. This decree, announced by me at a press conference, was heartily welcomed by media and public alike, and resounded in foreign scholarly and scientific circles. Our first steps were taken with UNESCO on a long and arduous journey to rescue Nubia’s monuments, but before the organization could launch its appeal for global participation, scientific and technical resources must first be guaranteed to persuade nations and institutions to join the endeavor. The date of January 9, 1960, was set for beginning construction of the High Dam, and the race was on with the encroaching waters. The time had come to determine the principles of cooperation between the Ministry of Culture and the world organization. In July 1959, the Director of the Department of Museums at UNESCO, M. Van der Haagen, and Mme Desroches-Noblecourt

joined Dr. Shukri, Dr. Shehata Adam, and legal counselor Mr. Mohammed Salem Gomaa to prepare the unprecedented memorandum that was to establish the blueprint and historic basis for future such endeavors. It incorporated four proposals— an international appeal addressed by UNESCO for participation by nations and institutions, an official declaration by Egypt reiterating our request and defining the concessions to participating organizations, an invitation to an international conference of experts to outline a plan in October 1959, and a UNESCO-sponsored aerial survey of Nubia. UNESCO immediately proceeded with implementation of its obligations. A team from the French Institut géographique national duly arrived in August of that year to undertake the aerial survey, accompanied by officers of the Egyptian air force, while in August-September, teams of geologists, engineers, and architects prepared reports on the condition of the temples and the feasibility of salvage. Meanwhile, experts at the EAO and the Center of Documentation readied exploratory studies on excavations and documentation programs. Despite the searing temperatures and initial missteps, the experts were afforded some measure of comfort and pursued their arduous work in a spirit of cooperation. The resulting reports predicted success in the preservation of Nubia’s monuments, whether by relocating them or protecting them in situ. While these reports were being readied for the forthcoming international conference, I met twice that summer with the EAO to review the steps taken during this stage. Qualms, doubts, or reservations expressed by several members with regard to some wording in the government declaration at the opening of the forthcoming conference of experts were soon overcome by the unanimous resolve that drove us in our quest. The international conference of experts convened on October 1, 1959, at the Center of Documentation, with 13 experts in archaeology, geology, and engineering from various nations participating. I delivered the prepared declaration and revealed a previously unannounced incentive to nations providing significant contributions to the rescue of important monuments (in particular the two temples of Abu Simbel, for which no sacrifice was deemed too great): the gift of the Nubian temples of Taffa, Dabud, Dendur, Ellessya, and El Derr, making them “ambassadors extraordinary” for our cause abroad.

the international campaign to preserve the monuments of nubia, 1959-68 Sailing the Nile between hill and vale, the participants spent ten days in Nubia, visiting sites and holding daily meetings. Flying by military helicopter from Aswan, I joined them at Abu Simbel, to announce that Egypt would give priority to the rescue of the two great temples. We engaged in objective, serious discussions that led to a detailed report on the means of the execution of the operation. The recommendations included forming expeditions to perform an archaeological survey of the entire area with special attention to prehistoric sites, undertaking excavation in all the archaeological sites, completion of antiquities documentation, and, connecting past to future, transfer of the temples to locations safe from future agrarian land reclamation in Nubia proper. Temples impossible to relocate, such as Abu Simbel, would be protected by the creation of rock/earth dams. Philae would be coffered according to the project earlier proposed by engineer Osman Rostem. The report, which concluded by calling upon the Director General to launch the international appeal, was of particular import to the Ministry of Culture as it strove to implement projects that would be of relevance to the life of contemporary Egyptians. The government of the Sudan, which had been closely observing our actions, decided to follow our lead, and on October 24, 1959, applied to UNESCO for assistance in saving the Nubian patrimony within its borders. The Executive Board responded by allotting $15,0005 to underwrite preliminary steps to be taken to save the monuments of Sudanese Nubia. In order to prepare international public opinion for the appeal, UNESCO issued an invitation to a large contingent of members of the international media to visit Nubia as guests of Egypt. The ministry further extended its invitation to several ambassadors and members of the diplomatic corps from countries deemed essential to the execution of our plan. In February 1960, a special charter flew them to Aswan, whence they proceeded by boat to Nubia for a ten-day visit. This was the ideal means to transmit worldwide a visually dramatic alert to the imminent dangers faced by our mon5

All dollar amounts are given in US dollars. The dinner hosted by our ambassador, Saleh Khalil, to mark the occasion was attended by the Queen Mother Elizabeth, who promised her full support for the campaign. I took questions at a press conference after the opening, and met with King Baudoin, who expressed great interest in all the particulars. The exhibition subsequently toured the capitals of 6

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uments, and soon the press abroad, particularly in Europe and the United States, was filled with reports overflowing with enthusiastic support for the project. After consultation with UNESCO legal counsel Hanna Saba, March 8, 1960, was the date agreed upon for launching the international appeal. An honorary Committee of Patrons would be chaired by His Majesty King Gustav VI of Sweden, and a Consultative Committee would be made up of twelve members, eight foreign nationals and four Egyptians. The decision to exhibit our national treasures abroad for the first time was our second important, but infinitely more complex and challenging, step in revealing to the world our heritage and civilization. Here opposition was contentious and obstinate, and overcoming it was truly difficult, but was achieved at last. Belgium, a nation in the forefront of our supporters, was selected as the first venue for the exhibition “5000 Years of Egyptian Art,” scheduled to open in Brussels immediately following the launching of the historic international appeal by UNESCO, proclaimed by Director General Veronese in Paris in the vast assembly hall of the organization’s headquarters. He declared that just like the writings of Socrates, the Ajanta frescoes, the walls of Uxmal, or Beethoven’s symphonies, the monuments of Nubia belonged to a common human heritage, and the Nile must not enfold in its bosom the glories bequeathed us by generations long gone to dust. Egypt’s permanent representative to UNESCO, Dr. Abdel Aziz elQusi, then delivered President Nasser’s greeting and message of thanks to the assembly. The resounding success of the exhibition, which opened in the Belgian capital on March 25 to a rapturous welcome by the media and a huge public turnout, was such that many countries sent requests to host the exhibition.6 Returning to France on March 30, 1960, I attended the UNESCO Executive Board meeting, strengthening ties with members. I noted with satisfaction their solid support, as well as that of the media, for the project. On May 22, 1960, I convened the Consultative Committee at the Center Holland, Switzerland, Denmark, Sweden, Federal Republic of Germany, and the United Kingdom for three years. This success encouraged us to follow up with exhibitions of masterpieces of Islamic and Coptic art the world over, and the Treasures of Tutankhamun were displayed in the United States, Canada, Japan, Paris, and London; all paved the way for the rescue of our Nubian heritage.

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of Documentation to discuss the response to the many requests for concessions in Nubia submitted by various scholarly and scientific institutions and other organizations. The summer of 1960 was a time of intensive activity as we prepared to face the UNESCO General Conference in November 1960, armed with voluminous documentation of preliminary research and studies. Expeditions soon began to arrive in Nubia, with work on the fleet of river boats to accommodate their members underway in Cairo at Bulaq. The frenetic activity in Nubia that summer provided the momentum for the revival of Egyptian archaeology, moribund since 1934.7 In the fierce summer heat, the engineering team from the French consultative engineers Coyne et Bellier toiled at Abu Simbel; another team, headed by the renowned Italian architect Piero Gazzola, examined the other temple sites; and a Dutch expedition investigated Philae—all formulating and developing salvage plans. The Ministry of Culture, with the cooperation of the Ministry of Irrigation, dismantled the low-lying temples of Taffa and Dabud, and the blocks were stored on Elephantine Island at Aswan. A number of Egyptian artists, writers, and poets, headed by the great architect Hassan Fathi, the artists Hamed Saeed, Gazibeyya Sirry, Salah Taher, Seif and Adam Wanli, among others, were invited to visit Nubia aboard the “Dakka.” Their Nubia-inspired output was published in a single volume by the ministry, which also produced a color documentary film on the life and customs of the Nubians, as well as a photographic record of the land, its history, and its people in Arabic, French, and English. On another front, I launched a diplomatic offensive, meeting with ambassadors accredited to our government, while our ambassadors abroad lobbied governments to support the project when it came up for debate at the General Conference. The Director General of UNESCO and his Deputy, for their part, targeted contacts with various countries. Choosing Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan as special advisor for Nubia, M. Veronese dispatched him to the United States and the United Kingdom. Other high officials traveled to Italy, Holland, and Scandinavia. The Director himself visited the Federal Republic of Germany, contacting industrialists and

economists. UNESCO issued a special “Nubian” edition of its magazine Courier, soon followed by a sequel. Finally, a striking installation of huge photographic enlargements displayed in the lobby of UNESCO headquarters and highlighting the temples of Abu Simbel and Philae greeted arriving delegates when the General Conference convened in November 1960. For the first time, I headed the Egyptian delegation. The Conference’s decisions would be of particular importance, since it represented all member states upon whom we counted for approval, participation, and contribution to the project. Here it became apparent that our diplomatic lobbying at home and abroad had borne fruit, as had the efforts of UNESCO. On November 24, 1960, I laid before the Conference the full array of our efforts and activities to date. The Nubian campaign project was discussed by the International Action Committee, with 24 member states represented and chaired by the prominent Brazilian delegate, Ambassador Paulo de Berrêdo Carneiro, a seasoned, consummate and brilliant diplomat, gifted orator, and physicist, who was steadfast in his support of the project from its beginning. The role of UNESCO had not yet been clarified. Previously, after intensive discussions at the EAO and consultation with expert scholars, it had been decided not to surrender our sovereignty to any authority, our appreciation and gratitude notwithstanding. With this full assumption of responsibility, the salvage would be undertaken under the laws of our state and its flag, with international cooperation and support. UNESCO would act as intermediary between Egypt and the participating nations, ensuring that work proceeded within sound international parameters, defined by the organization’s charter and the recommendations of the General Conference, the Executive Board, and the established committees. At the 1960 General Conference, however, the International Action Committee recommended that UNESCO should bear full responsibility for the project to its conclusion. It was a most intricate, complex problem, with many thorny issues raised. After intensive discussion, it was agreed that UNESCO would play the role of intermediary between Egypt and the Sudan and the participating nations. The Director also confirmed the sovereign rights of Egypt and the Sudan in decision making at every

7 The program of documentation was redirected to Nubia from Thebes, and the eventual fruit of this effort was a massive

archive, an invaluable resource for study and research of this rich period of human history.


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Fig. 5. The temple of Nefertari at Abu Simbel: salvage of the temple, re-erection of the façade on the new site, Oct. 1966. SCA Archives.

Fig. 6. Dr. Okasha with President De Gaulle in Paris, 1967.

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stage of the project, according to the UNESCO constitution.8 I linked the Nubian rescue project to the main topic of concern at the General Conference: the continent of Africa, African liberation, and the promotion of education on the continent, arguing that the Nubian monuments were a part of Africa’s heritage, and saving them became a part of UNESCO’s obligations towards Africa and the world. I further disclosed that the Egyptian government had budgeted L.E. 3,500,000 over seven years for the Abu Simbel project, an allocation for which I had just received the acquiescence of the President, thus proving our serious commitment to the cause. This announcement elicited a most favorable response. A potential crisis caused by the American delegate’s attempt to establish a choice of priority between African education versus the Nubian campaign was calmly defused through debate and persuasion. Expressing appreciation of the Egyptian sacrifices and efforts towards implementing the project, the International Action Committee recommended that states and their governments should contribute through budget allocations, and encourage organizational and institutional participation. The committee further acceded to the wish of the Director General to create an Executive Committee for the International Campaign to Save the Monuments of Nubia attached to the organization, composed of important personalities and representatives of the Egyptian and Sudanese governments. Members would work with him in an advisory capacity in matters concerning the disbursement of funds contributed by participating countries and organizations, and in the coordination and execution of work agendas. The International Action Committee’s decisions and recommendations were reviewed by the plenary “Programs” Committee, and then passed to the General Conference for ratification. After more than a year of struggle, the Egyptian delegation had achieved its objective, and the issue of the Nubian campaign, elevated to the international level, now came within the realm of feasibility. Basking in the glow of this sincere goodwill and communal support, we returned to Egypt to gird ourselves for the labor ahead. We had prepared the various projects—the Coyne et Bellier plan for Abu Simbel, the Gazzola

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I note here the positive expressions of support voiced by many members, prominent among them the representatives

project for the remaining temples, the Dutch Philae project—for presentation at UNESCO. Upon arrival in Paris, I was unexpectedly presented with an alternate project for Abu Simbel, based on an earlier, schematic proposal by Gazzola to raise both temples in monolithic blocks, which was rejected by the experts at the international conference of October 1959. I decided that the thorough and meticulously detailed plan now submitted by the company Italconsult SpA should not be turned down without serious review. The International Action Committee concurred with our opinion that both Abu Simbel projects be given equal consideration. Within days of the General Conference, the Director General and I had agreed to form an international five-member committee (Egypt, The Soviet Union, the United States, Switzerland, and the Federal Republic of Germany) to review the two Abu Simbel plans, known as the “French” and the “Italian” (or “Gazzola”) projects. The former involved the construction of a semicircular dam before the temples attached to the mountain on either side, rising above the projected water level, and provided with pumping stations to suction out the seepage. The drawbacks to this plan were its enormous initial expense, a costly and permanent yearly maintenance budget for dam and machinery, and the grave risk to the monuments in the event of a pump malfunction. The latter plan envisaged removing the summit of the hill above the temples, cutting both out of their rock matrix, and encasing them in concrete boxes, then raising them with thousands of electronically powered hydraulic jacks, recreating their original appearance within their mountain frame and the surrounding area at a higher elevation. Wonderful as this modern technological feat might appear, it seemed fantastical and unachievable to many. At its first meeting in Cairo in January 1961, the five-member committee opted for the Italian project. The weight of the great temple was estimated at 250,000 tons and that of the encasing concrete box at 50,000 tons. It was feared that the slightest mishap would severely damage or doom the monument, and a fierce debate ensued within the Consultative Committee for the Monuments of Nubia. Expert specialists from Norway and Sweden were allotted the task of studying and resolving certain technical queries, including

of Brazil, Belgium, Holland, Yugoslavia, Italy, France, and Poland.


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foundation reinforcement and calculating the effects of mechanical vibration. Engineer Dr. Hassan Zaki, then head of the Executive Organization for the Construction of the High Dam, confirmed that the experts had offered reliable solutions. In response to their recommendation, a five-member international council of experts in engineering and geology, known as the Board of Consultants for the Abu Simbel Project, was established, with Dr. Zaki in charge. Following approval by the EAO, and with the blessing of the President, the selection of the Italian project was announced on June 20, 1961. The Swedish firm Vattenbyggnadsbryan (VBB) was recommended by UNESCO as our engineering consultant, and planning for the project’s execution was initiated. An important milestone was reached in the implementation of the salvage plan.9 Financing was the next hurdle we faced. Time was of the essence, the costs immense. At a meeting in Cairo, M. Maheu and I agreed that the Director General should obtain commitments from member states to allocate funds commensurate with their annual contributions to the organization. A circular was issued requesting funds to be paid in installments covering the duration of the project, from 1961 to1968. These commitments were a necessary guarantee.10 The Secretary General traveled to the United States to explore the possibility of raising the equivalent of $25,000,000 in Egyptian pounds, should the Senate authorize President Kennedy to release the revenue from American wheat sales to Egypt for the Nubian campaign. The United States, the biggest contributor to UNESCO, was also the one nation with an ambiguous position regarding the Nubian campaign. Nubian patrimony was threatened because of the High Dam, and the High Dam project had triggered a succession of international crises resulting in the nationalization of the Suez Canal and provoking the Suez War. There was a hidden political agenda

behind the States’ negative attitude to the project.11 A number of supportive Americans were of the opinion that the best way to win over American public opinion and influence Congress, separating politics from culture, would be an exhibition of some of the treasures of Tutankhamun to tour 12 states, with the proceeds going to the Nubian campaign. This idea was endorsed by UNESCO, and the EAO approved it on February 16, 1961. I confess that I hesitated over this decision, for the treasures of the young pharaoh had never left Egypt since their discovery in 1922, and many of them were quite fragile. However, extreme need overcame doubt. With the permission of the President, and taking every precaution, I sent 34 artifacts to Washington in the care of Dr. Ahmed Fakhri, Professor of Ancient Egyptian History, and dispatched Dr. Hussein Kamel Selim to deliver lectures during the tour. I was invited to attend the opening of the exhibition in Washington on November 3, 1961. The exhibition was inaugurated by Mrs. Jacqueline Kennedy, to whom I presented a small Old Kingdom statue, a gift from the people of Egypt to the people of the United States. She was very moved, and astutely suggested that it be displayed in the exhibition to be viewed by the American public, and placed thereafter in a national museum, and so it was. During my stay in Washington, I made good use of my time, directing the attention of the public to the glories of our ancient civilization. The media overflowed with reports on the exhibits and the Nubian campaign, and Egyptian-American cultural relations. I met with archaeologists, members of the U.S. administration and Senate, and with State Department officials, from whom I exacted a promise to consider a U.S. contribution. The resounding success of the exhibition, with its record-breaking attendance, did influence U.S. decision making on participation in the campaign.12

9 Alongside the technical aspects of the international campaign, publicity was directed within Egypt by means of a national committee, and in an outreach to the Arab world through the good offices of the Arab League and its Secretary General, Mr. Abdel Khaleq Hassouna. The Cultural Committee of the League and its Council recommended that member governments set the example to others, and establish national committees to coordinate efforts. We pursued our use of diplomatic channels to keep up the flow of information. 10 Of the total cost of $87,000,000, members would contribute $67,000,000, while Egypt would bear $20,000,000. 11 In connection with US posture, I recall Mme Desroches-

Noblecourt relaying disheartening comments made at a dinner given by the US Ambassador Mr. Reinhardt, who derided our efforts to save the Nubian monuments and declared the High Dam to be a “political lie” never to be realized. 12 Alas, in the midst of our delight and high hopes, a most unfortunate incident occurred to mar the exhibition’s triumphal progress. On March 13, 1962, during the installation of the exhibition in Kansas, it was discovered that the staff of a shabti, not more than ten cm long, was missing. The theft was reported by the American Ambassador, Mr. John Badeau, and confirmed by Dr. Fakhri, the responsible authority who

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Following his visit to the United States, M. Veronese was informed that President Kennedy had requested ratification by Congress for the allocation of $10,000,000 from the wheat sales to be used in the rescue campaign in Egypt and the Sudan. With the approval of Congress, funds were directed to the expeditions, and for relocation of two of the most important temples of Nubia, Rameses II’s rock-cut temple at Beit elWali and his temple of Wadi el-Sebua, and the unique rock-cut tomb of Pennut at Aniba. Funding for Philae was withheld until the salvage plans were ready for execution, while UNESCO was led to hope that President Kennedy would present a second request to Congress for the financing for Abu Simbel. The year 1961 was truly glorious in the annals of the Nubian campaign. From Washington, I headed to Paris on November 10. Many members of the Executive Board affirmed their readiness to contribute funds to the campaign.13 The Board approved the steps taken in the campaign and extended our requested guarantee to November 1962. Next in Rome, I urged my friend Prime Minister Amintore Fanfani, with whom I had developed a close rapport during my tenure there as ambassador, to request an increase in Italy’s contribution exceeding that determined by UNESCO. The Italian government took special interest in the “Gazzola” Abu Simbel project, so it seemed reasonable to me that it should set an example in generosity! Work in Nubia, launched in 1960, was proceeding apace. Expedition members representing nearly 20 countries and more than 30 organizations, institutions, and universities, were allotted their sites; latecomers were asked to concentrate on the temples, or headed to Sudanese Nubia. The Center of Documentation reported that work on recording Nubia’s temples was 75% completed.14

Egyptian archaeologists and engineers supervised the transfer of the temples of Taffa, Dabud and Qertassi. The Federal Republic of Germany had offered to save the Temple of Kalabsha, and the German expedition was now dismantling it. The Nubian project, while drawing widespread international attention and support as an extraordinary cultural undertaking, reflected positively on the High Dam project, generating political repercussions that cannot be discounted. The participation of prominent individuals from various countries in the honorary and national committees of the campaign resonated in political circles, in the European Council, and in national parliaments. Intense media interest the world over provided us with welcome free coverage. Representatives of press agencies, newspapers, radio, and television flocked to Egypt, engendering a deluge of reports, photographs, slides, documentary films (UNESCO, 20th Century Fox), books, pamphlets, magazines (Life, Reader’s Digest) in numerous languages, with the Ministry of Culture contributing its share. This heady publicity encouraged travel agencies and tourist bureaus to join with airlines in promoting travel to Egypt and Nubia. Tourists poured in, rushing to visit Abu Simbel, and an Italian company was contracted to provide daily hydrofoil transportation to the site. Boats sailed from the First Cataract to Abu Simbel, and tens of thousands of visitors enjoyed viewing the monuments in their original sites. The international campaign succeeded in both informing and shaping world public opinion, reaching into every home and school. I received many touching letters of support and encouragement from ordinary people, adults and children, from far-flung lands. Egypt and Nubia were on every tongue, and the world was able to observe contemporary Egypt on the march from its towering ancient past to its present renaissance.

headed the exposition. This most serious loss could not be hidden, and a statement was prepared, both informing the public and announcing the intention of the ministry to withdraw the exhibit unless our treasures were fully secured. The Associated Press then claimed that the staff had been found, and the US Ambassador requested a correction. Al-Ahram newspaper castigated the ministry for an overhasty reaction. In our view, the object was lost in America, and both the negligence and the responsibility for our loss lay there. Dr. Zaki reported that the “recovered” staff was in fact a cosmetic replacement. The Al-Ahram rebuke and the ambassador’s letter were based on an erroneous report disseminated by AP to deny the theft! The precious and irreplaceable artifact remains lost to us, its disappearance a mystery.

13 The USA, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Morocco, Holland, Yugoslavia, Cyprus, Greece, Monaco, Tunis, Italy, Poland, Ecuador, Venezuela, the Philippines, and Qatar. France announced an initial contribution of $200,000. 14 I mention with utmost appreciation the painstaking work of the archaeologists sent by UNESCO to aid in the work of the Center of Documentation, their meticulous recording of the ancient reliefs and texts, and the invaluable assistance of the French Institut géographique national, the French Centre national de la recherche scientifique, the Institut français d’archéologie orientale, the Institut suisse de recherches architecturale et archéologique de l’ancienne Egypte, and the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago.

the international campaign to preserve the monuments of nubia, 1959-68 Preliminary studies of the Abu Simbel project concluded that work should be divided in two stages, the first, raising the monuments, to be executed between 1962 and 1968,15 then reconstituting the hill framing the temple and the crest above.16 At this sensitive time, Al-Ahram, to my utter disbelief, delivered a bombshell on February 10, 1962. Sensational headlines trumpeted the news that the international effort to finance the campaign was faltering, but Cairo would brook no delay in the construction of the High Dam! The whole enterprise was fragile, beset by crises, and shrouded in uncertainty, subject to the conflicting vagaries of foreign policies. The utterly baseless Al-Ahram report threatened to undercut the entire endeavor. I raced to issue a statement of denial, but I cannot to this day construe a reason for such a destructively negative fabrication. I embarked in March 1962 upon an extensive European tour, already planned, that had now acquired new urgency. I engaged throughout my travels in meetings, discussions, and consultations at the highest levels of government—with monarchs, presidents, prime ministers, ministers and other officials—and bore away reassurances from one and all, backed by commitments to contribute to the campaign.17 I began in Berlin and Bonn in the Federal Republic of Germany, and then went to Denmark, which was hosting “5000 Years of Egyptian Art” in April, followed by Sweden, for a meeting of the Abu Simbel Board of Consultants at the engineering consultants VBB’s headquarters in Stockholm. At VBB headquarters, the Board reviewed plans for raising the Abu Simbel temples prepared by the engineering consultant firm and studied the technical details. The Board also recommended assuring the financing of the project before its launch, since putting the project to tender without financial cover might expose the Egyptian government to liability to the participating companies. This warning only served, if need there was, to redouble our efforts in international circles. I then proceeded to Italy to unveil 15

Cost: L.E. 20,000,000 (the rate of exchange before May 1962 was L.E. 1.00= $2.872, after May $2.30). 16 Cost: L.E. 9,000,000, bringing the total cost to nearly L.E. 30,000,000. This meant that Egypt’s share of the cost must be increased. The President acceded to my request of an increase from L.E. 2,000,000 to L.E. 5,000,000. 17 In the Federal Republic of Germany, I met with the Mayor of West Berlin, Willi Brandt, Foreign Minister Gerhardt Schroeder, Minister of Economic Cooperation for Developing Countries Kirk Frei, the Minister of Education, the Deputy Minister, and the Director of Cultural Affairs

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the statue erected to our poet Ahmed Shawqi in the gardens of our academy in Rome. I held press conferences and met with the media throughout, and in Denmark delivered an address on the topic of Nubia at the Royal Swedish Academy of the Humanities and the Arts, attended by His Majesty King Gustav VI and a very large audience of academics, archaeologists, UNESCO officials, and culture and media representatives, as well as the general public. Aside from these intensive efforts to rally support for the Nubian rescue project, I attended to the business of bilateral cultural relations between the Ministry of Culture and these countries as well. The international fundraising campaign had been launched on the premise of voluntary contributions. Could it continue along those lines? The Abu Simbel project, started in 1960, lagged behind plans for the High Dam by several years. The race with time was on. Work preliminary to raising the temples—isolating the structures, digging tunnels, building the encasing boxes, installing the jacks— was scheduled to last into early 1966, whereas the waters of the High Dam were expected to rise in the autumn of 1964. On the financial front, despite two appeals by the Director General in 1961, scant voluntary contributions had been received for the financial guarantee sought by Egypt. We were mere months away from the scheduled start, and the deadline for the guarantee was November 1962. I shared my growing concerns with the Director General, who raised the issue with the Executive Board at the next General Conference, when René Maheu was nominated to succeed M. Veronese. A long-term loan issued by UNESCO, to be repaid by member states over 20 years, was the ingenious solution devised in response to our dilemma. The Director General spared no effort to secure the loan for the Abu Simbel project, contacting banks and lobbying member states for support ahead of the Conference, with the Brazilian delegate M. de Berrêdo Carneiro concentrating on Latin American nations. I embarked on the European tour, to positive response, and at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs; in Denmark with King Frederic and his daughter Princess Margrethe (the present queen), Prime Minister Viggo Kampman and other ministers concerned, Minister of Culture Julius Bomholt, and Minister of Education Helvig Petersen. In Sweden, I saw King Gustav VI, the Minister of Finance and the faculty of Uppsala University, accompanied by Professor of Egyptology Säve-Söderbergh, the Foreign Minister Osten Enden, and the Minister of Education. In Italy I met with President Gronchi and Prime Minister Fanfani, as well as the Ministers of Foreign Affairs and Education.

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met with foreign ambassadors at my office, while Egypt’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs worked the diplomatic channels. Informal feedback was not encouraging. Had we expended ourselves in vain, foiled in our endeavors only to stand helplessly by at last as the magnificent temples of Abu Simbel disappeared? With the consent of the EAO, I secretly commissioned the engineering consultant VBB to design two “reserve” projects for raising the temples in sections and assembling them at a higher elevation. The first plan was readied in under six months, even before my October 1962 deadline, for an estimated cost of L.E. 11,000,000 ($24,000,000). A second fallback proposal was calculated at L.E. 6-7,000,000, but this plan did not include removal of the ceilings of the temples and the rocks above the edifices. During these tense maneuverings, circumstances in September 1962, which I will not relate here, constrained me to request the President to relieve me of the post of Minister of Culture. He acceded, appointing me to the chairmanship of the National Bank of Egypt instead and further charging me to lead our delegation at the forthcoming UNESCO General Conference, to pursue the mission whose burden I had borne from its inception. The President also decided that I would be Egypt’s candidate for the Executive Board at its next elections preceding the General Conference. I should then be in a position of some influence. I headed to the October 1962 General Conference alternating between hope and despair, with no comfort save my secret, low-cost, short-timeframe, alternative projects. The plan for the Abu Simbel project, estimated at a total cost of $80,000,000, was to subsidize its first stage with a loan of $30,500,000, drawn upon banks in Italy and Egypt, plus $11,500,000 in interest, to be repaid over 20 years between 1963 and 1983. This proposal elicited determined opposition from the great powers, the USA, the USSR, Britain, and France, who protested that

18

Member states were reluctant or unwilling to commit or contribute for a variety of economic reasons, the Soviet Union was opposed, the USA would not decide before the presidential election, and the UK and France did not support the idea of a loan. I was quite unprepared for the announcement by the British Minister of Education, David Eccles, reported in Cairo newspapers on July 15, 1962, that no contribution would be made to the Nubia campaign, since Britain had been among the first countries to hasten to aid in the work of discovery, survey, and excavation in the area. The renowned British

compulsory contribution would set a dangerous precedent, that it was a mistake to spend so much on one project, that the interest would represent a priority debt in repayment for UNESCO, that there might be less-costly means of saving Abu Simbel—this from the US delegate, which made me suspect that my reserve plan must have been leaked!18 Holland, Italy, Sweden, Brazil, Cuba, and Tunisia, stressing the short time available for action, strongly supported the Director General’s proposal. These members argued that insufficient funds had been raised by voluntary contribution, and that the loan and interest debt would not represent an undue burden to member states, which numbered 113 at the time. The expert committee was divided between supporters and naysayers. Impassioned speeches were delivered calling for support and deploring intrigues, for the spirit of the organization to rise above the fray, and argument raged back and forth. These contentious disputes and maneuvers led to many votes of abstention, and protracted in-committee discussions led many delegates to withdraw from the meetings, weakening support. Maintaining continuous contact with the heads of delegations of the great powers, and the Asian, European, Latin American, and African blocks, I vainly appealed to the “Programs” Committee, entreating friendly nations for succor, but many retreated behind abstention or absence. I next turned to the General Conference, expressing my profound regret and deep disappointment at the position taken by certain member states while others, led by Brazil, strenuously exerted themselves to reach a solution to the impasse. For the entire month’s duration of the conference, the matter went from committee to committee, and back and forth to the General Conference, with every conceivable obstacle—procedural, legal, fiscal—raised at every turn, until the idea of compulsory contribution was vanquished at last by its foes, and the project for raising the temples, deprived of its long-hoped-for loan, in effect died

archaeologist Walter Emery mentioned that the severe economic crisis roiling the country at the time precluded foreign aid when teachers’ salaries were being cut back. The Labor and Conservative arts committees voiced support for the Abu Simbel project. Eventually, the government reversed its position, and Britain contributed $212,925 to the cause. The Soviet Union offered a team from Leningrad University to join other expeditions in Nubia. Otherwise, I did not press for support for the rescue of Abu Simbel, in view of the enormous efforts and aid rendered in the construction of the High Dam.


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in committee. This failure would be a bitter setback for UNESCO and its international campaign, but on the other hand it became a turning point in the rescue of the two temples. There now being no option remaining but to revert to the original approach and continue to solicit voluntary contributions to the project begun in 1959, states were called upon to announce contributions before March 31, 1963, to allow for an estimate of funds upon which Egypt might rely. In order to bolster the international campaign, the conference changed the composition of the Executive Committee for the International Campaign to Save the Monuments of Nubia, from membership by prominent individuals to one by states, 15 in all: Brazil, Ecuador, France, the Federal Republic of Germany, India, Italy, Lebanon, Holland, Pakistan, Spain, Sudan, Sweden, Egypt, the USA, and Yugoslavia. It also broadened the committee’s powers, freeing the Director General to act upon its authority without awaiting the yearly convening of the General Assembly.19 Most effort in 1962 was directed to the Abu Simbel project, which that year navigated rough and troubled waters, subject to the tidal pull of international dealings. Still, the year brought many positive advances, with ongoing work in Nubia on excavation, survey, and documentation, and the relocation of other temples. By the March 20, 1963, meeting at UNESCO headquarters, it became apparent that of the member states, now numbering 115, only 20 participants had come forward, with a total contribution far short of the estimated cost. The international campaign, so successful in its other aspects, was failing to finance the first stage of the Abu Simbel project. Contributing members met again on April 23-24, 1963, by which time 45 states had put up $7,700,000, hardly a fourth of the required sum. The time had come for me to reveal my “reserve” project commissioned in 1962, with an estimate not exceeding $36,000,000. The French plan for the construction of a dam protecting the temple in situ was also submitted for comparison on archaeological, aesthetic, technical, and fiscal merits. After wending their way through the many committees of experts in archaeology, geology, and

engineering in Egypt and at UNESCO, both projects, after exhaustive examination, were found to compare favorably, but the French project was deemed still schematic, its timeline too lengthy, and its cost (approximately $57,000,000) too high. The Board of Consultants for the Abu Simbel project in Cairo opted for my alternative project, despite reservations voiced regarding potential damage resulting from the stone cutting. Upon the council’s recommendation, the Egyptian Cabinet selected the “reserve” project. The UNESCO Executive Committee also ratified it. Between June and November 1963, the Ministry of Culture put the project to international tender. To ensure the hard currency needed for the project, the Ministry dispatched the Undersecretary of State for Nubian Affairs, Mr. Abdel Moneim el-Sawi,20 to obtain a loan from the Kuwaiti government of £3,000,000, to be used in part as down payment to the companies awarded the project. By the November 5-9, 1963, meeting of the participating nations and the Executive Board at the headquarters of the Arab League in Cairo, the total contributions committed, thanks to UNESCO efforts, now amounted to $17,200,000. The President authorized me to proceed, on the understanding that the fundraising campaign would secure at least $20,500,000, the minimum needed to initiate the project. He added a further proviso that the campaign make up the difference to reach the $24,500,000 required to complete it, apart from Egypt’s contribution of $11,500,000. The draft bilateral agreements between Egypt and UNESCO on the one hand, and the Organization and the participating nations on the other, were approved, and contributions would be transferred to Egypt after approval by the Executive Committee for the International Campaign to Save the Monuments of Nubia, pending a sixmonthly review of the progress report and the financial schedule. On November 9, 1963, the Egyptian Minister of Information and Culture, Dr. Abdel Qader Hatem, and M. René Maheu, UNESCO Director General, signed the accord financing the project. By the end of 1963, the project to save the most precious of all the Nubian monuments, whose

19 I was elected that session to the Executive Board, of which I remained a member until 1970. I was able to follow developments of the project at the international level and work toward promoting it and achieving its goal. I remained

as head of the Egyptian delegation from 1962 to 1970. 20 At the time of my absence from the ministry in 1962– 1966.

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seed I had sown and whose foundations I had fought to establish, was about to begin after protracted and involved travail. I have already mentioned the work on surveying, excavation, and documentation undertaken between 1960 and 1963, and the salvage of the temples of Taffa and Dabud. The relocation of Kalabsha temple at that time from its site 57 km south of Aswan to its new position 7 km south of that city, on the west bank of the Nile facing the High Dam, was undertaken by the Federal Republic of Germany in lieu of contributing to the Abu Simbel project. In 1963, the EAO re-erected the Temple of Qertassi next to Kalabsha. This area became the first zone to comprise important Nubian monunents—Kalabsha, Beit el-Wali and Qertassi—on their new site above the water level of the High Dam lake. Between 1964 and 1965, France undertook the salvage of the Amada Temple in two phases. Rather than dismantle its blocks and endanger their plaster coating, with its fragile ancient painted decoration, the rear of the temple was transferred by rail 3 km westward in one piece. The EAO moved the front of the temple. France funded the reconstruction of the Amada Temple at its new site, which also includes the temple of el-Derr and the tomb of Pennut,21 becoming one of three important concentrations of monuments. The temples of Dendur, Ellessya, Maharraqa, Dakka, and parts of the temples of Gerf Hussein and Abu Oda were dismantled. At this critical juncture, only the most important decoration of the temples of Gerf Hussein and Abu Oda could be preserved. The structures themselves had to be abandoned due to the high cost and the poor condition of the stones at Gerf Hussein. The Wadi el-Sebua temple was moved 4 km north, where it was joined by the temples of Dakka and Maharraqa in a second concentration.22 The Egyptian and foreign archaeological teams pursued their work until 1965, when the waters of the High Dam began to rise. Salvage archaeology proceeded

according to the goals, schedules, and priorities outlined in 1959.23 The Abu Simbel project is without doubt the greatest achievement in the field of antiquities in modern times, an unprecedented engineering feat worthy of those two peerless masterpieces of ancient Egyptian architecture.24 The Egyptian government contracted an international consortium of German, Arab, French, Italian, and Swedish companies to undertake the work, under the management of the German firm Hochtief. In anticipation of the execution of the project, I had dispatched a team headed by Dr. Zaki Iskander, the director of the Chemical Laboratory, with ten chemists and restorers and a large number of technicians to Abu Simbel to undertake restoration and reinforcement of the structures. They duly arrived at the site on August 9, 1962. They worked for seven months, reinforcing the weak sandstone, injecting the relief-covered plaster to ensure its strong adherence to the stone, filling surface cavities and cracks, and consolidating the mural decoration—a labor of committed dedication to which I can personally attest, since I visited them on site. I must briefly describe here the most important phases of the project devised by the Swedish engineering consultant VBB. During the first stage, a protective rock and rubble dam, with medial sheet steel piles constructed around the two monuments to shield ongoing work, was completed before Lake Nasser rose to 133 m above sea level in 1965. Dr. Aziz Yassin had assumed charge of the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities, after the EAO was briefly attached to that ministry in 196566. Four operations were underway by then. Steel scaffoldings were erected to protect the walls and ceilings during removal of rock above the temples, the façades of the temples were blanketed with sand to prevent damage from falling rock, and a connecting tunnel was excavated to the interior of the temples. Stone was reinforced and the reliefs fixed, and gauze was adhered to the cutting lines

21 The USA offered a generous donation of about $1,000,000 to move the temple of Beit el-Wali near Kalabsha, and the tomb of Pennut next to Amada Temple at its new site. 22 The Fund for the Rescue of the Monuments of Nubia underwrote the salvage of Dakka in 1963. It was rebuilt in 1969, with Maharraqa next to it. 23 Most commenced publication of the results of their laborious efforts. The EAO issued periodicals and dozens of scholarly publications by the Center of Documentation, capped by its impressive tome on the small Abu Simbel temple.

24 Of the cost, Egypt contributed approximately $12,000,000, with the USA generously matching that amount. Another 50 nations participated, France with almost $1,000,000, Italy with over $750,000, Sweden $500,000. The American Committee to Preserve Abu Simbel gathered $1,250,000, thanks to professors Joe Brew, Froelich Rainey, John Wilson, Edmundo Lassalle, Henry Fischer, and Max McCullough. Mrs. DeWitt Wallace of Reader’s Digest singly contributed $1,000,000. There was also the income from the exhibitions.


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Fig. 7. Dr. Okasha congratulating Mr. René Maheu upon the inauguration of the new temple site on September 22, 1968.

Fig. 8. General view of the temples of Philae with the machinery used to construct the cofferdam, Dec. 1972. SCA Archives.

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to prevent breakage at the edges. Finally, the rock above and around the walls of each temple was removed. During the second stage, the structures were cut into sections according to a predetermined pattern and the blocks then moved to the new sites being prepared. Dismantling and transfer were followed by reassembly 67 m higher than the original site in the precise ancient orientation. This operation was completed the same year. The penultimate stage was the restoration of the rocky outcrop above the temples to its original appearance, heaping the concrete domes above the temples with rock. Lastly, the seams caused by the cutting were filled so deftly that it was hard to imagine that the stones had ever been cut, transported, and reset! In September of 1966, I was re-appointed Minister of Culture, as well as Deputy Prime Minister. I named Dr. Gamal Moukhtar Undersecretary of State for Antiquities and supervisor of the Nubia Project.25 I also appointed Dr. Ahmed Qadri to the general administration of the Nubia fund, and Dr. Shehata Adam Mohammed to the general administration of the Nubian salvage operations. We were much in need at this time of a substantial infusion of funds, so I decided upon a four-month exhibition of the Tutankhamun treasures at the Petit Palais in Paris, which I opened with my French counterpart André Malreaux on February 16, 1967. “Tut’s” success was such that 1967 became “the year of Egypt” in France, reviving Egyptomania in all its manifestations. Better yet, the hard-currency revenue for our campaign fund reached a figure quite unanticipated! On May 9, 1967, I escorted President Charles de Gaulle and his spouse through the exhibition. I enjoyed a private meeting with him, engaging in a wide-ranging and far-reaching conversation on political matters of the day, with their attendant anxieties. At the formal lunch that followed, attended by a number of ministers and a select gathering of representatives of the culture, President de Gaulle delivered a most gracious address on the profound regard in which France held my country.

Alas, that Egypt’s blaze of glory in the city of light should be suddenly and tragically extinguished a few weeks later in the bitterness of her defeat in the Six-Day War on June 5, 1967. However, this crushing national reversal did not hinder the progress of our great labor. The rescue of the temples was completed two years ahead of schedule, and the day came when the results of our truly superhuman efforts were revealed to the world. Egypt’s guests were preceded to Abu Simbel by a swarm of members of the press and the media, who flew to Aswan and thence were transported by hydrofoil to Abu Simbel. At Aswan our guests toured Kalabsha, Qertassi, Beit el-Wali, Philae, and the High Dam. Military helicopters ferried them the following day to Abu Simbel for the festivities. Recalling the history of the campaign, I offered the gratitude of Egypt’s people and her government to all contributors to our success. There followed speeches by M. Maheu and M. de Berrêdo Carneiro, praising the great human and cultural endeavor, and the efforts of all involved. I was honored to receive at the hands of M. Maheu the UNESCO silver medal for signal cultural achievement. Thus did September 22, 1968, dawn upon Egypt, a day of joy and celebration.26 The challenges we confronted were indeed countless—the critical international circumstances surrounding the campaign; the bitter contest between rival blocs of nations; Egypt’s determination to preserve the sovereignty and independence of her positions; overcoming worldwide doubt as to the accomplishment of such an ambitious plan, even by a developed nation; a campaign relying solely on voluntary contributions; vacillating international positions over funding, and a dearth of hard currency, sometimes extended without security; the unwieldy enormity of the endeavor itself, extracting an entire temple from the bosom of the mountain, moving it above the encroaching waters, and restoring the monuments to their original appearance by rebuilding a mountain around and above them; providing adequate technical proficiency for the oversight of the project and ensuring its flawless execution; the challenge posed by the complete change

25 I must attest to the dedication and competence with which Dr. Moukhtar acquitted himself of his onerous task, to the admiration of all at home and abroad. 26 A film, The Eighth Wonder (1971), by New Zealand director John Feeney, four years in the making, reviewed the history of the construction of the temples using 85 imaginative/evocative paintings by the great artist Hussein Bikar. Mr. Feeney also documented the salvage operations, creating an

enduring record, faithful and gorgeously beautiful, of the tale of these two monuments, the pride of ancient human civilization and a symbol of the challenge to contemporary humanity in overcoming seemingly impossible odds. On September 22, 1970, two years to the day, the contract for the project expired, and with it the consortium’s responsibility for maintenance of the site. I instructed the Nubia fund to assign it to the care of the EAO.


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overtaking the character of the entire area; the excruciating living conditions in Nubia following the departure of its people, particularly during the stupefying heat of the summer months, a duress endured through iron resolve; providing for thousands of technicians, many of them foreign; and racing the High Dam, whose construction moved ahead inexorably, according to strict schedule! Egypt nevertheless persevered in the face of all adversity, embarking on a hazardous enterprise that touched her honor and pride and antiquity. The salvage of Abu Simbel was only one undertaking in that vast expanse strewn with our ancient heritage. All 17 temples in Nubia were salvaged and relocated or given as gifts. The aerial survey provided the experts with the archaeological topography of Nubia. The survey of the terrain was invaluable to the rescue effort. Some surveying for the prehistoric sites around the Nile basin was actually undertaken on foot over two seasons. Documentation provided guidance in the reconstruction of the monuments, and was the result of collaborative effort by the Center of Documentation with many other institutions. Teams compiled photogrammetric, photographic, architectural, and epigraphic records of all the monuments—a remarkable scholarly and scientific achievement. Egyptian restorers, chemists, and technicians exerted themselves to the utmost, reinforcing the fragile sandstone to allow the monuments to withstand the rigors of dismantling, transfer, and reconstruction. Thirty expeditions over five seasons took part in this great work.27 Egypt demonstrated her profound gratitude in gifts of temples and antiquities to contributors. The temple of Dendur, offered to the United States, was installed in the Metropolitan Museum of New York. The temple of Dabud, sent to Spain, was erected in Madrid’s Plaza Real. The Temple of Taffa, given to Holland, was placed in the Rijksmuseum van Oudheden, Leiden, while the Ellessya temple went to Italy’s Museo Egizio in Turin. As requested, France received a head of Amenhotep IV. Other nations received duplicate artifacts chosen from the antiquities magazines,

in a gesture of appreciation for their assistance in the preservation of our heritage.28

27 At a cost of $30,000,000, provided by the international campaign fund in addition to the $20,000,000 million for Abu Simbel. 28 Egypt repaid this generosity not only by offering her temples and antiquities to stand witness to her civilization in many lands, but by being the first UNESCO member to initiate the call to save the imperiled cities of Venice and Florence and their inestimable treasures. I was proud to announce at the meeting of the Executive Board, of which I remained

a member for eight years, that Egypt would place the first contribution to the city fund (L.E. 30,000 in 1967 and L.E. 20,000 in 1969) at the disposal of the Director General. When elected Deputy Chairman of the International Committee to Save Venice, I served in that capacity in excess of 10 years. I also donated all rights and proceeds of my book describing the Nubia campaign, Ramsès Recouronné: Hommage Vivant au Pharaon Mort, to the Venice project.

Epilogue One last task remained for the accomplishment of our goal: the pearl of Egypt, drowned Philae. After the construction of the first Aswan Dam in 1902, the waters of the reservoir slowly lapped up the shores of the sacred island and penetrated the sanctuary of Isis. Caring hands rushed to reinforce the temple’s foundations, replace fallen blocks, and restore the buildings so that the structure might withstand the onslaught of the creeping waters. The dam was twice raised, and the temple was flooded for the greater part of every year. After completion of the High Dam, with the yearly flood of the Nile tamed and contained, inundation became permanent. Only the superstructure remained visible, accessible by boat. A visitor could float beneath the ceilings, between the rows of column capitals, imagining the mighty goddess, her arms outstretched in mute and despairing appeal! We had not neglected her throughout the long years of our Herculean labor to save the monuments of Nubia, not from the first conference of experts in Cairo in October 1959. At the time, the construction of three protective cofferdams ringing the temple structures (proposed by the former Senior Engineer of the EAO, Osman Rostem) appeared to be the most likely solution. The Dutch expedition undertook further studies of this project. The experts decided to engage in detailed planning only after completion of the High Dam in 1968. Meanwhile, invaluable insights were gained by the experience of Nubia in the dismantling and re-erection of the ancient structures. Alternative plans to disassemble and rebuild the Temple of Philae on nearby Agilkia Island, 600 m away, were readied. Engineer Dr. William Selim Hanna chaired a committee that included experts from France, the USA, and Sweden to study the options, and the preferred

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alternative project was entrusted to Dr. Hanna to prepare in detail. A second committee of 12 experts, chaired by engineer Hassan Zaki, met in Aswan in April 1968 to examine both technically viable projects. The alternative project was estimated at a considerably lesser cost, and relocation would ensure the long-term safety and survival of the edifices, removed from the deleterious effects of humidity and seepage. UNESCO Director General Maheu issued his call for contributions to Philae on November 6, 1968, ahead of the 15th UNESCO General Conference, and invited me to unveil the Old Kingdom statue of Mihi the beer maker in the headquarters lobby. Egypt loaned this artifact to the organization in grateful recognition of its crucial role in the Nubian campaign, and as a symbol of the constructive cooperation between UNESCO and Egypt. Immediately following the session, the project was put to tender, and a technical committee was formed to evaluate the offers by Egyptian and foreign companies. The lowest estimate was submitted by the High Dam Authority,29 which estimated completion in five years. The runner-up was the Italian group Condotte D’Aqua and Mazzi. The project would be executed in two stages: the construction of a temporary cofferdam to drain the area, then the dismantling and re-erection of the temple. During an intermediate phase, the first documentation, drawing, and photographing of the temple would be undertaken. UNESCO called for a meeting of the International Committee for the Rescue of Philae on June 22-23, 1970, and the Egyptian High Dam Company for Civil Works was selected as the contractor. To preserve the international character of the project, the Egyptian company was licensed to form a joint venture with foreign companies that had submitted proffers not exceeding the amount of its own estimate and eventually settled upon the Italian group Condotte D’Aqua and Mazzi.30 In the end, unavoidable delays set back the original timetable and resulted in increased costs for the project. As a result, the Italian group requested an increase of its proffer by over L.E. 500,000 for undertaking the second stage of dismantling and transfer. The ministry acceded to an increase of half that sum. The High Dam Company for Civil

Works also requested an increase for its share of the work of building the temporary cofferdam, draining the area, preparing the site on Agilkia Island, and designing the landscaping; and in fees for supervision of the project. The final cost of saving Philae rose to L.E. 5,998,000. At a meeting in Paris of the Executive Board, its 18th session, delayed pending selection of the companies to be contracted for work on Philae, it was decided to hold a further meeting in Cairo on December 19, 1970. At this gathering, participating nations would sign the UNESCO Philae campaign contribution agreements with the Director General, and a special accord for the transfer of the funds from UNESCO to the Egyptian government. President Anwar el-Sadat reshuffled his cabinet on November 18, 1970, and appointed me Assistant to the President for Cultural Affairs. He charged me to continue supervising the Organization for the Rescue of the Nubian Antiquities that I might complete the project, now almost done, with the exception of Philae. On December 19, the delegates of the participating nations entered the conference hall in Cairo. Although I was no longer Minister of Culture, the President delegated me to represent the Egyptian government. I conveyed the President’s greetings to the assembled members, and announced Egypt’s decision to bear onethird of the costs. M. Maheu then gave his address, recollecting a similar day when members had assembled to offer their contributions to the Abu Simbel project, and what a magnificent experience that had been! He praised the departed President, Gamal Abdel Nasser, whose name would forever be linked to the High Dam, and who lent his support to the endeavor despite seriously adverse circumstances. M. Maheu also extended thanks to President Sadat, and invited members to sign the accord. In turn he addressed me, praising my part in the enterprise, which served a far higher ideal and purpose and a more noble cause than the gathering of funds. In his moving speech, Director General Maheu, recognizing my role as instigator of the first international campaign conducted under the auspices of UNESCO, cited the moral significance and value of the enterprise, not so much in the preservation of venerable stones as in establishing the concept of a cultural patrimony

29 L.E. 4,743,700, of which L.E. 954,200 was to be in hard currency.

30 The Hochtief consortium, which had worked on the Abu Simbel project, had submitted an estimate almost double that of the Italian group.


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common to all mankind, and its empowerment of the intellectual and moral solidarity of humanity, both instinctive and organized, in overcoming the forces of hatred and violence. International cooperation had given spectacular proof of the efficacy of this notion, he stated, and the United Arab Republic (Egypt) was the first member state to contribute, at my behest, to the campaign to save Florence and Venice. Such a chain reaction, M. Maheu predicted, boded well for the future of UNESCO and its mandate. He expressed his thoughts and sentiments in terms so gracious and generous that I could not but be moved, but also abashed and humbled. How my heart fluttered as the delegates each declared the amount of their country’s pledged contribution. The total reached the figure of nearly $4,000,000, with $2,443,000 from the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. This, in addition to the Egyptian one-third contribution of $4,500,000, left only almost the last third to be raised. We hoped to achieve this goal during the international campaign, by sending exhibitions abroad and contributing their revenue to the fund. I was flooded with relief as I signed the contract between our government and UNESCO to place the international contributions at the disposal of the Egyptian government to save Philae, the last temple threatened by inundation and oblivion. As the delegates were warmly shaking hands, M. Maheu stood to announce that UNESCO had awarded me its gold medal for having been the first to call for the first international campaign in a huge cultural project that had riveted the eyes of

the world. Not two years since I had been awarded the silver medal on September 22, 1968, before the temples of Abu Simbel!31 The President ratified the accord on March 13, 1971; the contracts for the project were signed by the Organization for the Salvage of the Nubian Antiquities, the Egyptian High Dam Company for Civil Works, and the Italian group on June 3, 1971; and the project went into execution, completing the last episode in the rescue of the antiquities of Nubia. I did not, however, continue in my supervisory capacity. This charge was assumed by the Ministers of Culture who succeeded me, and with them the Chairmen of the EAO, Dr. Gamal Moukhtar, and then Dr. Ahmed Qadri, until at last Philae was moved to its new site. We had indeed wrought a triumphant epilogue to the despairing “Death of Philae.” Would that Pierre Loti were alive to witness the resurrection of Isis! With what inexpressible satisfaction I view the success of this project. It was, among the many undertakings of the ministry, that uppermost in my thoughts and foremost in my concern, my prime responsibility and personal hope. My unshakable faith in eventual success prompted me to join with others, imbued with the “Spirit of Nubia,” to preserve for generations in time and places to come the timeless accomplishments of our first fathers at the dawn of civilization. Let the rescue of the monuments of Nubia be the gift of our generation to those who follow. A nation is enriched by its ability both to give and to receive.

31 I might note that the honors bestowed upon me by UNESCO were in fact a tribute not to my person, but to the country of my birth, and the revolution of which I was part, under whose auspices was undertaken a cultural project of unparalleled international scope. In 1975, I was named a corresponding member of the British Academy. In his book Temples and Tombs of Ancient Nubia: The International Rescue Campaign at Abu Simbel,

Philae and Other Sites (London and Paris, 1987), Professor Torgny Säve-Söderbergh cited the “personal factor” as the prime reason for the success of the international campaign, with leadership provided by influential individuals in Egypt, the Sudan, and UNESCO. Serendipity also played a part, in the Maheu-Okasha meeting in 1959 so central to the action, and Maheu’s subsequent elevation to the post of Director General of UNESCO.

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SOME THOUGHTS ON ΤO Υ∆ΩΡ OF THALES AND ΤO AΠΕΙΡΟΝ OF ANAXIMANDER Paul F. O’Rourke Brooklyn Museum

It is a privilege for me to offer this short article to the gentleman honored by this volume. Over a number of years, Jack and I have happily shared thoughts on points of common interest and even had the good fortune to collaborate with another scholar and friend on an article on a fragment of Late Egyptian sculpture.1 I take particular pleasure in contributing an essay that discusses a possible point of conjunction of Egyptian and Greek thought, a matter of great interest to Jack. Standing as they do at the beginning of the Greek philosophical tradition, Thales and Anaximander present myriad problems for the historian of philosophy. Their writings, long lost, if ever extant,2 have come down to us in ancient commentaries that are often concerned with the writings and ideas of other philosophers who lived generations after these two early thinkers. It is difficult—in many places impossible—to determine if the words attributed to them are direct quotes or vague paraphrases. In addition, the doxographical tradition3 routinely presents the ideas of these two philosophers in a terminology that was not of their making, quite possibly—even probably— distorting their original line of reasoning and ren1

J. Josephson, P. O’Rourke, and R. Fazzini, “The Doha Head: A Late Period Egyptian Portrait,” MDAIK 61 (2005), 219-241. 2 See G.S. Kirk, J.E. Raven, and M. Schofield, The Presocratic Philosophers: A Critical History with a Selection of Texts (Cambridge, 1993), 86-88, on the likelihood or not that Thales produced written work. 3 For the ancient commentators included under this rubric, see Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 4-6. 4 In the study of Homeric poetry, a similar situation obtains. See G.S. Kirk, The Iliad: A Commentary. Volume I: Books 1-4 (Cambridge 1995, rep.), xvii: “The Homeric epics are in any event a special case, since they stand at the beginning of known Greek literature and the influences on them are hard, if not impossible, to gauge; while literature and culture after them were so manifestly affected by the epic background that tracing influence at every point becomes self-defeating.” 5 Aristotle, Met. 983b 20f.: “Most of the first philosophers thought that principles in the form of matter were the only principles of all things; for the original source of all existing things, that from which a thing first comes-into-being and

dering undue emphasis on certain given points. Attempting to establish precisely what these two men were trying to say may often seem an exercise in “looking through a glass darkly.” Looking backwards from Aristotle through Plato and the later Presocratics to their forebears in Thales and Anaximander is not an exercise in abject futility, however, and one can appreciate some sense of where each of these two men stands in that tradition. A more intriguing question arises when we ask not what they were precursors to, but what traditions they themselves were adopting or adapting.4 Let us begin by outlining the basic cosmological theories of each of these thinkers and the routine problems one encounters in such an exercise. For the cosmology of Thales, two passages in Aristotle form our only sources. They inform us that in Thales’ vision: (1) water is the principle of all things5 and (2) the earth floats on water.6 In his attribution to Thales that τὸ ὕδωρ (water) is the ἀρχή of all things, Aristotle used the word ἡ ἀρχή in his sense of “original constituent material” that persists as a substratum into which all will eventually return.7 We are further informed into which it is finally destroyed, the substance persisting but changing in its qualities, this they declare is the element and first principle of existing things—Over the number, however, and the form of this kind of principle they do not all agree; but Thales, the founder of this type of philosophy, says that it is water.” See Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 88-89. 6 Aristotle, de Caelo 294a 28f.: “Others say that the earth rests on water. For this is the most ancient account we have received, which they say was given by Thales the Milesian, that it stays in place through floating like a log or some other such thing…” See Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 88-89. 7 For the discussion of Aristotle’s assessment of Thales’ theory, see Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 88-98, esp. 93-94. See also J. Barnes, The Presocratic Philosophers 1 (London, 1979), 9, where he translates ἡ ἀρχή as “material principle.” In both of these works, the authors are citing Aristotle, Metaphysics 983b 20f. On the appropriateness of Aristotle’s use of the term ἡ ἀρχή in describing Thales’ work and the problems that have arisen from that use, see Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 90f.

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that Thales posited this theory to explain how the earth remains suspended in space. According to Thales, the earth rests on water. There seem to be no disputes or questions about the nature of τὸ ὕδωρ in the ancient commentators. The word employed by Thales, τὸ ὕδωρ, appears to be a rather generic, non-technical term.8 In search of an answer to the question of what supports the earth, Thales thought of the waters of the sea.9 Water was also moisture, a manifestation of the principle of moist things.10 As a material element, water was, along with air, earth, and fire, a principle in Aristotle’s sense of the term.11 These four elements lie at much of the heart of the discussion of the nature of things by the Presocratics,12 and were ultimately to be posited by Empedocles as a quartet of roots that underlies all things.13 Be that as it may, one can still argue that the word τὸ ὕδωρ seems to have been something of a catchall term for water, at least for Thales.14 Anaximander, Thales’ successor and possibly his student,15 posited that the principle of all things was τὸ ἄπειρoν.16 This word is a substantive formed from the adjective ἄπειρoς, one that has a range of meanings from “boundless; infinite” to “endless; circular.”17 On what Anaximander

meant by this word, both ancient and modern commentators have generally disagreed.18 Furthermore, the statement in Simplicius that “He [Anaximander] says that it is neither water nor any of the other so-called elements but some other ‘apeiron nature’ from which come into being all the heavens and the worlds in them…” is noteworthy.19 This alleged denial that the principle is water20 sounds like a rejection by Anaximander of Thales’ basic premise. In addition to this ostensible refutation of his predecessor’s view, it has been argued that Anaximander made an apparent shift from a material principle like water to what seems to be an immaterial one21 when he introduced the term τὸ ἄπειρoν, usually translated “the infinite” or “the indefinite.”22 It is this point that has received much of the attention in subsequent discussions of his philosophy, both those of the ancient commentators and of modern scholars. The fact that Anaximander’s successors seem to have returned to the material realm in which to locate the principle of all things23 has led some modern commentators to conclude that these thinkers were explicitly rejecting his views and that Anaximander was either too forward thinking for his time24 or even simply confused.25

8 The word τὸ ὕδωρ occurs as early as Homer and Hesiod. It generally seems to mean “water, of any kind, but in Hom. rarely of seawater without an epith.,” according to the entry in H.G. Liddell and R. Scott, Greek-English Lexicon with a Revised Supplement (Oxford, 1996), 1845–1846. 9 See n. 6 above. 10 Aristotle, Met. 983b 20f.: “…taking the supposition both from this and from the seeds of all things having a moist nature, water being the natural principle of moist things.” See Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 89. 11 “The original constituent material of things, which persists as a substratum and into which they will perish.” This statement of Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 90, is based on Aristotle, Met. A3, 983b 6f. 12 An important study is U. Hölscher, “Anaximander and the Beginnings of Greek Philosophy,” in Studies in Presocratic Philosophy 1, ed. D. Furley and R.E. Allen (New York, 1970), 281-322. For an interesting discussion of the basic elements that are predominant in early Greek speculative thought, see G.E.R. Lloyd, “Hot and Cold, Dry and Wet in Early Greek Thought,” in Furley and Allen, Studies in Presocratic Philosophy 1, 255-280. 13 Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 286f.; M.R. Wright, Empedocles, The Extant Fragments (London, 1995), 22ff. 14 The point here is not that the Greeks did not have a range of words for water, which they certainly did, but rather that Thales chose a seemingly generic, non-technical term by which to name his principle. For a somewhat more complex view, see Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 91f. See also Hölscher, “Anaximander and the Beginnings of Greek Philosophy,” 306f.

15 Suda s.v. “Anaximander.” See Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 100-101. 16 According to the doxographical tradition, for which see n. 18 below. See as well Hölscher, “Anaximander and the Beginnings of Greek Philosophy,” 317-322. 17 Liddell and Scott, Greek-English Lexicon, 184. 18 See, for example, Simplicius Physics 24, 13: “….the principle and the element of existing things was the apeiron… He says that it is neither water nor any of the other so-called elements but some other ‘apeiron nature’ from which come into being all the heavens and the worlds in them…” See Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 106-108. Note the editors’ avoidance of a translation of the term ἄπειρoν. So also Diogenes Laertius II, 1: “Anaximander said that the unlimited is principle and element, not distinguishing it as air or water or anything else,” for which see Barnes, Presocratics 1, 32. 19 See n. 18 above. 20 It is worth noting that the only physical element specifically named by Simplicius is “water.” 21 See, for example, Barnes, Presocratics 1, 36: “What can its [the apeiron] character have been?”—“Vague and obscure, but certainly distinct from the stuffs familiar to us.” 22 On the meaning of this term, see the ensuing discussion. 23 See, for example, the claim of Anaximenes, a successor and possibly a student of Anaximander, that the material principle was “air” and “the infinite” (Diogenes Laertius II, 3), for which see Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 143. See also the discussion below. 24 See Barnes, Presocratics 1, 26-27: “Anaximander’s successors are often alleged to have betrayed his memory,

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The question remains: what precisely did Anaximander mean by the term τὸ ἄπειρoν? Both ancient and modern commentators have offered suggestions, most contradictory and none seemingly satisfactory. Aristotle understood τὸ ἄπειρoν to mean “spatially infinite.”26 Questions have been raised, however, about whether this was what Anaximander himself meant by this term.27 Modern commentators like Francis Macdonald Cornford have modified the translation of “infinite” for the term τὸ ἄπειρoν, suggesting a more generalized idea like “indistinct.”28 Jonathan Barnes also rejected the notion that the word means “spatially infinite.”29 Some scholars have reworked the etymology of the adjective apeiros to render it “intraversable.”30 As one reads through these discussions of the nature of τὸ ἄπειρoν, both ancient and modern, one experiences something of a sense of vertigo. τὸ ἄπειρoν is said to be both infinite but finite at the same time; or it is infinite but in a limited sort of way. Substantive answers about its nature seem to prove elusive. But perhaps we are asking the wrong question. Perhaps the answer to the questions about the nature of τὸ

ἄπειρoν lies in the return to another question: precisely what did Thales mean by the term τὸ ὕδωρ?31 As we said above, Thales stated that the principle of all things was water,32 and the commentators, both ancient and modern, have said or quarreled little about the specific meaning of the term as used by Thales. Thus, raising the question once again of what Thales meant by the term τὸ ὕδωρ does not seem to offer much help, at least at first glance. Perhaps a better question may be: “Where did Thales get his idea about water as the principle of all things?”33 There is a well-known and documented ancient tradition that Thales visited Egypt.34 Even Herodotus reports a story about the source of the flooding of the Nile that may be traceable to Thales.35 The ancients claim that Thales was a Milesian or at least had connections with the city of Miletus.36 Tradition, as well, has it that the merchant city of Naukratis in the Delta was settled by Greeks, at least some of whom were Milesians.37 The date of the founding of Naukratis is generally agreed to have occurred in the Saite Period, possibly early and within the time frame given for Thales’ floruit.38

retreating to primitive, Thaletan, thoughts and quitting the speculative heights to which he had ascended,” but see also 27, where Barnes rejects this claim. Hölscher, “Anaximander and the Beginnings of Greek Philosophy,” 321-322, focuses much of his discussion of Anaximander’s τὸ ἄπειρoν on the latter’s speculative powers. 25 See the negative conclusions of Barnes, Presocratics 1, 37, on the contributions of Anaximander to early Greek cosmology: “We find ourselves in a desert of ignorance and obscurity; so, I suspect, did the Peripatetic historian. It is possible that Anaximander set his views down with luminous clarity…but I doubt it, and I suspect that our uncertainty about Anaximander’s meaning reflects an uncertainty and lack of clarity in Anaximander’s own mind”; as well as the statement “Indeed, I guess that Anaximander’s interest in cosmogony has been vastly overestimated, and his achievements consistently mispraised. The partial and fortuitous survival of an obscure utterance has given him an undeserved reputation for metaphysics. That sentence, hinting darkly at a huge primordial tohu-bohu, was perhaps supported by a sketchy paragraph of argument.” 26 Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 109, citing Aristotle, Phys. Γ4, 203a 16. 27 Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 109110: “It is, however, uncertain that Anaximander himself intended ‘the apeiron’ to mean precisely ‘the spatially infinite.’” So also Barnes, Presocratics 1, 31: “Was the argument of Aristotle built by Anaximander? Or are the materials used in its construction late and synthetic?” See finally Hölscher, “Anaximander and the Beginnings of Greek Philosophy,” 304-305. 28 Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 110: “Thus Cornford and others argued that τὸ ἄπειρoν meant

‘that which is internally unbounded, without internal distinctions’, i.e. that which is indistinct, indefinite in kind.” 29 Barnes, Presocratics 1, 36: “Thus the word apeiros does not, in itself, show that Anaximander’s Urstoff was literally infinite.” 30 Barnes, Presocratics 1, 36 and 315, nn. 29-30. 31 This question has already been raised by Hölscher, “Anaximander and the Beginnings of Greek Philosophy,” 306. 32 See the discussion above and nn. 5-11. 33 Again Hölscher, “Anaximander and the Beginnings of Greek Philosophy,” 307. See also 308-309, where he discusses both Babylonian and Egyptian myths as potential sources. 34 Aetius I, 3, 1: “Thales…having practiced philosophy in Egypt…;” Proclus in Euclidem 65: “Thales, having first come to Egypt…” For these sources, see Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 79. 35 The passage in question appears at Herodotus II, 20. See Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 79. 36 Diogenes Laertius I, 22 and Herodotus I, 170. See Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 76-77. 37 The ancient sources are Strabo 17. 1. 18, who dates the founding of the city to the reign of Psamtik I (664-610 BC) and Herodotus II, 178-179, who attributes the founding to Amasis (570-526 BC). For a discussion of the various dates given for the city based on the archeological excavations carried out at Naukratis from the late nineteenth century to the present, see A. Leonard, Jr., Ancient Naukratis: Excavations at a Greek Emporium in Egypt, Part 1. The Excavations at Kom Ge’if, AASOR 54 (1997), 1-35. 38 On the time frame for Thales’ life, see Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 76, citing Herodotus I, 74.

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Thus, a real connection between Thales and Egypt remains a distinct possibility.39 If we take the tradition of Thales’ connection with Egypt seriously,40 we may find a firmer place to ground our discussion. Furthermore, an examination of the Egyptian cosmological and cosmogonical traditions, earlier—non-Greek—traditions from which Thales is said possibly to have developed his own theories, may lead us to experience the dissipation of some of the mist and fog that enshrouds the ideas of the early Greek thinkers. Reading through the Egyptian sources, we encounter a number of different words for water,41 some of which have very specific, delimited meanings. One of these is the noun variously written , , , and here transliterated nwn,42 although the exact reading has remained in question.43 It appears to be a derivative or a nwy, one of the more cognate of

39

The connection between Thales and Egypt via Miletus was already noted by Hölscher, “Anaximander and the Beginnings of Greek Philosophy,” 310-311, though he specifically followed the founding tradition given by Strabo. 40 As Hölscher did. See his “Anaximander and the Beginnings of Greek Philosophy,” 310-313. 41 For example, R. Hannig, Grosses Handwörterbuch Deutsch-Ägyptisch (Mainz am Rhein, 2000), 1490–1491 lists nine entries under the heading “Wasser,” including words like mw, nwy, nwn, mH, mtr, etc. 42 Wb. II, 214, 18-215, 12: “das Urwasser.” 43 The Wörterbuch entry gives a range of readings from nww to nwn to nnw. See also P. Wilson, A Ptolemaic Lexikon, OLA 78 (Leuven, 1997), 497, who gives the readings nwn and nnw. See further C. Leitz et al., Lexikon der ägyptischen Götter und Götterbezeichnungen 3, OLA 112 (Leuven, 2002), where the entry at 534-535 gives nw: “Das Chaos (?)” but a further entry at 543-547 offers nwn: “Nun.” See as well B. Altenmüller, Synkretismus in den Sargtexten (Wiesbaden, 1975) 89-91; W. Barta, “Die Bedeutung der Personifikation Huh im Unterscheid zu den Personifikation Hah und Nun,” GM 127 (1992), 7-12. See finally J.P. Allen, The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts, Writings from the Ancient World 23 (Atlanta, 2005), 438, who translates the term nw as “watery” and defines it as “The universal ocean, existing before the world was created and source of all water.” 44 Wb. II, 221, 3-13: “Wasser im gegs. zum Land.” See also the remarks of Wilson, Lexikon, 497, and S. Bickel, La cosmogonie égyptienne avant le Nouvel Empire (Freiburg, 1994), 23. 45 On the reading, see n. 43 above. Useful accounts include H. Grapow, “Die Welt vor der Schöpfung,” ZÄS 67 (1931), 34-38; E. Hornung, “Chaotische Bereiche in der geordneten Welt,” ZÄS 81 (1956), 28-32; S. Sauneron & J. Yoyotte, La naissance du monde selon l’Égypte ancienne, SO 1 (Paris, 1959), passim; J. P. Allen, Genesis in Egypt: The Philosophy of Ancient Egyptian Creation Accounts, YES 2 (New Haven, 1988), passim. 46 See Wilson, Lexikon, 497, on such an association in Ptolemaic texts. See also D. van der Plas, L’hymne à la crue du Nil (Leiden, 1986), 61, 64-65, for connections between

generic Egyptian terms for water.44 The word Nun (nwn), however, was a technical term associated, among other things, with the origins of the cosmos. According to Egyptian cosmogonical texts, the world came into being from a “primordial ocean” that was called nw or nwn by them.45 In addition to its association with the waters of creation, Nun was seen as “a general term for flood waters.”46 Furthermore, this word has a very long history in Egyptian thinking.47 Like many of their Near Eastern and Mediterranean neighbors, the Egyptians did not believe in creatio ex nihilo.48 They believed that there was some pre-existent space49 and that it was in this already-extant realm that the act of creation took place.50 This primordial space was Nun,51 an entity believed to be an essentially watery mass, an interpretation that etymologies of the word nwn and its cognates support.52 Two further characteristics of

the god Hapy (the personification of the inundation) and the Nun. See finally D. Meeks and C. Favard-Meeks, Daily Life of the Egyptian Gods (Ithaca, 1996), 92: “He [Nun] resurfaced in this world in several different forms—the Nile floods, the ground water, and the seas that surround dry land.” 47 F. Dunand and C. Zivie-Coche, Gods and Men in Egypt: 3000 BCE to 395 CE (Ithaca, 2004) 45: “If there was one element that all the cosmogonies agreed in defining as the first, original element, it was Nun, the primordial entity, the uniformed expanse that had no beginning or end.” References to the Nun are found as early as the Pyramid Texts. See S. Bickel, Cosmogonie, 23-31, and Allen, Genesis, 4 and 65, n. 9, and passim for references to the Nun in early texts. For an extensive but damaged late demotic text whose subject matter is the Nun, see M. Smith, On the Primaeval Ocean, Carlsberg Papyri, 5, CNI Publications, 26 (Copenhagen, 2002). Smith dates this manuscript to the second century AD. See finally J-F. Pépin, “Quelques aspects de Nouou dans les Texts des Pyramides et les texts des Sarcophages,” BSAK 3 (1988), 339-345, esp. 344-345, for a discussion of Nun/ Okeanos in the Orphic hymn tradition, citing sources as late as the sixth century AD. 48 Meeks and Favard-Meeks, Daily Life, 13: “The idea of non-being, total emptiness, absolute ‘nothingness’ was foreign to Egypt.” 49 Ibid.: “…everyone knew that a boundless watery region had existed before the creation, its inert, unmoving waters swaddled in absolute darkness.” 50 Ibid., 92: “Nun, though he was the Primeval Ocean as such, nevertheless had a place within the divine company because he represented the cradle of the world and was ‘father of the gods.’” E. Hornung, Conceptions of God in Ancient Egypt: The One and the Many, trans. J. Baines (Ithaca, 1982), 147-148: “From the Middle Kingdom on it [the epithet ‘father of the gods’] is associated especially with the god Nun, who is the primeval waters from which all the gods indeed originated, in divine form.” 51 Allen, Genesis, 1-7, and n. 49 above. 52 Bickel, Cosmogonie, 23: “Le Noun est un monde aqueux. Son nom nww pourrait être derive d’une racine significant ‘l’eaux’ qui aurait donné la valeur n à l’hiéroglyphe.

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Nun were darkness53 and inertia.54 Furthermore, the Egyptians believed that Nun was not only the place of creation but the matrix from which the activity of creation unfolded.55 It is clear that, for the Egyptians, water, especially the water associated with origin of all things, was a very complex entity.56 If Thales’ notion that water was the principle of things had its origins in ideas that he derived from the Egyptians,57 we may have better insight into understanding the term τὸ ὕδωρ as he intended it. The idea of water as a “source” or even “matrix” of the created world has a well-documented history in Egyptian cosmological traditions, as we have noted above.58 If we follow this assumed connection between τὸ ὕδωρ of Thales and the nwn of the Egyptians, certain statements encountered in the Greek commentators appear to us in different light. In the Egyptian way of thinking, Aristotle’s remark that “…for there must be some natural substance, either one or more than one, from which the other things come-into-being, while it

is preserved”59 is almost a given. The Nun of the Egyptians was the source of creation, the matrix of creation, and the principle of creation all in one.60 Accepting an Egyptian basis for Thales’ idea of τὸ ὕδωρ, we no longer need to see his choice of water as the primordial element as having a vague, indistinct Near-Eastern origin.61 But it is important to note that Thales seems to have focused primarily, if not solely, on the aqueous nature of the Nun. Turning to Anaximander, we recall that he is also said to have been a Milesian.62 He is also called a pupil, possibly a kinsman, of Thales.63 Even modern commentators who question the nature of their relationship at least agree that there was a strong connection between the two men.64 In order to clarify Anaximander’s thesis that τὸ ἄπειρoν is the principle of all things, we find help once again if we refer to the Egyptian cosmogonical traditions. Specific characteristics of the Nun noted above were water, darkness, and inertia.65 Another very important characteristic of

La pronunciation usuelle Noun reflète une forme secondaire d’époque tardive, probablement basée sur l’association de l’eau primordiale et de l’état d’inertie nnwt, form qui a été reprise par le grec et le copte.” See the statement at 23 as well: “Plusiers passages mentionent “les eaux du Noun,” citing CT IV 189c; CT VI 280t-u. 53 Hornung, The One and the Many, 176-177: “There are also a few very distinctive positive definitions of the situation before creation. The most important elements that constitute the state of non-existence are two: limitless waters or the primeval flood (Nun in Egyptian) and completely opaque, total darkness (kkw zmAw in Egyptian).” 54 Meeks and Favard-Meeks, Daily Life, 13: “…everyone knew that a boundless watery region had existed before the creation, its inert, unmoving waters swaddled in absolute darkness.” Hornung, The One and the Many, 66: “…Nun, the “weary” or “inert” primeval flood…” 55 Dunand and Zivie-Coche, Gods and Men, 51: “Matter was already in Nun, waiting to be coagulated to a point where the dry contrasted with the unformed matter.” Bickel, Cosmogonie, 23: “Ce monde de la préexistence, appelé le Noun est une entité très complexe, à la fois un element, un lieu et une divinité qui personnifie ces deux aspects.” 56 So also Bickel, for which see n. 55 above. 57 This possibility has been raised elsewhere, albeit not with any informed discussion. See, for example, Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 93: “Thales may have rationalized the idea from a Greek mythological form like the Homeric one; he may also have been directly influenced (as he seems to have been for the special detail that the earth floats on water) by foreign, perhaps Egyptian versions.” See also D.R. McBride, “Nun,” in The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt 2, ed. D.B. Redford (New York, 2001) 558. 58 On the Nun as matrix, see n. 55 above. 59 Aristotle, Met. 983b 20-2f. See Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 88-89. 60 On the continued existence of the Nun, see Dunand and Zivie-Coche, Gods and Men, 88: “The wall that surrounded it [the temple]…was perhaps at the same time the

image of Nun, who did not cease to be present in the world that emerged from him.” See also Meeks and Favard-Meeks, Daily Life, 16: “But the creation, the separation of the creatorgod, and the death of the precursor snakes did not, contrary to what one might assume, leave the Primeval Ocean empty and inert.” On the Nun as the principle of creation, see Meeks and Favard-Meeks, Daily Life, 92: “Nun, though he was the Primeval Ocean as such, nevertheless had a place within the divine company because he represented the cradle of the world and was ‘father of the gods.’” Nun as the father of the gods is a theme at least as old as the Coffin Texts. See, for example, CT IV, 188-189. On the Nun as the matrix of creation, see n. 55 above. As “father of the gods,” Nun should not be understood as the or a creator god, for which see Pépin, “Quelques aspects de Nouou,” 340. Cf., however, Hölscher, “Anaximander and the Beginnings of Greek Philosophy,” 308, where he states that “…according to the cosmogony of Heliopolis, the oldest god, Nun;…” See 308 n. 67 for the sources on which he based his remarks. See further 311-312, where he states that “The Egyptian idea of the First God had an essentially elementary character matched by no Greek god, only by the Sea.” He attributes to Anaximander a “rationalistic” and “demythologizing turn” in naming the principle τὸ ἄπειρoν. See finally M.R. Wright, Cosmology in Antiquity (London and New York, 1995), 95f. for the claims that Anaximander “called it [τὸ ἄπειρoν] ‘divine,’ but immediately glossed this as meaning ‘immortal’ and ‘indestructible.’ ” 61 See, for example, the discussion at Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 90 and 92f. Hölscher is more open to, and supportive of, the idea of specific Egyptian-Greek exchanges in matters of cosmological speculation. See his “Anaximander and the Beginnings of Greek Philosophy,” 310-311, and 312-313. 62 Diogenes Laertius II, 1-2. See Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 100-101. 63 See n. 15 above. 64 Barnes, Presocratics, 1 19: “…we need not accept the conventional statement that they were teacher and pupil.” 65 See nn. 53-54 above.

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the Nun about which there is general agreement is its lack of finiteness. It has been described as boundless,66 as having no beginning or end,67 as limitless,68 and as an unbroken infinity.69 Seen in this light, understanding what Anaximander meant by τὸ ἄπειρoν may prove an easier task. He, too, may have based his thinking about the principle of things on ideas that he derived from the Egyptians, specifically ideas associated with the Nun.70 In reviewing the theses of Thales, Anaximander may have objected to his predecessor’s use of the term τὸ ὕδωρ to characterize the Nun, seeing “water” as a limited and potentially misleading term.71 His use of τὸ ἄπειρoν may represent a word choice that he thought better captured the essence of what the Egyptians meant by the term Nun.72 It may also be true that in his alleged claim that τὸ ἄπειρoν was the principle of all things, there was no explicit or implicit refutation of Thales’ idea that τὸ ὕδωρ was the material principle.73 Rather, he may have been endeavoring to establish a clearer understanding of what he thought the Egyptians meant by Nun. Thus, in Anaximander’s choice of the term τὸ ἄπειρoν, we may be looking at a corrective, one that focuses on “boundlessness” as a primary characteristic of the principle of all things.74 Seeing Egyptian antecedents in the thought of the philosophers Thales and Anaximander and, more specifically, seeing the word Nun as the inspiration for their ideas about the nature of the principle of all things, expressed in their translation of the term nwn as τὸ ὕδωρ and τὸ ἄπειρoν respectively, apparently solves several problems.

We can establish a clearer relationship between the ideas of these two early thinkers, even underscore a link that appears to be linear.75 Additionally, Anaximander ceases to appear as an anomaly in a line of Greek thinkers wedded firmly to the idea of materialism.76 If he understood that the Nun was both material and infinite in the eyes of the Egyptian cosmologists, and based his thoughts about the material principle on such Egyptian views, Anaximander can no longer be accused of having departed from a tradition that assumed a material basis for the origin of all things.77 The introduction of the term τὸ ἄπειρoν was not an attempt to move the discussion into the realm of speculative thought but was rather an intentional effort to set the discussion straight as Anaximander saw it.78 Furthermore, if we accept this connection between the early Greek thinkers and Egyptian cosmologists, a central idea of Anaximander’s successor Anaximenes can be seen in a better light as well. Anaximenes, we are told, was a pupil of Anaximander who claimed that “the material principle was air and the infinite.”79 In light of the theory laid out above, it can now be argued that Anaximenes, following Anaximander, clearly understood that the principle of all things had a complex nature and that one of its primary characteristics was the infinite. In Anaximenes’ own view, this principle was both air and the infinite. In essence, he retained Anaximander’s fundamental understanding of the complex nature of the material principle. He accepted one of its primary characteristics, the infinite, but rejected water as its basic material property, substituting

66 Meeks and Favard-Meeks, Daily Life, 13: “…everyone knew that a boundless watery region had existed before the creation...” 67 Dunand and Zivie-Coche, Gods and Men, 45: “…Nun, the primordial entity, the uniformed expanse that had no beginning or end.” 68 Allen, Genesis, 3-4, citing a text from the Sety I cenotaph, and Hornung, The One and the Many, 176-177. 69 Allen, Genesis, 7. 70 Hölscher, “Anaximander and the Beginnings of Greek Philosophy,” 320, is skeptical about finding a source for Anaximander. But see n. 57 above. 71 See the discussion and n. 8 above. 72 Note that neither of these philosophers attempted to import this foreign term into his discussion through a Hellenized writing of the word but chose instead to offer a Greek translation of the borrowed concept. 73 See n. 18 above for the statement of Simplicius that Anaximander rejected Thales’ notion of water as the material principle. But see n. 74 following. 74 The possibility that Anaximander may not have rejected Thales’ idea of water as the constituent element but added the term apeiron to the mix seems to have been raised already by

Barnes, Presocratics 1, 31: “Did Anaximander positively deny that ‘the unlimited’ was water or the like? Or did he rather refrain from asserting that it was water or the like? The question is not merely trifling; for the view loses in plausibility if he did not positively distinguish it from the elements.” 75 On the possibility that Thales would have accepted the notion that his τὸ ὕδωρ could be described as ἄπειρoν, see Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 94, n. 1. 76 See discussion above and nn. 21-22. 77 See the discussion above and nn. 21-22. Simplicius understood the apeiron as a material element. Simplicius, Physics 24, 13: “…Anaximander, son of Praxiades, a Milesian who became successor and pupil to Thales, said that the unlimited (apeiron) is both principle (arche) and element (stoicheion) of things that exist.” See Barnes, Presocratics 1, 29. 78 On Anaximander and speculative thinking, see Barnes, Presocratics 1, 26 and also 23, citing W. Burkert, Lore and Science in Ancient Pythagoreanism (Cambridge, 1972), 308310. 79 Diogenes Laertius II, 3. See Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 143.

some thoughts on

ΤO Υ∆ΩΡ

of thales and

ΤO AΠΕΙΡΟΝ

of anaximander

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air in its place. He was not “returning” the discussion to a material basis but simply continuing the discussion that had begun with his predecessors. Additionally, accepting this line of reasoning allows us to see these first Milesian philosophers lying in closer conjunction than has been previously thought, more like three peas in the same pod.80 To conclude, investigating such Greek and Egyptian interconnections as these raises other interesting points of comparison. Simplicius’ remark that “…and the source of coming-to-be for existing things is that into which destruction, too, happens, according to necessity…’’81 resonates tellingly with an Egyptian statement found

in Spell 175 of the Book of the Dead: “What is a lifetime of a life?” says Osiris. “Thou art (destined) for millions of millions (of years), a lifetime of millions (of years)…And I will destroy all that I have made. This land shall return into the Deep, into the flood, as it was aforetime.”82 Aristotle’s statement that ἡ ἀρχή was “the original constituent material of things, which persists as a substratum and into which they will perish”83 certainly catches the eye as well. Further exploration of Egyptian-Greek interconnections may well open other avenues for productive study and hopefully expand the discussion of connections between the ancient West and Near East to include Egypt as well.84

80 Cf, however, Hölscher, “Anaximander and the Beginnings of Greek Philosophy,” 316, where he states that “Anaximenes, coming later, in certain respects shows greater dependence on the East.” 81 Simplicius, Physics 24, 13, for which see Kirk, Raven, and Schofield, The Presocratics, 106. 82 See T.G. Allen, The Book of the Dead: or, Going Forth by Day, SAOC 37 (Chicago, 1974), Spell 175, p. 184. 83 See n. 11 above. 84 See n. 61 above, and, for example, W. Burkert, Babylon, Memphis, Persepolis (Cambridge, 2004), 21-70, where the idea of interconnections between Europe and the ancient Near East is still presented as somewhat generalized, but with a decided emphasis on Mesopotamia. Burkert’s statement at 72 about specific Greek and Egyptian interconnections beyond the areas of architecture and sculpture is telling: “It is more difficult to document interrelations in ways of thinking or religious belief.” On the possible influence of Egyptian and Greek architecture and technology on the thought of Anaximander, see R. Hahn, Anaximander and the Architects: The

Contribution of Egyptian and Greek Architectural Technologies to the Origins of Greek Philosophy (Albany, 2001); and Hahn, “Proportions and Numbers in Anaximander and Early Greek Thought,” in Anaximander in Context: New Studies in the Origins of Greek Philosophy, ed. D. Couprie, R. Hahn, and G. Naddaf (Albany, 2003), 71-163; cf., however, others who have argued for more specific Near Eastern-Greek interconnections, focusing particularly on Assyria beginning in the seventh century BC. Some of these theses have made claims for both direct Assyrian-Greek interconnections and indirect ones through the kingdom of Lydia, for example. For works discussing Near Eastern and Greek interconnections, see, for example, S. Parpola, “The Assyrian Tree of Life: Tracing the Origins of Jewish Monotheism and Greek Philosophy,” JNES 52 (1993), 161-208; P. Kingsley, Ancient Philosophy, Mystery and Magic: Empedocles and the Pythagorean Tradition (Oxford, 1995); M.L. West, The East Face of Helicon: West Asiatic Elements in Greek Poetry and Myth (Oxford, 1997); and W. Burkert, Da Omero ai Magi: La Tradizione orientale nella cultura greca (Padua, 1999).

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mapping the temple of the goddess mut, karnak

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MAPPING THE TEMPLE OF THE GODDESS MUT, KARNAK: A BASIS FOR FURTHER EXPLORATION William H. Peck Detroit, Michigan

For many years, Jack Josephson has been one of the most devoted supporters of the Brooklyn Museum excavations in the Precinct of the Goddess Mut, South Karnak, and a loyal friend to Richard A. Fazzini, director of the project, as well as his colleagues in the excavations. When Richard began his investigations of the precinct in 1976, it was with the obvious intention of recording what was preserved, as well as searching for new information. The mapping of the principal temple in the precinct was a high priority. I offer this modest discussion of the results of that early endeavor to Jack with sincere regards.1 The greater temple complex of Karnak is undoubtedly one of the most thoroughly documented physical areas preserved from the antiquity of Egypt.2 It has been studied and analyzed, excavated and restored, the subject of theory and hypothesis, to the point that it would seem that there is little more to learn. In actual fact, one area of the complex, the Precinct of the Goddess Mut in South Karnak, had been somewhat neglected and only partly known until the excavations instituted by the Brooklyn Museum in 1976 opened a new chapter in its exploration.3 The precinct had been excavated and mapped and areas of it studied in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, but a more complete plan of the Temple of Mut proper was to await the work of the Brooklyn Museum excavations. As with many ancient sites in Egypt, it was somehow assumed that the basic work had been done and a reexamination might only improve previous results. In 2001, the Brooklyn group was joined by a separate mission from Johns Hopkins University under the direction of Dr. Betsy Bryan. The work of the two groups proceeded cooperatively but

independently, each pursuing separate goals in different areas of the precinct. The mapping project summarized here was carried out primarily in the 1980s and 90s and illustrates the state of the Temple of Mut before further work was done in its interior by the Hopkins staff. Over the years, with the occasional support of the Detroit Institute of Arts, various areas of the temple were examined, and a number of important features were clarified or discovered. Many of these can be illustrated on the new, tentative, plan (fig. 1). This plan is a compilation and reduction made from carefully detailed sectional drawings. It is important to repeat that the following descriptions include what was visible before the work of the Johns Hopkins University team in the body of the temple and explain what was planned and mapped before any attempt was made to further investigate foundations and the reuse of material in them, and in no sense is it a historical explanation of the growth of the temple. The first map of the precinct using the modern standards of cartography of the time was essayed by the savants of the French expedition4 at the end of the eighteenth century, as a part of the documentation of the ancient sites in the country (fig. 2). With the use of what was then the most modern technology, the engineers and architects of the expedition produced a map of the Karnak Temple complex of unquestioned value. It can be observed that the trapezoidal shape of the precinct of the goddess Mut is slightly off true when compared with more recent maps, and the horseshoe-shaped sacred lake seems to have been almost dried up at the time of the French visit. On this map, the three major temples in the precinct show little detail of the configuration of walls and rooms, indicating

1 Richard Fazzini has made a number of important suggestions and provided some references that have greatly improved this paper, and I thank him not only for that assistance, but for his many years of loyal friendship. 2 In PM II2, 336 pages were devoted to publications about the Karnak complex, and this was only to the date of publication.

3 PM II2 has 13 pages of references on the Mut Precinct (to 1972); a good deal has been written about the site since then. 4 Published in Description de l’Égypte, ou, Recueil des observations et des recherches qui ont été faites en Égypte pendant l’expédition de l’armée française (Paris, 1809–1822), Antiquities, vol. III, pl. 16.

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Fig. 1. Plan of the Temple of the Goddess Mut by the Brooklyn Museum Expedition.

Fig. 2. Mut Precinct as recorded by the eighteenth century French expedition. From Description de l’Égypte, vol. III, pl. 16.

mapping the temple of the goddess mut, karnak a considerable amount of accumulated debris at this period. Temple “A” in the northeast corner of the precinct is barely indicated; the Temple of Mut and the Temple of Ramesses III across the lake are indicated as almost nothing more than simple rectangles. It was not until the Prussian expedition of the 1840s under the direction of Karl Lepsius that a more complete map of the precinct and the Mut Temple was accomplished5 (fig. 3). The heightened accuracy of the plan of the temple, compared to that of the French expedition, after slightly less than fifty years, is remarkable.6 Temple “A” is revealed in a much more complete form, as is the Temple of Rameses III. A number of minor features, including two small gateways,7 are recorded that would later disappear, not to be seen again until the Brooklyn expedition uncovered them. Of great importance is the amount of detail within the Temple of Mut itself. The surveyors clearly saw and differentiated the parts of the temple in stone and those constructed only of mud brick. Among the minor errors that can be observed, however, was one brick wall that was shown as stone.8 The Contra-Temple at the rear of the main structure is shown as communicating with it by a doorway. In fact, it does not. However, on the whole, the mapping of temple plans in the 1840s was a considerable advancement in accuracy.9 Auguste Mariette, in his publication on the temples of Karnak,10 added more information in maps and plans. The map of the temple of Mut (fig. 4) is somewhat fanciful and should not be relied on in a number of details. It was almost another quarter of a century before another attempt was 5

LD, Abth. I, Bl. 74. However, there are three maps of the temple in LD. Abth. I, Bl. 74 is the general map of the entire precinct, Abth. I, Bl. 83 is a more detailed map of the Temple of Mut, and in the text, Abth. III, 75, there is a more detailed map with the propylon and the first court, with locations of the thenexisting sculpture. Some of the errors or omissions of the general map (Bl. 74) are corrected in the more detailed Bl. 83. I thank Jacobus van Dijk for calling the further two maps to my attention, and for a number of helpful comments on this essay. 7 Indicated as “y” and “g” on Bl. 83. 8 Corrected in the more detailed Bl. 83. 9 One detail on the two more general maps that has generally escaped attention is the delineation of a stairway in the east room, south of the columned hall. There is presently no trace of a stair at this location. It is hard to imagine that a stair was drawn where no evidence existed. The general area indicated has only the scribed lines of walls on the existing platform. The location for a stair at this position is logical; it would have given access to the roof of the hypostyle hall; it is possible that the structural elements of the stair were 6

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made to draft a plan of the Temple of Mut. This new plan was the work of E.F. Benson in the 1890s (fig. 5). Trained as a classical archaeologist, Benson accompanied his sister, Margaret, in the excavations she supervised in 1895-97.11 His plan is published in The Temple of Mut in Asher,12 the report of the work written by Margaret Benson and Janet Gourlay. There is much to commend in his attempt at a complete outline of the existing structures in the temple, probably aided by nothing more than a tape measure, but it stands as a record of the three seasons of excavation. It records the findspots of some of the discoveries and existing monuments, mainly sculptures of lion-headed Sekhmet, but it is lacking in some details and does not give a correct impression of the general design of the temple, particularly the pylons and other parts in mud brick. The temple might be characterized as a construction made up of a complex of materials and building periods, much of which can only be revealed in a plan. The simple fact that much of the temple is preserved only in mud brick made it impossible for E. F. Benson to grasp the complete picture. That his sister’s excavation concentrated on the interior areas of the temple, for the most part, also limited his ability to record the possible shape and extent of pylons and walls. All of this said, Benson’s plan was the best available for almost a century. When the Brooklyn Museum excavations were begun in 1976, the intent at first was to begin work outside the temple but within the precinct, but it soon became clear that a great deal of work was necessary to understand the structure and history completely removed, because they furnished conveniently fashioned building material. 10 A. Mariette, Karnak, Étude topographique et archéologique (Leipzig, 1875). There is much to be desired in the plan published by Mariette, probably the result of incomplete excavation, haste, or both. 11 Margaret Benson was the daughter of the Archbishop of Canterbury, an Oxford-educated Englishwoman, who originally traveled to Egypt for her health. Her work in the Precinct of Mut was the first archaeological excavation in Egypt officially directed by a woman. She was joined by Janet Gourlay in her second season. Her brother, E. F. Benson (later to become a successful novelist), assisted her in the excavation and produced the plan illustrated in this article. Percy Newberry was responsible for the translations of inscriptions included in the publication and was also of assistance in the conduct of the excavation. For a summary of her work in the temple, see: W.H. Peck, “Miss Benson and Mut,” KMT 2, no. 1 (Spring 1991), 11-19, 63-65. 12 M. Benson and J. Gourlay, with P. Newberry, The Temple of Mut in Asher (London, 1899), plan opposite p. 36.

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Fig. 3. Lepsius’s plan of the Temple Complex. From LD, Abth. I, Bl. 74.

Fig. 4. Plan of the Mut Temple by Auguste Mariette. From Karnak, as reprinted in M. Benson, J. Gourlay, and P. Newberry, Temple of Mut in Asher (London, 1899).


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Fig. 5. The Mut Temple Complex as recorded by E.F. Benson. From The Temple of Mut in Asher, opposite p. 36.

of the temple itself. The section with the Precinct of Mut from an overall aerial survey map of the Karnak complex was made available from the French Institut Géographique National.13 This obviated the need for a complete new survey of the extensive site bounded by the mud-brick precinct walls, and provided a reliable topographic map on which the ongoing work could be recorded and changes could be added. The layout of the temple follows a familiar pattern: entrance colonnade, pylon with monumental gate, two courts, and the main structure with multiple chambers. In addition, there is a small contra-temple at the rear. The material of the construction, as alluded to above, is a combination of stone work, unbaked mud brick, and some baked brick. The stone members have often been found to be reused material from other structures, as evidenced by numerous blocks with inscription and relief hidden in foundations and walls. The time of the construction, from present evidence,

spanned a period from early Dynasty 1814 through the Ptolemaic and Roman Periods, with considerable building (or rebuilding) during Dynasty 25, particularly during the reign of Taharqo. The following discussion of the plan is simply an attempt to elucidate the physical parts of the structure as they exist, or are clearly known to have existed, as revealed by clearance and excavation. For convenience, the temple is described here as oriented north to south. It is actually closer to north-northeast to south-south-west. Because the structure was the victim of considerable stone removal for other constructions in relatively recent times, much of what is visible consists of foundation and a limited number of courses of stone.

13 This map was the product of aerial over-flights, stereo photography, and mechanical reduction of the results. It records what could be seen from the air and is mainly useful as an overall map of the precinct, but it is not reliable (nor

intended to be) for the details of the individual structures. 14 The subsequent work of the Johns Hopkins group has uncovered evidence of pre-Dynasty 18 building.

1. The Entrance Colonnade (fig. 6) The main axis to the entrance gate is flanked by files of paired columns, seven pairs on each

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Fig. 6. The Entrance Colonnade. Brooklyn Museum Expedition.

side.15 Of these there are scant physical remains, except in the area nearest the gate where they are preserved up to three or four courses of stone.16 The remainder is preserved only in fragments of column bases, decayed stone, and as incised indications on the partly preserved foundations. The colonnade on the east side preserves some of its paving stones, as well as an unusual feature in the shape of a small gate house or guard room built into, and as a part of, the two last columns near the gateway. In the remains of the western colonnade have been found reused column drums with inscriptions of Taharqo of Dynasty 25, confirming the inscription in the “crypt” of Taharqo stating that Mentuemhat built a colonnaded porch for the Mut Temple.17 This was eventually replaced by the Ptolemaic rebuilding of the existing structure.

2. The First Pylon and the First Court (fig.7) The pylon was constructed of unbaked mud brick, and its front surface was plastered and painted 15

Earlier maps generally include only three pairs on each side, all that seems to have been visible. 16 Nestor L’Hôte in 1838-39 was able to record a number of features in the precinct that were later obscured. He reconstructed the entrance porches to their actual length of seven double pairs of columns. See H. Ricke, Das KamutefHeiligtum Hatschepsuts und Thutmoses III in Karnak, BÄBA vol. 3, part 2 (Cairo, 1954), pl. 1. 17 See R. Fazzini and W. Peck, “The Precinct of Mut During Dynasty XXV and Early Dynasty XXVI: A Growing

white. Only traces of this finish have been found but are sufficient to prove its existence. At the eastern corner of the pylon are the remains of a small stone gate, allowing access to the exterior of the wall of the first court. This gate is completely without inscription, but it appeared on the map of the Lepsius expedition, which enabled its rediscovery.18 The axial gateway in the center of the pylon has a threshold block made of a massive piece of reused quartzite. The gate structure is mainly of sandstone and extends through the thickness of the pylon, with some additions made to it at the entrance to the first court. The gate was apparently closed by a single-leaf door, as evidenced by the sole recess niche on the west side and traces of emplacement for only a single pivot.19 The interior of the First Court was bisected by a colonnade consisting of four pairs of columns. Of two subsidiary gates in the court at right angles to the central axis, the eastern one is positioned off center, closer to the southeast corner. The western gate is approximately centered in the west wall and was eventually cleared by the Johns Hopkins group. Scrappy traces of pavement, at right angles to the center colonnade and lined up with the two gates, suggest walkways rather than an overall pavement in this court.

3. The South Wall of the First Court (fig. 8) There is no evidence to suggest that this structure was a battered pylon. It is a composite of stone and mud-brick construction, demonstrating three major building phases. It is probable that it, like the first pylon, was originally of mud brick throughout. The south, or inner side of the mud brick, which faces into the second court, was sheathed in a “veneer” of one course of sandstone blocks. During the Ptolemaic Period, the eastern half (wing) was rebuilt completely of stone, retaining the earlier sheathing, but this was not done to the western half. The stone renovation to the east wing of this wall allowed the inclusion of a small room at the east end, a short corridor permitting Picture,” SSEAJ 11 (1981), 48, and Fazzini and Peck, “Excavating the Temple of Mut,” Archaeology 36 (1983), 21-22, ill. on p. 21. 18 Marked “y” on Abth. I, Bl. 83. 19 This type of niche is sometimes called “the shadow of the door” in descriptions of temple architecture. Although the evidence of the niche or recess indicates only a one-leaf door, the quartzite threshold block exhibits two channels for the placement of two. This may be evidence for an earlier version of the gate.


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Fig. 7. The First Pylon and First Court. Brooklyn Museum Expedition.

access from the first court to the exterior of the second court, and two other features. The existing stone remains show that there were two long rooms in the center of the wall and a stone stairway that ascended from east to west over them. The rooms were entered at a right angle from a small doorway in the first court. The stair began opposite the entrance to the small room at the east end of the wall and rose over the two interior rooms. Some of this detail appears on the map of the Lepsius expedition, but the west wing was mistakenly delineated as stone rather than mud brick.20

4. The Second Court (fig. 9) The second court displays a number of interesting features. The peripteral colonnade was made of rectangular piers or pillars, not cylindrical columns. The east and west walls were only one course of stone in thickness, leaving an outside corridor on the east and possibly a similar passage on the

Fig. 8. The South Wall of the First Court. Brooklyn Museum Expedition.

20 This was corrected on Abth. I, Bl. 83, but on neither of the two maps in LD is the interior of the east wing shown divided into its two rooms with the stairway.

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Fig. 11. The Contra-Temple. Brooklyn Museum Expedition.

Fig. 9. The Second Court. Brooklyn Museum Expedition.

Fig. 10. The Body of the Temple. Brooklyn Museum Expedition.

mapping the temple of the goddess mut, karnak west. On the northwest, what was taken by earlier excavators to be a raised platform was actually a small chapel, the fallen lintel21 of which was found exactly where it should have been, in the position of the door. Two pairs of column bases attest to a short entrance colonnade on the south side of the court, leading to the body of the temple. On the southwest is a passage leading south into the space between the sanctuary wall and the mudbrick exterior wall. On the east, in the mirror position to that passage, is a long chamber, designated on some plans as having contained a stairway.22 This was presumably based on the distinct shape of the room, but there is no trace of stair architecture or fittings in the room. It is properly part of the body of the temple and may have been a magazine or store room.

5. The Body of the Temple (fig. 10) From the architectural evidence, there were at least two clear phases of construction.23 The earlier phase exists as a platform smaller than the later, with some features only preserved as lines incised on its floor. This platform only extended on the north to the space of the eight-columned hall, the central bark station, and four small rooms that flank it on either side. The presently preserved temple is larger and provides space for a number of additional rooms and spaces. These will be described below. The long chamber leading from the second court in its southeastern corner has already been mentioned, as it is entered from the court. The adjacent space is a nearly square room with a single central column. Its entrance is a doorway from the central hall. On the axis of the temple is the eight-columned (hypostyle) hall, the emplacements of which are on the north end of the original, smaller temple platform, suggesting that they may have been part of a porch in the earlier design. The southernmost pair of columns has the remains of small projections, suggesting that they formed a doorway before the actual entrance of the sanctuary. The columned hall has 21

Inscribed for Ptolemy VI. H.H. Nelson, Key Plans Showing Locations of Theban Temple Decorations, OIP 56 (Chicago, 1941, repr. 1965), pls. 18, 19. Dieter Arnold also included a suggestion of a stairway in his plan of the temple in The Encyclopaedia of Ancient Egyptian Architecture (Princeton, 2002), 157. 23 This statement should be qualified. The two clear phases of construction were all that was immediately evident before the continued work of the Johns Hopkins group. 22

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six entrances, two axial and four giving access to rooms on either side. To the west of the central hall is another nearly square room, also furnished with only a central column, a mirror image of the one on the east. Behind the two single-columned rooms are two small chambers, the one on the west almost suggesting a storeroom, while the one on the east functions as the antechamber to the socalled “Crypt of Taharqo.”24 This is a small, narrow room with an even narrower doorway, suggesting that it was not meant to have easy access and may have been a serdab-like feature.

6. The Inner Rooms (also fig. 10) Beyond the columned hall is a long, corridor-like room, presumably a bark station for the sacred boat of the goddess. Flanking this is a room on the east, attested only by the outline of the walls incised on the stone platform. On the west is a smaller bark station-shaped room built of limestone. Eight smaller satellite rooms of various sizes complete the section leading to the tripartite shrines, presumably for the Theban triad. The three inner rooms are also flanked on the east and west by two rooms that each had a single central column.

7. The Contra-Temple (fig. 11) Behind the tripartite shrines is a transverse corridor, and abutting the outer wall at the center is a small, three-roomed structure. It has no access to the temple proper and would have been accessed from the outside. Some of the earlier plans show it as having a direct connection, but this was probably based on assumption rather than observation.25 This, then, demonstrates the physical state of the temple of the goddess Mut between 1980 and 2000, a snapshot in time. Much of what Benson and Gourlay did in the precinct a hundred years earlier could be reexamined and checked, with 24

Either missing or misunderstood as part of the long, narrow room to its north on the maps of Lepsius. 25 For recent consideration of the Contra-Temple see R. Fazzini and P. O’Rourke, “Aspects of the Mut Temple’s Contra-Temple, Part 1,” in Hommages à Jean-Claude Goyon, offerts pour son 70e anniversaire, ed. L. Gabolde, BdE 143 (Cairo, 2008), 139-150, and Fazzini, “Aspects of the Mut Temple’s Contra-Temple, part 2,” 83-102 above.

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new excavation. In some particulars, the two English ladies were vague as to locations and incorrect in descriptions. On the whole, their publication was a valuable guide to continued exploration. The work of Dr. Bryan and her colleagues has revealed

a great deal more about the history and physical structure of the temple, where over two decades of work by the Brooklyn Museum team laid the important groundwork for further exploration.

the dog of karakhamun

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THE DOG OF KARAKHAMUN Elena Pischikova American University in Cairo

I am honored to dedicate this piece of research to my esteemed colleague and friend, Jack Josephson. His works on Egyptian art of the Late Period were always an inspiration and source of learning for me. I will never be able to thank Jack Josephson and Magda Saleh enough for being such great supporters of my work in Egypt. Without their help, the present and future of the dog of Karakhamun would be precarious.1 The dog in question was found in the necropolis of South Asasif, south of Qurna, in 2006 under rather challenging circumstances. The necropolis of South Asasif is not so well known. It incorporates four Late Period tombs, Karabasken (TT 391), Karakhamun (TT 223), Ramose (TT 132), and Irtieru (TT 390), which offer incredibly interesting and diverse examples of Late Period tomb decoration. The importance of the necropolis can be determined by the fact that the tomb of Karabasken is the earliest known Kushite decorated tomb in the Theban necropolis.2 The necropolis of South Asasif was practically lost by the beginning of the century and had to be rediscovered in order to be explored. South Asasif was first located and visited beginning in the 1820s by such great explorers of Qurna as John Gardner Wilkinson, Robert Hay, and James Burton. Their notes and drawings are the main records of the condition of the tombs in the early nineteenth century. They documented the tombs’ 1 I would like to express deep gratitude to Jack Josephson and Dr. Magda Saleh for their support of the “South Asasif Conservation Project” in Luxor, directed by the author. 2 The author starts the Late Period with the Kushite Dynasty, so as not to separate the cultural trends of the Saite Dynasty from their roots in the Dynasty 25. 3 Drawings by R. Hay show remains of the some of the architectural features of the tomb of Karakhamun (British Library Manuscripts, Add. 29 848, 77); see D. Eigner, Die monumentalen Grabbauten der Spätzeit in der thebanischen Nekropole (Vienna, 1984), Abb. 16. J.G. Wilkinson’s observations, made around the same time, do not leave much hope that anything would remain intact for a length of time. Describing his visit to the tomb, he mentions bringing down “half of a doorway by merely placing [his] hand against it previous of entering it.” (J. Wilkinson, MSS, v. 176); see Eigner, Monumentalen Grabbauten, 41-42.

ruinous condition, weakness of the bedrock, and continuous decay.3 Richard K. Lepsius, who must have seen the tombs around 1840, left more comprehensive records, yet it is hard to say how much of the tombs’ decoration was still intact at that time. Although in the nineteenth century the tombs of South Asasif were already in a ruinous state, the notes and plans of early explorers provide priceless guidance now, when most of the tombs are almost completely destroyed. Lepsius was the first one to record the name and some of the titles of Karakhamun and a few fragments of his tomb’s decoration: the standing figure of Karakhamun’s brother, and a scene of Karakhamun in front of Re-Horakhty and a goddess of one of the hours of the night.4 The latter scene is a wellpreserved block that was sent by Lepsius to the collection of the Berlin Museum.5 The latest observation of the condition of the tomb of Karakhamun was made in the 1970s by Diethelm Eigner, who was able to photograph a few fragments of relief decoration in the Second Pillared Hall.6 Eigner concluded his observations with the statement that the tomb was being used as a quarry so intensely that it soon may completely disappear.7 The tomb disappeared shortly after without raising much concern in the scholarly world, as very little was seen of it and known about it.8 A modern village built in the middle of the necropolis concealed the remains of the tomb. 4

LD III, Text, p. 288, pl. 282d. Berlin Museum (2110), see H. Schäfer and W. Andrae, Die Kunst des alten Orients (PKG 2) (Berlin, 3rd ed. Rev., 1942), fig. 450 (lower); R. Hamann, Ägyptische Kunst: Wesen und Geschichte (Berlin, [1944]), Abb. 314; PM I2, part 1, pp. 318 (plan), 324. 6 Eigner, Grabbauten, 17, 41-42, figs. 15, 16, pls. 14B, 20A, plans 9, 28. 7 Ibid., 41. 8 Only one relief fragment showing Karakhamun in front of Re-Horakhty is now outside Egypt in Berlin’s Ägyptisches Museum und Papyrussammlung (2110), as it was chosen by Lepsius to represent the tomb; see Hamann, Ägyptische Kunst, Abb. 314; PM I2, part 1, 318 (plan), 324. 5

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Fig. 1. First Pillared Hall in the process of excavation in 2007.

Nothing is known of Karakhamun’s family.9 Karakhamun himself did not seem to have any important administrative positions, and his priestly title, first aq priest (variation of a wab-priest title) does not signify any particular importance. His Nubian name is one of the reasons why rare studies that mention Karakhamun date his presence in Thebes to the 25th Dynasty.10 The tomb’s architectural features, as far as they are known, also confirm this date.11 Karakhamun’s serpentine shabti is of a Nubian type with facial features that suggest a pre-Taharqo date, probably the time of Shabaqo.12 The tomb of Karakhamun, with its two pillared halls and multiple burial chambers, was the largest in the necropolis. As it was built for a person of no important position, he must have had close connections to the royal court or the royal family itself. Further exploration of the 9

Karakhamun and his family are omitted from the volumes by Kenneth Kitchen and Günther Vittmann, the most comprehensive studies on Third Intermediate Period and Late Period chronology; K.A. Kitchen, The Third Intermediate Period in Egypt: 1100-650 B.C., 2nd ed. with suppl. (Warminster, 1986), G. Vittmann, Priester und Beamte im Theben der Spätzeit (Vienna, 1978). 10 J. Leclant, Recherches sur les monuments thébains de la XXV dynastie dite éthiopienne, BdE 36 (Cairo, 1965), 179. 11 Eigner, Grabbauten, 41-42. Nineteenth century notes

tomb must bring more accurate information on the date of Karakhamun’s tomb and identity of the tomb owner. The fieldwork in the tomb of Karakhamun is only at the beginning (fig. 1). Its full excavation and reconstruction will take some time, considering its present condition. As first seen by the author in 2001, the tomb of Karakhamun had ceased to exist. It was supposed to be positioned to the east of the tomb of Karabasken (TT391), but the only remaining trace of the collapsed tomb was a large crack in the bedrock almost hidden under the sand. The crack was covered in soot and the depression under it became a village dump, showing signs of multiple reuse of the tomb site until recent times. From the villagers, we knew that the Abd el-Rasul family used to live in the tomb, which was gradually collapsing due to floods and allow the reconstruction of the plan of the tomb as a version of the Kushite type similar to the tomb of Karabasken (TT 391): one east-west axis, entrance on the east side of the court, no porticoes in the court, one or two pillared halls. The tomb of Harwa (TT 37), of the time of Taharqo, is the first 25th Dynasty tomb that offers elaboration of this plan, making a transition to a 26th Dynasty type, such as a bent axis and the introduction of the colonnaded porticoes in the court. 12 J.-F. and L. Aubert, Statuettes égyptiennes: chaouabtis, ouchebtis (Paris, 1974), 199, pl. 54, fig. 129.


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Fig. 2. North Section of East Wall.

quarrying. The space that was still remaining was used as a stable until the mid-1990s, when the tomb disappeared completely. The work at the site started in the summer of 2006. Preliminary calculations showed that the crack must have been a section of collapsed bedrock above the remains of the First Pillared Hall. The entrance structures and open court must have disappeared under the houses of the village. The main goal of the first season was to determine if any traces of the tomb’s architectural or decorative features could still be found in situ. The beginning of the excavation met with numerous difficulties and disappointments. After we reached

the original ceiling level about three meters below ground level, we realized that the ceiling had collapsed completely, bringing down the tops of the pillars and walls. The attempt to reach the floor in the eastern section of the hall, in order to explore the condition of the walls and pillars, at first brought only negative information. It seemed that there was no relief decoration remaining on the weak bedrock of the walls, and no traces of standing pillars. The tomb looked like it had ceased to exist. The first small fragments of relief decoration were found on the north wall almost two meters below the ceiling level. But the real discovery in

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this part of the tomb was the east wall (fig. 2). Divided by a door frame, it used to have two mirror-image scenes of Karakhamun seated at the offering table with the offering bearers, offering list, and rituals. Dramatically destroyed on the south section of the wall, this scene is unexpectedly well preserved on the north section. The importance of this find is twofold. It shows that some parts of the tomb still remain in situ. Furthermore, the exquisite quality of relief carving in this area puts the tomb of Karakhamun among the most beautiful Kushite tombs of the Theban necropolis. Karakhamun is presented according to the iconography of the Old Kingdom, with a broadshouldered torso, narrow waist, heavily muscled legs, closely cropped hair, and bare feet. He sits on a bovine-legged chair with a short back decorated with a papyrus umbel and the legs resting on a double pedestal. Although a priest, he is depicted without a pelt vest, in a pleated skirt and a broad collar. The round head with closely cropped hair, full cheeks, nose broad at the nostrils with “Kushite” folds at the side, protruding lips with small ridges of flesh at the corners, and a short chin are features shared by Kushite images.13 The shape of Karakhamun’s eyes and elongation of the neck endow his face with elegance and sophistication and bring it closer to the images of Shabitqo. Shabitqo’s best preserved relief images in the chapel of Osiris-Hekadjet at Karnak display the features that could have inspired Karakhamun to emulate them.14 The precision and elegance of the carving of the figure, the bold modeling on the legs, and the delicate, detailed carving of the eye and ear are beautifully balanced, creating an exquisite piece of art. Although executed in Old Kingdom traditions, this scene does not necessarily suggest Karakhamun’s knowledge of the art of the north. He, as well as Karabasken, probably never traveled to the north but brought his idea of a “proper” Egyptian image from Nubia, completely ignoring the decoration of the numerous New Kingdom tombs in the immediate neighborhood. Even more, Karabasken could have seen himself as the restorer of the “true” ancient type of image over

13

E. Russmann, The Representation of the King in the XXVth Dynasty (Brussels and Brooklyn, 1974). 14 K. Myśliwiec, Royal Portraiture of the Dynasties XXIXXX (Mainz am Rhein, 1988), pl. 34.

more modern examples. Contemporary art of tomb decoration in Nubia awaits excavation and research. Yet it is possible to suggest that it was based on a revival of the Old Kingdom legacy. Even when forced to leave Egypt, the rulers of Kush remained dedicated to the iconography and style of Old Kingdom tomb decoration in their burials at Nuri.15 The dog under the chair of Karakhamun on the north section of the east wall (fig. 3) is one of the most beautiful images found in the tomb so far. It is carved in sunk relief, as is the rest of the scene. The outlines of its elegant body are carved with sharpness and precision. The considerable depth of carving created a shadow line that reinforces the carved outline. Modeling is especially prominent on the muzzle, chest, and hind-leg area. The muscle structure is shown as extremely powerful, corresponding with the treatment of Karakhamun’s legs. The artist paid particular attention to details. The elongated eye is rimmed with a long cosmetic line almost reaching the collar. The collar itself is shaped as a sash, wrapped three times around the neck and knotted on the back. Where shown against the skin, the collar is carved in raised relief with gently modeled edges, while the bow on the back is executed in sunk relief. What gives the dog a flair of stylish elegance is its exaggeratedly long slender nose, upright pointed ears, and a long tail twisted into four coils. The softness and yet precision of the tail carving makes it the most attractive detail of the dog’s figure. The mirror image of the dog from the south section of the wall (fig. 4) was found in such small fragments that it was not easily identifiable. What was possible to recognize as part of a dog image was the hind leg, and small sections of a collar, nose, and tail. It retains traces of red paint on the collar. Dogs are often represented in Egyptian art, and many types and varieties are known.16 It is not always easy to determine a type of dog based on its representation. It seems that Karakhamun’s dog belongs to the most ancient greyhound-like hunting dogs with erect pointed ears, curled tails, and narrow flanks that resemble Sudanese basenji.17 Known from the Predynastic Period, this type of

15

The best example is a pyramid burial, Nu. 3; see D. Dunham, The Royal Cemeteries of Kush II: Nuri (Boston, 1955), pls. 16-17. 16 LÄ 3, 77-82, 219-236, 1054–1056.


3

4 Figs. 3-4. Dogs under the chair of Karakhamun. First Pillared Hall, East Wall. North and South sections.

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dog was popular in the Old Kingdom and well recorded in the Middle Kingdom.18 Two more Theban tombs of the Late Period, from the North Asasif, have dogs represented under the chairs of the tomb owners. The tomb of Pabasa (TT 279) shows a dog with a shorter muzzle, pendant ears, and straight tail. These saluki-type dogs were most popular in the private tombs of the New Kingdom.19 The dog in the tomb of Ankh-Hor (TT 414) is too fragmentary to be classified.20 The differences between Karakhamun’s and Pabasa’s dogs may be seen as a reflection of general stylistic trends in Late Period archaism. The 25th Dynasty leaned more toward the Old Kingdom tradition, with New Kingdom influence becoming prevalent in Saite art. Dogs held on leashes or sitting under the chairs of the tomb owners are often named.21 The names often describe their qualities or appearance. As little evidence as we have, it seems that Late Period dogs’ names were meant to have deeper symbolic connotations. Strangely enough, the name of the dog of Karakhamun, written above its back, was deliberately removed. The chisel marks are so deep that no trace of the hieroglyphic signs can be recognized. It can only be assumed that the name meant something that was not welcomed by the usurpers of the tomb. There is strong evidence of the tomb being prepared for reuse at a later time. In many places on the walls and pillars, the name of Karakhamun was cut out and replaced with a plain, uninscribed plaque of limestone. Only two of the found plaques contain traces of a preliminary drawing of the name of the usurper. The identity of this person is a separate subject that needs more evidence and research. It is possible to assume so far that the tomb was reused at the time of Psamtik I. Most likely, the removed name contained the name of the Kushite ruler and was meant to be 17

LÄ 3, 77. P. Germond and J. Livet, An Egyptian Bestiary. Animals in Life and Religion in the Land of the Pharaohs (London and New York, 2001), 72, LÄ III, 77; for Dynasty 11, see the stela of Wahankh Intef II, Cairo Museum CG 20512, in H.O. Lange and H. Schäfer, Grab- und Denksteine des Mittleren Reichs in Museum von Kairo, no. 20001–20780, vol. 2, Catalogue général des antiquités égyptiennes (Berlin, 1908), 99-102; P.H. Houlihan, The Animal World of the Pharaohs (London and New York, 1996), 79, fig. 56. The most characteristic example of Dynasty 12 is relief from the tomb of Serenput I in Aswan, see Germond and Livet, Egyptian Bestiary, 72, fig. 78. 18

replaced with a new one including the name of Psamtik I. The name of the dog of Ankh-Hor is a good example of what kind of new name could have been meant. The name of his dog is anxPsmTk, meaning “Life to King Psamtik.” Naturally, this kind of name had to be replaced if the tomb was to be reused. Besides having a name with a royal connotation, the dog of Karakhamun was part of a larger composition under the chair of the tomb owner that suggests a new interpretation of this image in the Late Period. In both offering scenes in the tomb of Karakhamun, an image of a dog lying under the chair of the tomb owner is combined with one of a few jars for sacred oils. The relatively well-preserved scene on the north section of the east wall shows a jar for Hknw oil covered with a lotus flower placed right above the dog. The south section of the wall is almost completely destroyed. Yet, thousands of fragments of its relief decoration found in debris in the tomb allow the reconstruction of a substantial part of it. This part of the wall was damaged by fire. Many fragments are covered with a thick layer of soot but still show visible traces of carving. A recognizable section of an oil jar of the same type on one of the fragments found together with the remains of the dog image show that the destroyed scene was a mirror image of its counterpart. Both scenes also included a row of HAtt nt THnw oil jars under the offering table. To our current knowledge, Karakhamun’s tomb shows the earliest Kushite example of a sacred oil jar placed under the chair of a tomb owner, which later becomes one of the key features of the Late Period’s private-tomb decoration.22 Before the latest discoveries in the tomb of Karakhamun, the earliest occurrences of this iconography were registered in the tombs of Mentuemhat (TT 34) and Petamenophis (TT 33). In this context, the name of the dog of Pabasa, 19

LÄ 3, 77; for Pabasa, see Houlihan, Animal World, pl. 32; for the New Kingdom, see, for example, Germond and Livet, Egyptian Bestiary, 72-74, fig. 81; N.M. and N. de G. Davies, “The Tomb of Amenmose (TT 89) at Thebes,” JEA 26 (1940), 131-135, pl. 24; P.H. Houlihan, “Canines,” in The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt 1, ed. D.B. Redford (New York, 2001), 229-231. 20 M. Bietak and E. Reiser-Haslauer, Das Grab des ‘AnchHor I (Vienna, 1978), 137, fig. 53. 21 Houlihan, “Canines,” 229. 22 For a discussion of images of sacred oil jars in Late Period tombs, see E. Pischikova, “Representations of Ritual and Symbolic Objects in Late XXVth Dynasty and Saite Private Tombs,” JARCE 31 (1994), 65-69.

the dog of karakhamun Hknw, may be read as “Praise to god or king,” or the name of the sacred oil. Therefore, although a jar is not represented, the sacred-oil is present in the composition. The meaning of the placing of jars with sacred oils under the chair of a tomb owner stresses the conception of receiving power for resurrection and rebirth in the afterlife when being anointed with oils.23 A dog sacred to Anubis and Wepwawet, in the context of sacred-oil symbol23

Ibid., 67-68. For the sacred meaning of a dog image, see Houlihan,“Canines,” 230. 24

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ism, may be interpreted in its funerary connotation, adding to the conception of the preservation and renewal of the body during mummification and funerary rituals.24 The tomb of Karakhamun will require many years of work to be fully understood and appreciated, but the dog of Karakhamun alone represents the tomb as an exquisite artistic achievement and important funerary monument of Kushite Egypt.

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the second pylon of the temple of ba-neb-djed at mendes

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THE SECOND PYLON OF THE TEMPLE OF BANEBDJED AT MENDES1 Donald B. Redford Pennsylvania State University

The discovery that the great temple of the ram god at Mendes had been fronted, from the thirteenth century BC onwards, by two pylons, focused attention on the structure itself as a typical processional temple.2 None of the limestone blocks of the First Pylon—between 40 and 50 survive— remains in situ, but the sand-filled foundation trench, c. 65 meters east-west by 10 meters wide, shows the monument to have been substantial and not far short of the Luxor Temple pylon in size. While no foundation deposits have as yet come to light, the presence of the names of Rameses II and Merenptah on a gate block, and that of the latter on one of the blocks in the eastern massif of the pylon,3 strongly suggests that the construction was part of a Ramesside building program. The court, c. 35 meters in length, behind the First Pylon is poorly preserved today, and it was only through careful excavation in the 2003 season that its southern side was identified as a second pylon. The latter had been completely stripped of its limestone masonry, probably for the lime kilns in the Middle Ages,4 but the foundation trench was easily discernible. In its present ruinous condition, the trench was found filled with smashed limestone chips and a varying depth of foundation sand at the bottom. The trench of the eastern massif of the pylon was intact, and its dimensions from the axial line of the temple to its eastern end

proved to be c. 30 meters. The western wing of the pylon had lost 6 meters at its western extremity due to the excavations in the 1960s to retrieve the subterranean installation of Pepy-yema.5 The presence of Rameses II’s name on a basalt block that must have been part of the jambs of the pylon gate,6 coupled with two “foundation deposits” of Merenptah,7 militate, as was the case of the First Pylon, in favor of a Ramesside date.8 The present destruction fill of the pylon trench shows varying degrees of disturbance. The east wing yielded a fragment of a “fish” stela of the sort known only from the Hat-mehyet shrine, c. 180 meters due east of the temple.9 Within the gate area, about two dozen disarticulated diorite, granite, limestone, and quartzite blocks lie scattered at the original level of the entry, viz. 11.72 meters a.s.l. The diorite (four blocks) clearly belong to the jambs, inscribed with Rameses II’s name, referred to above, while the granite formed a dado inscribed with alternating nomen and prenomen of Merenptah, in upright cartouches, along the reveals of the entry. Drums of engaged(?) limestone columns, approaching 2 meters in diameter, with the Horus-name aA-ib mry-tA[wy] indicate perhaps the presence of a columned chamber inside the gate decorated by Achoris.10 The gate itself suffered demolition and reconstruction at least twice. The granite dado was wrenched from

1 It is a pleasure to be able to offer the publication of this important piece of evidence relating to architecture to Jack Josephson, whose interest in Mendes and its archaeology is of long standing. 2 D.B. Redford, “An Interim Report on the Temple of the Ram God,” in Delta Reports, vol. 1: Research in Lower Egypt, ed. D.B. Redford (London, 2008). 3 H. De Meulenaere and P. MacKay, Mendes II (Warminster, 1976), 192, no. 15. 4 The date of the dismantling and/or demolition of the temple of Ba-neb-djed has become unnecessarily controversial. Everywhere in the destruction level, in the central part of the structure, the southern gate and the Second Pylon, the voluminous ceramic assemblages show mainly late Roman wares, dated fourth through seventh centuries AD, terminating with the Islamic conquest, i.e., the period of the structure’s use as a Christian church. The final destruction, therefore, must be dated to the Middle Ages.

5 D.P. Hansen, “Mendes 1965 and 1966,” JARCE 6 (1967), pl. XV. 6 De Meulenaere and MacKay, Mendes II, pl. 8e. 7 To be published by A. De Rodrigo in Delta Reports II. 8 See the present author, “Merenptah at Mendes,” FS K.A. Kitchen (forthcoming). 9 See Redford, Excavations at Mendes, vol. 1: The Royal Necropolis (Leiden, 2004), figs. 44-52; R. Mittelmann, “Hatmehyet: An Investigation of her Fish Cult at Mendes,” (master’s thesis, The Pennsylvania State University, 2005). 10 Cf. J. von Beckerath, Handbuch der ägyptischen Königsnamen (Mainz, 1999), 225 3. H3. The arrangement of signs most closely resembles the granite fragment from Ouasim: A. Bey Kamal, “Quelques fragments provenant d’Ouasim,” ASAE 4 (1904), 92; H. Gauthier, Le Livre des rois d’Égypte, vol. 5: les empereurs romaines, MIFAO 21 (Cairo, 1917), 167 (XVI).

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Fig. 1. Plan of the temple of Ba-neb-djed, oriented (local) north.

Fig. 2. Section through the western massif of the Second Pylon. The prominent sand stratum marks the bottom of the foundation trench. The scattered bricks (58) represent the demolition of a structure (MK?), while the surface below loci 63, 64, 84, 85 and 88 is the bottom of the Thutmoside pit. The limestone blocks at the bottom of the control trench belong to the partly preserved burial installation immediately east of the sloping corridor of Pepy-yema.


Fig. 3. Thutmose III bricks spanning the bottom of the foundation trench of the Second Pylon (facing south).

Fig. 4. The westernmost line of bricks, showing the pattern of stacking.

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Fig. 5. Brick stamped with the cartouche of Thutmose III.

its place and laid flat, with a 30 x 54 cm depression carved over two of Merenptah’s cartouches, to receive some kind of post. Later the block was set upright again, plaster inserted into the rectilinear depression, and the surface carved with nTr nfr [ ... ] ra [ ... ]. The west massif of the pylon had suffered a robber’s probe towards the (now lost) western extremity, perhaps in an effort to find a foundation deposit. In spite of the lamentable condition of the remains, the Second Pylon foundation trench yielded several important discoveries. In anticipation of a heavy superstructure, the foundation trench had been sunk 2 meters (9.90 meters a.s.l.) below the then-ground level. The bottom of the trench, both east and west, sloped almost imperceptibly toward the gate; while in section, north-south, the bottom of the trench showed a concave configuration. At a point roughly 8-10 meters west of the north-south temple axis, the builders had laid down two rows of bricks, 6 “courses” deep, stretching across the 10-meterwide trench (Plan, at B; see fig. 1). The bottom course comprised bricks laid flat, but all the upper

layers showed bricks laid at an angle and resting against each other: the first two ranges reclining north, the next two south and the upper (surviving) one north again (figs. 2-4). All bricks were of the large, “royal,” variety, 42 x 26 x 10 cm, and all were stamped with an oval brick-stamp within which was written Mn-xpr-ra (fig. 5).11 As we were disinclined to dismantle these “stacks”—they are presently under a sand backfill—it was difficult to ascertain the total number of bricks; but a judicious estimate falls between 250 and 300. It is difficult to divine the reason for this curious foundational feature.12 Such lateral “ribs” of brick would not contribute to the strength of the pylon to be raised on top, and in fact the foundation trench would have to be filled with sand up to the height of the top course. One must conclude, it seems to me, that whatever construction these stamped bricks belonged to, it must have been located on site, in the area where the Ramesside architects planned to erect the Second Pylon. In fact, it is most tempting to assume that the Ramesside construction of the Second Pylon was sited along the façade of the then-temple of the

11 S. Clarke and R. Engelbach, Ancient Egyptian Construction and Architecture (Mineola, 1990), 209-10; A.J. Spencer, Brick Architecture in Ancient Egypt (Warminster, 1979), pl. 23(a); D. Arnold, The Encyclopedia of Ancient Egyptian Architecture (Princeton, 1997), 36-37.

12 While the two rows described are well preserved, it seems that there may have been other stacks: at the western edge of the surviving cut, where the NYU excavation unit begins, six or seven similar bricks were uncovered in a similar north-south alignment.


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ram god, and that, having to dislodge the earlier mud-brick construction, the builders secreted the bricks from the 18th Dynasty façade in the foundations of their new pylon as a pious act. Certainly they could not very easily have discarded stamped bricks of the great “father of the fathers,” the pater familias of the New Kingdom kings!13 Something of Thutmose’s presence at the site may be adduced from the stratification immediately underlying the Ramesside level. Under the central part of the western massif of the Second

Pylon a pit descended over 3.55 meters through the accumulated detritus of the First Intermediate Period and the Middle Kingdom. The object of this pitting may have been to clear off the middens of refuse that had grown up in front of the Middle Kingdom temple; but the pit was backfilled with the same material, albeit with markers clearly pointing to the early New Kingdom.14 One wonders whether it was on this reconstituted surface that Thutmose erected the façade from which our bricks originated.

13 D.B. Redford, Pharaonic King-lists, Annals and Daybooks (Mississauga, 1986), 170, n. 37. Prior to the discovery of the bricks, no textual proof confirmed that Thutmose III undertook construction work at Mendes. But the great checklist of temple building of the overseer of construction Min-mose shows a lacuna that could accommodate two sites

between Bubastis and Balamun (Urk. IV, 1443:16-17), and it is a fair guess that Mendes was one of these. 14 E.g., an early version of the banded crater of medium marl: D.B. Redford, ed., The Akhenaten Temple Project, vol. 3: the Excavation of Kom el-Ahmar and Environs (Toronto, 1994), pl. LXXII, no. 2.

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four late period sculptures in the san antonio museum of art

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FOUR LATE PERIOD SCULPTURES IN THE SAN ANTONIO MUSEUM OF ART Gerry D. Scott, III American Research Center in Egypt

Selecting a topic to express my admiration and affection for Jack Josephson was a relatively easy task, as we share a common love for the sculpture of the Late Period. Indeed, one of Jack’s greatest scholarly achievements is his co-publication with Mamdouh Eldamaty of a volume of the Egyptian Museum’s venerable Catalogue Général presenting 49 of the museum’s sculptures of 25th and 26th Dynasty date.1 It is my sincere hope that Jack will find these San Antonio sculptures to be of interest, and I am honored to present them to a wider scholarly audience through this tribute to Jack, his record of scholarship, and his remarkable connoisseurship.2 The four sculptures discussed here, two relief fragments and two statue fragments, are all in the permanent collection of the San Antonio Museum of Art in San Antonio, Texas.3 Opened in 1986, the museum has a relatively small but significant collection of ancient Egyptian art and archaeological artifacts. The museum’s Egyptian objects range in date from the Predynastic Period to the Coptic Period, and include a number of objects dating to the Late Period. The four presented here seem to fit comfortably into the 26th Dynasty. The first San Antonio object to be considered is a relief sculpture depicting the important Mayor of Thebes, Fourth Prophet of Amun, and ancient Egyptian art connoisseur, Mentuemhat (fig. 1).4 This major figure in the history of the Late Period,

especially the period that witnessed the transition between the 25th and 26th Dynasties, commissioned an enormous private tomb, No. 34, on the West Bank of the Nile at Luxor, quite close to the famous temple of Hatshepsut at Deir el-Bahri.5 Although no specific information is recorded about the object’s provenance, on stylistic grounds it fits well with other certain relief depictions of Mentuemhat that derive from the chapels of the outer court of his tomb. Indeed, it is very nearly a mirror image of a relief fragment at Yale University, and compares favorably with similar depictions still remaining on the walls of the tomb’s outer court.6 The fragment is carved in fine white limestone. It is irregularly broken, but preserves the majority of the head and wig, the upper torso, and most of the far arm of the owner. The remaining portion of Mentuemhat’s long walking stick is grasped in the far hand, with its well-modeled palm, thumb, and fingers, complete to the nails and cuticles. The now-missing near hand held a staff of office, the top of which is preserved, decorated with a detailed, almost architectonic, papyrus umbel. In addition to the full bag-like wig pulled back behind his intricately carved ear, Mentuemhat wears a broad collar, his distinctive amulet, and a cheetah skin, the carefully carved claws of which appear at the far shoulder, just below his knotted epaulet.

1 J. Josephson and M. Eldamaty, Statues of the XXVth and XXVIth Dynasties, Catalogue général of Egyptian antiquities in the Cairo Museum, nrs. 48601-48649 (Cairo, 1999). 2 I must record my thanks to Rachel Mauldin, Charles Van Siclen, Shari Saunders, and Kathleen Scott for their kind assistance with aspects of this study. 3 I must also express my gratitude to the San Antonio Museum of Art for permission to publish these sculpture fragments, especially to Dr. Jessica Powers, Curator of Ancient Art; Karen Baker, Registrar; and Peggy Tennison, Photographer. 4 Accession number 91.129.1, San Antonio Museum of Art purchase with funds provided by the Lillie and Roy Cullen Endowment Fund. Height: 23.5 cm (approx. 17 ¼”). 5 For a selection of publications dealing with Theban Tomb 34 and its decoration, see: PM I, Pt. 1, 56-61; J. Leclant,

Montouemhat: quartrième prophète d’Amon, prince de la ville, BdE 35 (Cairo, 1961); H. Müller, “Der ‘Stadtfürst von Theban’ Montemhat,” MJBK 26 (1975), 7ff; P. Der Manuelian, “Prolegomena zur Untersuchung saitischer ‘Kopien,’” SAK 10 (1983), 21-45; E. Russmann, “Relief Decoration in the Tomb of Mentuemhat (TT 34),” JARCE 31 (1994), 1-19; E. Russmann, “The Motif of Bound Papyrus Plants and the Decorative Program in Mentuemhat’s First Court (Further Remarks on the Decoration of the Tomb of Mentuemhat, 1),” JARCE 32 (1995), 117-126; E. Russmann, “Mentuemhat’s Kushite Wife (Further Remarks on the Decoration of the Tomb of Mentuemhat, 2),” JARCE 34 (1977), 21-39 . 6 For the Yale University relief sculpture of Mentuemhat, see G. Scott, Ancient Egyptian Art at Yale (New Haven, 1986), cat. no. 77, 140-141.

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Fig. 1. Relief depiction of Mentuemhat, San Antonio 91.129.1. Courtesy of the San Antonio Museum of Art.

Mentuemhat’s facial features are crisply carved, with great attention to detail. The treatment of the eye and mouth is especially noteworthy, although there has been some slight, modern conservation in the area of the inner canthus of the eye and the bridge of the nose. All of the details of the carving of the fragment, the sculpting of the facial features, the treatment of the costume, and the proportions of the figure are so close to those of the Yale Mentuemhat fragment that, despite the lack of an inscription, it most likely also comes from his tomb. As with many of the relief sculptures in that tomb, it is reminiscent of the classic elegance and simplicity associated with the finest Old Kingdom and Middle Kingdom relief sculpture, works that were actively studied by Mentuemhat and several of his contemporaries during the 25th and 26th Dynasties, an era of intense artistic antiquarian interest. The second sculpture presented here represents a figure that was most likely a part of a larger, multi-figural composition (fig. 2).7 It is probable that it, too, ultimately derives from a Late Period private tomb on the West Bank of the Nile at Luxor, although its facial features perhaps owe Fig. 2. Relief depicting an attendant, San Antonio 2005.1.35. Courtesy of the San Antonio Museum of Art.

7 Accession number 2005.1.35, bequest of Gilbert M. Denman, Jr. Height: 23 cm (approx. 9”).


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slightly more to a New Kingdom model than do Mentuemhat’s. Like the first object, it is a fragmentary relief carved in white limestone. It is irregularly broken, but preserves the head, much of the torso, most of the far arm, and a portion of the near hand of a gesturing male attendant. The figure sports a round, short wig, and a portion of the waistband of his kilt remains. The treatment of the facial features is admirable, with the crisply carved eye and elegantly arched eyebrow especially pleasing. The wings of the nostrils, the naso-labial fold, and the lips are each marked with precision and attention to detail. Above the figure’s head are the remains of a hieroglyphic inscription: a vertical text-register divider and a partial hieroglyph. A third Late Period sculpture fragment in the San Antonio collection once represented its owner standing under the protection of a deity in bovine form, possibly the goddess Hathor represented as a sacred cow (figs. 3-6).8 The fragment preserves slightly less than half of the bovine form, and a portion of the head of the owner. The sculpture lacks the statue base, the bovine’s hindquarters and lower front legs, the horns and headdress, and the majority of the male figure sheltered beneath her muzzle. Sadly, no inscription is preserved, nor does it have a recorded provenance. A sense of the complete statue’s appearance can be understood from a well-known sculpture in the Egyptian Museum, Cairo. This is a pair statue depicting a late 26th Dynasty official named Psamtik, shown under the protection of Hathor, represented as a cow, CG 784.9 The Cairo statue is carved of schist (greywacke), and was discovered by Mariette at Saqqara in 1863 in a cache of sculpture that included the equally famous Late Period statues of Isis and Osiris (CG 38884 and CG 38358, respectively).10 It shows both Hathor and Psamtik standing with left legs advanced. Such compositions showing deities in animal form paired with human beings are relatively rare

in Egyptian art, but have a long history stretching back at least to the Old Kingdom, demonstrated by the famous Egyptian Museum diorite statue of Chephren (CG 14) protected by a falcon and the Brooklyn Museum alabaster statue of Pepy I (39.120), also in the company of a falcon. The New Kingdom composition of Amenhotep II with Hathor from Deir el-Bahri, now also in the Egyptian Museum (JE 38754-5), is an obvious reference point. Each of these works pairs a deity with a king, but by the late New Kingdom, pairings of lesser human beings, usually ranking clergy and high officials, with representations of divinities in animal guise are found, as is attested by the pair statue of Rameses-nakht (CG 42162) depicted writing under the protection (and probably inspiration) of Thoth.11 The San Antonio sculpture fragment stands in this tradition. In addition to the famous sculpture of Psamtik and Hathor, the Egyptian Museum houses two other sculptures that bear comparison with the San Antonio fragment, CG 676 and CG 683.12 CG 676, also carved in schist (greywacke), was found in the Delta and was commissioned by a private individual, whose kneeling figure is only suggested by the remains of his feet. The figure of the cow in this example is somewhat better preserved than that of the man, but it lacks its head, crown, and hindquarters. CG 683 is only somewhat better preserved. Like the San Antonio example, it is carved in limestone. Borchardt simply dates the sculpture to the Late Period, and he gives the provenance as the Serapeum at Saqqara. There are no remains of an inscription, although most of the statue base is preserved. The composition shows a kneeling male figure, now headless, holding an offering table, with offerings indicated. Behind him stands a headless bovine with left legs advanced. Borchardt records that the bovine is a “stier,” or bull, and the findspot would suggest that the deity in animal form is an Apis bull. Unfortunately, in the single photograph published by Borchardt showing the proper-left side of the sculpture, the advanced rear leg hides

8 Accession number 91.80.122, gift of Gilbert M. Denman, Jr. Height 32 cm (approx. 12 ¾”). 9 For a recent publication of the sculpture, see M. Saleh and H. Sourouzian, The Egyptian Museum,Cairo: Official Catalogue (Mainz, 1987), cat. no. 251. The comments of Terrace on this sculpture are also worth noting; see E. Terrace and H. Fischer, Treasures of Egyptian Art from the Cairo Museum (London, 1970), cat. no. 38, 165-168. 10 For these two statues, see recently, Saleh and Sourouzian, Egyptian Museum, cat. nos. 250, 252, respectively.

11 The statue toured the United States and Canada 19861989 as part of a special exhibition dealing with Rameses II. It is included in the various venues’ exhibition catalogues, but its presentation and number differ by venue. The Dallas version, for example, is R. Freed, Ramesses the Great (Memphis and Dallas, 1989) cat. no. 45. 12 See L. Borchardt, Statuen und Statuetten von Königen und Privatleuten im Museum von Cairo, Teil 3, Catalogue général des antiquités du Musée du Caire (Berlin, 1936), 21-22 and 28, respectively.

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3

5

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Figs. 3-6. Sculpture fragment depicting an official under the protection of a bovine deity, San Antonio 91.80.122. Courtesy of the San Antonio Museum of Art.


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any indication of the animal’s sex, and colleagues working in the Egyptian Museum who have examined the sculpture’s proper-right side inform me that part of the sculpture is damaged.13 To return to the San Antonio sculpture fragment, it preserves the partial head of the owner wearing a bag-like wig that is swept behind the ears and displays small tabs before them. The better-preserved bovine form displays careful sculpting in the sensitive, powerful face, the preserved right eye being especially well carved with the upper lid in raised relief. The carving of the body is equally sensitive and powerful, with rippling muscles, bold skeletal structure, and undulating flesh. Also preserved in the fragment is the stone matrix of “negative space” from which neither the human nor bovine figures were completely freed. This is especially significant for the bovine, as the legs were carved such that the near leg is fashioned in very high relief, while the far leg is indicated in lower raised relief. This was most likely true for both the left and right sides of the sculpture. In the end, though, what can be said of the identities of the fragment’s figures? Only that they represent an unknown official, probably of the late 26th Dynasty, shown with, and under the protection of, a deity in bovine form, probably Hathor, but also possibly a bull deity such as the Apis bull. As to the owner’s pose, given the relative position of his head to that of the bovine, and the two figures’ relative scale, a standing pose is probably more likely than a kneeling one. Completing the presentation of this group of sculpture is the bust from a statue representing an important 26th Dynasty military figure, General Ahmose (figs. 7-9).14 The bust is carved of schist (greywacke) and is broken off from the rest of the sculpture along a line that runs through the elbows and across the waist, just below the navel. The general wears a smooth, bag-like wig, and part of the waistband of his kilt is visible above the break line. The face gives the impression of being somewhat narrow and elongated. The intact right eyebrow is fairly narrow and is indicated in raised relief. It arches elegantly over the outer canthus

of the statue’s right eye, and then continues in a straight line across the forehead almost to the bridge of the nose. The statue’s left eyebrow and a portion of the left eye are now lost, as is the nose and most of the philtrum, although the nasolabial folds and cheekbones are shown. The mouth is straight, with the lower lip slightly fleshier than the upper lip, and the corners of the mouth are drilled. The left eye slants slightly more than the right eye, and both ears are prominent and well articulated. The torso is well modeled, with the nipples and navel each indicated. The arms are held closely to the sides, with a small matrix of “negative space” between them and the torso. In all, the surface of the sculpture has a lovely, velvety finish. Cartouches of King Apries are inscribed on the upper arms, and an inscribed back pillar, consisting of two vertical text registers, is partially preserved. The text registers are set off with three incised vertical lines, and are surmounted by a single narrow horizontal line. The incised hieroglyphs read from right to left. The text is a fragmentary invocation offering that begins with a request for the assistance of every wab priest who enters and comes forth. The San Antonio bust is not the only sculpture of General Ahmose to survive from antiquity. A very similar bust, also carved in schist (greywacke), is preserved in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, which acquired it from the private collection of Albert Gallatin. Interestingly, the lower portion of this statue also survives in the collection of the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, CG 895. Both were published in Egyptian Sculpture of the Late Period, and many of Bernard V. Bothmer’s and Herman De Meulenaere’s comments about the Metropolitan Museum statue fragment are relevant to the San Antonio Ahmose.15 Multiple statues for private individuals are relatively rare in the history of Egyptian art, so it is significant that this important general, who left an inscription in Greek on one of the statues of Rameses II at Abu Simbel to record his successful campaign against the Kushites in year three of

13 My thanks to Dr. Janice Kamrin and Ms. Stephanie Boucher for checking the sculpture’s condition. 14 Accession number 91.129.2, San Antonio Museum of Art purchase with funds provided by the Lilie and Roy Cullen Endowment Fund. Height: 22.5 cm. (approx. 8 7/8”). 15 B.V. Bothmer, Egyptian Sculpture of the Late Period (Brooklyn, 1960), cat. nos. 52, 59-61, pls. 48-49. For the New

York Ahmose bust when it was in the Gallatin collection, see J.D. Cooney, “Egyptian Art in the Collection of Albert Gallatin, JNES 12 (1953), 14-15, pls. 46-47. See also Paola Davoli, “Two Statues from Saft el-Henna in the Egyptian Museum,” in Egyptian Museum Collections around the World: Studies for the Centennial of the Egyptian Museum, Cairo 1, ed. M. Eldamaty and M. Trad (Cairo, 2002), 247-255.

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9 Figs. 7-9. Sculpture fragment depicting General Ahmose, 91.129.2. Courtesy of the San Antonio Museum of Art.

four late period sculptures in the san antonio museum of art King Psamtik II, had at least two commissioned. The New York/Cairo statue shows the general kneeling before his deity, his hands placed flat, palm down, on the apron panel of his kilt. This simple pose, which Bothmer termed as kneeling without attributes, was probably the same for the

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San Antonio example. One wonders if the New York/Cairo Ahmose and the San Antonio example were once housed in the same temple setting in antiquity or if they were intended for separate locations?

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news from kom el-hettan in the season of spring 2007

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NEWS FROM KOM ELHETTAN IN THE SEASON OF SPRING 2007 Hourig Sourouzian The Colossi of Memnon and Amenhotep III Temple Conservation Project

Jack Josephson regularly visited the site of Kom el-Hettan and often supported our work as friend and as donor. We would like to thank him for his interest and generosity with news on the latest works carried out by the The Colossi of Memnon and Amenhotep III Temple Conservation Project at Kom el-Hettan, and wish him long life, health, and prosperity. The Colossi of Memnon and Amenhotep III Temple Conservation Project resumed in spring 2007, its ninth season at the funerary temple of Amenhotep III at Kom el-Hettan, with clearance, mapping, conservation, and restoration work, thanks to the support of Zahi Hawass.1 Since the beginning of our work in 1998, our main concern was to preserve and conserve the last remains of the once-prestigious temple (fig. 1), now under threat of irrigation water, salt, vegetation, and fire. For the conservation of the remains in their original places, it was necessary to find a way to lower the water level in the temple precinct. In spring 2006, we realized the first phase of a large project to lower the water level.2 The project was successfully carried out in the zone of the Peristyle Court and the Hypostyle Hall, with the hope that future funds also would enable us to dewater the areas of the Second and the Third Pylons, where, like the Memnon, a pair of colossal statues once preceded the gates. During the past seasons, we had collected in and around the Peristyle Court numerous sandstone fragments remaining from the destroyed

1

The members of the project, with the author, wish to thank the Supreme Council of Antiquities of Egypt for kind permission to work under the backing of the German Archaeological Institute. We thank Madame Monique Hennessy, President of the Association des Amis des Colosses de Memnon; Dr. Ursula Lewenton, great benefactor of the project through the Förderverein Memnon; The Robert Wilson Challenge Fund to Conserve Cultural Heritage and the World Monuments Fund; Gaetano Palumbo; Ulrike Köhle; the ARCE/EAF and Gerry Scott. We thank Jack Josephson and Magda Saleh for their friendship and support. We kindly thank Sabri Abdelaziz, Mansour Boreik, and Ali El-Asfar. In addition, the author thanks very warmly the effective

walls and columns that once surrounded the court, as well as thousands of stone fragments deriving from the numerous royal and divine statues that were once placed between the columns surrounding the court (fig. 2). The court with its porticoes had collapsed in antiquity, the sandstone was reused in the neighboring temples, and the sculptures were quarried away over centuries. The last remains were later badly damaged by the actions of irrigation water, salt, vegetation, and fire. Only some royal torsos and smaller parts were lying fragmented between the scanty remains of column bases covered by rubble. We know that royal standing colossi sculpted in red granite from Aswan stood in the southern half of the court, and quartzite colossi brought from the northern quarry of Gebel el-Ahmar near Heliopolis were placed in the northern half of the court, all placed between the columns of the inner rows and facing into the open court. Within the rear rows of the porticoes and probably along the walls of the Peristyle, numerous statues of the goddess Sekhmet in granodiorite participated in the vast program of the court’s statuary. In addition to these sculptures, a monumental alabaster statue of a hippopotamus was placed in the northern portico, whereas two monumental stelae in quartzite flanked the passage of the eastern portico. Over the past years we have collected, sorted, and fully documented all these remains and grouped the colossal statue fragments with the aim to raise them back in their original places.

and devoted team members of the ninth season, named here by rank of seniority on the site, Rainer Stadelmann, Nairy Hampikian, Myriam Seco Alvarez, Josef Dorner, Christian Perzlmeier, Miguel Angel Lopez Marcos, Theodore Gayer Anderson, Eriko Kamimura, Ali Hasan Ibrahim, Ahmed Mohamed Ali, Tayeb Hasan Ibrahim, Mohamed Ali el Ghassab, Arkadi Karakhanyan, Ara Avagyan, Badawi Sayed Abdelrahim, Jola Malatkova, Maria Antonia Morena, Monica Blanco Sanz, Lourdes Mesa Garcia, Elena Mora Ruedas, Sophie Jeanne Vidal, Antoine and Odile Chéné, Ahmed Amin, Benjamin Lachat, and, last but not least, Mohamed Ali, the rais, and the 300 workmen on the site.

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Fig. 1. Preliminary reconstruction of the temple precinct by Nairy Hampikian.

Fig. 2. View of conservation works in the Peristyle Court. Courtesy of Memnon/Amenhotep III Project.


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When we succeeded in lowering the ground-water level, it was now possible to study the foundations and to plan the conservation and consolidation of the remaining structures. The excavation of the Peristyle was carried out by Myriam Seco Alvarez. In spring 2007, the lowered water level enabled further clearance of the porticoes and deeper investigations in the foundations. The latter consisted of three layers of sandstone blocks under the walls and the columns of the eastern and western porticoes, and limestone foundation blocks under the southern and northern columns. The court was paved with huge sandstone slabs. Seismologic investigations made by Arkadi Karakhanyan under the column bases, as well as a thorough examination under the colossal statue situated between the first and the second foremost columns of the West Portico north half, showed that the foundations had been disturbed by an earthquake and that they have been partly quarried away in later periods. The investigations also showed that the outer wall of the Peristyle had been completely quarried away, except for a very few blocks from the lowermost level of the foundations. From the architectural elements fallen during the catastrophe, blocks from the walls, the ceiling, the architraves and the columns had been almost entirely quarried away, leaving few fragments of decorated column drums and wall reliefs, as well as some larger parts of architraves and ceiling slabs, which are under study. All these elements are now temporarily lined up on mud-brick benches and covered with white fabric to avoid the action of sun and erosion. We started an extensive program to desalinate and consolidate the remaining column bases, which had suffered decay by water and salt in the past. As the water table is now lowered, a program to conserve the sandstone remains could be envisaged, in spite of the very high costs of the restoration materials. Thus three column bases were treated this season, with a method of desalination by application of limestone powder and hydraulic

lime. If this method proves to be effective over the summer, it will be applied to the remaining column bases of the portico. Conservation and reassembly work continued on the royal quartzite colossal statues in the Peristyle Court by Miguel Lopez and his team. All parts of colossal standing effigies of the king found lying within a heap of debris were saved from destruction by water, salt, and fire right at the beginning of our work in 1999/2000. These were the first monuments to be saved and recorded on site under the direction of Rainer Stadelmann. First they were isolated on wooden beams or cement bases, numbered, documented, and gradually cleaned and drawn, together with hundreds of smaller pieces, which are sorted by color and category, and gradually joined to the larger pieces by the quartzite conservation team. In the past years, we had consolidated the foundation of the second colossus from the axis to the north (PWN II), and put back in its original place the plinth, composed of large granite blocks. Upon this pedestal we had placed the base of the statue supporting the pair of royal feet. A grouping with the legs of the colossus was then placed on the feet, and in spring 2007, we succeeded in adding a large part of the torso (figs. 3-6). Thus the colossus is now reconstructed up to the waist of the king and standing on its original plinth. The chest has been restored and is now temporarily protected in a small mud-brick enclosure in front of the torso. We plan to place it on the torso next season. In the meantime, we have applied for an accurate cast of the royal head, kept in the British Museum since 1830 (EA 6), which will complete the colossus next season.3 The same operation will be carried out on the companion colossus (PWN I), first of the row in this portico. Grouped and recorded during several seasons, the torso, now reassembled in two parts, is ready to be joined and placed on the black granite pedestal at its original place. The third colossus, very badly damaged by fire in the past, is under restoration. The bases and feet of the fourth and fifth colossi have been placed at

2 On our previous works see: Sourouzian et al., “Three seasons of work at Kom el Hettan,” ASAE 80 (2006), 323-520. The dewatering project was carried out by N. Hampikian and Mohamed Elesawy (see ibid., Part III, 414-433, figs. 5-15, pls. XIX–XXI), thanks to the Robert Wilson Challenge Fund through the World Monuments Fund, matched with grants by Förderverein Memnon and Association des Amis des Colosses de Memnon, and a grant by Jack Josephson, whom we also thank for encouraging such a project at the beginning

of our work. We are also very grateful to Frédéric Pernel and Robert Kachinski, for kind advice and expertise. 3 This contribution was in print when we obtained the replicas of two royal heads in spring 2008, and we placed the first (EA 6) on the colossal statue PWN II (see fig. 6). The replica of the second head (EA 7) will be placed on the torso of another royal statue in the Peristyle. The acquisition and the transportation of the two replicas were possible thanks to the financial support of Förderverein Memnon.

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Fig. 3. Jack Josephson and Magda Saleh visiting the work. Courtesy of Memnon/Amenhotep III Project.

Fig. 4. Heaving a royal torso to be joined to the legs. Courtesy of Memnon/Amenhotep III Project.


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Fig. 5. The royal torso in quartzite placed in the West Portico. Courtesy of Memnon/Amenhotep III Project.

Fig. 6. The quartzite colossus of Amenhotep III PWN II raised in spring 2008, and completed with the replica of the head EA 6 from the British Museum. Height 7.50 m. Courtesy of Memnon/Amenhotep III Project.

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Fig. 7. A red granite royal torso in reassembly. Courtesy of Memnon/Amenhotep III Project.

their original place in the north half of the West Portico, after thorough restoration. The missing parts on these bases have been temporarily filled with lime and colored, in the hope that they will be found in earlier excavation debris or refills. Other parts of these colossi, together with torsos deriving from the North Portico, have been cleaned and recorded, isolated on wooden blocks, and temporarily put on display in the open court, protected by a provisional wooden enclosure. Two fragmented heads were restored and kept in the temporary workshop, awaiting the finding of the missing parts. In the northern part of the East Portico, several parts of a similar colossus were reassembled and temporarily put on display in front of the portico. The foundations of this colossus were studied, and this torso will be put in its original place next season, when the foundations will be consolidated. During the investigation, the beard of the king and a colossal head of a quartzite uraeus were discovered and conserved. Up to now, we have evidence of ten quartzite standing royal colossi, in the northern half of the Peristyle. They represent the king standing, feet joined, hands crossed on the chest and holding the royal insignia. The king wears the red crown

of Lower Egypt, and wears a pleated shendyt kilt, held at the waist by a large belt decorated with zigzag pattern, with a buckle inscribed with the name of the king. A long dagger, slipped under the belt, completes the royal attire. The bases of these colossi are decorated with representations of Northern Folks. Beside the known lists of place names, new toponyms, studied by Rainer Stadelmann, have revealed the names of Great Ionia and probably the Danaens. In the southern half of the court, the red granite colossi bear a similar iconography, except that here the king wears the white crown of Upper Egypt, and the bases bear southern toponyms. The latter include the land of Kush and new southern place names, now under study; their publication is in preparation. From the southern half of the Peristyle and from the heaps of debris scattered all over the court, we had recovered hundreds of fragments and splinters belonging to several red granite colossal statues of the king. These were studied and grouped, drawn and joined, leading to the gradual reconstruction of several larger parts by the team of red granite. The head of one such colossal statue of Amenhotep III could be completed with more pieces,


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Fig. 8. Three statues of the mighty goddess Sekhmet, before conservation. Courtesy of Memnon/Amenhotep III Project.

as well as the torso. Although quarried away in antiquity, enough large parts have remained to consider reconstructing the upper half of this colossus, until more of the legs and its base can be found. Up to now, the earth all around the discovered pieces has been sifted, and unnumbered smaller fragments have been recovered. This colossus is conserved in the temporary workshop (fig. 7). Pieces of another red granite quarried colossus, found three seasons earlier, have also been completed with new fragments, especially of the legs and feet, which were grouped in a temporary reconstruction. The torso and the feet are kept in a mud enclosure near their original place and protected by a shelter of white fabric. The feet of another statue, found on the site broken in two pieces, have also been joined. Maria Antonia Morena and Aly Hassan were in charge of the team for the conservation of red granite. Thousands of other smaller fragments are gradually sorted, recorded and studied, in view of future reassembly works. In this perspective, we also plan to bring to the site an exact replica 4 Guillemette Andreu, conservateur en chef of the Egyptian Antiquities of the Louvre, kindly agreed to support this operation.

of a granite head and a pair of feet of two similar colossi kept in the Louvre since the beginning of the nineteenth century, acquired from the collection of the British Consul, Henry Salt.4 Flooded by Nile alluvia, the multiple statues of the goddess Sekhmet were dragged into the destruction pits left by the quarrymen. These statues, in dark granodiorite, measure 2 m high and represent the goddess with the face of a lion, seated on a throne. They show excellent workmanship and are very important specimens of Egyptian art (figs. 8-9). After being drawn on the map, photographed and measured, these statues were taken to the temporary workshop of the site, desalinated, and cleaned, with the fragile surfaces consolidated by the team of conservators under the direction of Lourdes Mesa Garcia. The number of statues and statue parts of Sekhmet found during our clearance works since 2000 has now reached 72, not counting the hundreds of smaller fragments and splinters, which are now sorted by category and texture, and are daily joined to fragments found earlier.

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Fig. 9. The three statues of Sekhmet during conservation. Courtesy of Memnon/Amenhotep III Project.

Other statues represent the goddess standing, and holding with her left hand the papyrus scepter and with her right hand the symbol of life. These statues have all lost their feet and bases. However, a series of feet resting on bases inscribed with the names of Amenhotep III, beloved of Sekhmet, have been found earlier in the Theban region and stored in Medinet Habu. A full documentation of all Sekhmet statues of the site, as well as similar statues, parts, and fragments scattered or stored in other sites of the Theban region, is carried on by Christian Perzlmeier. A project proposal to bring back on site all these dispersed pieces has been submitted to the Supreme Council of Antiquities. We were already allowed to bring back to the site in 2007 five monuments from Medinet Habu, 5 For this operation we are grateful to Sabri Abdelaziz, Ali El Asfar, and Ray Johnson.

including a standing statue of Sekhmet found and published by our predecessors, stored in the block yard of Medinet Habu, and now in conservation on Kom el-Hettan.5 Parallel to this work, we also continued to address conservation of the northern stela, one of two large stelae in quartzite at the entrance of the Peristyle Court, which had collapsed in antiquity. The southern one, measuring 9 m high, was re-erected by the Antiquities Service in 1950 on the initiative of Labib Habachi. The northern stela was more fragmented and scattered all over the court. Over the past seasons, we had grouped and documented the dispersed fragments. In spring 2007, we proceeded to an extensive conservation program by cleaning a heavy crust of calcite

news from kom el-hettan in the season of spring 2007 and alluvial deposits from the surface of the fragments. Sophie Jeanne Vidal carried out this task by completing the documentation, cleaning the superficial calcite and pollution crust from all parts, and grouping all elements of the stela.6 The foundations and the neighboring structures of the stela were excavated and examined. Here also, the impact of the earthquake was evident. A project to re-erect the stela at its original place is now in preparation by the members of the team. Further east, studies continue at the Colossi of 6 This operation was done thanks to a grant of ARCE/ EAF. We would like to thank very kindly Gerry Scott for his warm encouragement.

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Memnon, excavations and conservation works at the Second Pylon and its colossal statues, and we carry on our appeal for additional funds to address conservation in the zone of the Third Pylon, with its two rare alabaster colossi lying in fragments since their collapse. Other colossal remains are half buried in the fields to the north of the temple precinct. We hope to save all these remains in the near future, with the generous support of our donors, whom we all thank very kindly.

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the prince kawab, oldest son of khufu

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THE PRINCE KAWAB, OLDEST SON OF KHUFU Rainer Stadelmann Cairo

The mastaba of prince Kawab is situated in the first row of the Eastern Cemetery at Giza1 (fig. 1). It takes the first and best place in the four rows of double mastabas directly behind the queens’ pyramids, that of the queen mother Hetepheres, and that of queen Meretyotes, most probably Kawab’s mother (fig. 2). Therefore, and due to his titles sA-niswt smsw and tAtj-jrjpʿt, “King’s Eldest Son” and “Vizier,” Kawab was regarded by scholars as crown prince and designated successor of Khufu.2 The four rows of eight large mastabas of the direct descendants of Khufu, sons and daughters, were constructed as double mastabas; only the enormous mastaba of Ankhhaf, almost certainly also a—younger—son of Khufu—not of Sneferu—who became vizier and master builder of Chephren’s pyramid, was built as a single tomb, most probably during the reign of Chephren.3 These double mastabas conceived for the king’s sons and their sister(?)-spouses are an innovation of the court of Sneferu at Meidum. There the princes of primogeniture, Nefermaat and his wife Atet, Rahotep and Nofret, were the first royals in the newly created princely mastaba cemetery to have the status and the benefit of this promotion.4 Not, however,

the crown prince.5 For him no tomb was foreseen. When he died in the time of his father Senefru at Meidum, he was given a large single mastaba, M17, near the pyramid, without an annex for an unknown spouse.6 At Dahshur the great mastabas of the first row to the east of the Red Pyramid are too destroyed to allow us to decide whether they were conceived as double mastabas or not. The prince Netjeraperef who had his mastaba tomb in the second row at Dahshur is a king’s son,7 but may be of a secundogeniture, a son of a son of Sneferu, like most probably Iynofer from Dahshur South.8 At Giza the double mastabas of the descendants of Khufu were each built by joining two separate mastabas into one of double size with a continuous casing on the east and west fronts (fig. 3). The cult niches were each cut near the southern corner of the twin mastabas. Thus there is a clear distinction between conventional mastabas, with two niches to the south and to the north, and these twin mastabas. This characteristic architectural feature may well serve as a decisive criterion for the establishment of the genealogy of the early 4th Dynasty. Regrettably it was abandoned in the time of Chephren.

1 W.K. Simpson, The Mastabas of Kawab, Khafkhufu I and II, Giza Mastabas 3 (Boston, 1978); H. Junker, Gîza II (Vienna and Leipzig, 1934), 36; G.A. Reisner, A History of the Giza Necropolis I (Cambridge, MA, 1942), 205 and fig. 113, see PM III, part I, 187-188; W.S. Smith, A History of Egyptian Sculpture and Painting in the Old Kingdom (HESPOK) (London, 1949), 167, 279, and fig. 62. 2 B. Schmitz, Untersuchungen zum Titel S3-NJ ŚWT “Königssohn” (Bonn, 1976); Reisner, A History of the Giza Necropolis II, compl. and rev. by W. Stevenson Smith (Cambridge, MA, 1955), 1-12; also Simpson, Mastabas of Kawab, Khafkhufu I and II; more reserved M. Römer, Zum Problem von Titulatur und Herkunft bei den ägyptischen Königsöhnen des Alten Reichs (Bonn, 1977) and “Kronprinz,” LÄ 3, 816. 3 Reisner, Giza Necropolis I, 41, 212, 308, and figs. 8 and 122. Reisner and Smith, Giza Necropolis II, 1-12, and Smith, HESPOK, 38-39. A. Bolshakov, “What did the Bust of Ankhhaf Originally Look Like?” JMFA 3 (1991), 5-14. P. Lacovara, “A New Look at Ankhhaf,” Egyptian Archaeology 9 (1996), 6-7. 4 W.M.F. Petrie, Medum (London, 1892), 11-17. 5 R. Stadelmann, “Khaefkhufu=Chephren. Beiträge zur

Geschichte der 4. Dynastie,” SAK 11 (1984), 165–172, and Stadelmann, “Userkaf in Sakkara and Abusir,” Archiv Orientálni Supplement IX (2000), 532 n. 14. The objections raised by A. Bolshakov in “Princes who became kings: where are their tombs?” GM 146 (1995), 11-22, are not relevant. His main thesis that the tombs of crown princes were abolished and demolished when they had become kings lacks evidence; neither in the row of large mastabas of the descendants of Snefru at Meidum nor at Dahshur are there any empty spaces; and more evidently in the tomb rows of the family of Khufu at the Eastern Cemetry G 7000 at Giza, there is absolutely no empty space that might attest to contemporary relinquished or destroyed mastabas. 6 W.M.F. Petrie, E. Mackay, and G. Wainwright, Meydum and Memphis III (London, 1910), 3-4, and Stadelmann, “Khaefkhufu=Chephren,” 165-172. 7 N. Alexanian, Das Grab des Prinzen Netjer-aperef: die Mastaba II/1 in Dahschur, Dahschur 2, AV 56 (Mainz, 1999). 8 Iynofer, see Nicole Alexanian in: R. Stadelmann and N. Alexanian, “Die Friedhöfe des Alten und Mittleren Reiches in Dahschur,” MDAIK 54 (1998), 296 ff.

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Fig. 1. Giza East Cemetery, G 7000. Photo: M. Haase.

Fig. 2. Giza East Cemetery. Queens’ Pyramids and Mastabas.

Kawab’s mastaba has suffered badly from stone looting in later periods. Not only the exterior chapels with their elaborate decoration, but also most of the casing in the niches and on the outer face, have been cut off and torn off for reuse. The gen9

Reisner and Smith, Giza Necropolis II.

eral aspect of the destruction of the mastabas of the Eastern Cemetery does not support George Reisner’s interpretation of a dynastic conflict between the sons of Khufu. This demolition is not an act of annihilation or extermination of personalities. For such a motivation, the destruction of the reliefs and the erasure of names would have been absolutely sufficient. It looks most certainly that the looting took place in order to obtain the valuable stone material in the construction of mosques, palaces, and bridges in the Arabic Middle Ages. Kawab’s wife was princess Hetepheres II, certainly also a daughter of the great king Khufu. After the death of Kawab she was married to Djedefre,9 son and successor of Khufu, who already had a royal spouse, Khentetenka, and several sons, among them Baka, the future king and successor of Chephren. Baka was the initiator of the unfinished pyramid of Zawiyet el-Aryan. The names Meresankh/Mersiankh, Meretyotes, Hetepheres and Khentetkaus are very frequent queens’ names in the family of the 4th Dynasty. Through her marriage to king Djedefre, Hetepheres II earned the title of queen. The daughter of Kawab and Hetepheres II was Meresankh III, who married Che-


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Fig. 3. Giza East Cemetery. First row. Mastabas of Kawab and Khaefkhufu. From W.K. Simpson, The Mastabas of Kawab, Khaefkhufu I and II, fig. 3.

phren when he had become king after the death of his brother Djedefre. But she was not the mother of Mycerinus. This was a queen Khamerernebti I, and he was also married to another woman of that name, Khamerernebti II. Hetepheres II is portrayed in the tomb of her daughter, Queen Meresankh III, G 7530 -40.10 Hetepheres wears a great court dress, deeply décolleté and with pointed stiff shoulders,11 and a wig interlaced with red threads. This must have been the fashion at the court in the time of Khufu. When Reisner first saw this depiction, he wrongly interpreted the wig as natural red hair and invented a whole story of intrigue about a red-haired Libyan princess, the “blond beast” who was the instigator of a bloody family feud among the sons and daughters of Khufu.12 Much later, Stevenson Smith found out that the assumed red hair was in reality a stylish wig, and no foreign Libyan princess was behind the intrigues, death, and the destruction of the mastabas at the Giza court.13

Although most of the decoration of Kawab’s chapel is shattered, Stevenson Smith and William Kelly Simpson were able to reconstruct some of the scenes and the titles by analogy with the chapel of the neighboring tomb of Khafkhufu (fig. 4). According to Smith, about 342 statue fragments were recorded, which could be attributed to about ten to twenty statues of all kinds and sizes, small and life-size, standing and sitting, and, for the first time, to scribe statues. The most important titles of Kawab are preserved on these fragments of his statuary and on fragments of his sarcophagus. He is sA nswt smsw, “king’s eldest son,” also n Xt.f, “of his body = the king's,” tAty and jry-pat and HAt-a.14 He also bears several priestly titles, but he is not priest of his father Khufu. The titles tAty and jry-pat together with HAt-a are the titles commonly regarded as those of a crown prince.15 If we, however, regard closely all persons who bore these highest titles from the Thinite period16 up to the 5th Dynasty, we can observe, and have to admit, that

10 D. Dunham and W. K. Simpson, The Mastaba of Queen Mersyankh III, Giza Mastabas 1 (Boston, 1974), frontispiece and pl. VII c. 11 Ibid, frontispiece, and Simpson, Mastabas of Kawab, Khafkhufu I and II, pl. XVI a. 12 Reisner, “The Tomb of Meresankh, a Great-Granddaughter of Queen Hetep-Heres I and Sneferuw,” BMFA 25 (1927), 64-78, and Reisner, Chapter X, “The Family of Mycerinus,” in Mycerinus (Cambridge, Mass, 1931). 13 Smith, HESPOK, 134, 143, 262 and fig. 48; C. Ransom Williams had interpreted the collared lines as conventional drawing lines, which was rightly corrected by W.S. Smith, in Giza Necropolis II, 7, with reference to the headdress worn by Djoser’s queen and the lady of the Bankfield stela. Queen

Henutsen, mother of Khafkhufu, also wears this collared headdress in Khafkhufu’s chapel, G 7230. 14 Reisner and Smith, Giza Necropolis II, 1-12, Reisner, Mycerinus, 244-245, and Smith, HESPOK, 30-31; Simpson, Mastabas of Kawab, Khafkhufu I and II, 8. 15 Reisner and Smith, Giza Necropolis II, 1-12; Schmitz, Untersuchungen zum Titel S3-NJSWT “Königssohn.” 16 G. Dreyer, “‘Wer war Menes,” in The Archaeology and Art of Ancient Egypt, Essays in Honor of David B. O’Connor 1, ed. Z. Hawass and J. Richards (Cairo, 2007), 221-230, has recently tried to identify princes with highest titles of the 1st Dynasty with future kings, but this remains as uncertain as the suggestions of N. Dautzenberg, “Zum König Ity I. der 1. Dynastie,” in GM 69 (1983), 33-35.

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Fig. 4. Giza East Cemetery. The Mastaba of Kawab. Isometric drawing by T. Kendall. From W.K. Simpson, The Mastabas of Kawab, Khaefkhufu I and II, fig. 4.

none of them ever became king! This fact has been completely ignored by all scholars who examined titles and their associated royal careers. If one would have examined simultaneously the individual princes together with their titles, it would have been obvious that these princes pursued the highest functions of wasirs, overseers of all building activities, directors of expeditions etc. but none of them ever became king. They cannot all have died before their royal fathers. This would mean that the designated crown prince had no official function during the lifetime of his father. Therefore we never find any hint, name or representation, of the person to become king. Under Djoser the most eminent prince and powerful person was Imhotep, who was even snty, “twin” of Djoser, but he was not the successor. This was Sanakht or Sekhemkhet, under whose reign Imhotep evidently supervised the construction of the pyramid complex.17 Senefru’s name never appeared during the long reign of Huni, nor was Khufu ever mentioned during Senefru’s reign, neither at Meidum nor at Dahshur, although we know that he was a son of Senefru and Hetepheres I. In Meidum the princes Nefermaat and Rahotep bear the highest titles, in Dahshur Kanofer, but a prince Khufu never came into view. Nor Djedefre at Giza before he had became king. There is even another negative criterion regard-

ing crown princes or future kings. When Senefru created a princely necropolis with large twin mastabas as an innovation at Meidum, he did not plan a tomb for the crown prince. When this designated prince died unexpectedly before his father, a large mastaba was hastily constructed beside the step pyramid of his father for the unknown prince. Neither at Dahshur, nor at Giza in the Eastern Cemetery for the princes and princesses of the primogenitor, was a mastaba tomb for the crown prince foreseen. Obviously, according to the royal code of belief, a crown prince should or could not die before his father. He had to become king and build his own pyramid! Who chose the future king? The reigning king alone or the ruling clan? Certainly the successor must have been chosen in advance, in order to avoid feuds or even bloody confrontations after the death of the ruler. The successor must have been installed in order to proceed at once after the death of the old king with the rituals of the mummification and deification of his predecessor. Among Kawab’s highest titles is hry HAbt hry tp, “Highest Exorcist.” And he bears the bizarre title of a wr-md-Smaw, “One of the Ten Great of Upper Egypt.”18 These are very ancient functions in the royal cortege dating back to the Thinite Period, when a clan of Upper Egypt reigned over Egypt. It may well be that the “Ten Great of Upper

17 Grafitto with the name of Imhotep on the inner niched wall, M. Z. Goneim, Horus Sekhem-khet, The Unfinished Step Pyramid at Saqqara 1, Excavations at Saqqara,

Service des Antiquités de l’Égypte (Cairo, 1957), pl. 13. 18 Simpson, Mastabas of Kawab, Khafkhufu I and II, 8.


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Egypt” was the board that chose, together with the king, the future ruler. Kawab in his function of an sA-nswt-smsw, “Eldest King’s Son,” was the head

of this important committee. He was, however, never the Crown Prince!19

19 After completing this article I became aware of two new publications, both related to the academic school of Vienna: Peter Jánosi, Giza in der 4. Dynastie: Die Mastabas der Kernfriedhöfe und die Felsgräber (Vienna, 2005), and somehow connected with the results of this study an article by Roman Gundacker, “Ein Beitrag zur Genealogie der 4. Dynastie,” in: SOKAR 16, 1 (2008), 22-51. Both authors insist that Reisner’s attribution of Cemetery G 7000, the mastabas east of Khufu’ pyramid, to the sons and daughters of Khufu only, the primogeniture, cannot be proved definitely and must therefore be rejected. Their main and only argument against Reisner’s thesis is an unlikely hypothesis according to which Kawab was a younger son of Sneferu and brother of Khufu. Gundacker even invents a

mysterious first consort of Kawab and a son with identical name. Both authors fail to notice that in the time of Khufu the allocation of a mastaba tomb was a strictly royal favor and decree of the king and there is no proof at all that any other prince or relative to Khufu was permitted to have a mastaba in the Eastern Cemetery. Even the most powerful persons beside Khufu, Hemiun, and the unknown prince of mastaba 2000, the builders of his pyramid were not authorized to have a tomb among the direct descendants, although Hemiun was a nephew, the son of Khufu’s elder brother Nefermaat. How should then Kawab have his mastaba tomb in the first row if he was not a senior son of Khufu.

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new perspectives on the brooklyn black head

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NEW PERSPECTIVES ON THE BROOKLYN BLACK HEAD Paul Edmund Stanwick New York City

As the archaeological remains of Ptolemaic Egypt become increasingly accessible through discovery and publication, there are more opportunities to comprehend the period from the standpoint of its elite. Judging from the corpus of private statuary, there is a richness to this history about which much remains to be understood. The Brooklyn Black Head (figs. 1-2) is an important example of this idea.1 It features over-life-size scale and Greek ideas, distinctive features that can inform us about the identity and social position of the person represented. The Brooklyn head and other monumental statues can provide insights into the history of high-ranking officialdom under the

Ptolemies (see list of sculptures at the end of this article; the Brooklyn head is no. 4). Egyptian-style statuary2 of the Ptolemaic elite is mostly about men, their status and occupations, and their relationships with the gods.3 Despite prominent queens from Arsinoe I through Cleopatra VII, and their frequent depiction in statuary, there are comparatively few private female statues in the Egyptian style, continuing the practice of Late Period Egypt prior to the arrival of Alexander the Great. Ptolemaic male statues were primarily intended for temple settings. The two main types preserved are standing statues with the left foot forward, and block statues.4 The standing figures

1 This article is warmly dedicated to Jack A. Josephson for his help and support over the years. I thank Edna R. Russmann for generous assistance in researching this article, including providing access to Bernard V. Bothmer’s Corpus of Late Egyptian Sculpture, and for photo permissions. Thanks also to Mervat Seif el-Din of the Graeco-Roman Museum and Mogens Jørgensen of the Ny Carslberg Glyptotek for permission to reproduce images of their museums’ sculptures and to Dietrich Raue at the Deutsches Archäologisches Institut in Cairo for photo permissions. These abbreviations will be used: Baines, “Egyptian Elite Self-Presentation” = J. Baines, “Egyptian Elite Self-Presentation in the Context of Ptolemaic Rule,” in Ancient Alexandria between Egypt and Greece, ed. W.V. Harris and G. Ruffini (Leiden, 2004), 33-61. Beck, Ägypten = H. Beck, P.C. Bol, and M. Bückling, eds., Ägypten, Griechenland, Rom: Abwehr und Berührung (Frankfurt, 2005). Bianchi, CE = R.S. Bianchi, ed., Cleopatra’s Egypt: Age of the Ptolemies (Brooklyn, 1988). Bianchi, Striding Draped Male Figure = R.S. Bianchi, The Striding Draped Male Figure of Ptolemaic Egypt I-III (PhD diss., Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, 1976). Bothmer, ESLP = B.V. Bothmer et al., Egyptian Sculpture of the Late Period, 700 B.C. to A.D. 100 (Brooklyn, 1960). Bothmer, “Hellenistic Elements” = B.V. Bothmer, “Hellenistic Elements in Egyptian Sculpture of the Ptolemaic Period,” in Alexandria and Alexandrianism (Malibu, 1996), 215-230. Derchain, Impondérables = Ph. Derchain, Les impondérables de l’hellénisation: littérature d’hiérogrammates (Turnhout, Belgium, 2000). Hölbl, History = G. Hölbl, A History of the Ptolemaic Empire (London, 2001). Huss, Ägypten = W. Huss, Ägypten in hellenistischer Zeit, 332-30 v. Chr. (Munich, 2001). Kaiser, “Datierung” = W. Kaiser, “Zur Datierung realistischer Rundbildnisse ptolemäisch-römischer Zeit,” MDAIK 55 (1999), 237-263.

Lembke, “Dimeh” = K. Lembke, “Dimeh: Römische Repräsentationskunst im Fayyum,” JdI 113 (1998), 109137. Lembke and Vittmann, “Skulptur” = K. Lembke and G. Vittmann, “Die ptolemäische und römische Skulptur im Ägyptischen Museum Berlin, Teil 1: Privatplastik,” JBerlMus 42 (2000), 7-57. Ridgway, Sculpture = B.S. Ridgway, Hellenistic Sculpture 3 (Madison, WI, 2002). Schmidt, Statuenbasen = I. Schmidt, Hellenistische Statuenbasen (Frankfurt am Main, 1995). Smith, Portraits = R.R.R. Smith, Hellenistic Royal Portraits (Oxford, 1988). Stanwick, Portraits = P.E. Stanwick, Portraits of the Ptolemies: Greek Kings as Egyptian Pharaohs (Austin, 2002). Stewart, Greek Sculpture = A. Stewart, Greek Sculpture: an Exploration 1-2 (New Haven, 1990). Yoyotte, “Contacts” = J. Yoyotte, “Les contacts entre Égyptiens et Grecs (VIIe – IIe siècles avant J.-C.),” Annuaire du Collège de France 95 (1994-95), 669-682. Zivie-Coche, Tanis = Ch. Zivie-Coche, Tanis: Statues et autobiographies de dignitaires Tanis à l’époque ptolémaïque, Travaux récents sur le tell Sân el-Hagar 3 (Paris, 2004). 2 “Egyptian-style” or “Egyptian” refers to hard stone and other statues characterized by frontality and the presence of a back pillar. 3 Selected literature on Egyptian-style, private Ptolemaic male statuary: Bothmer, ESLP; A. Adriani, “Ritratti dell’Egitto greco-romano,” RM 77 (1970), 72-109; Bianchi, Striding Draped Male Figure; Kaiser, “Datierung”; Baines, “Egyptian Elite Self-Presentation”; and Zivie-Coche, Tanis. 4 Block statue examples: K. Jansen-Winkeln, Biographische und religiöse Inschriften der Spätzeit aus dem Ägyptischen Museum Kairo (Wiesbaden, 2001), 232-257, nos. 37-40, pls. 77-85; and J.-C. Goyon et al., Trésors d’Égypte: la cachette de Karnak, 1904-2004 (Grenoble, 2004), 77ff., cats. 21, 24. See also M. Azim and G. Réveillac, Karnak dans l’objectif de Georges Legrain 1-2 (Paris, 2004).

Figs. 1-2. The Brooklyn Black Head. Brooklyn Museum 58.30, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund (photos: Brooklyn Museum).

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are varied in scale, attributes, material, and geographic distribution, and many wear draped ensembles of native origin. Their faces possess diverse indications of age and expression, which impart individuality, and some have an unmistakable visual relationship with Greek representations, as does the Brooklyn Black Head. The block statues tend to be more visually uniform and rote in appearance. They have Egyptian wigs, beards, and faces with simplified features. The preserved record of Greek-style statues5 of the Ptolemaic elite is extremely slim. As elsewhere in the Hellenistic world, most of these likely were made of bronze, and have since disappeared.6 An oft-published, life-size male head from the Greek island of Delos and a larger-than-life male figure found in the sea off ancient Magarsos in Cilicia provide a sense of how such bronzes might have appeared.7 There are also some better-preserved marble statues of men and women.8 Typically, such sculptures were standing and wore the himation mantle over a chiton garment. Statue bases provide information about Greek private statues in Egypt, but published examples are few compared to those found in other parts of the Hellenistic East. Most bases come from Alexandria, and document lost sculptures of royal courtiers, military commanders, and government officials, erected by the royal house, a city, or private citizens.9 Virtually all are of men, but the frequency of female statues elsewhere in the Hellenistic world suggests that there were some significant Greek sculptures of women in Egypt. One possible example is preserved only as a black granite base dedicated to Tryphaina, a royal nurse from the court of Ptolemy XII.10 Like their Egyptian

counterparts, these Greek statues could be erected in temple sanctuaries, but dissimilarly, they often had secular settings, namely agoras and theaters, of which little is known from Ptolemaic Egypt, especially from Alexandria and its environs, where one would expect large amounts of such statuary. Into this context falls the Brooklyn Black Head (figs. 1-2), notable for its monumental scale and visual correspondence to Greek sculpture (figs. 3-4). The head is covered with a dense, compact series of small, comma-shaped locks, partly arranged in rows, and emanating from the top back of the head. The face is lean and angular, with fine folds on the forehead, a natural brow, large eyes, and thin lips. The right ear is higher than its counterpart on the left. The back pillar’s incised hieroglyphic inscription (fig. 5) begins with the phrase “honored before… ,” with the names of two gods being supplied by the facing figures below, of whom only the hm-hm crown (left) and double crown (right) remain.11 The Berlin statue (no. 2) has a similar text at the top of its back pillar, which reads, “honored before… Neith, Osiris, and the gods of Sais,” though in this case, the text appears below the figures of the gods.12 Bernard V. Bothmer first published the Brooklyn head in the 1960 exhibition catalogue, Egyptian Sculpture of the Late Period, 700 B.C. to A.D. 100, dubbing it the “Black Head,” and thus associating it with the famous Berlin and Boston “Green Heads.”13 Bothmer dated the head to about 80-50 BC, seeing it as an exemplar of the strength of portraiture in late Ptolemaic Egypt: Egyptian in its frontality and back-pillar inscription; and Greek in its hair, wide-open eyes, and high degree

5 “Greek-style” or “Greek” refers to statues made by Greek craftsmen, typically in bronze or marble, mostly for Greek and Roman clients. 6 Such statues may be referenced in the hieroglyphic inscription on the Horemheb statue (no. 5), which identifies him as a Greek and mentions bronze figures of his father and mother, presumably in the Greek style; Yoyotte, “Contacts,” 673; and Derchain, Impondérables, 43, 74. 7 Delos head: Athens, National Archaeological Museum X 14612, bronze, h: 32.5 cm; Stewart, Greek Sculpture, 228, fig. 842; and N. Kaltsas, Sculpture in the National Archaeological Museum, Athens (Athens, 2002), 298, no. 623. Magarsos figure: Adana Museum 1.13.1984, bronze, h. 1.8 m; Ridgway, Sculpture, 123-124, pl. 44a-b; and S. Dillon, Ancient Greek Portrait Sculpture (Cambridge, 2006), 62, 75, fig. 66. 8 A. Lewerentz, Stehende männliche Gewandstatuen im Hellenismus: ein Beitrag zur Stilgeschichte und Ikonologie hellenistischer Plastik (Hamburg, 1993); and J.C. Eule, Hellenistische Bürgerinnen aus Kleinasien: weibliche Gewandstatuen in ihrem antiken Kontext (Istanbul, 2001).

9 Alexandrian statue bases collected in: E. Bernand, Inscriptions grecques d’Alexandrie ptolémaïque, BdE 133 (Cairo, 2001). 10 Alexandria, Graeco-Roman Museum 19016, black granite, h. 19 cm, w. 32 cm, possibly from Alexandria; ibid., 93-95, cat. 33, pl. 17. 11 Bothmer, ESLP, 173, mistakenly cites three crowns, possibly misreading the damaged hieroglyphic signs at the center as a third crown. Herman De Meulenaere pointed out to me that a Ptolemaic? male head with an idealizing face in Paris (Musée du Louvre E 10710, schist, h. 10 cm, provenance not known?) has a fragmentary back-pillar inscription similar to the Brooklyn Black Head’s. 12 Lembke and Vittmann, “Skulptur,” 12-13. 13 Bothmer, ESLP, 172-173. Recent publication of the Berlin (Ägyptische Museum 12500) and Boston (Museum of Fine Arts 04.1749) heads: J. Josephson, P. O’Rourke, and R. Fazzini, “The Doha Head: A Late Egyptian Portrait,” MDAIK 61 (2005), 219-241, pls. 39a-b, 38b-c, respectively.

Figs. 3-4. Marble head attributed to a late Ptolemy. Alexandria, Graeco-Roman Museum 24660 (photos: Deutsches Archäologisches Institut, Cairo).

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Fig. 5. Back pillar of the Brooklyn Black Head. Brooklyn Museum 58.30, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund (photo: Brooklyn Museum).

of asymmetry. Because of a dealer-provided Memphite provenance, Bothmer speculated that the sculpture might represent a high priest of Ptah or a governor of Memphis. Major scholars have followed Bothmer’s first-century BC dating. Over-life-size private statuary in the Egyptian style is not common during the Ptolemaic Period, but does occur with some frequency. At the end of this article is a preliminary list of nine examples that extends into the early Roman Period.14 Assuming a total height of seven times the head height, eight of the original figures (nos. 1-4, 6-9)

would have been about 1.9 to 2.4 meters high (or about 6 feet, 2 inches to nearly 8 feet), with the Brooklyn head at the range’s upper end. Bases likely made these sculptures even more imposing. Horemheb’s statue (no. 5), at 3 meters plus, is exceptionally tall relative to the group. Because of dating uncertainties, the list excludes four sculptures that are sometimes assigned to the Ptolemaic Period.15 The group of nine is heterogeneous in several respects. Hard stones, such as granite and diorite, predominate, but soft stones such as limestone are

14 A statue of Panemerit (Cairo, Egyptian Museum CG 27493 + Paris, Musée du Louvre E 15683, dark stone, h. 83.5 cm, from Tanis), a high official under Ptolemy XII, is sometimes called over life size (Kaiser, “Datierung,” 253, 261; and Baines, “Egyptian Elite Self-Presentation,” 52-53), but published measurements do not seem to support this. 15 Statue of Djedhor/Teos II (Cairo, Egyptian Museum CG 700, granite, h. 240 cm, from Tanis; P.-M. Chevereau, Prosopographie des cadres militaires égyptiens de la basse époque (Paris, 1985), 166-167, doc. 239; A.B. Lloyd, “The Egyptian Elite in the Early Ptolemaic Period: Some Hieroglyphic Evidence,” in The Hellenistic World: New Perspectives, ed. D. Ogden (Swansea, 2002), 127-129, fig. 5; and Zivie-Coche,

Tanis, 84-93, figs. 14-17. Three so-called “eggheads” are also excluded. Bryn Athyn, Glencairn Museum E1156, indurated limestone, h. 32.8 cm, provenance not known; Bothmer, ESLP, 127-128, cat. 99, pls. 92-93, figs. 247-249. Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek ÆIN 1384, limestone, h. 31 cm, provenance not known (acquired in Cairo in 1911); O. Koefoed-Petersen, Catalogue des statues et statuettes égyptiennes (Copenhagen, 1950), 66, cat. 113, pl. 121 (erroneous height of 50 cm). Providence, Rhode Island School of Design Museum of Art 85.093, basalt, h. 36.2 cm, provenance not known; D. Spanel, Through Ancient Eyes: Egyptian Portraiture (Birmingham, AL, 1988), 124, cat. 44.

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Fig. 6. Male head. Brooklyn Museum 55.120, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund (photo: Brooklyn Museum).

represented as well. Indications of maturity (thinning hair and facial folds) are prevalent (nos. 1, 2, 4, 6, 9), while some have youthful, idealizing, foldfree faces (nos. 3, 5, 7; figs. 6-8). One head is completely bald (no. 8). There appears to be a wide geographic distribution: Alexandria (no. 2), Naukratis (no. 5), and Tanis (no. 1) in the Delta, Dimeh in the Faiyum (nos. 6, 9), and Dendera in Upper Egypt (no. 3). Consistent with prior discussion, there are no large-scale private female statues.16 Sources of inspiration for the portrait features vary considerably. Some, such as the Munich (no. 9) and Brooklyn Black (no. 4; figs. 1-2) heads, appear to be based closely on Greek portraits.

16 Preserved examples are typically under life size: S. Albersmeier, Untersuchungen zu den Frauenstatuen des ptolemäischen Ägypten (Mainz am Rhein, 2002) 13-18.

Others are more selective with Greek ideas, such as the Copenhagen sculpture (no. 7; figs. 7-8), which depicts Greek-like hair as a decorative pattern emanating from a center point at the top of the head, an old native convention, and has Egyptian-style, large, almond-shaped eyes. The second Brooklyn head (no. 3; fig. 6) has a more tenuous connection to Greek ideas. Its forehead locks are carved as flat, nearly round shapes (perhaps tight curls were indicated with paint?), while the small, slanted eyes and semicircular smile follow native conventions. The deep facial folds on the Berlin (no. 2) and Cairo (no. 6) sculptures are indebted to the “realistic” strain of private portraiture in the Hellenistic East and Roman “veristic” portraits.


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Figs. 7-8. Male head. Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek ÆIN 944 (photos: Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek).

Despite a hieroglyphic inscription that explicitly calls him a Greek, Horemheb (no. 5) wears a traditional Egyptian bag wig and has idealizing, Egyptian-style facial features. Large scale can be equated to an individual’s importance and power because such depictions are generally only accorded to royal or divine persons in Egypt. Some of the most significant Ptolemaic sculptures were created for men who combined high-level government, military, and priestly roles. Indeed, one example in the list that preserves much of its inscription names the person depicted as Horos, a commander of the Delta troops and a priest of Neith in the temple at Sais (no. 2). We can imagine men like Horos as key benefactors of their local temple complexes, and likely the most visible representative of the state in their area. Over-life-size scale would thus confer quasi-royal status to prominent locals. In a

similar way, the Egyptian priesthood of first-century BC Thebes honored the strategos Callimachos with a decree on a recarved royal stela whose lunette preserved its relief of royal and divine figures.17 The stela’s parallel Greek and Demotic texts credited Callimachos, an Upper Egyptian official under Cleopatra VII, with saving the population from famine, a topos associated with the kings of Egypt.18 Over-life-size scale was a special honor accorded to selected officials. Where did the idea of over-life-size scale originate? There is some pre-Ptolemaic precedent in Egypt for persons closely connected to the crown, or having great regional authority. Two examples are: a seated statue of the Lady Sennuwy, wife of a powerful official of Asyut under Senwosret I (c. 1971-1926 BC);19 and a block statue of Senenmut, an influential official and confidante of Queen Hatshepsut (c. 1479-1458 BC).20 There was

17 Turin, Museo Egizio 1764, granite stela, 112 cm x 65 cm, Drovetti Collection; Hölbl, History, 239-240; and Stanwick, Portraits, 50. 18 H. Heinen, “Hunger, Not und Macht: Bemerkungen zur herrschenden Gesellschaft im ptolemäischen Ägypten,” Ancient Society 36 (2006), 22-41. 19 Museum of Fine Arts, Boston 14.720, granodiorite, h. 172 cm, from Kerma; R.E. Freed, L.M. Berman, and

D.M. Doxey, Arts of Ancient Egypt, MFA Highlights (Boston, 2003), 126-127. 20 Cairo, Egyptian Museum CG 579, siliceous sandstone or quartzite, h. 155 cm, from Thebes; C.H. Roehrig, ed., Hatshepsut: from Queen to Pharaoh (New York, 2005), 124-125, cat. 66. I thank Catharine Roehrig for assistance in identifying pre-Ptolemaic, over-life-size statues in Egypt.

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potentially a more contemporary impetus as well. Greek private statuary from the larger Hellenistic world was sometimes over life size for both men and women.21 This can be connected to the rise of politicians, military leaders, and businessmen who gained particular prominence in the mid-second century BC and later in the face of the decline of the Hellenistic monarchies and the rising power of Rome. Numerous over-life-size private statues come from Delos, which prospered as a major commercial center after it became a free port in 166 BC. A large-scale statue of the Roman slave trader C. Ofellius Ferus stood on a high base in a niche on the island’s Agora of the Italians, for which the man was a key donor.22 Another example comes from Asia Minor, where Diodoros Pasparos, a great city leader of first-century BC Pergamon, received many honors for his efforts, including a colossal bronze figure.23 There are also monumental private statues from Cyprus, which was part of the Ptolemaic empire, and Kos, which was an important Ptolemaic ally.24 In Egypt, there were many opportunities for individuals to assume power at the local level when the crown was otherwise distracted by the repeated intradynastic and interregional conflicts in the second and first centuries BC. The general Komanos was instrumental in ending a major Upper Egyptian revolt during the reign of Ptolemy V.25 The strategos Boëthus founded the cities of Philometoris and Cleopatra for Ptolemy VI.26 This sophisticated elite had the potential for significant dealings beyond Egypt’s borders. Italian merchants honored Lochos, a strategos of the Thebaid in the late second century BC, with a statue on Delos.27 These men likely had knowledge

of the portrait options available in the Hellenistic East, including the native ones of Egypt. Besides large scale, the Brooklyn Black Head also relates to royal sculpture in its portrait features. The head’s closest visual parallels are two over-life-size Greek-style representations attributed to the brothers Ptolemies IX and X, who alternated rules during the years 116-80 BC: a marble head from Mersa Matruh, west of Alexandria (figs. 3-4); and a limestone statue from Aphroditopolis (Atfih) in Middle Egypt.28 The mustache and under-the-chin beard of the Mersa Matruh sculpture (likely augmented in plaster) are not part of the original portrait, and were added in a subsequent alteration to depict a later ruler. Like the Brooklyn head, the two royal sculptures have comparably oval faces, hairlines about halfway down the forehead (similarly short-locked in the case of the Aphroditopolis king), wide-open, deeply set eyes, and prominent chins marked by a drill hole under the lower lip. In addition, both the Aphroditopolis and Brooklyn sculptures have fine forehead lines, folds at the outer canthi, and strong naso-labial furrows. Points of difference are that the Brooklyn head’s face looks leaner because of a sharper articulation of the templeand cheekbones, its lips are thinner and broader, and its occipital bulge is proportionally larger and more rounded. The Brooklyn Black Head’s resemblance to a Greek royal type may suggest a close relationship with the crown for the person represented, perhaps even family ties. It even may have demonstrated loyalty to one of the warring siblings, if the type represented by the Aphroditopolis and the Mersa Matruh (first version) sculptures

21 D. Kreikenbom, Griechische und Römische Kolossalporträts bis zum späten ersten Jahrhundert nach Christus (Berlin, 1992), 39-45 and Schmidt, Statuenbasen, passim (descriptions for selected bases indicate over-life-size statue scale). Two important large-scale statues of the female elite from Asia Minor: Baebia and Saufeia (Istanbul, Archaeological Museum 605 and 606; marble; h. 2.15 m and 2.07; from agora at Magnesia), mother and wife, respectively, of Lucius Valerius Flaccus, governor of Roman Asia in the first century BC; Ridgway, Sculpture, 118-121. 22 Stewart, Greek Sculpture, 227-228, fig. 839; and Schmidt, Statuenbasen, 445-446, cat. VII.16. List of large-scale Delian heads: A. Stewart, Attika: Studies in Athenian Sculpture of the Hellenistic Age (London, 1979), 68 (over-life-size scale = a). 23 According to Greek inscriptional evidence: Smith, Portraits, 17; and Stewart, Greek Sculpture, 51.

24 Cyprus: J.B. Connelly, Votive Sculpture of Hellenistic Cyprus (Nicosia, 1988); example: 71-72, cat. 26, figs. 98-99. Kos: R. Kabus-Preisshofen, Die hellenistische Plastik der Insel Kos (Berlin, 1989); example: 207-211, cat. 33, pls. 44-45. 25 Hölbl, History, 156; and Huss, Ägypten, 510-513. 26 Hölbl, History, 189; Huss, Ägypten, 581; and K. Mueller, Settlements of the Ptolemies (Leuven, 2006), 159-164. 27 Preserved as a statue base: Hölbl, History, 200; and Schmidt, Statuenbasen, 317-318, cat. IV.1.41. 28 Mersa Matruh head: Alexandria, Graeco-Roman Museum 24660, marble, h. 38 cm; Smith, Portraits, 97, 167, cat. 60, pl. 40: 3-4; and Huss, Ägypten, 58, 78, figs. 269-270. Aphroditopolis statue: Cairo, Egyptian Museum JE 42891, limestone, h. 2.05 m; Smith, Portraits, 97, 168, cat. 61, pl. 41: 1-3; and Stanwick, Portraits, 58, 78, figs. 271-273. Also: Stanwick, “Regional Styles in Ptolemaic Royal Portraits,” StädelJb 19 (2004), 407, 414, figs. 21, 28.


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was linked strongly with either Ptolemy IX or X. Further, the Brooklyn head’s appearance perhaps suggests that the person depicted was ethnically Greek. The Cairo Horemheb (no. 5) is an example of an Egyptian statue of a Greek.29 The Brooklyn Black Head’s connection to a known Greek royal type of the Ptolemies is unusual among Egyptian-style private portraits. No others in the group of nine have such a direct correspondence, though some have selected features in common. The Munich head (no. 9) comes closest: it has a brow and eye formation like that of a late Ptolemaic royal statue in Cairo;30 and it has a mustache and beard, a late royal portrait characteristic, such as in the second, altered version of the Mersa Matruh head (figs. 3-4). Similarly, the lightly chiseled beard of the Alexandria head (no. 1) recalls a like treatment on a later second-century BC Ptolemy in Paris.31 The Copenhagen head’s elongated proportions (no. 7; figs. 7-8) are reminiscent of royal sphinxes from Medinet Madi, which in turn echo Greek royal types of the second and first centuries, such as a Ptolemy VI head in Alexandria and a late Ptolemy in Malibu.32 An interesting question to ask is whether the Brooklyn Black Head might be based on a Greek bronze, perhaps of the same person. This phenomenon is apparent among the royal representations, where Egyptian and Greek versions have similar hair and faces, while the bodies typically follow differing cultural conventions. The same idea can be postulated for selected elite portraits, with resemblance focused on the head, while the bodies wore different draped garments from their separate cultural traditions.33 Several Egyptian texts refer to a city’s sponsorship of bronze statues in thanks for benefactions important officials have bestowed, which is the formula for Greekstyle elite sculptures (often of bronze) elsewhere

in the Hellenistic world. The abovementioned Callimachos stela records that native priests propose to set up three statues of the official in the public part of the Amun-Re temple at Thebes, one in hard stone offered by the priests and two by the city, one in hard stone and another in bronze.34 Hieroglyphic inscriptions on two, unfortunately headless, Egyptian-style stone statues of Pikhaâs, a high official under Ptolemy XII, mention a bronze statue of him erected by his city.35 Perhaps Callimachos’ and Pikhaâs’ stone and bronze statues were executed in the Egyptian and Greek manners, respectively, with both versions having comparable hair and facial features. The Brooklyn Black Head honored a high Ptolemaic official in the late second or first century BC. The statue acknowledged his government, military, and/or priestly roles, commemorated his benefactions, and may have been set up in tandem with a bronze Greek-style statue of the same person. The Brooklyn Black Head was one of a group of Ptolemaic and early Roman representations of the elite whose over-life-size scale marked their high status and reflected trends of the larger Hellenistic world.

29 For an Egyptian-style, draped statue (unfortunately headless) inscribed for an official with a Greek name (Cairo, Egyptian Museum JE 85743, greywacke, h. 93 cm, from Matbul), see I. Guermeur, “Le syngenès Aristonikos et la ville de To-bener,” RdE 51 (2000), 69-78, pls. 13-14. Egyptianstyle statues of the Greek elite may be more prevalent than generally understood, because draped statues frequently lack back-pillar texts, and were presumably inscribed on their now-missing bases. 30 Cairo, Egyptian Museum 13/3/15/3, dark stone, h. 96.3 cm, possibly from Karnak; Lembke, “Dimeh,” 125; and Stanwick, Portraits, 38, 77, 119-120, cat. D14, figs. 135-137. This recarved statue had a beard in its first version. 31 Paris, Musée du Louvre Ma 970, dark stone, h. 38 cm, provenance not known; Stanwick, Portraits, 72-73, 114, cat. C11, figs. 96-97; and H. Kyrieleis, “Ptolemaios X. (107-88 v. Chr.),” in Beck, Ägypten, 569, cat. 141.

32 Medinet Madi: Milan, Museo Archeologico E.0.9.40012; limestone, h. 50 cm; Stanwick, Portraits, 58, 112, cat. C4, fig. 83; and Stanwick, “Ägyptische Statuen der Ptolemäer,” in Beck, Ägypten, 247-248, fig. 4. Ptolemy VI head: Alexandria, Graeco-Roman Museum 24092, marble, h. 41 cm, provenance not known; Stanwick, Portraits, 57, figs. 254-255. Malibu Ptolemy: The J. Paul Getty Museum 83.AA.330, h. 34 cm, reportedly from Alexandria; Stanwick, Portraits, 58-59. 33 Baines, “Egyptian Elite Self-Presentation,” 51-52 on the garments. 34 Stanwick, Portraits, 50. 35 J.-J. Rifaud found the first statue, which is now lost, in the nineteenth century at Tanis: J. Yoyotte, “Une statue perdue du général Pikhaâs,” Kêmi 15 (1959), 67. Second statue: Cairo, Egyptian Museum JE 67093, dark stone, h. 93 cm, from Tanis; Zivie-Coche, Tanis, 272, 281.

Preliminary List of Over-Life-Size Egyptian Statues of Ptolemaic and Early Roman Elite Men The bibliography is selective. 1. Alexandria, Graeco-Roman Museum 3204 Basalt. H. 34 cm. Found by Auguste Mariette at Tanis. (Dimeh provenance sometimes cited is erroneous: Lembke, “Dimeh,” 125-126.)

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Bothmer, ESLP, 170-172, cat. 131, pl. 122, figs. 327-328 (80-50 BC). D. Wildung and G. Grimm, Götter, Pharaonen (Essen, 1978), cat. 129 (100-50 BC). Lembke, “Dimeh,” 123, 125-126, 129, no. 40 (late Ptolemaic).

2. Berlin, Ägyptisches Museum 2271 Black granite. H. 113 cm. Possibly Sais and then Alexandria (Lembke and Vittmann, “Skulptur,” 12). C. Vandersleyen, Das alte Ägypten, Propyläen Kunstgeschichte 15 (Berlin, 1975), 263, 272, cat. 233 (ca. 100-50 BC). Bianchi, CE, 125-127, cat. 31, pl. 5 (305-250 BC). Bothmer, “Hellenistic Elements,” 219, figs. 15a-b (end of fourth century BC). Kaiser, “Datierung,” 245, 246, 248, 252-253, 262263, pl. 35b. Lembke and Vittmann, “Die Standfigur des Horos, Sohn des Thotoes,” MDAIK 55 (1999), 299-313, pls. 47-49 (originally second or first century BC and reworked around the time of the Roman conquest of Egypt). Lembke and Vittmann, “Skulptur,” 9-13, figs. 1-4 (same as prior). Baines, “Egyptian Elite Self-Presentation,” 39.

3. Brooklyn Museum 55.120 (fig. 6) Basalt. H. 39.2 cm. Possibly from Dendera because of the resemblance to sculptures from the site: a statue of the strategos Pamenkhes (Cairo, Egyptian Museum JE 46320 + CG 50047, granite figure with separately carved sandstone base, h. 130 cm?; Bianchi, Striding Draped Male Figure, 296-304, cat. 23f, pl. 97, figs. 138-139; and Bothmer, “Hellenistic Elements,” 218-219, fig. 14); and a male head (Cairo, Egyptian Museum 6/6/22/4; granite, h. ?; Bianchi, Striding Draped Male Figure, 272273, cat. 23a1, pl. 93, fig. 130). J.D. Cooney, Five Years of Collecting Egyptian Art, 1951-1956 (Brooklyn, 1956), 18-19, cat. 21, pl. 37 (ca. 50-30 BC). Bianchi, Escultura del antiguo Egipto del Museo de Brooklyn (San Juan, 1979), 82-83, cat. 37 (Augustan). J. Josephson, Egyptian Royal Sculpture of the Late Period, 400-246 B.C. (Mainz am Rhein, 1997), 16, pl. 6c (first century BC). PM VIII (1999), 971, no. 801-799-500 (late Ptolemaic or early Roman).

4. Brooklyn Museum 58.30 (figs. 1-2, 5) Diorite. H. 41.4 cm. Reportedly from Memphis (dealer information).

Bothmer, ESLP, 172-173, cat. 132, pls. 123-124, figs. 329-331 (about 80-50 BC); C. Vandersleyen, “‘Tête noire’ de Brooklyn,” in Egypte éternelle: chefs-d’oeuvre du Brooklyn Museum, ed. H. De Meulenaere (Brussels, 1976), 132-133, 145, cat. 84 (time of Cicero and Julius Caesar); C. Aldred et al., L’Égypte du crépuscule (Paris, 1980), 166, fig. 147 (c. 45 BC); R.S. Bianchi, “The Brooklyn Black Head,” in Neferut net Kemit: Egyptian Art from the Brooklyn Museum, ed. R. Fazzini et al. (Tokyo, 1983), cat. 77 (time of Julius Caesar); H. Maehler, “Egypt under the Last Ptolemies,” BICS 30 (1983), 4 (late Ptolemaic); Bianchi, CE, 138-139, cat. 43, pl. 9 (first century BC); M. Cody, “The Brooklyn Black Head,” in Art for Eternity: Masterworks from Ancient Egypt, ed. R. Fazzini, J. Romano, and M. Cody (Brooklyn, 1999), 147, cat. 93 (first century BC); Kaiser, “Datierung,” 254-255, pl. 38g.

5. Cairo, Egyptian Museum CG 1230 Granite. H. 360 cm. From Kom Gajef (Naukratis). Bothmer, ESLP, 128 (time of Ptolemy II?). Yoyotte, “Contacts,” 671-673 (late fourth or third century BC). Derchain, Impondérables, 20-21, 42-43, 69-74. Baines, “Egyptian Elite Self-Presentation,” 39, 49-50.

6. Cairo, Egyptian Museum CG 27492 (= Alexandria, Graeco-Roman Museum 3191) Stone. H. 36 cm. Reportedly from Dimeh (Lembke, “Dimeh,” 125). C.C. Edgar, Greek Sculpture, CGC 27425-27630 (Cairo, 1903), 27, pl. 15. Lembke, “Dimeh,” 111, 123, 125, 129, no. 36 (late Ptolemaic/early Augustan).

7. Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek ÆIN 944 (= IN 1894) (figs. 7-8) Limestone. H. 31 cm. Provenance not known. Purchased in art market in 1902. V. Schmidt, Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek: Den aegyptiske Samling (Copenhagen, 1908), 432, cat. E. 486 (Ptolemaic).

8. London, British Museum EA 1316 Granite. H. 32.5 cm. Provenance not known.

new perspectives on the brooklyn black head E. R. Russmann, Eternal Egypt: Masterworks of Ancient Art from the British Museum (New York, 2001), 255-257, cat. 142 (first century BC).

9. Munich, Staatliche Sammlung Ägyptischer Kunst Gl. 30 Granite. H. 34.5 cm. Reportedly from Dimeh (Lembke, “Dimeh,” 112).

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Bianchi, CE, 84-85, cat. 2 (first century BC). Bothmer, “Hellenistic Elements,” 217-218, fig. 8 (first century BC). Lembke, “Dimeh,” 111, 112, 123, 124, 129, no. 37 (early Roman). H. Meyer, Ein Seleukide in Ägypten (Munich, 2000) (Antiochos II).

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a “realistic” head in the oriental institute museum (oim 13952)

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A “REALISTIC” HEAD IN THE ORIENTAL INSTITUTE MUSEUM OIM 13952 Emily Teeter1 Oriental Institute, University of Chicago

Jack Josephson is one of a rare breed in Egyptology—a connoisseur, and true appreciator and interpreter of ancient Egyptian art. In his work on Late Period sculpture, he has discussed a small corpus of “realistic” heads.2 In his honor, and in thanks for the friendship and support he has shown me over the years, I respectfully, and humbly, bring another in this series of extraordinary statues to his attention. The fragmentary head is in the Oriental Institute Museum (OIM 13952). Charles Breasted (the son of James Henry Breasted) purchased it in Egypt in early 1931 from the Alexandrine dealer Aristotle B. Economides. A search of the archive of the Oriental Institute has failed to produce any additional information about the provenance of the head.3 It is of banded brown and white quartzite (figs. 1-3). It measures 18.5 cm high, 11.4 high, and 12.2 cm across the width. The entire back of the head has been broken away, and the end of the nose and much of the chin are lost. The unfortunate loss of the back of the head makes it difficult to reconstruct the angle of the statue’s glance, and indeed, placing the head at different angles gives the countenance varying “moods.” Regardless, its main features are the extraordinary marks of realism, in particular the fine crow’s feet at the edge of each eye, the deep nasal-labial folds, and the rays of vertical wrinkles that radiate down both sides of the chin, all of which give the impression of worry and old age. The brow is crossed by the edge of the wig or wig cover. What appears to be a line from the midbrow up over the top of the head is an unworked

lighter-colored vein of the stone. Very little is preserved of the ears. On the right side (fig. 2), just the remains of the ear can be faintly seen. The opposite ear is completely sheared away (fig. 3). There is no indication of eyebrows, or of a cosmetic line at the eyes. The head is markedly asymmetrical. The right eye has an incised line above the full lid from to the outer corner of the eye itself to the bridge of the nose. No such line is seen over the left eye. The crow’s feet are more defined on the left side of the face than the right. The left side of the mouth is marked by lips of nearly the same fullness top and bottom, while in contrast, on the opposite side of the mouth, the upper lip is thinner. The right side of the mouth droops slightly downward, whereas the left side is straight. The left side of the mouth is longer than the right. Three strong wrinkles extend from the left nasal-labial fold, ending half way down the chin. On the opposite side, more closely spaced lines begin at the edge of the mouth and descend to the jaw line. The nasal-labial fold is more pronounced on the right than the left. Heads with naturalistic features pose problems in dating.4 As with other examples, certain features seem to point to one time period, while other aspects suggest an alternative date. In this case, the likely eras seem to be the late Middle Kingdom or the Late Period. Many of the naturalistic features of the Chicago head seem to mimic sculptural representations of Senwosret III, for example, the eyes set below a prominent brow with their heavy upper lids and small lower lid. The heavy-lidded eyes on the Chicago head appear first in the late Middle

1 I thank Geoff Emberling, Director of the Oriental Institute Museum, for his permission to publish the head, and for the photos that accompany this article. 2 See bibliography in this volume. 3 I thank John Larson, Museum Archivist, for making correspondence of Charles Breasted available to me. 4 A good example of this controversy is British Museum EA 37883, which has been assigned a variety of dates, most

recently late Dynasty 26 (E. Russmann, Eternal Egypt: Masterworks of Ancient Art from the British Museum [Berkeley and Los Angeles, 2001], 243-244), and Middle Kingdom or late New Kingdom by J.A. Josephson, “An Enigmatic Egyptian Portrait in the British Museum (EA 37883),” GM 184 (2001), 19-20. See also J. Josephson, P. O’Rourke, and R. Fazzini, “The Doha Head: A Late Period Egyptian Portrait,” MDAIK 61 (2005), 219-241.

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Fig. 2. OIM 13952, right side.

Fig. 1. OIM 13952, front view.

Fig. 3. OIM 13952, left side.

a “realistic” head in the oriental institute museum (oim 13952) Kingdom,5 and by the reign of Senwosret III, they become naturalistically represented.6 The absence of plastic eyebrows and cosmetic lines, two common characteristics of Dynasty 12 work, also argues for a late Middle Kingdom date. The mouth has some good parallels with sculpture of Senwosret III. The asymmetry is seen on one of the British Museum statues of Senwosret III,7 and the narrow upper lip over fuller lower lips is seen on a statue of that king in Lucerne.8 The head has some clear parallels to the Dynasty 13 statue of the official Sikaherka, also of quartzite. Both share what Russmann, in her discussion of that monument, calls “heavy, fleshy eyelids; [and] a conspicuously firm set to the mouth.”9 The absence of plastic eyebrows and cosmetic lines and the smooth contour of the front of the wig or wig cover are also common to both statues. The material also suggests a Middle Kingdom date, for hard stones (quartzite and granite) were especially favored for private statues in the Middle

5

Russmann, Eternal Egypt, 118. B.V. Bothmer traces these heavily lidded eyes to the close of Dynasty 11: “The heavy-lidded eye…is distinctly a product of the humanizing development in Middle Kingdom sculpture...” (B.V. Bothmer, “Bemused and Benign: A Fragmentary Head of Dynasty XIII in the Brooklyn Museum,” Brooklyn Museum Annual 10 [1968-69] in Egyptian Art: Selected Writings of Bernard V. Bothmer, ed. M. Cody [Oxford, 2004], 205). 6 Bothmer, “Bemused and Benign,” 202. 7 EA 686 in Russmann, Eternal Egypt, 101-104. 8 D. Spanel, Through Ancient Eyes: Egyptian Portraiture (Birmingham, 1988), 64. See also comments about the style of the mouth in F. Polz, “Die Bildnisse Sesostris’ III. und Amenemhets III. Bemerkungen zur königlichen Rundplastik der späten 12. Dynastie,” MDAIK 51 (1995), 228. 9 E. Russmann, Egyptian Sculpture: Cairo and Luxor (Austin, 1989), 75. 10 Russmann, Eternal Egypt, 114. See also the comment by Josephson, “Enigmantic Egyptian Portrait,” 18: “The use of quartzite for statues of commoners was so rare to be virtually unknown in late Dynasty XXVI…” suggesting an

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Kingdom, although examples are certainly known from the Late Period.10 Although many features of the head suggest a late Middle Kingdom date, some aspects of it do not appear in work of that era, especially the prominent crow’s feet, which are more commonly seen in sculptures of the Late Period.11 The wrinkles on the side of the chin are also not common to Middle Kingdom works, but they are only rarely encountered on statuary of the Late Period.12 In conclusion, OIM 13952 bears strong similarities to representations of Senwosret III, especially the heavily hooded eyes, the straight mouth with the thin upper lip and the deep nasal-labial fold that gives the impression of worry and age, and I would date the Chicago head to late Dynasty 12 or early Dynasty 13. However, as with extraordinary works such as this one, I present this intriguing fragment to Jack and my other colleagues for their further consideration.

earlier, rather than a later date for the Chicago head. See also more recently, Josephson, O’Rourke, and Fazzini, “The Doha Head,” 219-220, n.3, for the use of quartzite in private sculpture of the Late Period. For examples of Middle Kingdom quartzite statues, see Spanel, Through Ancient Eyes, 69, 72; R. Freed, “Head of a Man,” in Searching for Ancient Egypt, ed. D. Silverman (Dallas and Philadelphia, 1997), 130; Russmann, Eternal Egypt, 114-116. 11 B.V. Bothmer, in Antiquities from the Collection of Christos G. Bastis, ed. Emma Swan Hall (New York, 1987), 93-94; B.V. Bothmer, “A Brooklyn Head on a Cairo Statue: The Egyptian Priest Wesir-wer,” Brooklyn Museum Journal Annual 4 (1962-1963), in Egyptian Art: Selected Writings of Bernard V. Bothmer, ed. M. Cody (Oxford, 2004), 162 (figs. 10.7-8), 163 (fig. 10.9). 12 See British Museum 65221 in W. Kaiser, “Zur Datierung realistischer Rundbildnisse ptolemäisch-römischer Zeit,” MDAIK 55 (1999), pl. 39h, and ROM 958.221.4 in B.V. Bothmer, Egyptian Sculpture of the Late Period (Brooklyn, 1960), no. 101.

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TRANSFORMATION OF A ROYAL HEAD: NOTES ON A PORTRAIT OF NECTANEBO I Nancy Thomas Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Royal statuary of the Late Period, particularly works from Dynasties 26-30, have held particular interest for Jack Josephson, and what would be more appropriate for this Festschrift than an exploration of a portrait of one of his favorite ancient personages? A colossal (h. 47 cm) quartzite Egyptian head entered the collection of the Los Angeles County Museum, Art Division, in 1949.1 At that time, the museum was located in Exposition Park, near the urban center of Los Angeles, and was under the direction of James Henry Breasted, Jr., son of the famed Chicago Egyptologist, James Henry Breasted. Earlier that year, Wilhelm R. Valentiner, himself a noted museologist and scholar of decorative arts, traveled to the warehouse of William Randolph Hearst at San Simeon on the Central California coast and selected a number of objects for the museum’s collection. Included on the manifest2 for this specific gift of August 1949 were other significant works of Roman art, including the Landsdowne Athlete (LACMA 49.23.12) and the Landsdowne Bust of Athena of Velletri (LACMA 49.23.1), both from the eighteenth-century British collection of William Petty-Fitzmaurice, second Earl of Shelbourne and first Marquess of Landsdowne.3 William Randolph Hearst acquired the quartzite royal head from the auction of the well-known Brummer Gallery, New York, held on May 10, 1929.4 Soon after, the head was shipped to Los Angeles, and then on to Hearst’s estate at San Simeon, where it is recorded to have been on view in the main library. By that time, a substantial dis-

play of Greek vases was on view in the library, and a statue of the goddess Sekhmet and three additional Sekhmet statue fragments were incorporated into an outdoor fountain, where they remain in situ today. It is likely that Hearst’s interest in, or at least awareness of, the realm of antiquities was linked to the early support of the excavations of George A. Reisner, supported by Hearst’s mother Phoebe Apperson Hearst, through the University of California, Berkeley, from 1899-1905.5 In conjunction with these excavations, Hearst traveled with his mother to Egypt on several occasions. Between 1947 and 1951, Hearst, and later the Hearst Foundation, donated over forty works of Egyptian art to the Los Angeles County Museum. The colossal quartzite Egyptian head was first published in the Museum’s Bulletin of winter 1951 and at that time identified as a “a monumental head of an Egyptian king, or perhaps a high priest, in ferruginous quartz sandstone… the soft modeling of the face, the faint smile, and the simple archaized headdress suggest that this head should be attributed to the Saite period (26th Dynasty).” It was also noted that the right side was better preserved than the left and that the nose had been restored.6 The condition of the work remained essentially the same for the next thirty years, with the head retaining its overly large, straight-bridged, and slightly discolored restored nose (figs. 1-4). Jack Josephson has convincingly identified LACMA 49.23.7 as a portrait of Nectanebo I.7 He cites as evidence its resemblance to the inscribed

1 J. Breasted, Jr., “Notes on Some Recent Acquisitions of the Earlier Periods,” Los Angeles County Museum: Bulletin of the Art Division 3, no. 4 (Winter 1951), 2, no. 1. 2 Letter of August 11, 1949 from C.C. Rounds to Dr. W.R. Valentiner from Hearst correspondence files of the Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History. LACMA 49.23.7 is recorded as “SS.W.No.5005, Lot No. 40, Art No. 4, Red Stone head. Egyptian.” 3 Purchased by Hearst at Christies, London, sale of March 5, 1930, lots 64, 103. 4 Noted in Hearst San Simeon inventory books, based on

research of Mary Levkoff and recorded in correspondence with the author, 10 February 1997. 5 Biography of Phoebe Hearst commissioned by her son with a description of her philanthropic activities and travels to Egypt; see W. Bonfils, The Life and Personality of Phoebe Apperson Hearst (San Francisco: Privately printed, 1928), 86-89. See also N. Thomas, The American Discovery of Ancient Egypt (Los Angeles, 1995), 56-58. 6 Breasted, Jr., “Notes,” 2. 7 J.A. Josephson, Egyptian Royal Sculpture of the Late Period, 400-246 B.C. (Mainz, 1997), 25, pl. 9b.

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Figs. 1-4. View of royal head, possibly King Nectanebo I (LACMA 49.23.7), prior to rerestoration, photographed about 1965. Photograph ©2007 Museum Associates/LACMA.

transformation of a royal head: notes on a portrait of nectanebo i

Fig. 4.

bust found at Tell el-Bakleyyah (Hermopolis Parva) in the Delta and currently in the Mansoura storehouse.8 He also draws a compelling argument for the inspiration of this early Nectanebo I portraiture style from the idealized 26th Dynasty portraits of King Apries.9 The LACMA piece clearly displays the characteristic lack of facial modeling or visible bone structure and full arcing lips with well-defined drill holes at the corners providing the only hint of expression. In addition, the eyebrows run parallel to the nemes, dropping slightly at the ends, and the large eyes are outlined with delicate rims, continuing past the outer corners of the eyes with “turned-down short folds of flesh.”10 Other less-characteristic aspects of this piece are the unpleated nemes and the eyebrows worked in low relief, while the single-loop uraeus, largely broken in this example, has direct parallels in the other inscribed portraits of Nectanebo I. The LACMA head shares the same colossal scale with another inscribed statue of Nectanebo

8

Ibid., 6, n. 36. Ibid., 23. 10 Ibid., 7. 11 P. Stanwick, Portraits of the Ptolemies, Greek Kings as Egyptian Pharaohs (Austin, 2002), p. 66, pl.201a. 9

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I (Egyptian Museum JE 87298).11 Despite the similarities in scale, the Cairo figure points to a new direction in 30th Dynasty sculpture, carrying forward some of the characteristics of earlier sculpture, but with broader facial planes and relatively narrowed eyes, and the subtle suggestion of an almost godlike, self-satisfied demeanor.12 Correspondence files at LACMA reveal Professor Bernard V. Bothmer’s long-standing interest in this royal head. A letter from March 1981 notes that he has “known the piece for at least 25 years,” and that “the head is made of quartzite, just plain quartzite not of ferruginous…etc. sandstone. It does not date from Dynasty XXVI, but from Dynasty XXX (380-342 B.C.) or somewhat later, although I would not go beyond the time of Ptolemy I (323-282) with my attribution. ‘Ca. 330-320 B.C.’ is probably the best date for the time being….And please take that horrible nose off! I suggested this at that time (1959) and again and again at subsequent visits. I am sure the Hearst family would not mind.”13 The royal head entered LACMA’s Conservation Center for study in 1983. At the request of the curator (this author), the restored nose was removed. However, the removal of the nose presented a substantial problem, as the original restorer had removed a deep cavity of stone from the face, presumably in order to reattach a restored nose (fig. 5). Other images that may also represent Nectanebo I suffered from the same aggressive restoration techniques, especially the dark green greywacke Brooklyn Museum head and a second greywacke head from a private collection.14 Cautious consultation between the curator and a LACMA objects conservator, David Rasch, resulted in an experimental conservation strategy. Working from comparative photographs of royal sculptures from the 30th Dynasty, Rasch recreated an intact nose from modeling clay. The clay nose was temporarily attached to the face and then carved away to resemble natural stone fractures, taking care to leave only elements of the face that might reveal the original placement of features, but not incorrect contours or misleading details. Gradually the nose was carved down to follow the pattern of existing fractures evidenced

12

Josephson, Egyptian Royal Sculpture, 8. Letter from Bernard V. Bothmer to Glenn Markoe, Ancient Art, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, dated 17 March 1981. On file in LACMA Ancient Art departmental object file for 49.23.7. 14 Josephson, Egyptian Royal Sculpture, pl. 8a,b. 13

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Fig. 5. LACMA Conservation Center photograph 87.546 of 49.23.7 showing disfiguring cavity cut for 18th or 19th century restoration. Photographed on 17 July 1987.

Fig. 6. LACMA Conservation Center photograph 81.398s following completion of rerestoration, photographed March, 1988.

on the stone head, and the clay nose was carved and shaped until it assumed the very fragmentary appearance of a nose that had been broken in a manner consistent with other broken planes on the face. The fragmentary clay nose was removed from the sculpture, a mold was taken from the clay, and the fragmentary nose was recast in plaster. The plaster fragmentary nose was then attached to the sculpture using a barrier and reversible techniques, and the nose and additional infills were carefully painted with opaque watercolor paint and matched to the surrounding areas of original stone.15 While disclosure to the public of areas of restoration on ancient sculpture is generally desirable, it was determined that the best strategy for the viewing public would be to fully integrate the restored area into the surrounding area of the face by fully color-matching the restoration. In this restored face, the broken appearance of the nose

and upper lip replaces the dramatic modern disfigurement of the head and allows the viewer to focus on the original intent of the ancient artist (fig. 6). The colossal head of Nectanebo I was installed in a new gallery for Egyptian art at LACMA in 1989. Since that time, the work has remained on view, and the repairs have remained stable and virtually imperceptible to the viewing public. While strategies of restoration and re-restoration continue to evolve, it will be of interest to see if the next generation of Egyptologists and conservators finds this to have been an appropriate treatment. In the meantime, LACMA 49.23.7 was recently a featured object in a LACMA-organized exhibition on the collecting activities of William Randolph Hearst, in Hearst the Collector, installed in fall 2008 at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.16

15 David Rasch, details recorded in examination report for 49.23.7 dated 13 April 1988, Conservation Center, Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

16 M.L. Levkoff, Hearst the Collector (New York, 2008), 211, pl. 92.

notes on three late eighteenth dynasty statues

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A CAT, A NURSE, AND A STANDARDBEARER: NOTES ON THREE LATE EIGHTEENTH DYNASTY STATUES Jacobus van Dijk University of Groningen

A love of Egyptian art, the eye of the connoisseur, and scholarly acumen all come together in the work of Jack Josephson, who has greatly advanced our knowledge and appreciation of Late Period sculpture. His long-standing interest in Egyptian art is by no means limited to the last phases of Egyptian civilization, however, and I therefore feel confident that he will take pleasure in reading the following notes on some statues from a much earlier period, presented here as a small token of esteem for his scholarship.

The first of the three statues I propose to discuss is undoubtedly the least well known. It was briefly mentioned and illustrated with a single photograph in a (privately distributed) preliminary report on the Brooklyn Museum Expedition’s first four seasons of work in the Temple of Mut at Karnak (1976–1979),1 where it is described as “a rare representation of the goddess [i.e., Mut] in the guise of a cat.” A few years later it was used as the starting point for Herman te Velde’s article on the cat as the sacred animal of Mut;2 in it he gave a succinct description and a partial translation of the inscription on the base of the statue, but no illustration. During the 2007 season at Mut, when the contents of the site magazines were moved to new SCA storage facilities outside the precinct, it was possible to re-examine the statue and take a new series of photographs (figs. 1-3). This resulted not only in improved readings of the inscriptions,

but also made it possible to establish the date of the statue, hitherto said to be “uncertain.”3 The statue was found on 12 April 1979 in the remains of the approach to the temple, in the area in front of the First Pylon of the Mut Temple, c. 40 cm west of the sixth of the seven columns on the right-hand (west) side of the East Porch, at about pavement level. This was probably not its original location within the Mut Precinct, for the constructions in this area date from the 25th Dynasty and the Ptolemaic Period, while the statue, as we shall see, is much earlier in date. The stonework in which it was found was so damaged, however, that it would be hard to draw firm conclusions from its position within these remains; one might speculate that it may at some point have been reused in the foundations of the pavement between the East and West Porches.4 The measurements are as follows: the total preserved height, including the base, is 47 cm; the base is 58 cm long, 25 cm wide, and 11 cm high. The maximum width of the animal, measured across its hind legs and tail, is 22 cm, and the width across the front paws is 17 cm. The statue is made of sandstone. The head is missing and so is most of the proper right-hand side, including almost all of the inscription on that side of the base. All four corners are also damaged, again with loss of part of the inscription. That the animal represented is a cat and not a lioness is made clear by the inscription, but the statue itself, despite the missing head, also looks more like a cat than a lion; it is rather more gracile than the usually much sturdier figure of a lion, although the feet are relatively heavy. The absence of a mane, which would undoubtedly have been

1 R. Fazzini et al., The Brooklyn Museum—American Research Center in Egypt Expedition to the Precinct of the Goddess Mut at Southern Karnak. Preliminary Report (Brooklyn, 1979), 5 and fig. 32. 2 H. te Velde, “The Cat as Sacred Animal of the Goddess Mut,” in Studies in Egyptian Religion Dedicated to Professor Jan Zandee, ed. M. Heerma van Voss (Leiden, 1982), 127–137.

3 I would like to thank Richard Fazzini for permission to publish the statue here and Mary McKercher for providing photographs and additional information on the statue’s provenance. 4 According to the entry in the SCA register, it was found “in (the) remains of (the) floor,” and in the preliminary report (n. 1 above), it is said to have been found “at the level of the foundations of the porch.”

I. A Cat Statue from the Precinct of Mut at Karnak (Mut 4M.141)

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visible on the preserved part of the statue,5 further confirms this identification. The animal is depicted in what has been called its standard “hieroglyphic” form,6 sitting upright with its tail curled upwards between its right flank and thigh. Cat lovers will know that cats never actually hold their tails in this fashion, and the famous bronze cats from the Late Period almost without exception have their tails on the ground along their right side, sometimes with the tip curled around the right forepaw. The upward-curling tail may in fact have been borrowed from the images of lions and sphinxes (including the Great Sphinx of Giza), which are almost always shown with their tails held in this way. The statue is inscribed with a single line of text around all four sides of the base (fig. 4a) and a further short line on the top surface of the base, in front of the cat’s forepaws (fig. 4b). Of the latter text, only the first half is preserved, reading “The beautiful cat of BMutB (?)…,” confirming that the animal represented is indeed a cat. The identification with the goddess Mut is also obvious from the offering formulae inscribed on the base. This inscription starts at the center of the front with the usual Htp-di-nsw and then runs in opposite directions (fig. 5). The formula running from left to right along the front and left sides of the base reads: “An offering which the King gives (to) Mut […/…], mistress of the Two Lands, that she may give a happy lifetime in Thebes,7 and that (my) name may endure in her temple […]. Made (i.e., dedicated) by the BStandardB-Bearer […].”

The matching formula running from right to left is very incomplete, but although the right side is 5 Compare in particular the statue of a seated lion found in the center of the court between the Ninth and Tenth Pylons at Karnak, J.-C. Goyon and C. Traunecker, “Documents de l’Allée des Processions, 2. Statue de lion assis (VII N c 50),” Karnak VI, 1973–1977 (Cairo 1980), 132–135, pls. XXXVI–XXXVII and the parallels cited there. 6 J. Málek, The Cat in Ancient Egypt (London, 1993), 47–49. 7 m-Xnw WAst (not m niwt “in the precinct,” te Velde, “The Cat as Sacred Animal,” 127 with n. 1). Cf. the statue of the standard-bearer Kenamun (CG 935), also from the Mut Temple: di=s aHaw nfr m-Xnw WAst, P. Newberry, in M. Benson and J. Gourlay, with P. Newberry, The Temple of Mut in Asher (London, 1899), 328 and Urk. IV, 1407, 14. 8 nDm-ib Hr Sms nsw, cf. the inscription of Kenamun. 9 See now also N. Wahlberg, “Representations of Hathor and Mut in the Hibis Temple,” in Current Research in Egyptology III: December 2001, ed. R. Ives, D. Lines, C. Naunton, and N. Wahlberg (Oxford, 2003), 72–73 (I owe this reference to Richard Fazzini).

almost entirely missing, it continues on the back of the base: “An offering which the King gives (to) Mut […/…, that she may give …] BjoyfulnessB while following [the king (?)8 … …, to the ka of (?) the Standard-Bearer of] / the Great Regiment of Neb-maaat-Re, PaBserB, [justified (?)].”

The religious aspects of the cat as an image of the goddess Mut9 having been dealt with admirably by Te Velde, all that remains here is to establish the date of the statue. That it stems from the New Kingdom is clear: leaving aside an ephemeral Second Intermediate Period king of that name, the Neb-maaat-Re mentioned in the owner’s title can only refer to either Amenhotep III or Rameses VI. The title TAw-sryt “Standard-Bearer”10 is not attested after the New Kingdom and neither is the name Paser,11 although the reading of the latter name is not entirely certain. The offering formulae are also common during the second half of the 18th Dynasty (after the reign of Thutmose III) and the Ramesside Period.12 Close scrutiny of the inscription reveals the presence of minute traces of blue pigment in some of the signs and, much more clearly, of red in the framing lines. There are no traces of colors other than blue in the hieroglyphs, and since the framing lines show that at least red would almost certainly still be present had it been used, we may safely conclude that the hieroglyphs were originally all painted blue and the framing lines red. This was a popular color scheme for inscriptions at the end of the 18th Dynasty13 that appears to have gone out of fashion during the Ramesside Period. For this reason alone it is not very likely that the statue belongs to the reign of Rameses VI. 10

Wb. IV, 192, 13–18. ÄPN I, 117, 12–13. 12 W. Barta, Aufbau und Bedeutung der altägyptischen Opferformel (Glückstadt, 1968), 126–127, 153–154, 168 (Bitte 151 and 154). 13 Some examples: tombs of Amenemwia (temp. Amenhotep III–Akhenaten) and Meryneith (temp. Akhenaten– Tutankhamun) at Saqqara, see for the time being A. Zivie, Les tombeaux retrouvés de Saqqara (Paris, 1993), 76–81, and M. Raven, “The Tomb of Meryneith at Saqqara,” EA 20 (2002), 27, fig. at top right, resp.; stelae of Any, from Amarna, see, e.g., R.E. Freed, Y.J. Markowitz and S.H. D’Auria, eds., Pharaohs of the Sun: Akhenaten, Nefertiti, Tutankhamen (Boston, 1999), 173, fig. 134; stela of Amenemone, of unknown provenance (temp. Tutankhamun), ibid., 280, no. 259; Thebes: tomb chapel of Maya (TT 338), M. Tosi, La capella di Maia (Turin, 1969), unnumbered color plates. 11


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Fig. 1b. Inscription on top of base. Photograph: author.

Fig. 1a. Cat statue from the Mut Precinct, Karnak. Photograph: Mary McKercher.

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Fig. 2a. Cat statue from the Mut Precinct, front. b. Cat statue from the Mut Precinct, left side. Photographs: Mary McKercher.

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b Fig. 3a. Cat statue from the Mut Precinct, back. b. Cat statue from the Mut Precinct, right side. Photographs: Mary McKercher.

Fig. 4a. Cat statue from the Mut Precinct, Karnak. Diagram showing position of texts. b. Inscription on top of base.


Fig. 5. Cat statue from the Mut Precinct. Inscriptions around base.

Fig. 6. Cat statue in Luxor Temple blockyard. Photographs: author.

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Further indications are provided by the name and title of the owner. The “Great Regiment of Neb-maaat-Re” is attested elsewhere, albeit anachronistically: in the Theban tomb of Khonsu-Ta (TT 31), which dates from the reign of Rameses II, a “Standard-Bearer of the Great Regiment of Neb-maaat-Re, Nebmehyt”14 is mentioned and depicted in a scene that also includes the vizier Usermont and his brother, the priest of Montu Huy, both of whom are known to have lived during the reign of Tutankhamun.15 This Nebmehyt is called “his father,” meaning either Usermont’s father, who is known from another source to have been called Nebmehyt, or, as Labib Habachi has argued, Usermont’s son, who was the father of the tomb owner’s father Neferhotep, i.e., Khonsu-Ta’s grandfather. In that case, this Nebmehyt lived well after the reign of Amenhotep III, showing that the regiment bearing that king’s name still existed after the Amarna Period. The name of the standard-bearer who dedicated the cat statue to Mut is not Nebmehyt, however, but most probably Paser,16 and it is perfectly possible that this Paser was a predecessor of Nebmehyt from the time of Amenhotep III himself. On the other hand, a standard-bearer Paser is actually known: he was one of the two sons of Tutankhamun’s Nubian viceroy Huy, mentioned twice in his father’s tomb (TT 40).17 This Paser was also stablemaster (Hry-iHw) and overseer of the cavalry (imy-r ssmt), titles which may have been mentioned in the missing portion of the text preceding the standard-bearer title, or which he

14

N. de G. Davies, Seven Private Tombs at Qurnah (London, 1948), pl. XI; cf. P.-M. Chevereau, Prosopographie des cadres militaires égyptiens du Nouvel Empire (Antony, 1994), 113, no. 15.80. 15 L. Habachi, “Unknown and Little-known Monuments of Tutankhamun and of his Viziers,” in Glimpses of Ancient Egypt: Studies in Honour of H.W. Fairman, ed. J. Ruffle, G.A. Gaballa and K.A. Kitchen (Warminster, 1979), 32–41; Boyo G. Ockinga, “Another Ramesside Attestation of Usermont, Vizier of Tutankhamun,” BACE 5 (1995), 61–66. 16 The oblique line of the incomplete sign immediately following pA is almost certainly the staff of the sr sign (A21), and the traces behind it would suit the seated dignitary holding the flail (A52). 17 Nina de G. Davies and A.H. Gardiner, The Tomb of Huy, Viceroy of Nubia in the Reign of Tutaankhamun (No. 40) (London, 1926), pl. XI and (without this title) pl. VI; cf. Urk. IV, 2067, 2 and 2065, 9, resp.; cf. Chevereau, Prosopographie, 104, no. 15.20 and 47, no. 7.13. 18 Barta, Opferformel, 127, Bitte 154a with n. 7. 19 Cf. E. Hornung, Echnaton: Die Religion des Lichtes (Zürich, 1995), 109–110. 20 It is worth mentioning here that a similar cat statue was

may have acquired later in his career. Be that as it may, a date later than Amenhotep III would agree well with one further indication: the wish, recorded in the offering formula, to let one’s name endure in the temple or the city (rather than the tomb or the hereafter) is not attested before the Amarna Period,18 in keeping with the shift of the funerary cult from the tomb to the temple under Akhenaten.19 Thus, although there is at first sight little to go by, it seems reasonably certain that the cat statue from the temple of Mut must be dated to the last decades of the 18th Dynasty.20 II. The Royal Nurse from the Sacred Animal Necropolis (Cairo JE 91301) My second note concerns the by now well-known limestone statue of a nurse and child found by W.B. Emery in the Sacred Animal Necropolis at Saqqara in 1968 and now on display in the Cairo Museum (fig. 7). The date, as well as the sex and identity of the child, has been the subject of debate ever since the statue was published by Elizabeth Hastings in 1997.21 She dates the statue mainly on the basis of such criteria as the fringed garment worn by the nurse (Middle Kingdom–Dynasty 18 at least) and her enveloping wig (covering both ears and shoulders), which according to Vandier first appeared during the reign of Amenhotep II and continued throughout the New Kingdom. She then quotes Catharine Roehrig, who examined the statue in Cairo in 1985 and was able to read traces

found in or around Luxor Temple and is now stored in the Chicago House blockyard in the temple precinct (fig. 6). It is roughly the same size as the cat from Mut, but lacking not only its head, but also its base, including any inscriptions that may once have been on it. A considerable number of relief blocks in the Luxor blockyard, mostly from the Kushite and Ptolemaic periods, appear to have come from the Mut Precinct (cf. W.R. Johnson, “The Chicago House Season October 2002 to April 2003: A Monthly Diary,” Chicago House Bulletin vol. 14, no. 1 [September 1, 2003], 5; see now also W.R. Johnson and J.B. McClain, “A Fragmentary Scene of Ptolemy XII Worshiping the Goddess Mut and Her Divine Entourage,” in Servant of Mut: Studies in Honor of Richard Fazzini, ed. S.H. D’Auria (Leiden, 2008), 134–140), and it is possible that the Luxor cat also originates from the Mut Temple. The animal is depicted in a distinctly more upright posture than the Mut Temple cat, however, and it is therefore very unlikely that the two statues once formed a pair. I am very grateful to Ray Johnson for permission to mention and illustrate this fragment here. 21 E.A. Hastings, The Sculpture from the Sacred Animal Necropolis at North Saqqâra 1964–76 (London, 1997), 9–11, 75–76, pls. X–XII (no. 20).


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Fig. 7. Nurse statue Cairo JE 91301. From E.A. Hastings, The Fig. 9. Standard-bearing statue Cairo CG 42194. From Le règne Sculpture from the Sacred Animal Necropolis at North Saqqâra du Soleil: Akhnaton et Nefertiti (Brussels, 1975), 140–141. 1964–76 (London, 1997), Pls. X (detail) and XI (left).

of an inscription reading n kA n mnat wrt and also pointed out that a statue of Sit-Re nursing Hatshepsut already wears a similar wig.22 Hastings thus tentatively dates the statue to the early (i.e., pre-Ramesside23) New Kingdom (Dynasty 18). As regards the gender of the child, she writes that “absence of the genitalia suggests that the baby is female rather than male”; she also says that “the presence of the captives’ heads beneath the baby’s footstool surely implies a royal identity for the child, and that the main figure should be taken as a Royal Nurse.” She suggests that the statue was at some stage “removed from a New Kingdom tomb chapel, and thrown into the vestibule of the Baboon Gallery during one of the periodic destructions of the site” and adds that “it is highly desirable that (the inscription) should be fully transcribed and read.” From H.S. Smith’s

22

Ibid., 11 n. 6. And not “the early part of the Eighteenth Dynasty,” as Ertman (see n. 7; p. 339) incorrectly interprets her words. 24 The Egyptian Museum at the Millennium. Catalogue edited by C.M. Sheikholeslami (Cairo, 2000), [67] and 114 23

introduction to her book, and her own text, it is clear that Hastings was able to work only from photographs of the statue. In the exhibition “The Egyptian Museum at the Millennium,” mounted on the occasion of the Eighth International Congress of Egyptologists in Cairo in the spring of 2000, the statue was for the first time displayed to the public. In the booklet accompanying the exhibition, the caption to the illustration of the statue describes it as a “limestone statue of [a] nurse holding a prince, perhaps Maia and Tutankhamun,” but no further details are given.24 In the Centennial volumes of the Cairo Museum published in 2002, Earl Ertman, in an attempt to find another criterium for dating the statue, discussed the winged scarab worn by the child.25 He established that the type seen on the

(No. 23). The statue is now back in storage in Sector 3 of the Museum (information kindly supplied by Dr. Janice Kamrin and Mr. Wahid Edwar of the Cairo Museum). 25 E.L. Ertman, “Types of Winged Scarabs: Tutankhamun’s Use of the H-winged Scarab,” in Egyptian Museum

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statue is attested from the reigns of Thutmose IV to Psusennes I, and that it appears to have been particularly frequent among the objects, statuary, and paintings in the tomb of Tutankhamun.26 He shrinks back from identifying the child as Tutankhamun, however, because of the wig worn by the nurse. For this he consulted Joann Fletcher, who, working from photocopies, indicated that “the nurse’s hair/wig style is at least XIX[th] dynasty if not later.” Ertman adds that the wig style “is based on the long, full style so common in the mid-to-late Eighteenth Dynasty, but the outline and slight flaring towards its base and the thickness of the individual braids suggested by the surface decoration makes me suspect it is somewhat later.” As regards the sex of the child, he remains undecided, asking: “Was this meant to represent a boy and the genitals were not carved? That seems a possibility.” Ertman’s concluding statement is that “the style of the nurse’s wig places this object beyond a date in the late Eighteenth Dynasty, and should rule out King Tutankhamun from consideration as the individual represented here.” In the early spring of 2000, shortly before the statue went on exhibition, I was able to examine it in detail in the reserves of the Cairo Museum.27 My first aim was to try and read what was left of the inscription in the hope of being able to identify the owner. The base of the statue was cut down at some point in its history, presumably when it was reused in the Sacred Animal Necropolis, in order to fit it into a new hollowed-out block of limestone, and parts of the inscription are either lost or obscured by the gypsum plaster used to cement the statue into its new base. Copying the inscriptions in facsimile28 was therefore impossible, but with the help of a torch and a mirror I was able to read everything that was there (fig. 8). The text around the base is preserved only on the back

Unfortunately, the crucial part of the inscription that contained the names of the nurse and the child is irretrievably lost. What is left is part of the nurse’s title, confirming Catharine Roehrig’s reading n kA n mnat wrt. It is followed by what appears to be the top of a sw sign, which in this position strongly suggests the beginning of a king’s throne name (nsw bity), rather than nsw alone, which would have been written before the title (i.e., as mnat nsw wrt), Another, perhaps more likely, possibility would be to take it as the beginning of a prince’s title, sA nsw (with honorific transposition).30 The offering formula contains no surprises—the phrases used are frequent throughout the New Kingdom and provide no dating clues. My impression from the inscription was that the shapes and forms of the individual signs conform

Collections around the World: Studies for the Centennial of the Egyptian Museum, Cairo I, ed. M. Eldamaty and M. Trad (Cairo, 2002), 333–343. From the photographs published thus far, Ertman was unable to determine whether the round object held between the lowermost pair of legs of the scarab beetle was a shen ring or a sun disk. Examination of the actual statue leaves no doubt that it is a shen ring. 26 Under Tutankhamun, after a temporary eclipse during the Amarna Period, the scarab in general appears to have enjoyed a renewed popularity and to have acquired lunar as well as solar associations, see E. Hornung and E. Staehelin, in Tutanchamun: Das goldene Jenseits. Grabschätze aus dem Tal der Könige, ed. A. Wiese and A. Brodbeck (Basel, 2004), 82. It should be remembered, however, that a lack of comparative material from pre-Amarna royal tombs makes it difficult to assess this apparent renaissance.

27 For permission to do so, I am very grateful to Dr. Mohammed Shimy, then director of the Egyptian Museum. 28 The accessible part of the inscription was copied in facsimile by G. T. Martin, The Tomb of @etepka and other reliefs and inscriptions from the Sacred Animal Necropolis, North Saqqâra, 1964–1973 (London, 1979), 61 and pl. 53 (no. 211). See also the photographs in Hastings, Sculpture, pl. XI and her discussion of the inscriptions, pp. 75–76. 29 A further inscription (e) is found on the footstool on top of which the bound prisoners under the child’s feet are shown and which protrudes beyond the side of the base. All that remains of the text once inscribed on it are two signs reading rT… (cf. Hastings’ pl. XI left). Hastings very plausibly suggests that this may be part of RTnw “Syria” (op. cit., 75). 30 Cf. Roehrig’s suggestion quoted by Hastings, Sculpture, 76.

and on part of the proper left-hand side of the statue; on the front, the inscription has been cut away completely, and on the right-hand side, only minute traces survive. There are two lines, both of which somewhat unusually have to be read on each side first before continuing on the adjacent side—in other words, the second line of one side continues with the first line of the adjacent side. The inscription mainly consists of the remains of an offering formula: (a: 1–2, lost) “[An offering which the King gives to … and …,] (b: 3) […] Bthat they may giveB… […bread and] BbeerB (?), (b: 4) every [good and pure thing on which a god lives (?) … and what heaven gives,] (c: 5) the earth produces and Hapy brings forth from his cavern, inhaling (c: 6) the sweet breeze of the north wind, cool water, wine and milk, the ability to leave (the tomb) as a (d: 7) living ba in every form [she] BwishesB, [and to drink water from t he eddy of] (d: 8) the river, to the ka of the Great Nurse of the BKing of UpperB [and Lower Egypt …, NN, justified] / of the B King’sB [Son …, NN, justified]”.29


a

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b Fig. 8a. Nurse statue Cairo JE 91301. Diagram showing position of texts. b. Hand copies of inscriptions on base.

to the late 18th Dynasty forms with which I have become familiar during two decades of epigraphic work in the New Kingdom necropolis at Saqqara, and that they are clearly different from the forms encountered in the inscriptions in the Ramesside tombs there. This impression is further strengthened by the style of the statue itself: the “free,” “naturalistic” treatment of the figure of the nurse, who is shown seated on the ground with one leg raised, is very different from the much more formal statues of female nurses seated on block thrones or chairs from the earlier 18th Dynasty, such as the statue

of Hatshepsut’s nurse Sit-Re31 or the anonymous statue of a nurse holding four royal children found in recent years at Kafr en-Nahhal near Zagazig.32 It is true that two statues of male royal tutors of Hatshepsut’s daughter Neferu-Re33 are shown in this pose, but like many statue types introduced by Senenmut, these remain in many ways exceptional, and even these two statues do not display the same freedom of expression seen in the Saqqara nurse.34 Apart from two small Late Middle Kingdom bronze statuettes, one of which shows a princess suckling a royal child,35 the squatting posture of the female nurse from Saqqara is unparalleled.

31 Cairo JE 56264; C.H. Roehrig, in Mistress of the House, Mistress of Heaven: Women in Ancient Egypt , ed. A. K. Capel and G.E. Markoe (New York, 1996), 17 fig. 8b. 32 Cairo JE 99831; M. Saleh, “Varia from the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, 3. A Lady Nurse and Four Royal Children,” in Stationen: Beiträge zur Kulturgeschichte Ägyptens, Rainer Stadelmann gewidmet, ed. H. Guksch and D. Polz (Mainz, 1998), 358–361, pl. 19. 33 C.H. Roehrig, in Hatshepsut: From Queen to Pharaoh (New York, 2005), 113 figs. 49–50.

34 In the Saqqara statue, to mention only one significant difference, the child’s body is separated from that of its nurse, whereas in the earlier male statues, the two figures form an integral whole, with no space between the bodies of the tutor and the child. 35 J.F. Romano, “A Statuette of a Royal Mother and Child in The Brooklyn Museum,” MDAIK 48 (1992), 131–143, pls. 28–30.

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This informal, “uncanonical”36 pose suggests, to me at least, a date after the Amarna Period. The face of the nurse, although damaged, still displays the large almond-shaped eyes set at a slight angle that are not found before the reign of Thutmose IV at the earliest, and this also points to a date in the later part of the 18th Dynasty. The enveloping wig, with its rather thick individual braids held together with a fillet at ear level, agrees well with such a date; certainly I see no grounds for Fletcher’s and Ertman’s claim that this wig cannot be earlier than Ramesside. The slender body, long, rather thin legs, and elongated feet of the nurse, which are particularly striking in the side views published in Hastings’ pl. XI, are reminiscent of the figure of the goddess in the limestone dyad of Amun and Mut from the Luxor cachette,37 which was usurped by Ramesses II but originally belongs to the immediate post-Amarna period. A further detail suggesting a late 18th Dynasty date are the eyes and eyebrows of the royal child, which have been outlined in black in a way strongly reminiscent of the reliefs from the tombs of the vizier Ramose at Thebes (temp. Amenhotep III–IV) and the treasurer Maya at Saqqara (temp. Tutankhamun). The round, slightly protruding belly of the child is a further indication of such a date. I would therefore assign this statue to the late 18th Dynasty, or more precisely to the post-Amarna period.38 As far as the gender of the child is concerned, there can be no doubt that it is male. An examination of the statue itself rather than photographs reveals that the genitals are not absent, as stated by Elizabeth Hastings, but merely damaged. The bound prisoners under the feet of the boy, as well as the winged-scarab pectoral on his chest, clearly point to a royal child, that is, a reigning king depicted as a child. This combination of data, plus Hastings’ very plausible suggestion that the statue had been removed

36

Hastings, Sculpture, 10. M. El-Saghir, Das Statuenversteck im Luxortempel (Mainz am Rhein, 1992), 58–60. 38 A pre-Ramesside date is also strongly suggested by the title mnat wrt which, as Catharine Roehrig has pointed out, “is normally confined to the Eighteenth Dynasty,” see Hastings, Sculpture, 76. 39 Both forms occur in the tomb, see Zivie, Les tombeaux retrouvés de Saqqara, 88; cf. the variants of this name discussed by A.H. Gardiner in Davies, Seven Private Tombs at Kurnah, 28–29 (May=Maiay=Mutia). 40 Alain Zivie informs me that the inscriptions in her tomb never actually call her mnat wrt, but since these inscriptions, as well as a now-famous relief scene showing her with Tut37

from a New Kingdom tomb chapel before it ended up in the Sacred Animal Necropolis, to my mind strongly suggests that the statue does indeed represent Tutankhamun on the lap of his nurse Maia (or Mutia39), whose nearby Saqqara tomb was discovered by Alain Zivie in 1996.40

III. The Original Owner of the Earliest Nonroyal Standard-Bearing Statue (Cairo CG 42194) Among the many masterpieces of Egyptian sculpture to have emerged from the famous Great Cachette discovered by Georges Legrain under the floor of the court to the north of the Seventh Pylon at Karnak in 1903-441 is a small greenish breccia or tuff42 statue inscribed for the High Priest of Amun, Sheshonq, son of Osorkon I and Queen Maaatkare (fig. 9). Although there are no traces of earlier, erased inscriptions, it has long been recognized that this statue was in fact usurped by Sheshonq, who also added the relief figures of Amun and Osiris on the chest and skirt, and that it originally belonged to a late 18th Dynasty official. Legrain himself, in the text of the Catalogue Général volume in which this statue was first published, suggests that the piece was usurped; he dates the inscription alone to the 22nd Dynasty.43 In the early 1960s the statue was part of the exhibition “5000 Years of Egyptian Art,” which was shown in several European cities; in the catalogues for Brussels and Amsterdam the anonymous author44 of the entry on the statue states that it was usurped and that it originally dates from the 18th Dynasty, possibly the reign of Tutankhamun.45 In the Essen and Zürich catalogues, H.W. Müller takes a somewhat different stance; he dates the figure to Dynasty 22, but says that its style imitates that of the late 18th Dynasty.

ankhamun seated on her lap, make it abundantly clear that she had been the king’s nurse, this can hardly be considered a major obstacle to the identification proposed here. 41 PM II2, 136–167. 42 Breccia is the material usually mentioned in the literature, but Barbara Greene Aston has suggested to me that the stone should actually be identified as tuff. 43 G. Legrain, Statues et statuettes de rois et de particuliers III (Cairo, 1914), 3–4, pls. III–IV. 44 E. Bille-De Mot, cf. AEB 60153. 45 PM II2, 148 sounds unnecessarily skeptical in citing the Brussels catalogue (“called Dyn. XVIII”).

notes on three late eighteenth dynasty statues Pierre Gilbert, in an article about the exhibition in the Chronique d’Égypte, states unequivocally that the statue is a masterpiece from the time of Tutankhamun, usurped by Sheshonq during the Libyan Period; he draws attention not only to the face, which he says is “celui de Toutankhamon,” but also to the slightly protruding chest and abdomen, which are derived from the Amarna style.46 In 1968 the statue was discussed in some detail by Jean Yoyotte,47 who concluded that it belongs to the end of the 18th Dynasty: “Les proportions, la mode vestimentaire, et surtout un visage dont les traits sont familiers au connaisseur de la sculpture égyptienne, amènent à attribuer la pièce à l’époque de Toutânkhamon et d’Horemheb. C’est à côté de la dame Meryet de Leyde et de l’épouse de Nakhtmin que ce document du temps des Chechanq devrait prendre place pour s’en tenir à une simple chronologie de l’histoire de l’art.” In 1975 the statue came to Europe again, this time for the exhibition “Le règne du Soleil: Akhnaton et Nefertiti” in Brussels;48 the entry in the catalogue (no. 69) is by Gilbert, who repeats the date given in his earlier article. In the German catalogues,49 Matthias Seidel writes: “Eine stilistische Analyse der Gesichts- und Körperbildung erlaubt eine eindeutige Datierung der Plastik in der Zeit des Tutanchamun.”50 In the Swedish catalogue,51 too, Bengt Peterson speaks of a strong resemblance between the statue’s facial features and those of Tutankhamun. Finally, the figure was discussed by Edna Russmann in her magnificent book on Egyptian sculpture;52 for her, the statue “encapsulates the beguiling charm of post-Amarna sculpture,” and she draws attention to the official’s “soft-looking body with its pointy little bosom, and the delicate features of his Tutankhamun-type face.” In short, as this brief and no-doubt incomplete survey shows, there is a 46

CdE 36 (1961), 49–50. J. Yoyotte, Les trésors des pharaons (Geneva, 1968), 190–192. 48 cf. AEB 75569. 49 e.g., Nofretete–Echnaton (Berlin, 1976) and Echnaton– Nofretete–Tutanchamun (Hildesheim, 1976). 50 cf. also H. Satzinger, Der heilige Stab (cf. n. 54 below), 12: “Die für Tutanchamun typischen Gesichtszüge der Statue erlauben eine Datierung in dessen Regierungszeit oder in die unmittelbar folgenden Jahre.” 51 Echnaton och Nefertiti (Stockholm, 1975), 51, no. 69. 52 E. Russmann, Egyptian Sculpture: Cairo and Luxor (Cairo, 1989), 142–145, no. 66. 53 Note, however, G. Robins, The Art of Ancient Egypt (London, 1997), 207, fig. 249, where the statue is dated more generally to “the late Eighteenth or early Nineteenth Dynasty.” 47

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virtually general agreement that the statue belongs to the end of the 18th Dynasty,53 and more precisely to the reign of Tutankhamun. But whom does it represent? The total disappearance of the original inscriptions makes it difficult to answer this question with certainty. Apart from the “Tutankhamuntype face,” there seems at first sight little to go on. The dress and wig are of course paralleled elsewhere in statuary of the late 18th Dynasty and do not provide an indication of the identity of the person depicted, and the “gold of honor” collars worn by the man are also found on several high officials of the period. However, an important further clue is provided by the type of statue: it is the earliest known private standard-bearer, hitherto a strictly royal type. Forty-two examples of private statuary of this type are known, but none is earlier than this one.54 Very few people from the reign of Tutankhamun were in the position to be able to assume this kind of royal prerogative, and the first one who springs to mind is the chief treasurer Maya.55 As the most important civil administrator of the country, he effectively ruled Egypt in close collaboration with the general Horemheb, who acted as prince-regent during Tutankhamun’s early years.56 As such Maya is given a number of quasi-royal epithets that reflect duties normally carried out by the king himself. Thus he is said to “appease the Two Lands for his Lord” (sgrH tAwy n nb=f ), a direct reference to the nebty name of Tutankhamun (nfr hpw, sgrHw tAwy),57 and to be the one “who ties the Land together with his plans” (Tsw tA m sxrw=f).58 An as-yet unpublished inscription in his magnificent Memphite tomb says that Maya “fosters the Lord of the Two Lands and provides his sustenance” (rnnw nb tAwy, irw DfAw=f). As the studies by Satzinger and Chadefaud have shown, the “standard” held 54 H. Satzinger, “Der Heilige Stab als Kraftquelle des Königs: Versuch einer Funktionsbestimmung der ägyptischen Stabträger-Statuen,” Jahrbuch der kunsthistorischen Sammlungen in Wien 77 [=Sonderheft Nr. 263] (1981), 9–43, gives a catalogue comprising 42 royal statues, 4 belonging to other members of the royal family, and 41 nonroyal statues (of which CG 42194, Satzinger’s C 15, is the earliest; see his p. 12). See also C. Chadefaud, Les statues porte-enseignes de l’Egypte ancienne (1580–1085 avant J.C.): Signification et insertion dans le culte du Ka royal (Paris, 1982). 55 J. van Dijk, “The Overseer of the Treasury Maya: A Biographical Sketch,” OMRO 70 (1990), 23–28. 56 van Dijk, “¶orem·eb, Prince Regent of Tutaankhamun,” in The New Kingdom Necropolis of Memphis: Historical and Iconographical Studies (Groningen, 1993), 11–64. 57 van Dijk, “A Statue Base of May(a) in Copenhagen,” OMRO 71 (1991), 7–12.

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by the statue owner is closely linked to divine and royal power and particularly to the royal Ka. A private person holding such an emblem is thus holding a symbol of the divine king’s authority. An inscription on a fragmentary statue of Maya in the Louvre actually says that “the Royal Ka is in his (Maya’s) hands every day (kA nsw Hr a.wy=fy ra nb).”59 Sacred staffs of this type were carried in procession during religious festivals; they are often depicted underneath the sacred bark of the god.60 One of Maya’s chief titles, mentioned more than once in his tomb, was “Leader of the Festival of Amun in Karnak” (sSm-Hb n Imn m Ipt-swt) or “Leader of the Festival of the Lord of the Gods” (sSm-Hb n (pA) nb nTrw); during the period following the collapse of Akhenaten’s new religion, he was responsible for the restoration of the traditional cults, and first and foremost of these was that of Amun of Karnak. The statue comes from the temple of Karnak, where it may still have stood

when Sheshonq usurped it. Finally, the statue is of such superb quality that only someone who had access to the best sculptors employed by the royal workshops could have commissioned it. Inscriptions in his tomb record that Maya was in charge of the “Mansion of Gold of the temples of all the gods,” the temple workshops where statues of divinities were made and that he “made the temples function again by fashioning the sacred images of the gods (m mst aSmw nw nTrw).”61 As chief treasurer and overseer of works Maya was, moreover, at the heart of the country’s economy. The combination of these important functions made him someone who was uniquely placed to enable him to commission a statue of this quality. Thus, although we shall probably never know for certain, I would suggest that, taken together, these indications point to Maya being the nowanonymous original owner of the earliest nonroyal standard-bearing statue in Egyptian art.62

58 B. Schlick-Nolte, “Ein weiteres Relief des Schatzhausvorstehers Maya,” OMRO 72 (1992), 55–60. 59 J. Vandier, Revue du Louvre 18 (1968), 98–99; Vandier, “À propos de deux statues fragmentaires récemment entrées au Musée du Louvre,” Ugaritica VI (Paris, 1969), 483–499. 60 Satzinger, “Der Heilige Stab,” 20, fig. 11; 24, fig. 13.

61 Cf. J. van Dijk, “Maya’s Chief Sculptor Userhat-Hatiay,” GM 148 (1995), 29–34, esp. p. 33. 62 The identification was first suggested briefly in the final paragraph of an article I published several years ago in Dutch, “Elite en goddelijk koningschap aan het eind van de Achttiende Dynastie,” Phoenix 44 (1998), 7–20.

the tmp’s online image database of the valley of the kings

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THE THEBAN MAPPING PROJECT’S ONLINE IMAGE DATABASE OF THE VALLEY OF THE KINGS1 Kent R. Weeks American University in Cairo

During the past fifty years, the numbers of tourists visiting the Valley of the Kings (KV) has grown from about 100 each day to nearly 9,000. Recently, the Egyptian government declared that one of its primary goals will be to increase that number to 18,000 per day within the next decade, thereby doubling ticket revenues.2 Increasing and unchecked tourism is the single greatest threat to KV tombs—greater even than threats of flash flooding, earthquakes, pollution, or theft—and it has become painfully clear that, unless steps are taken soon to better manage the increasing numbers of visitors, many tombs will simply crumble away, destroyed by the changing environmental conditions that tourism causes. Exacerbating the problem of crowding, the number of KV tombs open to the public has been gradually reduced over the past few years from nearly 20 to 12 because of concerns for their survival. Large numbers of tourists do not invariably mean the destruction of the monuments they visit, but safely accommodating large numbers does require careful, long-term planning. Any plans to protect KV tombs must be based on a careful study of their past and present condition, and detailed topographic maps, accurate hydrological studies, precise geological and geotechnical surveys, and thorough historical studies of past archaeological work, conservation interventions, and engineering projects must be produced before any new work begins. Surveys for each tomb must include detailed architectural plans and conservation reports. Comprehensive photographic coverage of their walls should ideally be taken at intervals over several years, so that changes in condition can be identified and monitored.

1

This article is by way of saying thank you to Jack Josephson for his many contributions to the study of ancient Egyptian art and his continuing concern for its preservation. 2 These statistics are based on the Stakeholder Survey of the Valley of the Kings undertaken by the Theban Mapping Project and the Social Research Center of the American

The Theban Mapping Project (TMP) has been working in the Valley of the Kings since 1979. During that time, it has prepared several such reports. It is helping to manage tourists in the valley, working with the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA) to design interpretive signs at each tomb entrance (and ban tour guides from lecturing inside the tombs). It has installed information panels in a new Visitors Center (built by the government of Japan), conducted a survey of KV stakeholders, and prepared a detailed KV management plan. It is working with the SCA to install new LED lighting, environmental monitors, and temperature and humidity controls in tombs that are open to the public, and it has developed plans for a program of long-term site management. The management plan covers subjects ranging from the most desirable number and location of toilet facilities and rubbish bins, to flood-control measures, and ways of using ticketing systems to control visitor numbers. In 2000, The TMP published an Atlas of the Valley of the Kings, which provided detailed maps, plans, sections, and axonometric drawings of all KV tombs.3 The Valley of the Kings has been a popular site with Egyptologists and archaeologists since the mid-nineteenth century. Many expeditions have worked here and continue to do so. (Of the 63 tombs now known in KV, 30 were discovered after 1898, the most recent in 2006.) The site has been the subject of hundreds of books and articles, and it has become arguably the best-known archaeological site in Egypt (after the Giza pyramids), and, thanks to Howard Carter’s discovery of the tomb of Tutankhamun in 1922, one of the best known in the world.

University in Cairo. See Valley of the Kings Stakeholder Consultation, Stage I, Publications of the Theban Mapping Project IV (Cairo, 2004). 3 K.R. Weeks and N. Hetherington, eds., Valley of the Kings Site Management Masterplan (Publications of the Theban Mapping Project III) (Cairo, 2006).

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But despite great and continuing interest, until recently most excavators were concerned with discovering new tombs, not recording already-known ones. Rarely have KV tombs had their walls properly recorded in photographs or drawings. Copies of a few wall paintings were made by the French expedition of 1799-1802,4 by Ippolito Rosellini (1834)5 and Jean-François Champollion (18351845),6 Hector Horeau (1841),7 Richard Lepsius (1842-1845),8 and Eugène Lefébure (1889),9 but their work was incomplete and often inaccurate. A nearly complete set of drawings of the tomb of Sety I was made in 1820 by Giovanni Belzoni.10 Francis Frith took several exterior photographs in KV in 1857, but the first epigraphic project to use photographs as the basis for line drawings (a forerunner of the so-called Chicago Method) was not undertaken until 1907, by Félix Guilmant in the tomb of Rameses IX.11 That tomb was the first in KV to be accurately and completely recorded, and Guilmant’s scaled drawings still have epigraphical value. The tomb of Rameses VI was photographed in 1954 and published by Alexandre Piankoff.12 The tombs of Sety I, Horemheb, and Rameses IV and VII were photographed and published by Erik Hornung in the 1970s and 1990s, and this work, much of which is in color, is of considerable value to epigraphers and conservators (figs. 1-2).13 For other KV tombs, the recording of relief and painting has been decidedly hit or miss, and the lack of detailed photographic records makes their proper conservation, management, and protection difficult. Without a record of what is there, and a record of what was there in the past, conservators are rather like physicians who fail to collect a patient’s medical history or check the current state of his health before prescribing medical treatment. Before any new work can begin in a tomb, an existing condition report must be prepared, and that report must include comprehensive photographs of a tomb’s interior, especially its decorated walls and ceiling.

For the past six years, the TMP has devoted considerable time to preparing such reports and photographic surveys of KV tombs. To date (2008), existing condition reports have been prepared for 18 KV tombs, and photographic records made of 15.14

4 Description de l’Égypte, ou, Recueil des observations et des recherches qui ont été faites en Égypte pendant l’expédition de l’armée française. Antiquités (Planches), 5 vols. (Paris, 1809-1822). 5 I Monumenti dell’Egitto e della Nubia: Monumenti Civili (Pisa, 1834). 6 Monuments de l’Égypte et de la Nubie, 4 vols. (Paris, 1835-1845). 7 Panorama d’Égypte et de Nubie (Paris, 1841). 8 Denkmäler aus Aegypten und Aethiopien, 12 vols. (Berlin, 1849-1859). 9 Les hypogées royaux de Thèbes, MAAF 2, 3 (Paris, 1889).

10 About 300 of the drawings made by Belzoni in KV 17 are in the Bristol City Museum, England. 11 Le Tombeau de Ramsès IX, MIFAO 15 (Cairo, 1907). 12 The Tomb of Ramesses VI, Bollingen Series 40, 2 vols. (Princeton, 1954). 13 The Tomb of Pharaoh Seti I (Zurich, 1991); Das Grab des Haremhab im Tal der Könige (Bern, 1971); Zwei Ramessidische Königsgräber: Ramses IV. und Ramses VII., Theben 11 (Mainz am Rhein, 1990). 14 The condition reports, the work of Lotfy Khaled, Lamia el-Hadidi, and Dina Bakhoum, are published in: Weeks and Hetherington, eds., KV Site Management Masterplan. See volume III: Appendix III: Condition Reports.

KV Tombs for Which the TMP Has Prepared Condition Reports and Photographic Surveys Number Name

Condition Photographic Reports Survey

KV 1

Rameses VII

x

x

KV 2

Rameses IV

x

x

KV 5

Sons of Rameses II

x

x

KV 6

Rameses IX

x

x

KV 8

Merenptah

x

xa

KV 9

Rameses V and VI

x

x

KV 11

Rameses III

x

x

KV 14

Tausret and Sethnakht

x

x

KV 15

Sety II

x

x

KV 16

Rameses I

x

x

KV 17

Sety I

–

–b

KV 19

Mentuherkhepeshef

x

–c

KV 23

Ay

x

x

KV 34

Thutmose III

x

x

KV 35

Amenhotep II

x

x

KV 43

Thutmose IV

x

–a

KV 47

Siptah

x

x

KV 57

Horemheb

x

x

KV 62

Tutankhamun

x

x

a Tombs closed and under repair when photographic work was undertaken. b KV 17 was recently studied and photographed by another project, and we have therefore postponed our work here. c The SCA determined that the huge glass panels fronting the walls could not safely be removed for photography.

the tmp’s online image database of the valley of the kings

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Fig. 1. The Book of the Earth, part A, scene 6, on the right wall, upper level, burial chamber “J” in the tomb of Rameses V/ VI in the Valley of the Kings; photographed by Francis Dzikowski in 1999 for the Theban Mapping Project. ©1999 TMP.

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Originally, the TMP’s photographic surveys were made using color slide film. More recently, those images have been scanned and transferred to electronic media, and our photographers have switched to digital SLR cameras, using a variety of lenses. Images were shot in RAW format. Walls were lit with 1000-watt lamps with umbrella reflectors, and the number used varied from two to eight, depending on conditions. To ensure accurate colors, white balance was adjusted several times each day. No attempt could be made to brush or otherwise clean the walls before they were photographed, but dust accumulation does not seem to have significantly altered pigment colors. Before being archived, each image underwent computerized examination in Photoshop CS, and adjustments were made to correct distortion, differences in lighting, shading, and color. Over 5,000 images have been taken so far, nearly all by TMP photographers Francis Dzikowski and Matjaž Kačičnik. The main purpose of our photographic surveys was to provide a record of existing tomb conditions, especially of decorated walls, and the TMP compiled historical images as well, to give the survey historical depth so that we could track changing conditions over time. We do not consider the photographic record thus created a static reference to be locked away and infrequently

consulted. Instead, we wanted to create an archive that could serve as a basic research tool of value to all persons interested in the Valley of the Kings, whether professional Egyptologists, art historians, conservators, engineers, students, tourists, or armchair archaeologists. Thus, while copies of all images have been collected on external hard drives and DVDs and deposited in the SCA offices in Luxor and Cairo, the SCA’s Conservation Department offices in Luxor and Cairo, the Centre du Documentation in Zamalek, the American Research Center in Egypt (Cairo), the American University in Cairo, the TMP’s Cairo and Luxor offices, and the Paris and New York offices of the World Monuments Fund, another and, we believe, even more useful archive has also been established. That archive is online, at www. thebanmappingproject.com. When the TMP’s website went online in 1996, its simple goal was to provide regular updates on the project’s work in KV 5. Although KV 5’s first six rooms had been seen in 1825 by James Burton, the tomb achieved world fame in 1995, when the TMP discovered that it had over 86 chambers, making it the largest tomb in KV. (We have now found over 125, and many more rooms and corridors are yet to be explored).15 The website drew a large audience from the outset, and within a few months it became obvious from visitor feedback that more could be done with it, that there was a large audience anxious to have access to a reliable and comprehensive source of information about other features in the Valley of the Kings. In 2000, the TMP added the plans and drawings from its Atlas of the Valley of the Kings to the website, presenting them in an easily accessible format. Hundreds of pages of detailed tomb descriptions and historical data accompany the drawings. The Atlas is interactive, and visitors can use a scaling tool to measure tomb components in cubits, feet, or meters. It also offers aerial photographs of the Theban West Bank, through which users can explore in detail the topography of Thebes and its monuments. Recently, a 5,000entry bibliography of West Bank archaeological sites has been added. Now, we are adding several thousand more photographic images of tombs in KV to the several hundred already on the website.

15 In addition to information online, see K.R. Weeks, ed., KV 5: A Preliminary Report on the Excavation of the Tomb of

the Sons of Rameses II in the Valley of the Kings, Publications of the Theban Mapping Project II, rev. ed. (Cairo, 2006).

Fig. 2. The same scene; a painting by Henri-Joseph Redouté for the Description de l’Egypte (1812), 2: 86.6.

the tmp’s online image database of the valley of the kings There are several advantages to publishing photographs of KV tomb walls online, as opposed to publishing them only in hard copy: 1. An online image database can be easily and regularly updated as new photographs become available, instead of having to wait years to be added to a new print edition. 2. Search engines make it possible to rapidly find and compare scenes or texts, or components of scenes and texts, in different tombs, something typical hard-copy indices do not allow. Our KV-wide online images will eventually allow searches for deities, pharaohs, particular texts and chapters of texts, and iconographic features. 3. Architectural data, descriptions of decoration, historical background, and records of archaeological and conservation activity can be easily integrated with an online image database. At present, many of our images can be accessed by clicking on walls of tomb chambers shown in axonometric drawings. The number of images accessible this way will continue to grow. Correlations between texts, scenes, and architectural features become readily apparent. 4. Images can easily be downloaded so that print copies can be carried into the field, instead of having to haul costly volumes into hot, dusty environments. 5. Thousands of images can be stored and studied as needed, a single work station replacing dozens, even hundreds, of cumbersome volumes of plates. 6. An online database is much less expensive to establish and maintain than a hard-copy edition, making it affordable and accessible for small libraries and individual users. 7. Database images can be Zoomified. Using this tool, an image covering, say, a square meter of decorated wall can be zoomed into, enabling the viewer to enlarge a single hieroglyph or a feature of a costume, and examine it in detail. It is possible in this way to closely study the ancient artist’s techniques of carving and painting, compare the proportions and iconographic

16 For details, see Archaeological Database (ADB) and Image Database (IDB), Publications of the Theban Mapping Project VI, VII (Cairo, 2006).

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details in several examples of the same figure, examine potential conservation problems, such as cracking or staining, or read wall areas that have been obscured by salt incrustations or flaking paint. The aerial photographs available on our website are also Zoomified, allowing users to “fly” from 1,500 meters above the landscape down to only about 100 meters and examine details of topography, architecture, and archaeological features. An important side benefit of preparing the database for a large, international audience whose members have very different backgrounds was the need to develop a standardized terminology for the architectural components of KV tombs and for all fields of data accompanying the images. Spellings of proper names, with cross-references to numerous variants, have also been standardized.16 The TMP has also been experimenting with an imaging system called Quantapoint. It uses three-dimensional imaging technology to digitize a structure and its surface features in a database with a resolution of three millimeters. It uses low-power light to scan and create high-quality 3-D models. We have tested Quantapoint in KV 14 and in the Temple of Rameses III at Medinet Habu. It has proved extremely promising. It is possible to scan an entire tomb chamber in a matter of minutes, and the resulting 3-D image will show structural features, surfaces, and decoration accurately and in detail. We hope to use Quantapoint to provide comprehensive coverage of all KV tombs, whether open or not, decorated or not, and create a comprehensive existing condition survey that will help in future to produce better site-management planning and conservation work.17 Together with the TMP’s maps, plans, drawings, descriptions, and bibliographies, the images on the TMP website combine to provide the most comprehensive survey of the Valley of the Kings ever assembled. The website currently receives nearly six million hits each month, an indication of the usefulness of its data for students and

17 For some brief but positive comments on the value of this kind of equipment for epigraphy, see P. Dorman, “Epigraphy and Recording,” in Egyptology Today, ed. R. Wilkinson (Cambridge, 2007), 91.

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scholars. It will take several more years before the final version of the TMP’s image database is fully online, but the archive already offers great rewards for those interested in KV. More impor-

tantly, it helps ensure that the tombs of Egypt’s Valley of the Kings will be protected for future generations to learn from and enjoy.

the tomb of iahmes, son of psamtikseneb, at saqqara

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THE TOMB OF IAHMES, SON OF PSAMTIKSENEB, AT SAQQARA1 Christiane Ziegler Musée du Louvre

Of the tombs recently discovered by the Mission archéologique du Louvre à Saqqara, several date to the Late Period. I should like to dedicate the study of that of Iahmes to a distinguished colleague and great scholar of the art of the late periods. Ultimately, it is to a long-standing friend that this work pays tribute. The tomb of Iahmes, son of Psamtikseneb (fig. 1), was discovered in autumn 2003, during our thirteenth excavation campaign at Saqqara.2 It is located north of the Unas Causeway, in the northern sector of the area excavated by the mission. Like numerous tombs previously discovered, it is accessed via a shaft hewn into the structure of an older Old Kingdom mastaba.3 This shaft was entirely back-filled. The rock-cut burial chamber was intact, a fact rare enough to raise interest in this structure. The brink of shaft Q appeared directly under a Coptic occupation layer, dated by the presence of large amphorae. Five slabs were laid on the brink, covering up the entrance. The cross-section of the shaft is square, 1.30 m each side.4 Along a depth of 2 meters, the walls are carefully hewn; this corresponds to the preserved height of the mastaba. As the shaft goes deeper into the bedrock, the

1

Translated by Caroline M. Rocheleau. Mission under the directorship of Christiane Ziegler. Please see: C. Ziegler and G. Lecuyot, “Mission archéologique du Musée du Louvre à Saqqara. Dernières découvertes,” in Proceedings of the Ninth International Congress of Egyptologists 2, ed. J.-C. Goyon and C. Cardin (Leuven, Paris, and Dudley, MA, 2007), 2021-2029. 3 Mastaba Q was already buried when the tomb of Iahmes was planned, as is shown by the level of the brink at +3.60 m. 4 The architectural study was conducted by J.-P. Adam and shall be published in C. Ziegler et al., Fouilles du Louvre à Saqqara, vol. 2, Les tombeaux de Basse Époque (Leuven, expected early 2009). 5 Detailed study by G. Lecuyot forthcoming in Ziegler et al, Fouilles du Louvre. 6 Dated to circa 420 BC by my colleague Martine Denoyelle, chief curator at the Musée du Louvre’s Department 2

cross-section becomes irregular. Exploration stopped at a depth of 3.96 m, in order to study the burials then revealed. Sand clearing in the lower section, which likely leads to other undisturbed burials, is planned for later seasons. The sand fill contained animal bones and numerous ceramic vessels, some of which were practically complete.5 These vessel forms are found in relation to burials: Bes vases, bottles, feeders, jugs, spindle-shaped vessels (often revealing dark marks), and torches, as well as a small lekythos (fig. 2) decorated with black palm motifs on a red background, covered with natron.6 Inside certain vessels were preserved traces of a substance similar to resin, with its glossy aspect and black or honey color. Over 30 uninscribed stoppers also belong to this corpus; they are fashioned from mud, covered in fabric, and occasionally retain the bindings that held them to the vessel.7 Basketry items also important in burial practices were discovered in the same context: basket, papyrus and reed mats, and papyrus-fiber bundles. Shaft Q also contained close to 300 faience amulets, blue turquoise or pale green in color8 (fig. 3). One hundred wedjat eyes of varying types were discovered. Wedjat eyes with schematic

of Greek, Etruscan and Roman Antiquities, to whom I am grateful. 7 Detailed study by N. Couton forthcoming in Ziegler et al., Fouilles du Louvre. 8 For this type of object common in the Late Period, see: P. Germond, Le monde symbolique des amulettes égyptiennes (Milan, 2005); M. Hüttner, Mumienamulette im Totenbrauchtum der Spätzeit (Vienna, 1995); C. Andrews, Amulets of Ancient Egypt (London, 1994); B. Schlick-Nolte, Liebighaus-Museum Alter Plastik (Melsungen, 1990); C. Müller-Winkler, Die Ägyptischen Objekt-Amulette (Freiburg and Göttingen, 1987); E. Acquaro, Amuleti Egiziani ed Egittizanti del Museo Nazionale di Cagliari, Studi Fenici 10 (1977); G. Reisner, Amulets II, Catalogue général des antiquités du Musée du Caire (Cairo, 1958); W.M. F. Petrie, Amulets (London, 1914); G. Reisner, Amulets I, Catalogue général des antiquités du Musée du Caire (Cairo, 1907).

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Fig. 1. Saqqara, Tomb of Iahmes. Plan of tomb.

Fig. 2. Lekythos.

Fig. 3. Amulets.

the tomb of iahmes, son of psamtikseneb, at saqqara decoration9 and those with black decoration10 date from the 22nd to the 26th Dynasties. The corpus also includes deities (Amun/Amun-Min, Anubis, Bes, Shu, Isis, Ptah, Thoth, Taweret, and Pataikos) as well as animals and divine emblems (falcon, stairs, white crown, and papyrus column). These are of poor quality, as are a group of small cubic amulets, thicker than they are large, rather schematic, and often difficult to identify. To this group of amulets must be added a large plaque representing an openwork double-sided wedjat eye11 (fig. 4) and bronze amulet of Harpocrates.12 At the –5.28 m level, shaft Q opens unexpectedly at the west end onto a narrow passage that leads to a long north-south room (Gallery A), located below it. North, the shaft gives onto a large ledge cut into the gebel and upon which rested a limestone sarcophagus still covered with its lid. Bones belonging to a man, a woman, and three children were discovered on the ledge together with a bundle of rods resting on a piece of wood that was formerly part of a coffin belonging to Tjainu, son of Padibastet, son of Sekhmetnefret. This space was cleared of parts of its contents, but the heavy limestone sarcophagus was left in situ, unopened because of the lack of space. North of the ledge, a small tomb,13 roughly trapezoidal in plan and found empty (Tomb B), gives access to a chamber. At the back, in the southwest corner of Tomb B, was found a blue faience shabti bearing the name Tasheryiset, daughter of Nakhtiset; in the northwest corner lay a vessel made from coarse terracotta covered with plaster. Shaft Q goes down 3.40 meters further. East, it opens up to the undisturbed burial of Iahmes (Chamber C, fig. 5), otherwise accessed by a very low passageway that was sealed by a roughstone and mud-brick structure. The chamber is of modest size,14 irregular shape (roughly rectangular—its greatest dimension in a north-south

9

Müller-Winkler, Objekt-Amulette, 144c, 145. Ibid., 137, 145 d. 11 SA.03/136; type described by Andrews, Amulets, 44, cf. pl. 46. 12 SA.03/219 a and b. 13 Depth 2.34 m; height 0.94 m. 14 Max. width (middle): 1.85 m; length west side: 3.60 m; length east side: 3.36 m. 15 Only 1.21 m from the ground. 16 For this type of object, see: H.-C. Loffet, “Une statuette de Sokar-Osiris au musée Charles-Léandre de Domfront,” La Revue des Musées de France. Revue du Louvre 2 (April 2007), 22-28; J. Budka, “Einige Bemerkungen zu Ptah-SokarOsiris-Statuetten,” GM 193 (2003), 99-101; C. Ziegler, “Un Ptah-Sokar-Osiris au nom d’Ankhpakhered, fils de Nesmin,” 10

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Fig. 4. Openwork wedjat eye.

orientation), and is hewn into the gebel. The ceiling is extremely low15 and the walls entirely undecorated. The northwest half of the rock floor resembles a large L-shaped ledge, while the southeast half is back-filled, most likely corresponding to the emplacement of a large pit that could not be explored due to technical difficulties. Chamber C contained a few grave goods of great quality: a coffin, a small chest, and a statuette of PtahSokar-Osiris.16 The contents of the room appear intact, despite the fact that the coffin suffered some damage to the head and left shoulder. The coffin also bears traces of restoration: a piece of wood has been fastened to the torso. The mummiform coffin17 (fig. 6) was carved from sycamore-fig wood (Ficus sycomorus L., Moraceae).18 The coffin belongs to the type with prominent pedestal and back pillar, well modeled with a bulging chest and prominent buttocks.19

in Hommages à Fayza Haikal, BdE 138 (Cairo, 2003), 315324; D.A. Aston, “Two Osiris Figures of the Third Intermediate Period,” JEA 77 (1991), 95-107; U. Hübner, “Eine Osiris-Statuette aus Schweizer Privatbesitz,” GM 74 (1984), 31-41; M.J. Raven, “Papyrus-Sheaths and Ptah-Sokar-Osiris Statues,” OMRO 59-60 (1978-1979), 251-296; J. LipinskaBoldok, “Some Problems of the Funerary Figures of Egyptian God Ptah-Sokar-Osiris,” Bulletin du Musée National de Varsovie 3 (1961), 75-84. 17 SA.03/255. Dimensions of closed coffin: length: 2.03 m; width at: neck 0.50 m, shoulders 0.61 m, feet 0.485 m; thickness at: nose 0.565 m, ankles 0.365 m, pedestal 0.52 m. 18 Wood identified by Dr. Victoria Asensi, xylology expert (UPMC-Paris VI), Xylodata. 19 With such characteristics, it is similar to the coffin of

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Fig. 5. General view of the chamber.

Fig. 6. Coffin of Iahmes.

the tomb of iahmes, son of psamtikseneb, at saqqara The head is proportionally rather large. The coffin is stuccoed, painted,20 and covered with a bituminous-looking layer upon which the polychrome paint was applied. The inscriptions and the details of the face, beard, and wig are painted yellow.21 The decoration program—which is rather dense— is highlighted with white, red, and blue. It covers the exterior of the lid and case; the interior remains raw wood. The texts, which were quickly and tightly written, are rather corrupt. They alternate between the usual offering formulae and invocations to deities (mostly Osiris)22 and more specific recurring funerary formulae (invocation to the goddess Nut and the enumeration of the body parts depicted on the lid and case). The names of the owner and his parents represent one third of the inscriptions: they refer to Iahmes,23 son of Psamtikseneb24 born to the lady of the house Taheret.25 No titles are given for this man, which is not infrequent with coffins discovered in this area of the Saqqara necropolis. We are therefore left in the dark regarding the man’s socio-professional status. On the lid, the sculpted face is unusually long: the nose is relatively thin with well-defined nostrils, the contour of the mouth is ill defined, and the chin is emphasized. The eyes are large and round; the black iris contrasts singularly against the white cornea. A yellow line highlights both the iris and the contour of the eye; the latter is lengthened towards the temple by a cosmetic line. The yellow eyebrows also follow this curve. The chin rests on the chest, and the top of the shoulders is at nose level.26 A striated tripartite wig reveals ears that are low and large, with sculpted anatomical details. At the front, the rounded wig is slightly concave near the shoulders, and the end of the front locks is underlined with a yellow line. A thin beard—curled and braided—is fixed under Payef-tjau-(em)-auy-Khonsu (SA.05/50=CSA 81), discovered in neighboring shaft H1. Study forthcoming by C. Bridonneau in Ziegler et al., Fouilles du Louvre. 20 Pigments currently under analysis by Sandrine Pagès C2RMF: pale yellow=orpiment; reddish yellow =As-S . 21 Regarding the association of these two colors (yellow being a probable substitute for gold) and their symbolic values, see J.H. Taylor, “Theban Coffins from the Twentysecond to the Twenty-sixth Dynasty: Dating and Synthesis of Development,” in The Theban Necropolis: Past, Present and Future, ed. N. Strudwick and J.H. Taylor (London, 2003), 166. 22 For these two types of formulae, see: H. Willems, Chests of Life (Leiden, 1988). 23 iaH-ms: PN I, 12.19; id., PN II, 338. 24 psmTk-snb(w): PN I, 137.2. 25 tA-hr.t: PN I, 365.12.

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the chin. The throat is decorated with horizontal bands of polychromatic floral patterns. A wesekh collar with six strands and falcon-headed terminals covers the breast. The remaining decorative scheme is a symmetrical composition that comprises alternating cultic scenes, deities, and texts. It shall be described briefly, from top to bottom. At mid-torso, a winged Nut spreads her wings; she is flanked by two superposed vignettes. On the right, Anubis faces the deceased’s mummy and, below it, Isis kneels with her hands placed upon the shen sign. Symmetrically, on the left, Horakhty faces the mummy of Iahmes while below, Nephthys imitates Isis. Under Nut was once depicted an embalming scene, of which very little is left: the bed over which Anubis leans, and the canopy topped by rearing uraei. A procession of nameless deities led by Isis on the right and Nephthys on the left is found on either side of this scene. The procession continues in the next register, from which the central scene has disappeared. Isis and Nephthys face each other, kneeling on either side of an unidentified motif. Two obelisks frame this procession. Next, the decoration is symmetrically organized around seven columns of text that run down to the ankles. The Nut spells inherited from Old Kingdom royal texts occupy the two middle columns.27 The enumeration of the deceased’s body parts28 is written left of the Nut spells and continues on the left side of the lid. Certain sections are repeated on the right side. The body parts are traditionally placed under the protection of deities. Although these are not named on Iahmes’ coffin, they are probably depicted in the ten vignettes, superposed in groups of five, on either side of the central axis. At the feet, the text and decorations are upside down, facing the face of the coffin. Symmetrically, 26

Taylor, “Theban Coffins,” 99; the distance between the base of the nose and the chin is short; the lips are thick and prominent. 27 This spell, used for millennia on funerary objects, has many variants. See the bibliography compiled by N. Billing, Nut—The Goddess of Life in Text and Iconography, Uppsala Studies in Egyptology 5 (Uppsala, 2002), in particular pp. 87-99. 28 From the pyramid age onwards, the limbs of the deceased king are identified with different deities (PT 13031327); the concept is borrowed in various funerary texts such as the Coffin Texts (CT VI 391 a-f), the Book of the Dead (Ch. 42 and 172), and the second Book of Breathing. For charts of various deities and their associated limbs, see: J. H. Walker, Studies in Ancient Egyptian Anatomical Terminology, The Australian Centre for Egyptology Studies 4 (Warminster, 1996), 289-334.

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the goddesses Isis (right) and Nephthys (left) are represented kneeling upon the hieroglyphic sign for gold. They frame columns of text that place the deceased under their protection. The texts continue on either side. The tip of the toes is decorated with feather motifs, the pedestal with geometric patterns of crosses and rosettes. With the exception of the back of the striated wig, on which the image of a standing Nephthys is drawn,29 the decoration of the exterior of the case consists of inscriptions and related vignettes. Seven columns are displayed in the center, where texts already found on the lid are inscribed: invocation to Osiris, offering formula, Nut spells (column 3), and enumeration of body parts (column 7). Column 5 invokes the four sons of Horus painted on the right side of the case, among the six superposed vignettes representing anonymous deities. Near each edge, a column of hieroglyphs naming Iahmes and his parents is topped by a large depiction of an akhem bird. The mummy of Iahmes was placed in a supine position with his head towards the south and his feet north. It was wrapped in bandages and covered by a plain linen shroud.30 Its state of preservation is very poor—both the mummy and the bandages are extremely friable. X-rays show that the skeleton is mostly disarticulated.31 The dislocation appears to be the result of poor mummification rather than conservation conditions. Major bone displacements and post-mortem fractures are noted. X-rays show that the hands are placed over the genital area, the usual position for male subjects. The man was approximately 1.65 m tall, which is the average height of ancient Egyptians. The cranial index of 73.6 places the subject in the category of dolichocephals, which is commonly observed in Egypt. We are dealing with a relatively old man, at least 50 years of age, as shown by the grooves on the cranial vault caused by the cranial vessels, and the teeth, which appear abraded. The brain appears to have been removed.

The mummy’s poor state of preservation does not allow any comments regarding the “soft parts.” Neither jewelry nor amulet is seen on the X-rays. The cause of death could not be determined. At the conclusion of this non-intrusive examination, the mummy was placed once again in its coffin and the lid closed. The statuette of Ptah-Sokar-Osiris32 (fig. 7) was discovered between the right side of Iahmes’ coffin and the wall of the chamber. It lay on the ground, broken in half, the base placed on its right side and the statue face down.33 It was carved from wood, painted red and highlighted with black and white. It belongs to the type without a back pillar or a pedestal.34 The base is rectangular and bears traces of whitish stucco in the left corner. The underside shows a large rectangular hollow near the front,35 as well as a smaller, almost-square one, where the feet of the statuette were fitted.36 A black line is the only evidence of now-gone painted decorations. The statuette has an arched back and prominent buttocks, and is broken in its lower half. The upper part of the tenon that once secured it to the base is preserved at the back. The statuette depicts a mummiform figure without apparent arms or hands. It is coiffed with a tripartite wig that shows the ears. Black lines on the lock falling over the left shoulder indicate hair strands. A horizontal black line underlines the tip of each lock of hair. The wig—which shows archaizing parallels with Late Period statuary—is wide, flat topped, and concave on the temples.37 The eyebrows, the contours of the eyes, and the irises are painted black; the eyes are white. The beard is long and thin, broken at the tip. A wesekh collar of eleven strands is painted in black on the chest; its lower section is bordered by a row of white droplets. The two falcon-headed terminals are drawn in black on the shoulders. A column of black hieroglyphs on a beige background bordered by a black line is drawn down the front of the statuette, from the chest to the

29 During the 25th and 26th Dynasties, it replaces the image of the scarab; Taylor, “Theban Coffins,” 118-119. 30 Detailed study forthcoming by R. Cortopassi in Ziegler et al., Fouilles du Louvre. 31 The examination was undertaken on April 25-26, 2005, by Drs. Roger and Martine Lichtenberg. We are borrowing numerous excerpts from their research, which will appear in Ziegler et al., Fouilles du Louvre. 32 SA.04/5. Base: height 5.3-5.8 cm; length 32.2 cm; width 11.3-11.4 cm; statue: height 39 cm; max. width 11 cm; thickness of head 7.4 cm. 33 The statuette can also be placed near the head of the coffin; cf. J. Garstang, The Burial Customs of Ancient Egypt

(London, 1907), 202, fig. 216; the statue is against the left side of the head of the coffin; at Tabbet el-Guech, the statuette is standing against the right flank of the coffin at knee level; cf. B. Mathieu, “Travaux de l’Institut d’archéologie orientale du Caire en 2003-2004,” BIFAO 104, vol. 2 (2004), 665, fig. 27. 34 No parallels have been found in Raven, “PapyrusSheaths”; similarly in D.A. Aston, “Two Osiris Figures.” 35 Length 12.6 cm; approx. width 3.2 cm; max. depth 2.5 cm. 36 Length 4.9 cm; width 3.65 cm; depth 3.2 –3.5 cm. 37 For example: J.H. Taylor, Death and the Afterlife in Ancient Egypt (London, 2001), 129, fig. 92, shabtis of Mentuemhat and Padiimenemipet, early 26th Dynasty.

the tomb of iahmes, son of psamtikseneb, at saqqara

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Fig. 7. Statuette of Ptah-Sokar-Osiris belonging to Iahmes.

feet. The text is an invocation to Osiris Khentyimentiu in favor of the Osiris Iahmes. Both text and decoration are absent from the back of the statuette. The chest38 (fig. 8) was discovered on the rocky floor against the northern wall of the chamber, a few centimeters from the foot of Iahmes’ coffin. It is fashioned from wood, entirely covered with a thick and shiny black coating39 that hermetically

seals the chest. Its four faces display yellow painted decorations.40 A bird affixed to the chest is also covered with this mixture, but is painted red. The chest belongs to type B.41 Slightly trapezoid in shape and set on a small base, the chest is closed by a rectangular lid. The akhem bird is held in its center by two dowels. The bird’s simple shape is emphasized by the thick coating that entirely covers it. Nevertheless, details such as the globu-

38 SA. 04/50. Dimensions of chest: height 39.9 cm; length base 24.6 cm, width base 22.3 cm; lid: length 23 cm, width 21 cm; bird: length 14 cm, width 4 cm, height 6 cm. 39 Analysis in progress by Sandrine Pagès-Camagna, C2RMF. 40 Analysis in progress by Sandrine Pagès-Camagna, C2RMF. 41 D.A. Aston, “Canopic Chests from the Twenty-first Dynasty to the Ptolemaic Period,” ÄgLev 10 (2000), 159-178. For the unpublished thesis by Marie-Cécile Bruwier, under the directorship of Prof. Cl. Vandersleyen, Université Cath-

olique de Leuven-la-Neuve, see: M.-C. Bruwier, “Présence et action d’Anubis sur le coffret d’un prêtre héracléopolitain,” in Egyptian Religion. The Last Thousand Years, Studies Dedicated to the Memory of Ian Quaegebeur, ed. W. Clarysse, A. Schoors, and H. Willems, vol. 1, OLA 84 (Leuven, 1998), 61, n.3 (pp. 61-79). For older periods, see: B. Lüscher, Untersuchungen zu ägyptischen Kanopenkästen: Vom Alten Reich bis zum Ende der Zweiten Zwischenzeit, HÄB 31 (Hildesheim, 1990).

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Fig. 8. Chest of Iahmes.

lar eyes, the definition of the wings, and the tail feathers are easily identifiable. Each of the sides, formed by four panels, is decorated with a yellow tuft of papyrus, the three erect stems crowned by opened umbels. The plants emerge from a rectangular water pool with ripples. The whole can be read as a hieroglyphic sign,42 the numerous meanings of which evoke protection, solar and Osirian rebirth, and the primordial waters. The chest was opened to reveal four layers of fabric, cut from one piece of linen. They cover a vessel containing make-believe organs. The uppermost layer of linen consists of balls of fabric

soaked with mummification products. The second layer includes six swabs used to coat the inside of the chest, as is demonstrated by the threads stuck in the black coating. The third layer was simply crumpled to secure the vessel, while the fourth comprises small fragments of cloth used to stuff it. The vessel is an ovoid ceramic container, 23 cm tall. Its neck and lip were already damaged when it was placed inside the chest. Approximately ten centimeters of the interior surface are eaten away, from the bottom up, by the natron it once contained. The vessel contained three small, elongated packages wrapped in linen, some of which were tied with strings.43

42 A.H. Gardiner, Egyptian Grammar (Oxford, 1982), Sign-list M 16.

43 Respective dimensions: #1: height 12 cm, thickness 2 cm; #2: height 5 cm, thickness 4 cm; #3: height 6 cm, thickness 7 cm.

the tomb of iahmes, son of psamtikseneb, at saqqara A fourth, slightly larger package44 was placed at the bottom of the vessel, amidst bits of fabric and ceramic sherds. The presence of grains, undoubtedly barley, has been noted. This assemblage is a witness to the funerary practice of having organs removed, embalmed, and replaced in the thoracoabdominal cavity, adopted from the 21st Dynasty onwards.45 The chest and the four packages that it contains have a powerful symbolic value, following the canopic-jar tradition dating back to the Old Kingdom.46

Conclusion Having been discovered intact, with objects in their original position, this corpus reveals itself to be particularly interesting. The small number of objects, which is a constant in our excavation area, is striking, and we must revise our idea of Late Period funerary goods. Our excavations have revealed the frequency of the coffin/Ptah-SokarOsiris statuette/chest combination.47 In general, the shabtis, the net, and the amulets placed upon the mummy are absent. Cartonnages, present in numerous tombs in the area, are absent from the decorated coffins. This may be the result of a selection based on the financial resources of the deceased and their families. The discovery of objects in situ is extremely important. Of such objects now in museum collections, few have a secure archaeological context, and many have been separated from their contents, 44

Height 13 cm; thickness 7 cm. Their presence was not noted on the X-rays of Iahmes’ mummy. 46 For the rich symbolic value of this assemblage and a detailed technical analysis, see: F. Janot and C. Lapeyrie, “Saqqara, Révélations sur le coffret de Iahmes,” Archéologia, no. 430 (February 2006), 54-60. 47 Shaft F 17, shaft H, and shaft N. See: C. Bridonneau, G. Lecuyot, “Saqqara à la Basse Époque—Étonnantes coutumes funéraires des Vè-IVè siècles av. J.-C.,” in Archéologia, no. 445 (June 2007), 34-46. 48 For example, in the area of the Complex of Unas, that of Tjanenhebu, PM III 2, part 2, 648, and Hekaemsaef, ibid., 650; also see: Dieter Arnold, “The Late Period Tombs of HorKhebit, Wennefer and Wereshnefer at Saqqâra,” in Études sur l’Ancien Empire et la nécropole de Saqqâra dédiées à JeanPhilippe Lauer, ed. C. Berger and B. Mathieu, OrMonsp 9 (1997), 31-54. 49 These names are frequently found on stelae from the Serapeum at Memphis, dated to the reign of Darius I (PM III2, part 2, fasc. 3, 799-803). 45

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notably chests and coffins. With the exception of the tombs of individuals with well-documented careers,48 the precise dating of these assemblages generally causes problems. The Greek lekythos found in the fill of the shaft gives us a terminus post quem; it is dated to circa 420 BC, but was reused. A terminus ante quem is provided by the combined presence of two basilophoric names, Iahmes and Psamtikseneb, which leads one to consider the 26th Dynasty and the First Persian Period.49 However, this onomastic criterion is not sufficient. The name Psamtik was in fashion until the Hellenistic period, while that of Iahmes50 had been popular as early as the New Kingdom. It is difficult to find precise dating criteria in the inscriptions on the coffin and the statuette. We are not dealing with the texts characteristic of Nectanebo I and II found on stone sarcophagi.51 The style of the coffin—yellow decoration on a black background—is found on later coffins, but these are very different from that of Iahmes by their squat proportions and by the layout of the decorative scheme.52 On the other hand, the striated wig found on the coffin and the statuette is often considered a dating criterion: it does not appear on coffins after the Saite Period.53 The chest belongs to type B2 by its proportions and the presence of a bird.54 The yellow decoration carelessly painted on a black background is found on two chests dated to the sixth century BC, preserved in Leiden.55 At present, several arguments support dating our tomb to the Saite Period.

50

J. Josephson, “Amasis,” in The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt 1, ed. D.B. Redford (New York, 2001), 66-67. 51 C. Manassa, The Late Egyptian Underworld: Sarcophagi and Related Texts from the Nectanebid Period, UMI, vol. 12 (Ann Arbor, 2005). 52 J.H. Taylor, Egyptian Coffins (Aylesbury, 1989), 61-62=BM 29582 (from Akhmim, 30th Dynasty or Ptolemaic); the black background is rather exceptional for the 25th and 26th Dynasties: Taylor, “Theban Coffins,” 118-119. 53 M.-L. Buhl, The Late Egyptian Anthropoid Stone Sarcophagi (Copenhagen, 1959), 153; it disappears from private statuary during the reign of Nekau, see: B.V. Bothmer, Egyptian Sculpture of the Late Period (New York, 1969), 2. 54 D.A. Aston, “Canopic Chests,” 164-165, pls. 5-6; “a Saite date could reasonably be presumed.” 55 Ibid., pls. 20-21, pp. 174, 176; “should perhaps be dated to the sixth century BC.” (Leiden AM 32a and b).

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the “saga” of ‘aper-el’s funerary treasure

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THE “SAGA” OF ‘APEREL’S FUNERARY TREASURE Alain Zivie CNRS (Paris) and Mission Archéologique Française du Bubasteion (Saqqara)

“Beautiful objects,” les beaux objets, of the remote past, from ancient Egypt or from anywhere else in the world, are a blessing. Don’t they bring beauty and harmony to the heart, as well as puzzling questions and stimulating interrogations to the intelligence? But sometimes, when an unusual or even outstanding archaeological ensemble (homogeneous funerary material for example) is discovered, “beautiful objects” can generate problems: they begin living their own life, being separated from this knowledge that gives them their genuine significance and to which they give a big part of its real value. It is a pity, because then beauty separated from meaning is no more just a blessing, but can become almost a curse. Yet beauty and knowledge must and can live in perfect harmony, as is illustrated by such an incredible number of ancient Egyptian artifacts kept and beautifully presented in museums and collections in Egypt and all over the world. Jack Josephson would certainly agree with that idea. So I thought, as I wrote this short tribute to a great friend (even if his interest goes first to the periods posterior to the New Kingdom, the period that is the focus of this paper). Jack’s humanity, generosity, science, and sense of beauty are indeed a blessing for Egyptology, as well as for Egyptologists; from America, from Egypt, and from everywhere, including France! With him I associate of course our dear Magda, his wife. The tomb of ‘Aper-El at Saqqara (tomb Bubasteion I.1, figs. 1-2) was discovered in 1976, and then excavated, preserved, and studied

since 1980 by this writer, with his team of the MAFB (Mission Archéologique Française du Bubasteion).1 During all these years, there were several highlights. Amongst them we can particularly mention the discovery, in November 1987, of the burial chamber of the tomb, still containing the mummies (now rather skeletons) and a large portion of a unique funerary treasure. These human remains and objects belonged to the Vizier, Divine Father, the Child of the Palace (kap), and several other things, ‘Aper-El, certainly an Egyptian transcription of ‘Abed-El or ‘Abdiel/‘Abdouel, a name meaning “Servant of the god El,” variant ‘Aperia (for ‘Abdi?)2 ; to his wife, the lady Tauret or Uriai; and to their son, the Generalissimo, Chief of the Chariotry, and Overseer of Recruits, Huy (for Amenhotep).3 The excavation of the tomb was a long and difficult task. With the MAFB we had to face many problems and challenges. We have even been almost obliged to quit because of the apparently hopeless situation that we met, and because of the really dangerous aspects of the excavation. I shall simply recall here some facts. The tomb Bub. I. 1 of ‘Aper-El is located under the rest-house of the Antiquities Service (now SCA) built on the top of the escarpment in the forties of the last century. Because of the presence of this modern building erected just over it and other very close tombs, ‘Aper-El’s sepulture suffered terribly from the water and sewage falling down from the resthouse. So, for several years, working in this tomb and trying to rescue it, in this rather strange con-

1 To be completely accurate, the MAFB was created in 1986, and during the first years the work entered the frame of the Mission Archéologique Française de Saqqara (MAFS). For the detailed history of the work at and about ‘Aper El’s tomb until 1989 (before the discovery of the hidden part of the chapel), see A. Zivie, Découverte à Saqqarah. Le vizir oublié (Paris, 1990), abbreviated below as Découverte, which has unhappily never been translated into English (but has been translated into Arabic with a foreword by Dr. Zahi Hawass, under the title Kachef fi Saqqara. Maqbara ‘Abria (Cairo, 1995). Many facts and data, updated or new, can be found in the recently published The Lost Tombs of Saqqara (Toulouse,

2007), by the writer, with photographs by P. Chapuis, translated into English by D. Lorton. 2 See A. Zivie, “Le nom du vizir ‘Aper-El,” in Études Égyptologiques et Bibliques à la mémoire du Père B. Couroyer, Cahiers de la Revue biblique 36 (Paris, 1997), 115-123, where the editor did not correct some misprints of his own (cf. the review by C. Cannuyer in CdE 74, (1999), 45-46. 3 Certainly the elder son of the vizier, whose parents and parents-in-law remain unknown for the time being. Two other sons are mentioned in the chapel, the steward Seny and the priest Hatiai, and the family could have also included one or several daughters.

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Fig. 1. Plan of the tomb (Bubasteion I.1) of ‘Aper-El, by Marie-Geneviève Froidevaux (CNRS, MAFB). © Hypogées.

Fig. 2. Perspective showing the four levels of the tomb (Bubasteion I.1) of ‘Aper-El. Axonometric drawing by Marie-Geneviève Froidevaux (CNRS, MAFB). © Hypogées.


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text, was a permanent challenge for the team, with the strong support of the SCA (then Egyptian Antiquities Organization) Inspectors of the site, a challenge never definitely won. As a matter of fact, excavating the Bubasteion, beginning with ‘Aper-El’s tomb, has been a real rescue operation. A few decades later, the marl clay of the gebel would have eventually completely collapsed and the tomb would have been lost forever.4 A striking illustration of the risks the tomb faced, and of our rescue role, occurred in 1989. The burial chamber of the tomb had been discovered in 1987, and its excavation began in 1988. Only half of the material, more or less, had been excavated and removed from the tomb at the end of this season. But when we came back as quickly as possible for the next campaign in 1989 (in summer, not the best season for exhausting work more than 20 m down the gebel), we had the surprise of discovering a kind of local “Niagara Falls” in the burial chamber. Masses of water were rushing down along the eastern side of the room. But the remaining unexcavated material was in the western side; so we arrived just in time, even if this strong hygrometric increase of the atmosphere was not very good for material (especially wood) already much decayed…5 Even if we felt the discreet jubilation of having been right to be obstinate, our feelings at the discovery of the burial chamber in 1987 were not exactly triumphal. No temptation to say “wonderful things” like our admired colleague Howard Carter when we caught the first glimpse into the room! Everything indeed seemed in such a bad condition. We saw at first a heap of shapeless wooden fragments, except for a coffin lid with its original shape and its mask, and some vessels. It took time before we realized that at our modest scale, we too met a unique funerary treasure, even if it had been plundered in antiquity. As a matter of fact, such a set of funerary material of the New Kingdom had never been found in a regular and

scientific excavation before this discovery (and after). This tomb and its material indeed shed new light on the period of the kings Amenhotep III and Amenhotep IV (Akhenaten). Moreover, the quality of many objects is noteworthy and is comparable to some artifacts discovered in the Theban tomb (KV 46) of Yuya and Tuya one century ago.6 It took two or three seasons at least (i.e., two or three years) before we could succeed, with the conservators of the mission,7 in giving meaning to many fragments of wood and to restore some wooden objects, and, at first, the coffins of the three owners of the tomb. Altogether there were nine coffins, three for each one, as we understood, and the lids of some of these coffins were not completely lost. Some were real masterpieces. But such a huge amount of work was waiting for us in the storerooms of the mission. And yet it took time before the discovery was acknowledged at its real value, due to several reasons, or so-called reasons. For example: the apparently bad condition of the discovered material (which needed several seasons of work and restoration to interpret all its significance). Or the “strange” context of the site, with the presence of the Antiquities resthouse and the Late and Graeco-Roman Bubasteion, with its catacombs of mummified cats. Or also the fact that Saqqara, in spite of all the discoveries and studies at this time, was known at first as an Old Kingdom cemetery. Moreover, it was difficult to admit that this tomb and its material, which were supposedly shedding some light on the Amarna Period (and which really do), did not seem so much “Amarnian” at first glance. Lastly, there is the puzzling identity of ‘Aper-El: instead of considering that a vizier and a father of the god (inter alia) unknown before, for a period we are supposed to know so well, brings important new data, many limit themselves to saying that this man was just a “foreigner,” which is certainly not true, or not so simple.8

4 And alas, not only this tomb: in the early eighties of the last century, we saw the progressive destruction of the tomb Bub. I.6, belonging to the chancellor Nehesy, certainly the man of the famous Punt expedition under the reign of Hatshepsut: see A. Zivie, “Un chancelier nommé Nehesy,” in Mélanges Adolphe Gutbub (Montpellier, 1984), 245-252. 5 Découverte à Saqqarah, p. 125ff. 6 About the funerary material (treasure) discovered in the tomb, see A. Zivie, “Recherches et découvertes récentes dans la tombe d’Aperia à Saqqarah,” in Comptes rendus de l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres (Paris, April-June

1989), 490-505; Zivie, “Le trésor funéraire du vizir ‘Aper-El,” in BSFE 116 (1989), 31-44; Zivie, “The ‘Treasury’ of ‘AperEl,” EA 1 (1991), 26-28. 7 Mrs. Valérie Lacoudre and Mr. Jean-Baptiste Latour, later joined by Mrs. Aleth Lorne. 8 A “foreign” name is not enough to make a foreigner… On this question, see Zivie, “Le nom du vizir ‘Aper-El,” and Zivie, “Le vizir ‘Aper-El au Musée,” in Egyptian Museum Collections around the World : Studies for the Centennial of the Egyptian Museum, Cairo 2 (Cairo, 2002), 1261-1274.

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Immediately after they were discovered, the objects and all the fragments were deposited in the two adjacent storerooms built at the site, close to the Inspectorate. In one of these storerooms, we even built a laboratory well fitted for conservation, restoration, photography of the coffins at the same scale, etc. The material was studied and when possible restored before being published on an ongoing basis. Of course, a large percentage of this material, particularly the wooden coffins and the elements of furniture, was in very bad condition. The conservators of the mission succeeded in reconstituting objects from small and shapeless fragments and preserving them. But some other objects were, on the contrary, in very good condition, after having received adequate treatment. Then, after the discovery of the burial chamber itself, came the time of new surprises and discoveries: in the storerooms, indeed, but even in the tomb itself. The work realized on the objects, even on some material apparently devoid of meaning that was found in the burial chamber, gave us the opportunity to discover objects whose presence, at first, we were unaware of.9 It was a kind of resurrection or rebirth. But at the same time, a big surprise was waiting for us in the tomb itself. After a few seasons of work, we had the feeling that there was nothing more to be recovered from the tomb, particularly at its upper level, where the larger part of the chapel was missing, certainly destroyed or collapsed. But, preparing the final plans, we needed more information, and we tried to remove some later blocking or masonry that we could see in some places, as well as in other spots in the cliff. Carefully removing the blocking, we discovered that a large portion of the chapel was still preserved, and well preserved, with its paintings, inscriptions and decoration.10 This coup de théâtre and its consequences brought us an unexpected amount of scientific, but also conservation and site-management, work, always during tooshort seasons. But then came also the time of dispersion, which is sad, and can even be negative in the

case of an important archaeological discovery that brought to light rich material, in quantity and quality.11 This is, nevertheless, what began to happen to the funerary treasure of ‘Aper-El and his family. As is usual in such cases, two elements played their part: gold and beauty. Gold, because there are legal regulations about the antiquities, the legitimacy of which we perfectly understand, due to the always-crucial problem of security: gold objects and elements must be transferred to, and kept in, the Egyptian Museum, without exception. Beauty, because the archaeological and historical importance of the whole discovered in the tomb, and particularly of some its elements, goes often with an evident beauty. As a matter of fact, many of the objects are real “pieces de musée,” as we say in French, and so some of them became, but sometimes following strange and sinuous ways, as we shall see. For many years now, the gold objects, even the fragmentary ones, found in the funerary chamber of the vizier and his family have been transferred to the Cairo Museum (Egyptian Museum), and specifically to the jewelry room on the second floor. The pieces from tomb Bubasteion I.1 are kept in a case along the western (left) wall of the room, near the northwest corner.12 This move has been realized in three phases, between September 1990 and November 1992, according to the progress of the work of conservation done in the mission’s lab on the site. These ornaments and elements of jewels, in gold, faience, glass, or gilded wood, were found during the excavation in the rock tomb of ‘Aper-El, mainly in the burial chamber, but also at upper levels, except for a much later statuette of Osiris.13 The exhibits include earrings, rings used as seals (they belonged to Tauret), fragments of a collar or a pectoral with inlays, and beads or pieces of collar(s) of different types, in the shape of the nefer sign, or little palmettes. Two kinds of gold ribbons (fragmentary), which were found around the humeri of the vizier, are also particularly noticeable. One of the coffins contained

9 About this phase of the work and some examples, see Zivie, Lost Tombs of Saqqara, 44-45; Zivie, “Aper-El, Taouret et Houy: la fouille et l’enquête continuent,” BSFE 126 (1993), 5-16; V. Looten-Lacoudre, “Fouille et restauration de bijoux nouvellement découverts dans le matériel de la chambre funéraire d’‘Aper-El,” BSFE 126 (1993), 17-23. 10 See Zivie, Lost Tombs of Saqqara, 46-51. 11 About the beginning of this dispersion, see Zivie, in Egyptian Museum Collections around the World, 12611274.

12 At first, these objects were exhibited in their own case with some pictures of the discovery and the work. But some time later, the room in the Cairo Museum was completely transformed and refurbished, and the presentation of ‘AperEl’s objects received some modifications. 13 This piece (JE 98629) was discovered outside, in front of the cliff, and must be from the Late Period.

the “saga” of ‘aper-el’s funerary treasure some gold circular bands, as well as a well-preserved diadem, certainly belonging to the equipment of the mummy. These objects have been registered in the Journal d’entrée (JE), on three occasions, after preservation and presentation work done by the conservators of the Museum: A. September 8, 1990: 14 entries (JE 98587-98600); B. December 4, 1990: 8 entries (JE 98602-98609); C. November 26, 1992: 14 entries (JE 98616-98629). Altogether 36 items. Almost at the same time as gold objects came the time of “beautiful objects,” at first for a superb temporary exhibit organized by the SCA in Cairo. So, in the month of July 2002, six pieces from the tomb of ‘Aper-El were removed from the MAFB storerooms, having the honor of participating in the exhibit “The Hidden Treasures of the Cairo Museum,” opening in December 2002 in the Egyptian Museum, for its centenary.14 The five objects that were exhibited with “Hidden Treasures” later returned to Saqqara and are now prominently displayed in the Imhotep Museum. But almost at the same time as the Cairo exhibition, other objects from the funerary treasure of ‘Aper-El experienced a different fate. Because of their often-exceptional character, and more generally, because of their beauty, a certain number were chosen to be put on display in one of Egypt’s new museums. Such is the case with the canopic jars of Tauret, ‘AperEl’s wife, and some stone vessels that were also discovered in the vault. Thirteen objects have been removed from the storerooms on November 11, 2002, indeed, to be transported to the museum of the Great Library of Alexandria, where they have been on display for some years. Of the thirteen objects moved to Alexandria, only ten were discovered in the tomb of ‘Aper-El: four canopic jars with their lids, belonging to the lady Tauret, and two alabaster vessels. The three other numbers have nothing to do with this tomb, but are a series of Late or Graeco-Roman Period

14

The numbers of these pieces in the SCA (former EAO) register of the MAFB at Saqqara are n° 28, 107, 130, 225, 172, and 220 A-B (these last two numbers are different pieces of one piece, a pectoral in schist), and 286 (a stela eventually not exhibited). In this list, the first five objects were superbly exhibited in a showcase, the last one is not. See also Z. Hawass in Hidden Treasures. 15 Amongst the exhibited objects, there are also two elements of a wooden harp, discovered in an upper level of the tomb Bub. I.1, in a different context, and therefore certainly not belonging to this ensemble. 16 Discovered in the “eastern tombs” communicating with ‘Aper-El’s and without doubt coming from his material, because a sherd from a wine jar and inscribed with the name

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amulets found in 1998 in the tomb of the lady Maïa (Bub. I.20). However, Dr. Zahi Hawass, Secretary General of the SCA, who has always been aware of the problems generated by the dispersion of such an ensemble, decided that all of the objects that had been transported formerly to Alexandria had to be brought back to Saqqara. Therefore, eventually Tauret’s canopic jars and vessels (and also the late amulets) came back to the Memphite necropolis after their long sojourn on the Mediterranean coast: the transfer and return trip occurred on May 11, 2007, with the efficient and kind help of the curators of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina Antiquities Museum and of the Director and Inspectors of Saqqara. Happily, the recent opening of the beautiful Imhotep Museum in Saqqara is changing a lot of things in this respect. Now “beautiful objects,” and not only those, can be exhibited on the site in outstanding conditions, even if temporary exhibits can be organized here and there in the future. ‘Aper-El’s funerary treasure now has its own case in this museum (northwest room, righthand case). Some twenty objects are now exhibited (fig. 3), being amongst the most beautiful ones discovered in the tomb, we must confess, and including the five objects that had been exhibited in the Cairo Museum (“Hidden Treasures”) in 2002.15 Amongst them figure some elements connected to the mummy of ‘Aper-El (amulets, pectoral, etc.), and also two objects that became emblematic of the tomb: an ivory unguent palette in the shape of a Tilapia nilotica,16 and the head of a young woman in stuccoed and painted wood, which must have been the support of a wig.17 We can also quote two outstanding glass inlays representing the goddess Nut; they are parts of the lids of the inner coffins of the lady Tauret and the generalissimo Huy.18 Lastly, how not to mention here two cubit rods, one in schist, anepigraphic,

of the general Huy, which was discovered close to this palette à fard, perfectly fits the jar itself, found in the burial chamber. For this tilapia, which seemingly received the number JE 99124 after its passage in Cairo, see A. Zivie, “Tombes rupestres de la falaise du Bubasteion à Saqqarah—IIème et IIIème campagnes (1982-1983),” ASAE 70 (1985); and Découverte à Saqqarah, 65. 17 This wooden head has been published by A. Zivie, “Portrait de femme. Une tête en bois stuqué récemment découverte à Saqqarah,” RdE 39 (1988), 179-195. See also Zivie, Découverte à Saqqarah, 83-86. 18 For these inlays, see Zivie, Découverte à Saqqarah, 109ff., and The Lost Tombs, 38-39.

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Fig. 3. General view of the case devoted to ‘Aper-El’s treasure in the Imhotep Museum, Saqqara. Picture A. Zivie © Hypogées.

and the other in wood, with the names and titles of ‘Aper-El?19 With the exhibition of beautiful, and even outstanding, pieces in the Imhotep Museum at Saqqara, and the return to the SCA storerooms at Saqqara of the objects once sent to Alexandria, the situation of this unusual ensemble seems, and is, better. But dispersion is still operating. Certain objects from the funerary treasure of ‘AperEl could perhaps enter the new museums in the Cairo region: the Museum of Egyptian Civilization, which is now under construction in Fustat,20 and the Grand Museum of Egypt, north of the pyramids, a grandiose edifice that is planned for the coming years. The last, and perhaps the most important, event in the endless saga of ‘Aper-El’s tomb treasure happened at the end of the year 2007 with the moving of the MAFB storerooms to the new storerooms of the SCA. Due to new site-management policies of the SCA, indeed, all the storerooms constructed on the plateau of Saqqara have to be

emptied and dismantled. Naturally, the rich material gathered by the mission over the years is no exception to this rule. The mission, therefore, had to leave its former storerooms on the plateau in December 2007, and to move, rather quickly, all of their contents (including many more objects than ‘Aper-El’s) into the new storeroom n° 2 of the SCA, north of the storeroom n° 1 and the Imhotep Museum at the limit of the valley. This move, realized in good conditions due to the help of the authorities of Saqqara and the conservators of the mission (Mr. Fabrizio Finotelli and particularly Ms. Vanessa De Castro Dutra), is not without consequences, at least for a while, for two reasons. First, the mission had two storerooms (one being a real lab) of altogether 200 m2 on the plateau and has now only one of 50 m2 in its new premises. Second, the transportation of the remains of the nine coffins that were originally in the tomb has been a challenging operation for such fragile material. Moreover, this particular material still has to find its definitive location, which will allow

19 After having been exhibited in the Cairo Museum, they received the ref. JE 99121 (schist cubit), and JE 99120 (wooden cubit). About this last object particularly, see Zivie, in Egyptian Museum Collections around the World. 20 I understand that a certain number of objects removed

for some years from the storerooms of the mission, including “beautiful objects” from ‘Aper-El’s tomb, are already in the Civilization Museum, but still in boxes.


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us to continue the difficult work of presentation, which these sadly damaged but exceptional coffins still deserve in the future, in spite of all the important conservation work already realized.

But at the same time, the finder of this precious treasure rescued from destruction and oblivion would like to hope that he will not have to set off, again and again, on the trail of these traveling “beautiful” objects!21

21 I want to thank here Dr. Zahi Hawass, who strongly supports the necessity of keeping together the membradisjecta of ‘Aper-El. In this quest, I have also received the help of the Director of Saqqara, Mr. Osama El-Shimy, the Chief Inspectors, and the Inspectors, as well as the officials in charge of the Imhotep Museum and the new SCA storerooms. I also

take this opportunity to say how much the work on ‘AperEl’s material owes to Marie-Geneviève Froidevaux, whose drawings will be so precious for the forthcoming complete publication of the tomb and its material, once the last phase of work in the new storeroom is finished.

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index

357

INDEX

Abu Simbel, xxvi, 176, 223, 224-238, 240, 243, 281 earthquake damage, 10 Abydos, v, xxi, xxiii, xxiv, 1-4, 73-78, 105, 109, 113, 182 town, ix, 2, 151, 169, 189 royal funerary enclosures, 1-8 Ägyptisches Museum, Berlin, 119, 176 Ahmose, general, 281-282 Ahmose Nefertari, 212 Akhenaten, v, xxii, xxv, 39, 40, 42-43, 51, 79-81, 111, 133, 141, 143, 145-147, 149-150, 164, 212-213, 275, 322, 351 alabaster, 95, 133, 136-137, 139, 145, 279, 285, 293, 353 in forgery of antiquities, 137, 139 Alexandria, xxviii, 33, 38, 105, 198, 301, 303, 306, 308-310, 353-354 Graeco-Roman Museum, xxviii, 301, 303, 308-310 Allam, Shafik, 23, 31, 121 Amada inscriptions, 187 Amarna, v, xxiii, xxiv, 41, 43, 71, 79-80, 111-112, 133, 136, 138-143, 145-151, 159, 183, 211-215, 322, 328, 330-331, 351 Amarna Period, 41, 43, 79, 111-112, 133, 143, 145, 147, 149150, 183, 212-215, 326, 328, 330, 351 Amasis, xv, 45, 51, 53, 247, 347 Amélineau, E., 73, 78 Amenemhat, scribe, 39-43 Amenemhat I, xxi, xxii, 13-15, 19, 22, 34, 36-38, 67, 126, 201, 206-207 pyramid of, 11-14, 214, 296, 298 Amenemhat II, xxii, 13-15, 19, 34, 36-38, 67 Amenemhat III, xxii, 13-15, 19, 34, 36-38, 67 pyramid of, 13 Amenemhat IV, xxii, 34, 37-38 Amenhotep Huy, 212 Amenhotep II, v, vi, xxiii, xxiv, xxvi, xxviii, 9, 39, 41, 63-65, 67-69, 71-72, 95, 104-105, 107-108, 111, 119, 127, 136, 159, 162, 164-166, 183, 192, 209-210, 212, 214-215, 217, 221, 279, 285, 290, 292, 322, 326, 330, 334, 351 Amenhotep III, v, xxiii, xxviii, 9, 39, 41, 63-65, 67- 69, 71-72, 95, 104-105, 108, 111, 136, 159, 162, 183, 209210, 212, 214-215, 217, 285, 290, 292, 322, 330, 351 funerary temple of, 9, 285 Amenhotep IV, 69, 209, 212, 214-215, 241, 351 amulets, xxvi, 30, 178, 339, 341, 347, 353 Amun, 39, 41, 72, 81, 89, 94-95, 97, 101, 105, 113, 116-117, 119, 121, 159, 164, 182, 191, 196-197, 209, 212, 213-215, 221, 277, 309, 330, 332, 341 “Amun of the Hearing Ear,” 13 Amun-Re, 72, 95, 105, 119, 309 Anubis, 203, 269, 341, 343 ºAper-El, xxix, 349-355 Apis bull, 279, 281 Apis, murder of, 51 Apries, 98, 281, 319 archaism, 268 Arnold, Dieter, 57-58, 99 Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, xxiii, 73, 75-76, 123, 178, 180 Assmann, Jan, 121 Assyrian Art, 136, 139, 145, 147, 150-151 Aten, 39, 41, 79-81, 141, 145-146, 209, 212-213, 215 Atum, xxiv, 79, 105, 107 authentication of art, 136 Ay, 145, 209, 211, 212, 215, 334

back pillar, xxviii, 64-65, 69, 71-72, 108-109, 136, 139, 141, 143, 166, 281, 301, 303, 305, 309, 341, 344 Ba-neb-djed, temple of, xxvii, 271-275 banqueting, xxv, 161 Bastet, 50, 98-99, 169, 176, 189 Beit al-Kretliya, xxv, 179-180 Belzoni, Giovanni, 334 Beni Hasan, 17, 19-22, 24, 29 Benson, E. F., xxvii, 255, 257 Benson, Margaret, xxvii, 63-64, 67, 72, 85, 95-96, 98, 255256, 252, 322 Berliner Museum, xxiii, 79-81 Bia-Punt, xxii, 33, 36-38 Book of the Dead, v, 121-122, 124-131, 251, 343 Bothmer, Bernard V., viii, xi, xv, 68, 92, 195, 199, 281, 283, 303, 305, 310-311, 319 Bourriau, Janine, 17, 19 Breasted, Charles, 313 Breasted, James Henry, 188-189, 313, 317 Breasted, James Henry, Jr., 317 British Museum, London, xv, xxiii, xxviii, 67-68, 136, 138139, 180-181, 195, 287, 289, 305, 315 Brooklyn Museum, v, vii, xii, xiii, xxiii, xxvii, xxviii, 39, 83, 85, 92, 95, 99, 100, 105, 179, 182, 195, 215, 244, 253, 255, 262, 279, 310, 315, 319, 321, 329 Expedition, xviii, xxiii, xxvi, xxvii, 1, 83, 85, 95, 98-99, 111, 217, 234, 321 Brunner, Hellmut, 123 Bryan, Betsy, 98, 253, 262 Bubasteion, at Saqqara, xxix, 349-353 Bubastis, xxiv, 99, 112, 176, 189, 197 temple, 9 Buhl, Marie-Louise, 45 Burkard, Günter, 123 burning of temples, by Persians, 51 Busiris, 201, 204 Byma, 115-116 Callimachos, 307, 309 Cambyses, 46, 51, 53 canopic jars, 41, 353 Caviglia, G.B., 55 Champollion, Jean-François, 334 Chlamydia, 153, 155-157 Coffin Texts, 122, 125, 127, 249, 343 colossal head, 68, 176, 290, 320 Contra-Temple, v, xxiii, xxvii, 83-87, 92, 94-101, 255, 261 Coptos, 33, 36, 38 crown prince, 295, 297-298 crow’s feet, 313, 315 Cusae, 22, 28-30 Dahshur, v, xxi, 9, 11, 13-14, 295, 298 earthquake damage, 9-11 Darius, 53, 347 Deir el-Bahri, 9, 34, 113, 119, 277, 279 Deir el-Medina, 41, 112-113, 119, 121-128, 132, 166-167, 196 Delos, 303, 308 Delta, v, xii, 9, 23, 169, 187-190, 193, 196-198, 201, 247, 271, 279, 306-307, 319 eastern, ix, 24, 34, 36, 85, 171, 189-190, 192-193, 213, 258, 265, 271, 285, 287, 351, 353

358

index

Dendera, 79, 306, 310 Description de l’Égypte, xxvii, 253 destruction of temples, by Persians, 51 Detroit Institute of Arts, 83, 253 Dewen (Den), xxiii, 73, 76-78 Dimeh, 301, 306, 309-311 Diodorus, 51, 56 Djedefre, 296-298 Djehutynefer, v, xxiv, 115-117, 119 Djoser, king, 4, 298 dog, 41, 263, 266, 268-269 Dreyer, Günter, xii, xv, 2 Drovetti, Bernardino, 115, 119 Dunham, Dows, 217 dwarf, 21 Dzikowski, Francis, xxv, xxvi, xxix, 178, 181-182, 184, 335336 ear, 4, 64, 94, 103, 105, 109, 111, 113, 266, 277, 303, 313, 330 pierced, 109, 143 earthquake, xii, xxi, 9-14, 287, 293, 333 Eastern Desert, 33-34, 38 Ebers Papyrus, 153, 155 Egremont, Earls of, 133, 138, 149 Egypt Exploration Fund, xviii, xxiv, 5 Egyptian Museum, Cairo, xxiv, 83, 92, 100, 176, 279, 281, 328, 351 Egyptian Museum, Turin, 112, 115, 119, 241 el-Bersheh tombs, xxi, 10-11 Elephantine, 51, 100-101, 196, 198, 206, 230 elite, 22, 28, 126-128, 188 Ptolemaic, 301, 312, 308-310 Eye of Re, 97-98 eyebrows, 68, 103, 105, 115, 139, 171, 176, 279, 281, 313, 315, 319, 330, 343-344 plastic, 315 eyes, 17, 39, 68-70, 103, 105, 108-109, 111, 115, 129, 139, 141, 171, 176, 183, 243, 250, 266, 303, 306, 308, 313, 315, 319, 330, 339, 343-344, 346 Fazzini, Richard, xii, xv, 83, 253, 310 Federkrone, 79 First Intermediate Period, 19, 50-51, 125, 128, 196, 201, 275 Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, 17, 179-180, 182-183 history of, 1, 6, 41, 53, 85, 177, 209, 240, 277, 281, 301, 349 forgery, 138-151 French expedition, xxvii, 253, 255, 334 fringe, 20 Frith, Francis, 334 garments, 21, 29, 31, 309 female, vii, xxiii, xxiv, 19,-23, 28-31, 86, 95, 97-99, 111, 141, 147, 156, 159, 182-183, 206, 301, 303, 306, 308, 327, 329 Ptolemaic draped, 303, 309-310 Garstang, John, 17, 19 Gayer-Anderson, R.G., xxv-xxvi, 177-184 Gayer-Anderson, Theo, 179, 181 Gayer-Anderson, Thomas, 177-180 Gebel Barkal, xxvi, 92, 217, 220 Gebel es-Silsilah, 166 generalissimo, 351 Giza, xxvi, xxviii, 45, 55-56, 127, 203, 209, 214, 295-299, 322, 333 Eastern Cemetery, 295-296, 298-299 mastabas, 45, 206, 295-299 God’s Wife of Amun, 98, 197 Goldhorusname, 80

Golenischeff, Wladimir, 45 Gonorrhea, 153, 156 Götterstatue, 77 Gourlay, Janet, xxvii, 63-64, 85, 95, 98, 255-256, 261 Graeco-Roman Museum, Alexandria, xxviii, 304, 309-310 graffiti, xxiv, 55, 92-94 foot, 94 Great Pyramid, v, 55-56, 58-60, 62 Greaves, John, 55 greywacke, 69, 279, 281, 309, 319 hair, 17, 23-24, 28-30, 63, 67, 92, 103, 109, 111, 113, 133, 156, 182, 193, 266, 297, 303, 306, 309, 328, 344 Hathor, xxiv, 17, 22, 23, 28-31, 81, 85, 98-100, 113, 125, 213-214, 279, 281, 322 temple of, xxvi, xxvii, 9-10, 28, 51, 83, 95, 105, 107, 169, 196, 212-215, 217, 234, 238, 241, 255, 261, 271, 274, 277, 326, 332 Hathor-head capitals, 99-100 Hatshepsut, 67, 98, 105, 107, 166, 277, 307, 327, 329, 351 Hearst, William Randolf, 317, 320 Heliopolis, xv, 187, 191-192, 249, 285 Henettawy, queen, 72 nurse, 165 Hermitage Museum, xxii, 45-50, 52 Herodotus, 51, 53, 56, 98, 247 Herpes, 153, 157 Hetepheres II, 296-297 Hierakonpolis, 1, 74-75 hieroglyphs, xxiv, 43, 46, 50, 53, 93, 122, 124-131, 139, 166, 181, 203, 281, 322, 344 cursive, 122, 124-130 Horakhty, 39, 263, 343 Horeau, Hector, 334 Horemheb, 71, 107, 109, 162, 165, 192, 209, 211, 214, 303, 307, 309, 331, 334 Hornung, Erik, 334 Houdin, Jean-Pierre, 58-61 Human Papilloma Virus (HPV), 153-154 Huy, 164, 326, 349, 353 generalissimo, 349, 353 priest of Montu, 326 viceroy of Nubia, 326 Iahmes, vi, xxii, xxix, 45-51, 53, 339, 341, 343-345, 347 Prince, Overseer of the Army, son of Amasis son of Psamtikseneb, 339, 343 Inkarnation, 79, 81 Institut Géographique National, 257 Intef I, 206, 268 internal ramp, xxii, 55, 59-60, 61-62 Iseum (Behbet el-Hagar), 9 Isheru, 87, 95-99 Isis, 81, 100, 214, 224, 241, 243, 279, 341, 343-344 Jahrestäfelchen, xxiii, 75 Johns Hopkins University, 63, 95, 98, 166, 209, 253 Kačičnik, Matjaž, 336 Kahun, 153, 196 Karabasken, 263, 264, 266 Karakhamun, vi, xxvii, 263, 264, 266, 268, 269 Karnak, v, vi, xxvii, xxix, 71, 72, 81, 83, 85, 92, 94, 95, 96, 97, 98, 99, 101, 105, 107, 108, 111, 119, 136, 146, 183, 187, 188, 189, 190, 191, 192, 193, 201, 203, 220, 253, 255, 257, 258, 266, 301, 309, 321, 322, 330, 332 Temple, v, vi, xxii, xxiii, xxvii, xxix, 28, 63, 64, 65, 67, 69, 70, 71, 72, 80, 83, 85, 92, 94, 95, 96, 97, 98, 99, 100, 101, 105, 107, 146, 164, 169, 176, 197, 212, 213, 215,

index 221, 223, 234, 238, 241, 253, 255, 258, 261, 271, 275, 285, 321, 322, 326, 337 Kartusche, 79, 80, 81 Kawab, vi, xxviii, 295, 296, 297, 298, 299 Khaemhat, 214 Khamerernebti I, 204, 297 Khnumhotep, 12, 19 Khonsu, 72, 81, 83, 89, 92, 94, 101, 326, 343 Khonsu-Ta, 326 Khufu, vi, 55, 214, 295, 296, 297, 298, 299 kiosk, royal, 162-165 Kom el-Ahmar, 187, 191, 192, 275 Kom el-Hettan, vi, 67, 68, 285, 292 Kompositstatue, 73, 74, 77, 78 Königsname, 79 Königsstatue, 77 Koregentschaft, 79 Kushite, 83, 92, 195-197, 263, 264, 266, 268-269, 277, 326 Late Egyptian, 45, 122-124, 188-190, 245, 301, 303, 347 Late Period, v-vi, xi, xv, 45, 83, 92, 99, 107, 130, 169, 195199, 245, 263-264, 268, 277-279, 281, 301, 303, 310, 313, 315, 317, 321-322, 339, 344, 347, 352 art of, vii, xii, 92, 122, 159, 169, 195, 223, 263, 266, 339 Lavenham, 179-180 Leclant, Jean, 45, 94 Lefébure, Eugène, 334 Lepsius, Karl Richard, xviii, xxvii, 145, 159, 162, 255-256, 258-259, 263, 334 Leverhulme, Lord, 149 Libyans, 187-93 Lieblein, Jens, 45 Lisht, xxi, 13-14, 29 earthquake damage, 13-15 Lisht-North, 201, 206-207 Lisht-South, 10, 19 Locken, 74, 77-78 Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), xxviii, 317320 Louvre, Paris, 67-68, 70-71, 136, 138, 291, 332, 339 Luxor Museum, 64, 68, 71 Lythgoe, Albert, 179 Mahu, 115-116, 119 Maia, nurse of Tutankhamun, 327, 330 maiming of hieroglyphs, 50 Manassa, Colleen, 188-190 Mariette, Auguste, xxvii, 4, 45, 255-256, 279, 309 Maru-Aten, 141 Maske, 73-74, 77-78 Matthiew, Militsa, 45 Maya, chief treasurer, 330-332 Medinet Habu, 69, 71, 128, 192-193, 292, 337 Mehit, 113 Meidum, 10, 166, 295, 298 Meketaten, 145 Memnon, colossal statues, 9, 285, 293 Memphis, xviii, 4, 10, 71, 98, 107, 111-112, 132, 187, 192, 196-198, 212-213, 251, 279, 295, 305, 310, 331, 347 Memphite, xxv, 15, 136, 182, 192, 197, 212, 215, 305, 331, 353 Mendes, vi, xii, 271, 275 menit, 23, 105, 164-165 Mentuemhat, vii, xxvii, 83, 87, 89, 92, 96, 99, 101, 195, 197, 258, 268, 277-278, 344 Mentuherkhepeshef, 334 Mentuhotep-Nebhepetre, 201, 203 Mentuhotep-Seankhkare, 201 Mentuhotep temple, 9 Merenptah, 9, 64, 67, 69, 71-72, 187-193, 271, 274, 334 Meritaten, 139, 141

359

Mersa/Wadi Gawasis, 33-34, 36, 38 Meryre I, 212 Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 11 Middle Kingdom, v, vii, xiii, xv, 9, 13, 14, 17, 19, 21-22, 24, 29-31, 33-34, 36, 50, 119, 122-123, 125, 127, 171, 176, 183, 189, 197, 203-206, 215, 247, 268, 275, 278, 313, 315, 326, 329 Min, 36, 38, 95, 275, 341 Mission Archéologique Française du Bubasteion (MAFB), 349-354 Moran, Thomas, 147-149 Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, xiii, xxi, xxiii-xxiv, xxvi, 19, 22, 74-75, 105, 109, 136, 217, 307 Mut, v-vi, xv, xxii- xxiii, xxvii, xxix, 63-65, 67-72, 83-85, 87, 89, 92, 94-99, 101, 122, 133, 182, 253, 255, 257-258, 261, 321, 322, 326, 330 precinct of, xxvii, xxix, 85, 94-95, 253-255, 257, 261, 321-326 temple of, xxii- xxiii, xxvii, 63-65, 67, 69-72, 83-101, 255-258, 321 Mutia, nurse of Tutankhamun, 330 mutilations of inscriptions, 46, 50-51, 53 Mycerinus, 297 Nakhtiset, 341 Narmerpalette, 77-78 Naukratis, 247, 306, 310 Nebengräber, 77 Nebit, mastaba of, xxi, 11-15 Nebmehyt, standard-bearer, 326 Nectanebo I, vi, xxiii, xxviii, 85-86, 97, 107, 317, 319-320, 347 Nectanebo II, xxiii, 85-86, 97, 107 Neferhotep, 211-212, 326 Neferitatjenenet, 207 Nefermaat, 10, 295, 298-299 Neferti, 51, 201 Nefertiti, xxix, 79, 81, 111, 133, 141, 145, 149, 322, 331 Neferu, 30-31, 207, 329 Nefret, vi, xxvi, 201, 204, 206 Nefru[-sheri?], 206 negative space, xxiv, 67, 133, 136-138, 281 Nekhtbastetru, queen, xxii, 45-47, 50-53 nemes, 63, 68, 70, 105, 107, 148-149, 220, 319 Nephthys, 343-344 Nesptah, 83 New Kingdom, xxii, xxiv, 11, 17, 24, 33-34, 36, 40, 42, 43, 56, 64, 67, 85, 94, 95, 97-98, 100-101, 113, 119, 122, 126128, 132, 136, 181, 187, 190, 196, 201, 209, 212-213, 221, 266, 268, 275, 279, 313, 322, 326, 327-331, 347, 349, 351 Noth, Martin, 187 nurse, 164-167, 303, 326-330 Nut, 343-344, 353 Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek, Copenhagen, xxviii, 119, 307, 310 offering formula, 203, 322, 326, 328, 343-344 Old Kingdom, 19, 29, 34, 50, 56, 95, 121, 127, 196, 201, 203, 205-206, 215, 233, 242, 266, 268, 278-279, 295, 339, 343, 347, 351 O’Rourke, Paul, xii, xv, 83 Osiris, xxiv, xxvi, 23, 47, 49, 81, 92, 98, 105, 107, 108, 113, 115-117, 119, 179, 203-204, 211-212, 251, 266, 279, 303, 330, 341, 343-345, 352 temple, xxi, xxvi-xxviii, 9, 10, 13, 24, 28-30, 34, 41, 45, 51, 63, 65, 67, 69, 72, 81, 83, 85, 92, 94-99, 101, 105, 107, 113, 125, 128, 166, 169, 176, 182, 187, 196, 212215, 217, 221, 224, 230, 232, 234-235, 237-238, 240243, 249, 253, 255, 257-258, 261-262, 271, 274-275, 277, 283, 285, 293, 301, 303, 307-309, 321-322, 326, 332, 343

360

index

Padibastet, 341 “palace” façade, 3-4 Papyrus of Ani, 129-130 Paser, standard-bearer, 322, 326 Pepy-yema, xxvii, 271 Per-Barset, 188-190 personal piety, 112 Petrie, W.M.F., 55-56, 73, 75 Petrovsky, Nikolai, 51 Piankoff, Alexandre, 334 Piay, 112 Pikhaâs, 309 Pinudjem I, 72 Plunder Lists, 187-188, 191-193 precinct of, 63, 201, 253 priest of Montu, 326 Post-Amarna Period, 212, 214-215, 330 proportions, 4, 6, 21, 67, 97, 139, 143, 278, 309, 331, 337, 347 provenance, 21, 39, 98, 113, 115, 139, 147-151, 277, 279, 305, 309-310, 313 Psamtik, vii, xv, 45, 51, 53, 247, 268, 279, 283, 347 Psamtik III, 45, 51, 53 Psamtikseneb, vi, 339, 347 Ptah-Sokar-Osiris, xxix, 341, 344, 347 Ptah-Tatenen, 108 Ptolemaic elite, 301, 303 Ptolemaic Period, 92, 97-98, 171, 183, 196, 198, 258, 301, 305, 321, 345 Ptolemy II, 85, 310 Ptolemy VI, xxiii, 85, 89, 97, 100, 261, 308, 309 Ptolemy VIII, xxiii, 85, 89, 97, 100 Ptolemy IX, 309 Ptolemy X, 303, 305, 309, 326 Punt, xxii, 33, 34, 36-38, 351 Pylon, vi, xxvii, 63, 71, 81, 85, 94, 96, 99, 258, 271, 274-275, 293, 321, 330 Pyramid Texts, 50, 122, 131, 248 Qadesh, 188 Quantapoint Imaging System, 337 Quartzite, 150 Rameses I, v, xxiv, xxvi, 9-10, 67-69, 71, 95, 107, 111, 127128, 132, 169, 171, 176, 182, 187-190, 192-193, 234, 255, 271, 279, 281, 326, 334, 336-337 Rameses II, v, xxiv, xxvi, 9-10, 67-69, 71, 95, 107, 111, 128, 132, 169, 171, 176, 182, 187-190, 192-193, 234, 255, 271, 279, 281, 326, 334, 336-337 sons of, 215, 296, 326, 344 Rameses III, 9, 128, 187, 189, 192-193, 255, 334, 337 temple at Medinet Habu, 128, 192, 255, 337 Rameses IV, 71, 334 Rameses V/VI, xxix Rameses VII, 334 Rameses IX, 127, 334 Ramesside Period, 95, 109, 111-113, 121-122, 125, 130, 189, 210, 322 Ramose, vi, xxvi, 164, 182, 209-215, 263, 330 vizier, vii, 33, 125, 206, 210-211, 295, 326, 330, 349, 351-352 ramp, xxii, 34, 56-62 Red Sea, v, 30-31, 33-34, 36, 38 Rehuerdjersen, 201 Reisner, George A., 296-297, 217, 317 retrograde writing, 121, 128-130 Risley Lanx, 139, 150-151 Roman Period, xxv-xxvi, 9, 72, 92, 94, 100, 181-183, 257, 305, 353 Roscoe, 147-149, 151

Rosellini, Ippolito, 354 Rundplastik, 73, 315 Russmann, Edna, 311, 315, 331 sacred oil, 268-269 Saite Period, 247, 347 San Antonio Museum of Art, vi, xxvii, 277, 281 sandal graffiti, 94 Saqqara, vi, xxix, 4, 9, 73, 111, 196, 213, 279, 298, 322, 326, 329-330, 339, 343, 347, 349, 351-355 Step Pyramid complex, 4 sarcophagi, anthropomorphic, 45 Saww, v, 33, 36 Schenkel, Wolfgang, 123 Scribe, xxii, 39-41, 116-117, 119, 131, 162, 212-215 of the Counting of the Grain, 39, 41 of Counting the Cattle and Fowl, 116 Sea Peoples, 187-193 Second Intermediate Period, 196-197, 201, 322 Seidlmayer, Stephan, 19 Sekhmet, xxii, xxviii, 63-64, 72, 85, 98, 255, 285, 291-292, 317 Sekhmetnefret, 341 Senenmut, 329 Senwosret, xxi, 11-14, 19, 21, 31, 33-34, 150, 201, 207, 307, 313, 315 Senwosret I, xxi, 11-14, 19, 21, 31, 33-34, 150, 207, 307, 313, 315 Senwosret II, xxi, 11-14, 19, 34, 150, 313, 315 Senwosret III, xxi, 11-14, 19, 34, 150, 313, 315 Seshu, v, xxiv, 115-117, 119 Sethnakht, 334 Sety I, xxiv, xxv, 105, 109, 111, 149, 151, 213, 250, 334 Sety II, 334 shabti, 39, 41, 43, 233, 264, 341 Sheikh abd el-Qurna, 159, 164-165 Sheshonq, High Priest of Amun, 330-332 Sethnakht Shu, 79-81, 341 Shulman, Alan, 188 sidelock, 133, 139, 141 Sikaherka, 315 Silverton Park, 133, 136, 138, 145, 149-151 Simpson, William Kelly, xii, 297 Siptah, 9, 156, 334 Sit-Re, nurse of Hatshepsut, 327, 329 Smith, W. St. (William Stevenson), viii, 73-75, 77, 195, 297 Smyth, Piazzi, 55-56 Sneferu, 30, 295, 299 Sonnenstrahlen, 79 South Asasif, 263 Spalinger, Anthony, 188-190 sphinx, vii, xxv, xxvi, 96, 145-147, 149-150, 217, 220-221 Spycket, Agnès, 28 Staatliche Sammlung Ägyptischer Kunst, Munich, xxiv, 104, 311 statues, vii, xxii, xxiii, xxviii, 63-64, 67-69, 71-72, 77, 85-86, 94-96, 98-99, 107, 111, 113, 133, 141, 145-147, 159, 166, 169, 176, 179, 198, 217, 279, 281, 285, 287, 290-293, 297, 301, 303, 305-309, 313, 315, 321, 326, 329, 331, 332 block, xxiii, xxiv, 15, 59, 85-87, 89, 94-96, 98, 111, 113, 136, 203, 258, 263, 271, 274, 292, 301, 303, 307, 328329 bronze, 24, 105, 107, 179, 190, 303, 308-309, 322, 329, 341 cuboid, 111, 113 Greek, xi, 10, 51, 92, 245-251, 281, 301, 303, 306-310, 317, 319, 339, 347 over life-size Ptolemaic elite Statuenkammer, xxiii, 76-78

index statuette, ivory, 19-20 steatopygia, 136 stelae, 30, 34, 36, 38, 50, 94-95, 112, 127-128, 285, 292, 322, 347 Strabo, 51, 247-248 style, vii, 29, 41, 43, 68-69, 85, 87, 92, 97, 100, 123, 125, 127, 129, 149-150, 159, 162, 165-166, 176, 196, 212, 266, 301, 303, 305-309, 315, 319, 328-331, 347 Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA), 333 Syphilis, 153, 156 Taharqo, 257-258, 261, 264 crypt of, 13-14 Taheret, 343 Tanis, 71, 171, 176, 189, 196, 301, 305-306, 309 Ta-Sety, vi, 201 Tasheryiset, daughter of Nakhtiset, 341 Tauret, wife of ‘Aper-El, 349, 352-353 Tausret, 334 Tehneh, Fraser Tombs, 10 Tell Basta, v, xxv, 9, 169, 170, 176, 189 Temple of Mut in Asher, xxvii, 63, 72, 85, 255 Theban Mapping Project, vi, xxix, 333, 336-337 Thebes, xxii, xxvi, 10, 22, 30-40, 42-43, 85, 101, 112-113, 119, 124, 128, 132, 159, 162, 164, 167, 181-182, 187, 189, 196-197, 211-212, 215, 230, 264, 268, 277, 307, 309, 322, 330, 336 Thutmose III, xxvii, 9, 39, 41, 67, 94, 96, 98, 105, 107, 113, 115, 119, 164-165, 187-189, 210, 275, 322, 334 Thutmose IV, xxii, xxiv, 39-43, 67-68, 103-105, 107-108, 127, 162, 164-166, 328, 330, 334 Tjainu, son of Padibastet, 341 tombs, royal, 2, 124, 127-128

361

tourism, 333 Trachoma, 155-157 trichiasis, 155-156 Turaev, Boris, 46 Tutankhamun, 51, 67, 133, 149, 183, 209, 212-213, 215, 223, 229, 233, 240, 322, 326-328, 330-331, 333-334 twin, xxv, 177-178, 180, 295, 298 Udjahorresent, 51 Umm el-Qa’ab, 2 Usermont, vizier, 326 Usersatet, 165-167 Valley of the Kings, vi, xxix, 124, 127-128, 131, 181, 211, 333, 336-338 Vollbart, 74, 78 Wadi Gawasis, 33-34, 36, 38 Warner, Nicholas, 179, 181-182 wedjat eyes, 23, 339 wesekh collar, 115, 343, 344 Western Desert, v, 187, 189-193 wig, xxv, 63, 103, 105, 107-109, 111, 113, 115, 171, 217, 277, 279, 281, 297, 307, 313, 315, 326-328, 330-331, 343-344, 347, 353 asymmetrical, 111, 313 women, 22-24, 28-31, 94, 99, 105, 109, 136, 153-155, 157, 164-165, 206, 303, 308 wood, xxi, xxii, 4, 8, 12, 17-18, 24, 36, 38-40, 42-43, 56, 101, 127-128, 181, 184, 341, 343-345, 351-354 Würfelstab, xxiii, 76-78 Zeremonialbart, 77-78

index

362

Dynasties Dynasty 1, xxiii, 2, 73-74, 77, 297 Dynasty 2, 1 Dynasty 3, 4 Dynasty 4, 10, 204, 295-296 Dynasty 5, 203, 297 Dynasty 6, 34, 127, 197 Dynasty 11, 30, 125, 206, 268, 315 Dynasty 12, xv, 10, 11, 19, 22, 29, 33-34, 111, 125, 128, 203, 206, 268, 315 Dynasty 13, 315 Dynasty 17, 209 Dynasty 18, 29, 34, 39, 40, 42-43, 71, 98, 105, 109, 115, 119,

126, 128-129, 162, 164, 166, 176, 179, 182, 196, 209-211, 257, 275, 322, 326-327, 329-331 Dynasty 19, 109-111, 119, 182, 197, 213 Dynasty 20, 99, 124, 195 Dynasty 21, 63, 72, 94, 127, 129, 183, 195-196, 347 Dynasty 22, 330 Dynasty 25, 92, 94-97, 100, 182, 92-97, 195-198, 221, 263264, 257-258, 263, 321 Dynasty 26, vii, 45, 98, 195, 197-198, 264, 277, 279, 281, 313, 317, 319, 344, 347 Dynasty 27, 195, 198 Dynasty 30, 85, 97, 319, 347

Theban Tombs (TT) 1, 41, 127 31, 326 33, 268 34, 268, 277 40, 212, 326 46, xxvi, 209-215 48, 210 49, 211-212 55, 182, 210-212 57, 214 63, 164 64, 164 77, 164 78, 161-162, 165 82, 39, 41 85, 164-165 88, 159, 164-165 89, 268 90, 159, 162, 167

91, 159, 167 93, 164-165 94, 164 95, 165 96, 165 98, 165 116, xxv, 159-167 132, 263 188, 212 192, 136, 210, 212 201, 164 223, 263 256, 164 279, 268 338, 322 350, 164 390, 263 391, 263-264 414, 268 Egyptian Words and Phrases

imy-r pr “Steward”, 212 imy-r pr m tA Hwt pA Itn “Steward of the Temple of Aten”, 212-213 imy-r mSa n nb tAwy “General of the Lord of the Two Lands”, 214 imy-r ssmt “overseer of the cavalry”, 326 imy-r ssmwt n nb tAwy “Overseer of the Horses of the Lord of the Two Lands”, 212 imy-r Snwty “Overseer of Granary”, 212 imy-r Snwty nw rsy mHw “Overseer of Double Granaries of Upper and Lower Egypt”, 212 ir.w DfAw=f “who provides his (the King’s) sustenance”, 331 mi.t nfr.t n.t Mw.t “the beautiful cat of Mut”, 322, 324 mwt-nswt “King’s Mother”, 203, 205 mnat nswt “Royal Nurse”, 164 msi aSm.w n.w nTr.w “to fashion the images of the gods”, 332 r-pat “Prince”, 159, 162 rnnw nb tAwy “who fosters the Lord of the Two Lands”, 331 rxt HAqw “Plunder List”, 187

HAty-a “Count”, 159, 162, 164, 166 Hm-nTr tpy n Imn m Mn-st “High Priest of Amun in Menset” (mortuary temple of Ahmose Nefertari), 212 Hry-iHw “stablemaster”, 326 sS nfrw “Scribe of Recruits”, 162 sS nsw “Royal Scribe”, 212 sS nsw mAa “True Scribe of the King”, 162 sS Hsb iHw Apdw “Scribe of Counting the Cattle and Fowl”, 116 sS Hsb iHw n Imn “Scribe of Counting the Cattle of Amun”, 117 sSm-Hb n Imn m Ipt-swt “Leader of the Festival of Amun in Karnak” , 332 sSm-Hb n (pA) nb nTrw “Leader of the Festival of the Lord of the Gods”, 332 sgrH tAwy n nb=f “who appeases the Two Lands (for his Lord)”, 331 kA nsw Hr a.wy=fy ra nb “the Royal Ka is in his hands every day”, 332 TAy xw Hr wnm nsw “Fanbearer on the Right of the King”, 212 TAw sryt “Standard-bearer”, 322 Tsw tA m sxrw=f “who ties the land together with his plans”, 331 sA.w aA n Nb-mAa.t-Ra “the great regiment of Neb-maat-Re”, 322

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Burnt Offerings

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Debt of Honor (Jack Ryan Novels)

Eye to Eye

Eye to Eye

Eye to Eye

Offerings to the discerning eye: an Egyptological medley in honor of Jack A. Josephson

an Eye for an Eye

An Eye for an Eye

An Eye for an Eye

Eye for an Eye

Eye for an Eye

In the Blink of an Eye

Eye for an Eye

Eye for an Eye

In the Blink of an Eye

An Eye of the Fleet

Eye of An Octopus

Eye of an Octopus

Eye of an Octopus

Eye of An Octopus

Blink of an Eye

Fool's Gold?: Discerning Truth in an Age of Error

Eye of an octopus

Eye of an Octopus

Discerning the Mystery: An Essay on the Nature of Theology

An Eye for a Tooth

Eye for an Eye The Doll

The Preacher's Daughters: Eye for an Eye

Burnt Offerings

Burnt Offerings

Peace Offerings

Effect Of Geometry On Fluxon Width In A Josephson Junction

Debt of Honor (Jack Ryan Novels)

Eye to Eye

Eye to Eye

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