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In the hedgehog shaped container is probably stored kohl.
Hedgehogs were believed to be observant as nocturnal animals, and a hedgehog awakening from hibernation was considered a symbol of rebirth. In ancient Egypt, hedgehogs were also eaten.
Faience
26th dynasty
Provenance unknown
Cat. 3375 Museo Egizio
Egypt of Glory exhibition, Amos Rex Art Museum, Helsinki
From the collection of Museo Egizio, Turin, Italy
9.10.2020-21.3.2021
Protective goddess Nekhbet was found in the tomb of Amenhotep II in Valley of the Kings, Western Thebes.
Vulture goddess who was the protector of Upper Egypt and especially its rulers. Nekhbet was responsible for protecting the body of the king in his afterlife journey.
Wood
18th dynasty, New Kingdom
Tomb of Amenhotep II, Valley of the Kings
NMEC National Museum of Egyptian Civilization, Fustat Cairo
Faience
Late Period
Egypt of Glory exhibition, Amos Rex Art Museum, Helsinki
From the collection of Museo Egizio, Turin, Italy
9.10.2020-21.3.2021
Wooden cosmetic boxes
The lids of boxes attached at the back open to reveal compartments for cosmetics. The box could be secured by winding twine around the two knobs at the front.
The elaborate decorations of cosmetic boxes were intended to imitate more expensive boxes inlaid with ebony, ivory, and perhaps cedar or mahogany.
NMEC National Museum of Egyptian Civilization, Fustat Cairo
The wooden anthropoid coffin of a man called "Aba son of Ankh Hor", ruler and governor of Upper Egypt and the Head of the treasury.
The coffin is fully decorated in the shape of a mummy resembling Osiris with the upturned ceremonial false beard and a wig. The eyes are inlaid with ivory and ebony. Iba wears a large multicoloured necklace, and the sky-goddess Nut appears on the chest area. The coffin lid is also decorated with texts from the Egyptian Book of the Dead and the base shows hieroglyphic inscriptions.
Organic material, sycamore wood
Late Period, 26th Dynasty, Saite Period
Provenance Upper Egypt, Luxor (Thebes), West Bank, Qurna
BAAM 829
Antiquities Museum of Bibliotheca Alexandrina
Statue of the sphinx, which has no history clearly. In the Ptolemaic period, it was common to place small sphinx statues in front of the temples to be used for protection and guarding.
Limestone
Ptolemaic Period
Kom Ombo
NMEC National Museum of Egyptian Civilization, Fustat Cairo
The wooden anthropoid coffin of a man called "Aba son of Ankh Hor", ruler and governor of Upper Egypt and the Head of the treasury.
Organic material, sycamore wood
Late Period, 26th Dynasty, Saite Period
Provenance Upper Egypt, Luxor (Thebes), West Bank, Qurna
BAAM 829
Antiquities Museum of Bibliotheca Alexandrina
Table games were very much appreciated in ancient Egypt with the most popular being Senet. The game was for two people and played on a rectangular board with the upper surface divided into thirty squares; probably the game consisted of moving tokens around the board following the throw of small battens that corresponded to our modern dice. The lower surface of the board was used for playing the twenty-square game.
Tutankhamun had four senet boards of which the largest was the most lavish. The squares were inlaid with ivory and the board itself rests on a small frame with supports in the form of lion' paws and fitted with runners. The drawer on the short side was found empty and removed from its housing and, as the tokens were missing, it is supposed that they were made from a valuable material and stolen by the tomb thieves. The token shown in the picture belonged to other, less magnificent, boards.
During the New Kingdom, Senet took on a magical-religious value and in the introductory formula in Chapter 17 of the Book of the Dead, it was considered essential that the deceased played a game against an invisible opponent to ensure his survival.
Valley of the Kings, Tutankhamun's tomb KV62
18th dynasty
JE 62059 - SR 1/82 - 580
Egyptian Museum, Cairo
When the Ptolemaic state was established in Egypt, art that arose in Alexandria was in a purely classical style. Then it was soon mixed with ancient Egyptian art and its ancient traditions. Statues of the Ptolemaic kings appeared in Egyptian features mixed with artistic influences from ancient Greece. This statue depicts a king from the Ptolemaic Period in a mixed style that expressed the merging of these two cultures together.
Black granite
Ptolemaic Period
unknown origin
NMEC National Museum of Egyptian Civilization, Fustat Cairo
Tutankhamun and Ankhesenamun hunting and fishing in the marshes.
Valley of the Kings, Tutankhamun's tomb KV62
18th dynasty
JE 62059 - SR 1/82 - 580
Egyptian Museum, Cairo
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In 1797 the British government authorized Matthew Boulton to strike copper pennies and twopences at his Soho Mint, in Birmingham. It was believed that the face value of a coin should correspond to the value of the material it was made from, so each coin was made from two pence worth of copper (2 ounces). This requirement means that the coins are significantly larger than the silver pennies minted previously. The large size of the coins, combined with the thick rim where the inscription was punched into the metal, led to the coins being nicknamed "cartwheels". All "cartwheel" twopences are marked with the date 1797. In total, around 720,000 twopences were minted.
This head of a colossal statue of Hatshepsut would once have crowned one of the Osirian pillars that decorated the portico of the third terrace of the queen's temple at Deir el-Bahri. It was discovered there in 1926 by the mission of the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art.
The portico was divided into two by a granite portal which preceded the 'Festival Hall', on to which opened the more intimate rooms of the temple and the sanctuary of Amun.
Some of the characteristic stylistic features of the statuary of Hatshepsut are present in this head. The face is triangular and the features are very delicate. The striking almond-shaped eyes, decorated with a line of kohl extending to the temples, have large dilated pupils, imparting a sense of innocence and purity. The slightly arched nose is long and slim. The small mouth is set in a faint smile. The same face is found not only on many other statues of the queen but also on those representing private individuals of the same period.
One unusual element is the dark red colour of the skin, usually a feature of male images, it is justified in this case by the fact that the queen is represented here as a pharaoh in Osirian form. The false beard painted blue emphasizes the divine nature of the 'king'. The blue colour of lapis lazuli, together with gold, signified divinity.
From what remains of the queen's headdress, it can be deduced that she wore the Double Crown symbolizing the union between Upper and Lower Egypt.
JE 56259 A - 56262
Egyptian Museum, Cairo
This gilded cartonnage mask shows Yuya wearing a long wig. His eyebrows and eyes are inlaid with blue glass, marble and obsidian. He wears an elaborate collar that goes beneath his wig. It consists of eleven rows of golden beads and it ends in teardrop-shaped pendants. The inside of the mask is covered in bitumen.
Titles of Yuya:
King’s Lieutenant
Master of the Horse
Father-of-the-god
18th dynasty
From the Valley of the Kings, KV46
Tomb of Yuya and Tuya
Upper floor, gallery 43
CG51008 - JE 95316-SR93
Egyptian Museum, Cairo
A coffin lid, or alternatively a mummy board, has been found in the vicinity of Theba with nine small shabti statues. The mummy boards were corpse-shaped wooden boards evolved from the lids of the coffins, placed on top of the mummy.
The objects were part of the Egyptian Khedive ruler's donation to the Russian emperor in the 1890s, 10 of which were further donated to the Helsinki Historical Museum in 1895. The cover of the anthropomorphic or human-shaped coffin has a deceased resting with its arms crossed next to it, as well as the sacred ibis, scarabs, priests, and nine rows of hieroglyphs.
Wood
21st dynasty
From the collection of the National Museum of Finland
Egypt of Glory exhibition, Amos Rex Art Museum, Helsinki
9.10.2020-21.3.2021
In the hedgehog shaped container is probably stored kohl.
Hedgehogs were believed to be observant as nocturnal animals, and a hedgehog awakening from hibernation was considered a symbol of rebirth. In ancient Egypt, hedgehogs were also eaten.
Faience
26th dynasty
Provenance unknown
Cat. 3375 Museo Egizio
Egypt of Glory exhibition, Amos Rex Art Museum, Helsinki
From the collection of Museo Egizio, Turin, Italy
9.10.2020-21.3.2021
Naos is a small religious shrine. It was used as a portable shrine to carry a god. The headless figurine lying on top of the naos model is probably shrew.
Limestone
Late Period
Egypt of Glory exhibition, Amos Rex Art Museum, Helsinki
From the collection of Museo Egizio, Turin, Italy
9.10.2020-21.3.2021
The Wedjat eye was a powerful symbol of protection encountered especially inside the shrouds of mummies. The Wedjat was also used for healing wounds; such an amulet was often placed on top of the incision made in the lower abdomen for the removal of the visceral organs.
Faience
Late Period
Egypt of Glory exhibition, Amos Rex Art Museum, Helsinki
From the collection of Museo Egizio, Turin, Italy
9.10.2020-21.3.2021
Nesikhonsu was the young wife of Pinedjem (Pinudjem) II. The mummy of Nesikhonsu was buried in two coffins. This one is the outer and it is intact with the gilded hands and face untouched by robbers contrary to the second coffin which has lost their hands and face.
Wood
From Deir el-Bahri
21st dynasty, reign of Pinedjem II
CG 61030
Egyptian Museum, Cairo
The cow Hathor, one of a group of statues of the protective goddesses found in the tomb of King Amenhotep II.
They were responsible for protecting the body of the king in his afterlife journey.
Wood
18th dynasty, New Kingdom
Tomb of Amenhotep II, Valley of the Kings
NMEC National Museum of Egyptian Civilization, Fustat Cairo
In each scene, the person conducting the rituals is portrayed as Pharaoh Sety I.
Red and black granite
19th dynasty
Provenance Heliopolis
S. 2676 Museo Egizio
Egypt of Glory exhibition, Amos Rex Art Museum, Helsinki
From the collection of Museo Egizio, Turin, Italy
9.10.2020-21.3.2021
One of the most important objects in a tomb was naturally the coffin that would protect its owner's mummy and incidentally preserve important information and research material for modern-day Egyptologists. During the New Kingdom coffins were often human-shaped. A deceased could have as many as three nested coffins.
Nakhtkhonsueru's wooden meticulously crafted coffin is representative of a typical Late Period coffin style. The maker has spread a layer of white plaster on the wooden lid and executed the paintings on the plaster. The coffin was discovered in the tomb of Prince Khaemwaset, son of Ramses III, among several other coffins. According to the inscriptions on the coffin, Nakhtkhonsueru was an important Theban person, "the Lord of the Necropolis at the temple of Amun".
25th dynasty
Egypt of Glory exhibition, Amos Rex Art Museum, Helsinki
From the collection of Museo Egizio, Turin, Italy
9.10.2020-21.3.2021
Detail of the statue of the Young Centaur discovered in Hadrian's Villa at Tivoli in 1736. Possibly a Roman copy in grey marble of a Hellenistic original in bronze. Capitoline Museum, Rome, 1998. Photographed with a Ricoh R1.
This statue represents one of the protective goddesses that were found in the tomb of king Amenhotep II. They were responsible for protecting the body of the king in his afterlife journey. It represents Meretseger in the form of the winged Cobra.
Meretseger, a Cobra goddess dwelling on the mountain overlooks the Valley of the Kings in western Thebes. During the New Kingdom Meretseger had great authority over the whole Theban necropolis area. She can appear as a coiled cobra or as a cobra with a female head and an arm projecting from the front of the snake’s hood.
Her name translated as ‘she who loves silence’, aptly descriptive of a deity protecting secluded royal tombs.
Wood
18th dynasty, New Kingdom
Tomb of Amenhotep II, Valley of the Kings
NMEC National Museum of Egyptian Civilization, Fustat Cairo
Queen Hetepheres' tomb contained a magnificent collection of wooden furniture including this fine example of a gilded chair.
The space between the arms, the seat, and the backrest is decorated with an elegant floral design, the dominant decorative element of the armchair. The floral design is composed of three papyrus flowers whose stems are tied with a band.
Old Kingdom, 4th dynasty, reign of King Khufu
From the tomb of queen Hetepheres I, G 7000X Giza Plateau
(JE 53263)
NMEC National Museum of Egyptian Civilization, Fustat Cairo
Este prisma de arcilla hexagonal es uno de los dos de Nínive con la misma inscripción real de Senaquerib escrita en acadio utilizando la escritura cuneiforme. Escrito en primera persona del rey, el texto describe ocho de las campañas militares de Senaquerib y la construcción de un nuevo palacio, el ekal kutalli (Palacio Trasero) para cumplir una función militar y residencial, en el montículo de Nebi Yunus en Nínive.
The god Nilus was a symbol of the Nile river. This statue is one of the rare pieces depicting him as a man leaning on a hippo over a rock from which the water flows. He is surrounded by a group of children symbolizing the high level of the flood.
Marble
Roman Period
From Qena
NMEC National Museum of Egyptian Civilization, Fustat Cairo
© Cat Art. www.facebook.com/carolyn.dansky?v=feed&story_fbid=268...
Megalithic Art, Knowth, Co. Meath, Ireland
Knowth contains more than a third of the total number of examples of megalithic art in all Western Europe. Over 200 decorated stones were found during excavations at Knowth. Much of the artwork is found on the kerbstones, particularly approaching the entrances to the passages. Many of the motifs found at Knowth are typical; spirals, lozenges and serpentiform. However, the megalithic art at Knowth contains a wide variety of images, such as crescent shapes. Interestingly, much of this artwork was carved on backs of the stones. This type of megalithic art is known as hidden art. This suggests all manner of theories as regards the function of megalithic art within the Neolithic community which built the monuments in the Boyne valley. It is possible that they intended the art to be hidden. It is also possible that they simply recycled stones and reused the other side.
www.megalithicireland.com/Knowth.htm
Planet Earth Daily Photo - planetearthdailyphoto.blogspot.com/2009/03/art-of-ancient...
Some of the boat models had a religious significance. According to ancient Egyptian religious beliefs, Osiris's body was taken by a boat for burial at Abydos, his chief cult place. In their lifetime, many Egyptians either made a pilgrimage to Abydos or sent a votive stela or both. In death, they also wished to be buried there, or at least that their mummy should visit this sacred town. Usually, of course, not even this was possible, so a wooden model of the deceased's mummy on a boat or a representation of this journey on the tomb wall had to serve instead.
Wood
11th dynasty
BAAM 620
Antiquities Museum of Bibliotheca Alexandrina
Marble head of Archilochus, lyric poet from the island of Paros.
100 BC- 100AC, found at Herakleia Lynkestis, now Bitola, Republic of Macedonia
Detail from wooden Ptolemaic coffin of a woman. Some sources say that the goddess here is Nut and others Isis.
Ptolemaic Period
Provenance Minya, Sharuna (El-Kom El-Ahmar)
BAAM 608
Antiquities Museum of Bibliotheca Alexandrina
This anthropomorphic coffin belonged to an unknown person, probably a woman. The coffin and the mummy wrapped in bandages of varying widths probably originate from the Late Period, when the sophistication of mummification declined remarkably compared to the preceding Third Intermediate Period, which marks the high point of mummification.
During the Late Period, a typical modest funeral complement included the following items: an anthropomorphic inner coffin, a rectangular outer qrsw coffin, a shabti box containing shabti statuettes, four canopic jars, and occasionally a box for holding them, a wooden stela, a wood sculpture of Ptah-Sokar-Osiris and possibly a number of pottery jars and other objects. However, the Late Period saw the gradual disappearance of most everyday objects from burial chambers.
Late Period
Egypt of Glory exhibition, Amos Rex Art Museum, Helsinki
From the collection of Museo Egizio, Turin, Italy
9.10.2020-21.3.2021
This head of a colossal statue of Hatshepsut would once have crowned one of the Osirian pillars that decorated the portico of the third terrace of the queen's temple at Deir el-Bahri. It was discovered there in 1926 by the mission of the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art.
The portico was divided into two by a granite portal which preceded the 'Festival Hall', on to which opened the more intimate rooms of the temple and the sanctuary of Amun.
Some of the characteristic stylistic features of the statuary of Hatshepsut are present in this head. The face is triangular and the features are very delicate. The striking almond-shaped eyes, decorated with a line of kohl extending to the temples, have large dilated pupils, imparting a sense of innocence and purity. The slightly arched nose is long and slim. The small mouth is set in a faint smile. The same face is found not only on many other statues of the queen but also on those representing private individuals of the same period.
One unusual element is the dark red colour of the skin, usually a feature of male images, it is justified in this case by the fact that the queen is represented here as a pharaoh in Osirian form. The false beard painted blue emphasizes the divine nature of the 'king'. The blue colour of lapis lazuli, together with gold, signified divinity.
From what remains of the queen's headdress, it can be deduced that she wore the Double Crown symbolizing the union between Upper and Lower Egypt.
JE 56259 A - 56262
Egyptian Museum, Cairo
Bovine-legged beds dating from the Predynastic Period onward have been found in the funerary context all over Egypt. In the Middle Kingdom coffins appear that seem to combine the rectangular coffins of that time with the lion bier. It is merely a logical development to add feline heads to the already lion-legged beds. In the Greco-Roman Period, they are no longer simple coffins or beds but combine features of both. (Ancient Egyptian Coffins, Strudwick & Dawson)
Mummy bed of Nedjemib, called Tutu
Late Ptolemaic Period
from Akhim
SR/ 11359/4
Upper floor, gallery 21
Egyptian Museum, Cairo
Egyptian women had a significant interest in beauty since ancient times. They had black and green eyeliners that were stored in pots of different shapes and materials, and also they used the red tint as blushes. They were very familiar with oils and aromatic fats and carefully stored them in elegant bird or other animal-shaped pots. She also took care of her hair appearance and therefore used combs for styling and hair pins for fixing in front of mirrors made of metals.
NMEC National Museum of Egyptian Civilization, Fustat Cairo
Miss i Messiah and Friend.
"Cryptomnesia occurs when a forgotten memory returns without it being recognized as such by the subject, who believes it is something new and original. It is a memory bias whereby a person may falsely recall generating a thought, an idea, a song, or a joke, not deliberately engaging in plagiarism but rather experiencing a memory as if it were a new inspiration."
Wikipedia
Steatite, gold
New Kingdom
Egypt of Glory exhibition, Amos Rex Art Museum, Helsinki
From the collection of Museo Egizio, Turin, Italy
9.10.2020-21.3.2021
This fragment probably comes from a chair, that was part of a funeral assemblage. Some of the inscription is still readable: "Osiris, great god, ruler of eternity. Made for the singer of Amun Ruji and singer of Amun Sat...".
The cult of Amun rose significance during the 18th dynasty. It has been speculated that Pharaoh Akhenaten tried to suppress the worship of Amun partly because of the power of priests of Amun. The child Pharaoh Tutankhamon, son of Akhenaten restored the worship of Amun. Finally, the clergy owned such a large share of Egypt's land, ships and other property that their power equalled that of the Pharaoh and Egyptian religion started to approach monotheism.
Wood
21st dynasty
Egypt of Glory exhibition, Amos Rex Art Museum, Helsinki
From the collection of The Finnish Egyptological Society
9.10.2020-21.3.2021
Cartonnage is a type of material used in Ancient Egyptian funerary masks from the First Intermediate Period to the Roman era. It was made of layers of linen or papyrus covered with plaster.
Egyptian Museum, Cairo
This elaborate container was used to hold perfumed oils and ointments and was found in the burial chamber between the first and second shrines. The container is in the form of the hieroglyph sema meaning union. The two figures at the sides, representing the god of the Nile, knot the heraldic plants of Upper and Lower Egypt to the pot. The overall composition reproduces the emblem meaning 'the union of the Two Lands' often seen on the throne in statues of the pharaohs.
JE 62114
Egyptian Museum, Cairo
Some of the sacrificial rituals depicted in fragments were successfully identified, and the naos has rebuilt by placing 50 identified fragments in their original places in the reconstruction. A fully preserved naos would have depicted the succession of the god cult's daily rituals.
Red and black granite
19th dynasty
Provenance Heliopolis
S. 2676 Museo Egizio
Egypt of Glory exhibition, Amos Rex Art Museum, Helsinki
From the collection of Museo Egizio, Turin, Italy
9.10.2020-21.3.2021
This fragment once belonged to a frieze from an architectural façade, decorated with wine leaves, and a scroll with a modified cross whose ends are carved in the shape of wine leaves. A small bird stands calmly on the scroll, with his wings closed. It perhaps symbolises the triumph of Christianity, although the modified crosses were common in the earlier phase of the spread of this religion.
Limestone
Byzantine Period, 4th-6th Centuries AD
Provenance Bahnasa (Ancient Oryxhynchus) Minia
Coptic Art in the Graeco-Roman Museum
Alexandria Egypt
Akhenaten's body was probably removed after the court returned to Thebes, and reburied somewhere in the Valley of the Kings, possibly in KV 55. His sarcophagus was destroyed but has since been reconstructed from fragments and displayed outside the Cairo Museum. Its reconstruction shows that it had representations of the queen Nefertiti, sculpted in high relief and extending protective arms at each corner of the monument in the likeness of the guardian goddesses of the four corners.
Amarna Period
I’ve heard that the sarcophagus is no longer in the museum yard, but has been moved somewhere...
Egyptian Museum, Cairo
The coffin of Nedjemankh is a gilded ancient Egyptian coffin from the late Ptolemaic Period. It once encased the mummy of Nedjemankh, a priest of the ram god Heryshaf.
In Egyptian mythology, Heryshaf, or Hershef (Ancient Egyptian: ḥrj š f "He who is on His Lake"), was an ancient ram deity whose cult was centered in ancient Heracleopolis Magna. He was identified with Ra and Osiris in ancient Egyptian religion, as well as Dionysus or Heracles in the interpretatio graeca.
The identification with Heracles may be related to the fact that in later times his name was sometimes reanalysed as ḥrj-šf.t "He who is over strength". One of his titles was "Ruler of the Riverbanks". Heryshaf was a creator and fertility god who was born from the primordial waters. He was pictured as a ram or a man with a ram's head.
NMEC National Museum of Egyptian Civilization, Fustat Cairo
This coffin lid from the Late Period, was made for Taditratawy, "the mistress of the house".
The colours of the paintings have been well preserved; complex patterns in yellow, green, blue and red paint constitutes a riotously colourful but pleasant whole.
25th dynasty
From the Valley of the Queens QV 43 or QV 44
S. 5243 Museo Egizio
Egypt of Glory exhibition, Amos Rex Art Museum, Helsinki
From the collection of Museo Egizio, Turin, Italy
9.10.2020-21.3.2021