PART II: POST-SAITE AND PTOLEMAIC PERIODS
Dynasty 27 through 31 (525–332 B.C.): Dated material Dated stone statuary and evaluation of recent attributions
No known Egyptian-style statues are preserved of the kings of dynasty 27, though it is clear that a fine statuary tradition was maintained.57While the nature of the control
exerted and the interest shown in Egypt itself by the Persian kings is not entirely clear, temple activity certainly continued and at least at Hibis Persian kings of Dynasty 27 were shown in relief in the roles of Egyptian kings.58 It is almost certain that
there are among the types I have identified as fourth century small uninscribed royal bronzes that date to the Persian Period, but, short of the emergence of precisely dated comparanda, they simply cannot be more closely categorized.59The same is,
of course, true of the shorter Dynasty 31 and Macedonian Period.
Review of Jack Josephson’s study
During dynasties 28–30 there was a considerable amount of stone royal statuary produced judging from the quantity of preserved named statuary with and without heads, and further reflected in the number of heads that seem stylistically to require consideration in this period. Putting aside the apparently stylistically anomalous sphinx heads of the Dynasty 29 kings, Jack Josephson’s study proceeds to examine inscribed heads of Nectanebo I which on the one hand generally copy images of Apries by his analysis, but on the other hand may be differentiated from them by two particular stylistic characteristics that continue throughout the fourth century: a) suppression of facial modeling, and b) a schematic flat triangular area formed
between the brows and the spring of the nose.60He notes c) prominent drill holes at
the corners of the mouth as another characteristic of this style. Josephson further dif-
57 For 27thdynasty private sculpture, see ESLP, pp. 67–84(nos. 57–67); the latest version of Bothmer’s
views is given on p. 56 of his “Verism,” but very few of these datings are sure although one presumes continuity has to have been maintained somehow. Josephson, Royal Sculpture, pp. 1–2 and pl. 1a and b, discusses with references the statue of Darius from Susa that may be of Egyptian manufacture and the Brooklyn piece possibly depicting a Dynasty 31 satrap.
58 For some recent historical supplement to Kienitz, see Bianchi, “Perser in ¨Agypten,” coll. 943–951,
which provides the basic bibliography. Grimal, History, pp. 367–376 provides a recent juxtaposition of the major biographical/historical inscription of Udjahorresnet with the other historical material. Josephson,
Royal Sculpture, note 10, refers to recent work on Persian activities in Egypt. Finally, there is ongoing
work on Persian Period habitation levels atªAyn Manawir near Douch in Kharga Oasis by a French team headed by Michel Wuttmann. The work, reported yearly in BIFAO, provides some insights into economic and temple activities, including production of very cursory bronze deity statues.
59 Aubert, Bronzes et or, p. 360 refers to a bronze in the Michaelidis collection with the name of
Seheribre Pedubaste III of Dynasty 27, but he may be talking about Pedise, TIP-15.
ferentiates three types among the few inscribed monuments of Nectanebo I, terming them “archaizing,” “heavy-faced,” and “mannered.”61
To Nectanebo II he attributes an “even more mannered” style with even flatter facial planes and narrower eyes, which is not represented by any named example but seems to him a logical development of the style of Nectanebo I. Furthermore, he feels this style can be to some degree bounded at the lower end by the emergence of a different, fleshier, style at least by the time of Ptolemy II, though it is important to note that the “fleshier” style is only one of the styles of Ptolemy II.62
Grouping and characterization of these types of representations based on careful first-hand observation and comprehensive presentation is a very important contribu- tion, and the broad stylistic distinction between some 4th century and some early 3rd century royal sculpture seems valid and enlightening and can be used in relation to the bronzes. However, aspects of Josephson’s assignment of types to particular kings are more problematic, and, moreover, certain types are excluded altogether from his discussion. Two areas in particular require comment as they bear upon the bronzes discussed below.
The overwhelming association of Nectanebo II and the blue crown which emerges from Josephson’s study is odd since we do not normally know that kind of very spe- cific choice of regalia except in the case of the Kushites. It would require some kind of programmatic explanation, and stands out as an area needing further inquiry.63Two
directions of investigation suggest themselves. First, the inscribed Louvre head wear- ing the white crown which exemplifies his “mannered” representation of Nectanebo I does not actually seem to figure as a comparison for the pieces he assigns to Nectanebo I and then terms mannered.64This head deserves more consideration: its
eyes are quite narrow, and its relationship to the “very mannered” group of heads in the blue crown that Josephson assigns a Nectanebo II date should be carefully examined and his reasons for differentiating the two types made more explicit. Sec- ondly, there is inadequate consideration of the named torsos that exist; despite the vagaries of preservation from antiquity, which do not allow us to rely on there being any correlation between numbers of heads preserved and numbers of torsos for a particular king, such a survey at least provides another possible parameter.65A num-
ber of torsos exist of Nepherites and Achoris, for example, and on some the type of headgear can be ascertained or at least defined within a certain range: upright crowns were worn by the Boston granite torso of Achoris, and the torso of Achoris from Ahnas el-Medina, which is in the same unusual stone as the head apparently from the Mendes area that Josephson attributes to Nectanebo II, though M¨uller and
61 Represented, respectively, by: a granodiorite bust from Hermopolis Parva in the Mansura storehouse,
his pl. 2 a; a limestone statue from Hermopolis Magna in the yard at the Egyptian Museum, JE87298, his pl. 3c; a red granite head in the Louvre 27124 without provenance, his pl. 2d.
62 Josephson, Royal Sculpture, especially pp. 27 and 43–44. 63 Josephson, Royal Sculpture, p. 27.
64 Regarding the Louvre head, Josephson, Royal Sculpture, pp. 7 and 27; regarding the “mannered”
heads of Nectanebo I, pp. 23–26.
65 It is for such reasons, and, of course, with the hope of establishing matches, that all parts of statues
were collected by Bothmer for the Corpus of Late Egyptian Sculpture and taken into consideration by him. A. Leahy’s “Sculpture Review” of inscriptionally datable Saite material is a very good example of the “salutary,” as he says, results of tracking such material, even if they cannot be directly applied or must be overridden altogether.
others attributed it to Achoris.66Likewise, the British Museum torso of Nectanebo I
wore an upright crown. One bronze to be discussed below representing Achoris or just possibly Nectanebo I wore the blue crown.
As a further procedural comment, it is not desirable to simply put aside some of the evidence relating to Nectanebo I and Nectanebo II, that is, the large and numerous sphinxes for the former and the small figures beneath the falcon for the latter.67The
limestone sphinxes show a distinctive image of Nectanebo I with a heavy throat and a prominent and unusually curved upper lip; the same non-idealizing image is seen in a very large dark hard stone head of a sphinx on the art market, which, because of its material, is more difficult to dismiss as a non-specific image resulting from “mass-production” as Josephson proposes to do with the limestone sphinxes, though this is not to say it might not be an image belonging to a particular sphere.68
As for the falcon statues of Nectanebo II, they were important statues apparently closely tied to a statue cult of Nectanebo II and provide the only images of the king datable by inscription; the king’s faces are indeed small, but they are not negligible and warrant consideration as specific and significant like many small images created by the Egyptians, as, for example, many of the bronzes discussed throughout this study.69Nectanebo II under the falcon(plate 66) clearly has a much rounder face,
a less drawn-up smile and rounder, more heavy-lidded, eyes than the blue-crown images Josephson assigns to this pharaoh.
Inscriptionally dated bronzes
To the above 4th century images in stone can be added the bronze mentioned above which has long been attributed to Achoris(LPPt-20; plate 65). The dating was based
on the stylistic evaluation of the figure, combined with evidence from the unreadable cartouche inscribed on the belt. First, as to the cartouche, it is clear there are three signs, all fairly compact. The name therefore must be pre-Ptolemaic and does not fit any Persian ruler nor is it an obvious fit for any of the ephemeral native rulers of the period. While Saite names would be possible, with other criteria that point to a date for this piece in the post-Saite period, to be discussed, the only possibilities are 3nm-mAat-Ra (Achoris) or 2pr-kA-Ra (Nectanebo I). The proportions of the former
66 Cairo, Egyptian Museum CG 838; Josephson, Royal Sculpture, pl. 7b, pp. 3, 18, 28; his notes 132 and
133 give other bibliography. Grimm, “Hakoris,” points out the similarity of the stone between torso and head. Indeed, the exuberant shape of the headgear on this piece – though I fully agree that both headgear shapes and uraei are by no means reliable as chronological markers in these late eclectic periods – and the subdued mouth itself do not fit smoothly into the “Nectanebo II” group. Traunecker’s studies of the 29thdynasty and of its works at Thebes demonstrate the conceptual vitality and the significance of the
works undertaken by the dynasty; see Traunecker, “XXIX,” and Achˆoris.
67 Josephson, Royal Sculpture, pp. 8–9 and 30; for illustration of several sphinxes and references see
My´sliwiec, Portraiture, pl. 82 and nearby images; for a summary discussion of the falcon images and references to the basic studies and illustrations, see Brooklyn Museum of Art, Cleopatra, pp. 94–6 and also further below.
68 Royal Athena, New York 1999 volume 10, dealer’s catalog, lot 183. See also Mantova, Museo Civico
di Palazzo Te inv. 439, basalt?, h. 36.5 cm. illustrated on p. 165 of Il senso, dated there to Dynasty 26. See now also Z. Hawass, Bibliotheca Alexandrina: The Archaeology Museum(2002), p. 112.
69 The most complete after Metropolitan Museum of Art acc. no. 34.2.1 was recently purchased by
Munich, and is illustrated in Christie’s London, December 1995, sale catalog, lot 101. Other photos, not too clear but offering some details, are found in the original publication of the piece: Tresson, “Deux monuments.” The king’s face is damaged somewhat, but can be seen to be round and rather wide-eyed.
name are slightly better suited to the traces of the signs.
For the stylistic evaluation, there are several points to be made, of greater and lesser strength. The face of the king is not clearly related to any known face: it is broad, with natural brows, level, symmetrical, and wide-open eyes with symmetrical upper and lower lids set off from the eyeball, a very slightly smiling mouth with marked furrows down from the corners, and a round chin. The profile is rather flat, the forehead is fat or lumpy beneath the crown which seems a bit small, and the chin is definitely a double chin. It is not at all similar to any of the Saite images with their generally clear contours(although, of course, Psamtik I remains something of
a cipher and singular realistic relief images of Psamtik I and Necho II/Psamtik II have been cited), and its fleshiness and general appearance are not at all related to
the Third Intermediate Period.
Most chronologically suggestive are a number of stylistic points, of which the chief is the modeling of the king’s torso: it is tripartite, but very definitely the post-Persian version of tripartite, with soft teardrop abdomen around the navel and suppressed modeling throughout the shoulder and breast area in particular so that this area appears rather long, and very soft and fleshy without underlying bone structure. This kind of modeling is a sort of variant of the tripartition with bipartition which was recognized and well-defined in both royal and private statuary by Bothmer and distinguished from the more simply horizontal tripartite modeling of the late 26th dynasty; it is found in torsos of Achoris and also in a torso of Nectanebo I, and alongside the more clearly marked form of compound tripartite and bipartite modeling which is richly developed in the Louvre torso of Nectanebo I.70Though
obscured by corrosion it seems that there is a slight indication of sharply slanted clavicles near the neck as is seen in certainly the Boston and Alexandria torsos of Achoris. One detail should be kept in mind for comparative purposes, that is, the attractive way in which the steeper arc of the upper contour of the king’s belt forms a shallow curve beneath his soft stomach, while the lower contour remains relatively flat. This detail is seen in two bronzes that also have the peculiar streamer and that are discussed below(LPPt-22 and LPPt-23).71
The highly peculiar pendant element behind the crown is termed a streamer by comparison to both earlier(e.g. Amasis on the censer) and later (e.g. Ptolemaic
examples discussed below) bronzes which show a different form, but one quite clearly
intended to be understood as a streamer. Here the streamer projects horizontally outward from the back of the neck, then at the appropriate distance makes a rounded corner to run vertically, rejoining the surface of the back; a large separation is thus left from the neckline to the top of the backbone. The streamer runs continuously from neckline to waistline. The streamer and the disks on the crown of the figure are
70 For examples of this type of modeling with the long soft and fleshy shoulder and breast area, see the
Dattari statue, Brooklyn Museum of Art acc. no. 52.89, ESLP no. 80, p. 100. Similar modeling may be seen in the torso of Nectanebo I in the British Museum which is well-illustrated alongside the magnificent Louvre torso 25491 of the same king combining bipartition and tripartition in Aldred, Cr´epuscule, p. 157. The latter is also well illustrated among major torso modeling types in Bothmer, “Hor,” pl. 3 no. 3.
71 Similar treatment is seen in the Hermopolis torso of Nectanebo I(Josephson, Royal Sculpture, pl.
2a), though perhaps less marked because the figures are not kneeling. Well-dated Saite royal bronzes do not show this detailing of the feature; analysis of comparative stone Saite material is difficult given the vagaries of preservation and the different clothing styles of many private figures in that period.
cited by Bothmer as features that can be probably be considered post-Persian. The former is probably true – a streamer of this form is certainly not found among any of the bronzes dated or attributable to Dynasty 26. Moreover, this particular form seems to be limited, since, as will be discussed, something clearly derivative of this type with its odd separation at the neck, but different, evolves by certainly at least the 3rd century. As for the discs on the crown, Bothmer’s suggestion is not too compelling since earlier examples certainly existed and could always influence style. It seems to me much more likely that they in fact never really disappeared completely from usage in the Saite period(there is, in fact, very little evidence one way or the other
for the Third Intermediate Period), though they may have fallen out of fashion for the
fine smoothly polished surfaces of stone representations of the blue crown favored during that period; based on my review of bronzes, they continued to appear on metal statuary throughout(cf. LPPt-8 discussed above).72
One iconographic point that might seem to reinforce an attribution to Achoris may be adduced. Close examination reveals that the trajectory of the king’s right forearm is preserved, and that it was raised from the horizontal at about a twenty degree angle and turned inward at about a thirty degree angle so that, if the left arm were also directed in this manner, the arms would have met or almost met in front of the body.73 Maat and wedjat are the offerings held in arms angled toward the
center of the body, the offering in the left hand and the right hand curved protectively behind the offering. If this king is Achoris and held maat, the offering would nicely reiterate the name in his belt.
On the whole, I think the dating to Achoris in particular is quite strong on a number of grounds. The non-idealizing features of the face do not disturb me; indeed, I think there are other hints that a not traditionally idealizing strain exists in 4th century royal representation.74This will be discussed further.
A second royal bronze datable to the fourth century comes from the Falcon Catacomb at the Saqqara Sacred Animal Necropolis and bears the cartouches of Nectanebo II as read by the excavator(LPPt-21; plate 67). The bronze must have fit
into other metal or wooden elements which formed the lower part of the figure. The piece is highly corroded and difficult to read. It is clear that the king’s face is very round to square and is flat or frontal. His eyes are rather round, and were inlaid; the brows and eyes have long cosmetic lines; the mouth appears to be flat and unsmiling, with rather wide lips. On the whole, the image is most similar to the stone statue of the king beneath the falcon discussed above.
72 An earlier example is, of course, the Turin Ramesses II. The discs do appear in stone statuary in the
fourth century to Ptolemaic period, for example see the statue attributed to Nectanebo II(?) by Jack Josephson, Royal Sculpture, pl. 11 c.
73 I am very grateful to Robert Cohon, Curator of Ancient Art at the Nelson-Atkins Museum, for his
precise examination of this statue.
74 There are, of course, occurrences of private “realistic” sculpture known at the end of dynasty 26 /27
and the strain maintained some kind of continuous profile thereafter(see the history of realism/verism in this period as envisioned by Bothmer, “Verism”), though its sources and course are not at all clear; evidence of non-idealizing royal images, whatever their ideological or religious sources, besides this bronze and another noted below might include the sphinxes of Nectanebo I discussed above.
The Ptolemaic Period(332–30 B.C.)
Dated statuary and evaluation of recent attributions and stylistic studies
Inscriptionally dated sculptural representations of the Ptolemaic kings are very rare. However, dating and understanding of a stylistic evolution of sculpture of the Ptole- maic era has been much advanced recently by R. R. R. Smith’s important demon- stration that, besides the Hellenistic-style portraits of the Ptolemies theoretically recognizable by comparison with the information of coin portraits and sealings, hard-stone and other more traditional Egyptian workshops sometimes incorporated