Egyptian Sculpture

Important corpus of eclectic range of less well known Egyptian statues of varying quality and subject matter, including examples in wood.

This facsimile reissue of Anthea Page’s catalog of the stone and wooden statuary in the Petrie Museum makes available again a major corpus of material. The bulk of statuary in the museum was purchased since the finest sculpture from Petrie’s own excavations rightly went to Cairo and other museums. While the sculpture in his own collection covers the whole length of Egyptian dynastic history illustrating many different schools and qualities of workmanship, it does not provide a comprehensive view of the art of the Egyptian sculptor. Nevertheless, the 174 items described and discussed cover a wide range of subjects and forms. Statues of gods and animals and types loosely classifiable as ‘figurines’ or ‘models’ are deliberately excluded and the corpus focuses on representations of royalty, priests, officials and unknown individuals (men and women), of varying status and possible ethnicity in a variety of poses. Statues of multiple individuals are represented as well as a statuette of a man and a monkey. The catalogue is preceded by an introduction by H. S. Smith outlining the history of Egyptian portrait sculpture, the religious ideas behind it and nature of patronage, and is accompanied by detailed drawings and translations of associated inscriptions. All pieces are illustrated by photographs.