shabti
- Museum number
- EA49343
- Description
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Shabti of Renseneb: limestone shabti of the retainer Renseneb. Eight right-facing horizontal lines of blue-painted hieroglyphs are inscribed around the front of the body. Blue paint survives on the wig, and black and red details on the eyes and flesh. Renseneb holds an ankh sign ('life') in one hand, and in the other a vase (ḥs) that can be read as 'favour'. The hieroglyphs are mutilated: the birds and figures lack their lower parts and legs.
- Dimensions
-
Height: 23 centimetres
-
Weight: 0.91 kilograms
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Width: 7.50 centimetres
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Depth: 7.30 centimetres
- $Inscriptions
-
- Curator's comments
- The so-called 'shabti spell' is first attested on coffins of the early 12th Dynasty, and from the middle of the dynasty it is found on mummiform statuettes of the deceased ('shabtis'). The spell allows the deceased to produce a substitute for the labour duties he might be called upon to provide in the Otherworld, reflecting the actual practice of corvee labour.
Bibliography:
T.E. Peet, 'Cemeteries of Abydos 1911-1912', Memoirs of the Egypt Exploration Fund 34 (London, 1914), 57,113, pl. 13.3;
D. Franke, 'Personendaten aus dem Mittleren Reich (20-16. Jahrhundert v. Chr)', 'Ägyptologische Abhandlungen' 4 (Wiesbaden, 1984), no. 241;
J. Bourriau, 'Pharaohs and Mortals: Egyptian Art in the Middle Kingdom' (Cambridge, 1988), 83.
G. Pinch, Magic in Ancient Egypt (London 1994), fig.34.
- Location
- Not on display
- Exhibition history
-
Exhibited:
2010/11 Oct-Mar, Leiden, National Museum Of Antiquities, Egyptian Magic
- Condition
- good
- Acquisition date
- 1910
- Department
- Egypt and Sudan
- BM/Big number
- EA49343
- Registration number
- 1910,1008.105
