stela

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Object Type
Museum number: EA636
Description: Rectangular painted limestone stela of Renefseneb: with a polychrome border, and a raised band of stone framing the scene. Two rows of black monochrome hieroglyphs on a yellow background record the traditional prayer in Middle Egyptian. The final words are painted in a third line that encroaches on the scene. All the hieroglyphs face the same direction as the figures to which they refer: opposite Renefseneb are two relatives, a man and a woman who are named in painted hieroglyphs added above them.
Cultures/periods
Findspot: Found/Acquired: Thebes (historic - Upper Egypt)
Materials
Technique: painted; carved
Dimensions: Height: 36.20 centimetres (on base); Weight: 11.80 kilograms; Width: 31.50 centimetres; Depth: 8.30 centimetres
$Inscriptions
Inscription subject
Curator's comments: The stela was presumably placed in his tomb chapel, where it would have acted as a focus for the funerary cult. The scene shows three figures and a heap of offerings.
Bibliographic references: Scott-Moncrieff 1912 / Hieroglyphic texts from Egyptian stelae, etc., in the British Museum, Part 2. (pl.39); Parkinson 1999 / Cracking Codes: The Rosetta Stone and Decipherment (3)
Location: Not on display
Condition: fair
Associated names: Named in inscription: Renseneb; Named in inscription: Osiris
Associated places: Named in inscription: Busiris
Acquisition name: Purchased through: Rev Chauncey Murch; Purchased from: Mohammed Mohassib
Acquisition date: 1900
Department: Egypt and Sudan
BM/Big number: EA636
Registration number: 1900,0609.147
Additional IDs: Miscellaneous number: BS.636 (Birch Slip Number)
Conservation

Free entry

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