heart-scarab
- Museum number
- EA7925
- Description
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Heart-scarab of Iuy: a green feldspar 'heart-scarab', to be placed on the mummy as its heart. On the underside is a funerary spell in Middle Egyptian. There are twelve right-facing horizontal lines of hieroglyphic text on the underside were first carved leaving a blank space for the name: later the name of the lady Iuy was added in a less accomplished manner than the rest of the inscription, when she or her heirs acquired the scarab (l. 1). On the front of the scarab's body are four right-facing lines of additional prayers, and on the heart-shaped base is a row of decorative and emblematic hieroglyphs: the 'djed' pillar, writing 'stability', and associated with Osiris, is flanked by the sign for 'life' and by the amuletic 'Isis knot' (which does not have a regular reading as a specific word). The amulet is pierced by two transverse drilled holes for attachment to the mummy.
- Dimensions
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Length: 9.50 centimetres
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Width: 4.10 centimetres
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Depth: 2.70 centimetres
- $Inscriptions
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- Curator's comments
- The inscription could be written on an amulet shaped like the heart, but the scarab is attested from the 13th Dynasty on as a symbolic representation of the heart. In this case, a scarab sits upon a base formed from the hieroglyph for 'heart'; the amulet is thus formed of two complementary signs.
Bibliography:
C. Andrews, 'Amulets of Ancient Egypt' (London, 1994), p.57, fig. 56.
- Location
- Not on display
- Exhibition history
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Exhibited:
2010 4th Nov-2011 6th March, Round Reading Room BM, Book of the Dead
- Condition
- fair
- Acquisition date
- 1835
- Department
- Egypt and Sudan
- BM/Big number
- EA7925
- Registration number
- .7925
- Additional IDs
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Miscellaneous number: BS.7925 (Birch Slip Number)
