A Group of Royal Sculptures from Abydos

A Group of Royal Sculptures from AbydosAuthor(s): Victoria SoliaSource: Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt, Vol. 29 (1992), pp. 107-122Published by: American Research Center in EgyptStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40000487 .

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A Group of Royal Sculptures from Abydos

Victoria Solia

In 1984 the Dallas Museum of Art acquired a dark granite bust of a king which, according to the inscription on the back pillar, represents Sety I (ca. 1306-1290 b.c.) of Dynasty XIX (figs. 1-6, 18-20).1 It is slightly underlifesize; at first glance the kind of statue from which it came is not obvious. Comparisons with two other well dated sculptures of Sety I have, however, indicated that it may come from a statue in which the King was shown presenting offerings.

The other two statues which were originally placed in the Temple of Sety I at Abydos are lifesize. The more complete figure is in the Met- ropolitan Museum of Art in New York (figs. 7- 12, 18-21). 2 The New York statue shows the King wearing the striped nemes headdress; he is kneeling and presenting an inscribed composite offering.

Only the lower part of the second statue, also of the kneeling King behind an inscribed composite offering, is preserved in two large joined fragments in the Museo Correale di Terranova in Sorrento, Italy (figs. 13-21).3

The Dallas bust is broken in front just below the chest and above the elbows, and across the lower edge of the cartouche on the back pillar. From the side view it is clear that the arms are moved slightly forward. The lower edge of the break in front is flared toward the viewer, indi- cating the upper edge of a missing object such as an offering or offering table. These features suggest that the king could have been standing; but he was more likely kneeling, leaning forward and proffering an object. These attitudes are known in statuary of earlier and later periods.

The Dallas bust of King Sety I wears a pleated nemes with uraeus and a false beard with beard

1 Dallas Museum of Art ace. no. 1984.50. Height 36.2 cm; Width 29.9 cm; Depth 18.65 cm; Width of back pillar at top 7.05 cm; Width of back pillar at break 6.8 cm; Intracolum- nar width 4.9 cm. This bust was acquired for the Museum in honor of Betty Marcus through the generosity of the Art Museum League Fund, the General Acquisitions Fund, and a gift from Melba D. Whatley. My thanks are here extended to John Lunsford, Steven Nash, and Elizabeth Simon for making it possible to study and photograph the Dallas Sety bust. Bibliography: Nash, "Egyptian Bust of Seti I Acquired in Honor of Betty Marcus" in Dallas Museum of Art Bulletin (Fall, 1984), 1 (illus.).

New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art ace. no. 22.2.21. Height 1.14 m; Width of base 35.0 cm; Depth of base 75.5 cm; Width of back pillar at top 11.0 cm; Width of back pillar at bottom 11.7 cm; Intracolumnar width at top 8.1 cm; Intra- columnar width at bottom 8.9 cm. Thanks are due to Edna Russmann for arranging under ideal conditions the study and photography of this statue and for her help in taking its measurements. Thanks are also offered to Dorothea Arnold and Marsha Hill for providing access to the Museum photo files and to the statue itself. Bibliography (selective): Scott, Egyptian Statues (1945), fig. 21; Hayes, Scepter of Egypt l\

(1959), 330-31, fig. 210 on p. 335; C. Aldred, in LEmpire des Conquerantsll (1979), 186, 292, fig. 350.

3 Sorrento, Museo Correale di Terranova no. 74. Height 76.11 cm; Width of base 35.5 cm; Depth of base 64.5 cm; Width of back pillar at break 12.7 cm; Width of back pillar at bottom 14.3 cm; Intracolumnar width 9.0 cm. I am grate- ful to Rubina Cariello, Marchese Luigi Buccino Grimaldi, and Paolo Gargiulo for giving me access to this sculpture. I am most especially indebted to Mrs. Margherita von Habs- burg for generously sharing information and bibliography from her files and for obtaining photographic details of the inscription on the front of the Sorrento statue. Bibliog- raphy: PM VII (1951), 419; Margherita di Savoia-Aosta- Habsburg, "La statua di Seti I e la recentemente ritrovata statua di Padimenemipet" in Studi Classici e Orientali 24 (1975), 211-15, pls. 1-7. The museum accession numbers for the two sculptures in SCO have been erroneously ex- changed. The correct number is 74.

I have previously attributed a red granite head fragment to Sety I, "The Dallas Head: A Puzzle in New Kingdom Icon- ography" in Artibus Aegypti (Brussels, 1983), 147-52, fig. 1 on p. 152. The article title is no longer correct because although the head belonged to Mrs. Melba Greenlee of Dallas, Texas, at that time, her collection was eventually sold and the royal face came to the Cleveland Museum of Art (ace. no. 88.97).

Dittmar, "Ein Bruchstiick einer opfernden Figur in der Tubinger Sammlung" in Gottinger Miszellen 41 (1980), 21-32.

107



108 JARCE XXIX (1992)

Fig. 1. Dallas Museum of Art 1984.50. Statue ofKingSety I: Front View (Courtesy of the Dallas Museum of Art).

Fig. 2. Dallas Museum of Art 1984.50. Statue ofKingSety I:

Left 3A View (Courtesy of the Dallas Museum of Art).


Left Profile View (Countesy of the Dallas Museum of Art).

straps. The nemes proper has recessed and pro- jecting stripes of uniform width. The wings are lifted well above shoulder level. In profile, the front plane of the wings is tilted slightly toward the back (fig. 3). The thick lappets show fine parallel striations and have smooth inner seams edged against each lappet by an incised line. The back of the nemes ends in a neatly banded queue that curves down to the top of the back pillar.

An incised line separates the edge of the nemes from the frontlet which is worked in one

6 Inner seams on nemes lappets have been observed as early as the reign of King Tuthmosis III, Dynasty XVIII, e.g., Cairo CG 577 (PM II [1972], 121); Cairo CG 578 (PM II [1972], 281). See fig. 22.



A GROUP OF ROYAL SCULPTURES FROM ABYDOS 109


Right 3A View (Courtesy of the Dallas Museum of Art).

with the tabs. The forehead below the frontlet is slightly cut back so that the eyebrows become

prominent. Head and hood of the uraeus are

missing; but from traces it is evident that the hood projected just below the upper edge of the frontlet and that the right loop was probably parallel to the left. The left loop is set well above the frontlet and shows a depression in the center; it is slightly longer than high. The uraeus tail winds over the crown of the head in ten raised, wavy bends (fig. 6). The tip of the tail ends just beyond the crown of the head.

The eyebrows are arched in low relief. The inner ends are rounded above the root of the

Fig. 5. Dallas Museum of Art 1 984.50. Statue of King Sety I: Rear View (Courtesy of the Dallas Museum of Art).

Fig. 6. Dallas Museum of Art 1984.50. Statue of King Sety I: View Above Head.

7 For uraeus nomenclature see Sally B. Johnson, The Co- bra Goddess of Ancient Egypt: History of the Uraeus I (1990), 29ff. Broken surfaces evenly flanking the hood of the uraeus on one other dated sculpture of Sety I, namely Cairo CG 751 (PMV [1937], 47), suggest the original position of the uraeus loops, now missing. This may in time prove to be a dating criterion for Sety I sculptures.




Fig. 7. New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art 22.2.21. Statue of King Sety I: Front View (Courtesy of the Metropol- itan Museum of Art).

Fig. 8. New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art 22.2.21. Statue of King Sety I: Left 3A View (Courtesy of the Metro-

politan Museum of Art).

Fig. 9. New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art 22.2.21. Statue of King Sety I: Left Profile View (Courtesy of the Met-

ropolitan Museum of Art).

Fig. 10. New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art 22.2.21. Statue of King Sety I: Right 3A View (Courtesy of the Metro-

politan Museum of Art).




Fig. 11. New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art 22.2.21. Statue of King Sety I: Rear View. (Courtesy of the Metropol- itan Museum of Art).

nose; the other long, drawn out ends are

squared off (figs. 2, 4). The eyeballs are rounded in a natural manner

with slight depressions above the rimmed upper eyelids. The eyelid openings are small, the eyes are close together and set high in the face. The inner canthi are barely marked. The cosmetic lines extend in low relief from the plastic eyelids; their ends are also squared off.

The nose is missing; its width was almost

equal to the width of the mouth. The philtrum region is damaged and so is the upper lip. The lower lip is quite full. The deep corners of the mouth are turned up. The lips are outlined by a vermilion line.

Between the corners of the mouth and the

jaws are deep depressions which separate cheek from chin. The trapezoidal chin is so distinctive

Fig. 12. New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art 22.2.21. Statue of King Sety I: Offering Table .

in all well dated sculptures of Sety I that the identification of the Dallas bust as Sety I would have been practically assured even without the

inscription on the back pillar (fig. 4). The ears are set well back of the nemes tabs and

beard straps. They are thick, deeply modeled and well articulated. The tragi are turned in, and the helixes are slightly pressed forward by the nemes wings. The lobes show slight indenta- tions but do not appear to be nicked.

Sety I has a broad neck which is modified by two parallel wrinkle lines on either side of the beard. The uppermost wrinkle line marks the

juncture between head and neck. The false beard is held by incised beard straps

which end at the ear tabs. The surface of the beard is mostly missing except just under the

chin, whose contour it follows. There, traces of four vertical grooves are preserved. The beard ends well above the points of the lappets but it is damaged there so that one cannot see the manner in which it ended.

The King's bare shoulders and torso are mus- cular. The collarbones are well modeled and

For a discussion of the form of the human eye in statuary of the New Kingdom, see Bothmer, "Eyes and Icon- ography in the Splendid Century: King Amenhotep III and His Aftermath" in The Art of Amenhotep III: Art Historical

Analysis (1990), 84-90, pls. 20-27.




Fig. 13. Sorrento, Museo Correale di Terranova 74. Statue

of King Sety I: Front View (Photo by Mr. Antonio Gargiulo).

can be seen between the lappet seams and again beyond the nemes lappets reaching to- wards the shoulders. The sternum is concealed by the beard. The chest shows well developed pectoral muscles; the nipples are raised.

Seen from the rear, the contrast between the broad rounded shoulders and the slim waist is especially telling (fig. 5). This view conveys the impression of powerful strength by the pronounced modeling of the shoulder blades and the movement of the arms. It is noteworthy that


of King Sety I: Left Profile View (Courtesy of The Brooklyn Museum).


of King Sety I: Right Profile View.

9 For another unusual example of pronounced modeling of shoulder blades in Egyptian royal statuary, see New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art ace. no. 25.6, seated headless statue of King Sesostris I, Dynasty XII. The backbone is hol- lowed out below the queue of the nemes headdress; the shoulder blades are indicated by curved lines. Pijoan, Summa Artis III El Arte Egipcio (1945), 200, fig. 264. Also see below footnote 13.





of King Sety I: Rear View.

both upper arms are marked by three splayed grooves which may also be intended as an ex- pression of strength (fig. 3). That they also occur on reliefs of Sety I can be seen on the base of his temple model in The Brooklyn Mu- seum (fig. 23).11

The space between arms and torso is deeply carved with only a shallow amount of recessed fill linking the parts.

Fig. 1 7. Sorrento, Museo Correale di Terranova 74. Statue

of King Sety I: Offering Table.

The flat-topped back pillar begins immedi- ately below the nemes queue and is inscribed with deeply sunk hieroglyphs, without interior modeling, flanked by columnar lines. The text begins with a pt-sign and reads: Mr nfr Mn-mjct- rc (///), "The Good God, Men-maat-ra (///)." Some of the back pillar surface and a few of the signs are damaged. The end of the cartouche is missing.

The statue of Sety I in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York also shows the King wearing the pleated nemes with uraeus, and false beard held by beard straps. In proportion, form, and detail the nemes is almost the same as on the Dallas statue. Frontlet, tabs, and probably uraeus too were rendered similar to those details on the Dallas Sety. On the New York sculpture however, there is no trace at all of the head, hood, or tail of the uraeus; only a small part of the left loop is intact. The rest of the uraeus has been restored. Originally it likely had two parallel loops flanking the hood,

10 For previous observations on the shoulder grooves, see Bothmer, "The Philadelphia-Cairo Statue of Osorkon II" in fournal of Egyptian Archaeology 46 (1960), 7, n. 2. The shoulder grooves also occur on a colossal statue of Sety I in Vi- enna. See below footnote 31 and fig. 27.

The Brooklyn Museum ace. no. 49.183. Badawy, "A Monumental Gateway for a Temple of Sety I: An Ancient Model Restored," in Miscellanea Wilbouriana I (1972), 1-23.




Fig. 18. a. Dallas 1984.50. b. Sorrento 74. c. New York, MMA 22.2.21. The Dallas and Sorrento statues do not belong to-

gether as a single statue. The drawings are meant to show similiarity of statue type only.











Fig. 21. b. Sorrento 74. c. New York MMA 22.2.21. Inscriptions from right sides of statues.




Fig. 22. Cairo CG 578. Statue of King Thuthmosis III with inner seams on lappets (Courtesy of The Brooklyn Museum).

and the tail was not straight but wavy. The lower edge of the uraeus hood probably did not hang quite so low in front of the frontlet.

The head of the New York statue was broken off and has been replaced. Much of the head-

dress, uraeus, right side of face, and all of the shoulders have been restored in plaster. The curved left eyebrow is contoured by an incised line. It runs parallel to the upper eyelid rim and

Fig. 23. The Brooklyn Museum 49.183. Gateway Model

Relief of King Sety I (Courtesy of The Brooklyn Museum).

long drawn out incised cosmetic line. Both eyebrow and cosmetic line are squared off at the ends. Above the root of the nose the eyebrow is

missing, but its end was probably rounded like the Dallas eyebrow. The lower edge of the cosmetic line springs from below the outer canthus. The upper eyelid is rimmed by an incised line. The inner canthus is pointed downward. The eyeball is rounded in a natural manner.

The nose may have been aquiline; the tip of the nose is missing. The philtrum is indicated.

The lips of the New York statue are contoured by a fine vermilion line. The medial line between the lips dips slightly in the center. The corners of the mouth are depressed and slightly drawn up. The plump cheeks are set off against the mouth by a marked depression running from nostrils down to the sides of the rounded chin.

Like the ears of the Dallas head, the left ear of the statue in New York is well set back of the nemes tab and beard strap. It is thick, deeply modeled and well articulated. The tragus is turned in and the helix is slightly pressed forward by the nemes Wing. The lobe is broken away.

On the New York statue, the King's neck is broad and shows parallel wrinkle lines exactly as they occur on the Dallas sculpture. The

King's beard on the New York statue was also held by incised beard straps which end at the

12 The Photo Archive of the Department of Egyptian, Classical, and Ancient Middle Eastern Art, The Brooklyn Museum, has photographs of this sculpture as it was re- corded in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in the condition originally received in 1922 when it was purchased. At that time the head had been reattached with plaster to the torso without restoration. Since the sculpture is not listed in the Hotel Drouot Catalogue of 1912 it must be assumed that this sculpture was held by the heirs of M. Giovanni Dattari until it was purchased by a Cairo dealer.




nemes tabs. The beard itself is almost entirely missing. The remains show three oblique incised lines on either side of the chin. It is also evident from the break that the beard ended well above the lappets; its length is exactly the same as on the Dallas beard. As a matter of fact, the shape of the face and numerous details indicate that the Dallas and New York faces look very much alike.

The torso of each statue shows well developed pectoral muscles with raised nipples, and no median line is visible. The abdomen of Sety I in New York is mostly obscured by the support of the offering table, yet a slight swelling above the beltline is noticeable.

Seen from the rear the Dallas and New York statues virtually complement each other. How- ever, both have a portion of the back where the queue of the nemes meets the top of the back pillar. There is a striking difference between the two sculptures, namely the manner

i ^ in which the shoulder blades are sculpted. Whereas on the Dallas statue the shoulder blades are shown as most unusually pronounced vertical ridges flanking the nemes queue, on the New York statue, traditional carving on the shoulder blades is far more subtle (figs. 5, 11).

The statues in New York and in Sorrento have long been identified as companion pieces from the Temple of Sety I at Abydos.14 The inscriptions of the two sculptures and the symbolic use on one of the lotus (Sorrento) and the other of the papyrus (New York) at the base of the offerings relate them as statues for Upper and Lower Egypt. Their paired nature is further supported by similarity of type, size, and stone.

The statue type combines the traditional pose of the kneeling king together with more recent forms of offerings (figs. 24-25). 16

The two figures of Sety I are from the waist down almost identical in measurements and form. Each shows the King wearing a low-waisted belt that tapers considerably to the abdomen. The belts have plain oval buckles appearing on either side of the offerings. The belt straps are decorated by closely layered zigzag lines running parallel to the plain edges of the belts. A diamond chain pattern occurs through the centers of the zigzag design. The finely pleated kilts end well above the knees. The legs and feet are similar as well. The flexed muscle of the lower leg, is given emphasis by a pronounced ridge. The toes are widely splayed in a natural manner. The soles are nearly vertical, paralleling the rising back pillar.

The back pillars each have one column of inscription flanked by columnar lines, as does the Dallas bust. The hieroglyphs are very much alike in depth of carving, placement, proportion, and form. Under the pt-sign the text on the back pillar of the New York statue reads:

wcb ccwy hr msy htp n it'f Wsir nb Td-wt nsw bity Mn-mjct-rc

"He who is pure of hands in bearing gifts to his Father, Osiris, Lord of the Thinite nome, the King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Men- maat-ra."

The text on the back pillar of the Sorrento statue reads:

nsw-bity Mn-mjct-rc di cnh, "The King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Men-maat-ra, given life.'

As described by Hayes, the composite offering held by Sety I in the New York statue consists

13 Depressions flanking the queue of the nemes of the

Dallas sculpture are bordered by ridges. They may have been created after the original sculpture was completed; however, we do not know the reason for this alteration.

14 Von Habsburg, op. cit., 214. For a history of the kneeling statue in Egyptian

art through the New Kingdom, see Edna Russmann, "The Statue of Amenemope-em-hat," in the Metropolitan Museum Journal 8 (1973), 103-4, notes 15-18.

16 Cairo CG 42073 (PM II [1972], 138-39) is a likely prototype for the kneeling king holding an offering table. Cairo

CG 42073 is a statue of King Amenhotep II (see fig. 24). A private kneeling statue of Senenmut, tp. Hatshepsut, in The Brooklyn Museum (ace. no. 67.68) serves as another mid-Dynasty XVIII prototype for the &a-element in the composite offering. Fazzini, Ancient Egyptian Art in The Brooklyn Museum (1989), no. 34 (illus.) (see fig. 25).

The pattern of this belt occurs already on sculptures of Queen Hatshepsut, e.g., New York, MMA 29.3.1. Dor- man, The Metropolitan Museum of Art: Egypt and the Ancient Near East (1987), 46, no. 29, and 47 (illus.).

My thanks are here extended to Dr. Peter F. Dorman for his translations.




Fig. 24. Cairo CG 42073. Statue of King Amenhotep II with Offering Table (Courtesy of The Brooklyn Museum).

of five parts.19 This explanation can equally well be applied to the Sorrento statue as follows.

The uppermost part is an offering table. Although offering tables dating to Sety I are rare,20 and those preserved are in poor condition, they appear to be of a usual New Kingdom

Fig. 25. The Brooklyn Museum 67.68. The Steward Senen- mut with ka-sign (Courtesy of The Brooklyn Museum).

type.2 They are rectangular with spout project- ing toward viewer and the slightly raised border for inscriptions framing a center field with vari- ous offerings in raised relief.

On the New York statue, all edges of the offering table are broken away (fig. 12) so that only a portion of the center field is preserved. One basket of berries is flanked by te-vases above which there are two cucumbers, five figs, and a bunch of grapes, all represented in raised

19 Hayes, op. cit., 138-39.

z A partial list of offering tables known to belong to Sety I includes Cairo CG 23090; Kitchen, Ramesside Inscriptions I, 4 (1974), 121, no. 60; and Turin Cat. 22025; Habachi, Tavole d'offerta (1977), 133 (illus.). 21 Vandier, Manuelll (1954), 533-34.




relief.22 A horizontal band separates this group from the inscriptions above. Only the lower tips of two vertical hieroglyphs are barely visible.

All edges of the Sorrento table are worn away and only a few hieroglyphs along the upper and lower edges are at all discernible. The assembly of offerings in the center of the table was oblit- erated long ago (fig. 27).

The spout and spout bracket are now represented only by the break of the protruding part on the front of the support. This support was flanked by the two arms of the ka-sign which were worked half in the round as can be judged by the remaining portion at the bottom of the

support's front (figs. 7, 13 and cf. fig. 25). The vertical surfaces of the supports framed

by the ka-signs may represent negative space (figs. 7, 13). These surfaces contain Sety's cartouches in sunk relief topped by sun disks and

finely ribbed double plumes. The sun disk is

preserved only on the Sorrento statue above the right cartouche. The inscriptions are badly damaged on both statues, but on each, the right cartouche was probably (Men-maat-ra), the left one was probably (Sety-Merenptah). Flanked by the cartouches on both statues the word "nhh" is carved deeply. The word for eternity appears again, at the end of a vertical inscription on the spout bracket. Above the "nM" another sign is partly preserved. On the Sorrento statue a broad horizontal with its ends turned upright can be seen (fig. 18b). On the New York statue, only the lower right corner of the sign remains (fig. 18c). All the sun disk and ra-signs have in their centers a small raised point like a nipple. The /j-signs are depicted as twisted rope.

Below the ka-signs on both sculptures are the papyrus and lotus columns rising from the bases of the statues (figs. 7, 13). On the New York statue, five rolled concentric bands separate the plain papyrus umbel from its thick em- blematic shaft. The banding below the Sorrento

capital, representing the so-called Lotus of the South, consists of six evenly spaced rolled bands without column shaft below.

Finally, the side surfaces below the table, which may also represent negative space, are each inscribed in three columns (figs. 9, 10, 14, 15,20,21).

The text on the left side of the New York statue reads:

Mr nfr wcb c c' wy shtp ntrw Td-wt sd Rc nb hcw

Swty-mr-n-Pth.

"The Good God, pure of arms, who satisfies the gods of the Thinite nome, the son of Ra, Lord of Appearances, Sety-Merenptah."

The text on the right side of the New York statue reads:

Mr nfr wr dfcw in kSw n nbw Td-wt nsw-bity nb

tjwy Mn-rriDCt-rc.

"The Good God, great of provisions, who

brings sustenance to the Lords of the Thinite nome. King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Lord of the Two Lands, Men-maat-ra."

The text on the right side of the Sorrento statue reads:

Mr nfr nb tiwy Mn-mjct-rc (mry) Wsir hry-ib Hwt-Mn-mDCt-rc-nhh-m-rnpwt m jbdw.

"The Good God, Lord of the Two Lands, Men- maat-ra, beloved of Osiris, who resides in the

temple of Men-maat-ra-of-millions-of-years in

Abydos."

The text on the left side of the Sorrento statue reads:

Nsw cn hr irrt iw- w hr hpr mnw m st jhw.

"A King who is pleasing in regard to what is done, (that is,) monuments being created at the place of power."

One final striking similarity between these two statues is the damage which they incurred. Surface weathering aside, the manner in which the spouts of the offering tables and all four of their sides are broken is about the same for both. Likewise, breakage along the Kings' arms

22 This combination of offerings is also known from The- ban tomb paintings of the New Kingdom, e.g., Lhote, Les chefs-d'oeuvre de la peinture egyptienne (1954), fig. 46: Tomb no. 52, Nakht. 23 I.e., Abydos.




and hands is similar. So too are the breaks through both statues at waist level. All the hands and arms of the ka-signs are broken away. It would seem that these statues endured similar fates through their destruction at the same time in history. The missing upper half of the Sorrento statue probably came apart, in more than one piece, like that of the New York statue.

Margherita von Habsburg has been able to trace the Sorrento statue to the Historiae nea- politanae II (1771), where on page 137 Giulio Cesare Capaccio describes the statue in the same condition as we know it today, namely broken through the middle, only the lower part being preserved. Her research has shown that the block which forms the offering table and its support was for a time lost. This is clear from the Wilkinson Ms in the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, where a sketch by G. Levinge given to Joseph Bonomi for Wilkinson in 1838, shows the right side of the kneeling Sorrento statue but with the offering part missing. The sketch by Mr. Levinge includes a copy of the inscription on the back pillar. The same page bears the note, "Will you have the kindness to give this to Mr. Wilkinson with my compli- ments. It was only a few days ago I laid me hand on it after many previous searches . . . Broken Statue at Sorrento of granite. Mrs. Starke in- formed me she found the upper part of the body since I copied this. - "^ This last state-

ment has not been verified; it is probable that Mrs. Starke only located the offering fragment and not "the upper part of the body." The statue was erected in the Largo di Sedile Domi- nova in Sorrento in 1864. Indeed the offering fragment (missing in the sketch by Levinge) was replaced, as can be seen in an oil painting by the artist Teodoro Duclere (1816-1867) which hangs today in the Sorrento Museum. The painting shows the lower half of the Sety statue set up on a high pedestal in the main town square where it remained until it was removed to the Museum in 1918.

In contrast to the detailed history of the Sor- rento statue, little can be told of the history of the statue in New York. It is known to have been in the Dattari Collection in Alexandria. It was purchased in Egypt in 1922 and that same year came to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

From the art historical point of view the Dal- las bust is a very important addition to the cor- pus of dated and inscribed sculptures of Sety I. Among the statues carved in hard stone it has the most complete and best preserved face and headdress.30

It is a statue of great quality not unexpected in the reign of Sety I. Stylistically it is of an idealizing type with much attention to detail which puts it in a class with the New York and Sorrento sculptures and with another very fine statue of the King in the Kunsthistorisches Mu- seum, Vienna (fig. 27). 31

24 See the von Habsburg article cited in footnote 3 above. Oxford, Ashmolean Museum, Wilkinson Manuscript

XXI.A.5. 26 Godfrey Levinge was a traveler in Egypt in 1833. His

book, Traveller in the East, was published in 1839. My thanks to M. L. Bierbrier, the British Museum, for help with the identification of G. Levinge.

27 Mariana Starke (1762P-1838), born in Surrey, En- gland, was a writer of guide books. She is known to have been in Naples in early 1838. That same year the draughts- man and traveler, Joseph Bonomi (1796-1878), was work- ing for Wilkinson in Rome. My thanks to Max Marmor and B. V. Bothmer, Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, for their help with the identification of Mrs. Starke.

In addition to the "many searches" made for the upper part by Mr. Levinge et al., fruitless searches have been con- ducted in the Louvre because of a statement by M. Fasulo in 1906. In his La penisola sorrentina (Naples, 1906), 477, he writes that the upper part of the body of the statue lies in the Louvre in Paris. Recent investigations have not been able to confirm his statement. It is my surmise that

M. Fasulo saw the publication, Egyptian Inscriptions (1855) by Samuel Sharpe where on p. 28 a fragment from the Louvre is printed on the same page as the Sorrento piece. Perhaps Fasulo then assumed that the objects belonged together, re- sulting in his misleading statement.

28 Von Habsburg, op. cit., pl. II. See above footnote 12.

60 There is one other sculpture of Sety I, although much smaller, that is also in very good condition, that is, Cairo CG 751 (PM V [1937], 47), the only known sculpture of the King in hard stone with the nose almost completely preserved except for the very tip (see fig. 26). It can be seen however that the nose was definitely acquiline. There is another statuette of Sety I with the nose fully intact, Cairo CG 1224 (PMI.2 [1981], 775), which, however, is in limestone.

31 Vienna, Kunsthistoriches Museum 5910 (fig. 27). This is undoubtedly the sculpture excavated by Mariette and published in his Abydos excavation reports of 1867 and 1869 as well as in his Catalogue general des monuments d' Abydos (1880), 31-32, no. 351; PMVI (1939), 9.




Fig. 26. Cairo CG 751. Statue of king Sety I. (Photo by Ber- nard V. Bothmer).

The faces of the New York and Dallas figures are well rounded and show precise linear treat- ment around the eyes. The Vienna head, of which only the lower half of the face is preserved, can be grouped with the New York and Dallas heads in its carving of the mouth which introduces a standard, taut Ramesside expres- sion, where the corners of the mouth are slightly turned up. The modeling of the area between mouth and chin, which is set off from the cheeks by deep oblique depressions, is in particular a feature of Sety I's facial style that can be seen on the Dallas, New York, and Vienna heads.

The statue of the King in Vienna was found at the Temple of Sety I at Abydos. In my opin- ion, the statue of the Dallas bust was also made for the King's temple at Abydos.

This Abydene group of royal statuary reflects a taste for the vigor and perfection of mid-

Fig. 27. Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum 5910. Statue

of King Sety I: Right 3A View (Courtesy of the Kunsthis- torisches Museum, Vienna).

Dynasty XVIII (cf. figs. 22, 24). However, to the purity of Tuthmoside style, Sety I has further refined the facial features. He has also added detail to the garments and complexity to the composite offering. These novel subtleties com- bine with characteristic elements from the Am- arna Period such as wrinkle lines on the necks and plunging beltlines. What results then is an Abydos sculptural style for Sety I.

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A Group of Royal Sculptures from Abydos