Ashay-6113/qwen2-2b-instruct-trl-sft-britishmeusium
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0 | 0 | Unknown | Terracotta statuette of a standing naked woman.
A naked female being, plump, with pendulous breasts, standing with her left arm bent, the hand placed in front of her hip, her right arm also bent, the hand raised with the fist clenched. Her hair is parted in the centre and curves down on each side in neatly arranged formal locks; at the rear it is brought back to a large and intricate flat bun. She wears ball earrings, a jewelled necklace of separate panels, and armlets, bracelets and anklets (the last may be the tops of low boots: no toes are indicated). There is summary treatment at the back, with the hair and the anklets (or boottops) shown; a small vent is pierced below the buttocks.
Hollow; two-piece mould; the area below the feet has been added after moulding. The moulding itself has left the rear part moved slightly to one side in relation to the front, giving the erroneous impression that the figure wears a narrow wreath. Micaceous orange-brown Nile silt; traces survive on the right foot of a white dressing, painted red and pink; a very little red colour remains in the hair at the back. | BM Terracotta IV
Comparanda. Close, probably same mould-series: Bayer-Niemeier 1988: no. 254, dated first quarter of third century ad. Close: Bresciani 1976: pl. xxix:172 (head only), from Narmouthis in the Fayum; Petrie Museum uc34726; Galerie Günther Puhze Katalog 7, 1987: lot 120; Schürmann 1989: no. 1132, dated first half (second quarter) of third century ad; Van Wijngaarden 1958: no. 75. Close, but with large wreath: Besques 1992: no. 388, from Middle Egypt, dated beginning of third century ad; Christie’s Sale Catalogue, 8 December 1993: lot 110; Fischer 1994: no. 841, dated second half of third to beginning of fourth century ad. Similar hairstyle: Breccia 1934: no. 267, a head broken from a figure. Near (same stance, different hair): Edgar 1903a: pl. xxv:32079, an impression from a very large, splendid plaster mould (the lower arm was made separately); Graindor 1939: pl. xv:38, with a basket slung on her left arm. Near (same stance, different facial features and hair): Breccia 1934: no. 204. Near, with alien head: Vogt 1924: pl. lxxxii:3.
Bibliog. Walters 1903: C 646; Schürmann 1989: 300, no. 1132; Fischer 1994: 340, no. 841; Walker and Bierbrier 1997: 125, no. 121: Neronian date suggested. | 1stC-2ndC | Made in: Egypt | terracotta | mould-made | Unknown |
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1 | 1 | Unknown | Round-topped red granite stela; incised detail in two registers; upper: Horus-name of Senusret I between figures of Satis and Khnum; lower: seven rows of Hieroglyphic text. | Published:
PM V: p. 242.
HTBM Part 4: Plate 1
Franke, D, 1996, in Fs. Simpson I, p.276, 287-9;
N. Strudwick, Masterpieces of Ancient Egypt, London 2006, pp. 76-7.
Image at top: Fischer, Egyptian Studies II, fig. 91.
See Malaise, SAK 9 (1981), 278.
Comments, L. Habachi, MDAIK 31 (1975), 30.; Strudwick N 2006
King Senwosret I carried out a very active building programme all over Egypt during the early Middle Kingdom. This granite stela comes from the island of Elephantine, close to Egypt's southern border. The stela is roughly finished on the rear, indicating it was intended to be set into a wall or building. The scene at the top shows the god Khnum, called 'lord of the cataract region', on the right, with Khnum's consort Satis, 'mistress of Elephantine', standing at the left. Both deities are offering the gift of life to the king, represented by his Horus name, which is written as usual in a large serekh enclosure in the centre. Khnum presents an ankh (life) sign to the falcon on top of the serekh, while Satis' gift is expressed in the words 'may she give life'. Below are the remains of six damaged lines of hieroglyphs which begin with the king's names; the remainder consists of laudatory epithets, which also associate him with the goddess Satis and her daughter Anuket. Khnum, Satis, and Anuket were the local deities of Elephantine and the cataract region (where the river Nile became un-navigable). Triads of gods such as this were found in most major Egyptian religious centres, such as Memphis (see the Great Harris Papyrus, EA 9999).
It seems very likely that this stela was set up in the area of the temple of Satis on Elephantine Island; it was probably placed near another stela of Senwosret I, now in Cairo (TR 19/4/2/1). The latter stela bears a longer text, which, in addition to praise of the king and gods, mentions 'repelling enemies' and 'destroying the bowmen', perhaps a reference to the king's campaigns in Nubia. Basing his opinion on the form of the writing of several hieroglyphs, Detlef Franke suggests that the stelae were not produced before about years 17/18 of the king's reign; he also argues that these stelae not only name specific gods but also refer indirectly to many more, including the king, who are both creators and the created. It is likely that this is the first depiction of the king as the creator. These stelae thus stressed both the importance of the king in the Elephantine area and his place in the cosmic order. | 1940BC (c.) | Unknown | red granite | incised | ancient egyptian deity |
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2 | 2 | Unknown | Terracotta good luck charm in the form of a combined mule and phallus.
A large phallus with a horse modelled to fit within its shape, the head projecting at its root, and the rear legs reaching to the ridge of the glans. A suspension-lug is placed behind the horse’s neck. A small hole has been bored through the back, probably in modern times to fix the object to a stand.
Hollow; two-piece mould. Micaceous orange-brown Nile silt with a grey core. Sparse traces of a white dressing, and a few vestiges of a matt orange-brown paint. | Unknown | 1stC-2ndC | Made in: Egypt | terracotta | painted | equestrian; eroticism/sex |
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3 | 3 | Unknown | Limestone ostracon with ink drawing on one side. The drawing depicts a goose on her nest, with four eggs shown beneath the bird. In the upper left corner are two very faint drawings of goslings in red. Possibly painted black over a red draft. | Bibliography:
W.H.Peck, 'Drawings from Ancient Egypt' (London, 1978), p.185, fig.119.; Figured ostraca were found in large numbers in and around Deir el-Medina, and are mostly interpreted as artists' sketches (some bear grids). However, some may have been left as 'votive' objects in sacred places, particularly where the subject matter depicts pharaoh or divine figures.
See
Anthea Page. Ancient Egyptian Figured Ostraca in the Petrie Collection. Warminster
Brunner-Traut 1979. Emma Brunner-Traut. Egyptian Artists' Sketches: Figured Ostraka from the Gayer-Anderson Collection in the Fiztwilliam Museum, Cambridge. Istanbul
Brunner-Traut 1956. Emma Brunner-Traut, Die altagyptischen Scherbenbilder (Bildostraka) der Deutschen Museen und Sammlungen. Wiesbaden
J. Vandier d'Abbadie. Catalogue des Ostraca figures de Deir el-Medineh, 4 volumes (DFIFAO). Cairo (see pls.36-9 for sketches of birds). | Unknown | Unknown | limestone | painted | Unknown |
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4 | 4 | Unknown | A pair of moccasins, made of moose's hide with decoration of red, brown, white and green bird quills and a moose's hair fringe. | This object featured in an episode of the BBC children's television programme "Scan", filmed in November 1976. | Unknown | Unknown | moose hair; moose skin; feather; copper | quillwork | Unknown |
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5 | 5 | Unknown | Rustam slaying Shaghad; single-page painting mounted on detached album folio. Rustam's envious half-brother, Shaghad, sets a trap of spikes in a pit, hidden by turf, for Rustam and his horse, Rakhsh. As Shaghad hides behind a tree, Rustam drags himself out of the pit, where his horse lies impaled, and fires one last arrow, which pierces the tree and Shaghad together, killing Shaghad just before Rustam falls to his own death. Image is situated within the bottom half of the page, surrounded by six columns of Persian text above and below the painting. From an illustrated manuscript of the Shahnama (Book of Kings) of Firdawsi. Section/chapter heading appears in a rectangular panel spanning third and fourth columns and covering second and third lines.
Ink, opaque watercolour and gold on paper. | This painting belongs to an illustrated copy of the Shahnama, or 'Book of Kings', put to verse by the Persian poet Firdawsi around 1010. This manuscript was probably produced in Tabriz, Iran, in the 1330s, toward the end of Ilkhanid Mongol rule in Iran and Cetnral Asia. The episode shown here is the final in the saga of the great warrior Rustam and his faithful red horse Rakhsh.
Rustam's jealous half-brother Shaghhad plotted with the king of Kabul to kill Rustam. They dug a deep pit, lining it with spears and concealing it with bracken. They then invited Rustam to accompany them on a hunting trip, leading him straight to the trap. Falling into the pit, the hero's horse Rakhsh was impaled on the spears and killed, and Rustam was also fatally injured. Realizing his half-brother's treachery before his impending death, however, the wounded Rustam begged Shaghhad to string his bow for him, so that he could protect himself from wild animals as he lay dying. Foolishly, Shaghhad obliged, enabling Rustam to shoot Shaghad dead, pinning him to a tree with his final, well-aimed arrow.
The painting is divided into three parts. On the left, the curve of Rakhsh's body in the pit is echoed by the bending tree-trunk and sagging body of Shaghhad on the right. In the middle, the dying Rustam sits up straight to fire his last arrow, a vertical line at the centre of the story. | 1330-1340 (circa) | Made in: Tabriz (probably) | paper | painted | persian myth/legend |
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6 | 6 | Unknown | Flint lance-head. | Unknown | Unknown | Unknown | flint | Unknown | Unknown |
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7 | 7 | Unknown | Textile (decorated with repeated representation of Amilcar Cabral) made of cotton. | Unknown | 1980-1988 (circa) | Made in: Guinea-Bissau | cotton | woven | Unknown |
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8 | 8 | Unknown | Stucco figure of a standing warrior wearing a scale armour and a helmet. The figure was made using a mould and then painted in green, red and yellow. When found, the figure was broken into three pieces that were re-assembled at a later point. For more information see curatorial comment below. | English
From Whitfield 1985:
The occurrence of more or less identical figures through the use of moulds has enabled this figurine of a warrior in armour to be shown complete with spear and shield, although the three components were found separately in the same shrine at Ming-oi, in the passage (xii) behind the cella (xi). The decoration of the whole shrine consisted mainly of relief friezes along the walls. Stein recovered hundreds of fragments, but owing to damage by fire few had retained the original colouring as this example has.
The friezes of relief figures had been fixed to the walls on a wooden framework, square holes for which are clearly seen in one of Stein’s photographs (Serindia, Vol. Ⅲ, Fig. 291). The holes were in rows, the lowest about sixty centimetres from the ground and the next one and a half metres higher. At one point a projecting, cornice still remained, made of stucco over a wood and reed wattle framework, with rows of holes left by the small pegs which had fastened the figures to it. They had included a striking proportion of warrior figures such as this one. Perhaps they originally represented soldiers of the army of Mara. Their appearance and accoutrements have been excellently described by Stein in his entry for one of the figures (Mi. xi 00109); Serindia, Vol. Ⅲ, p. 1209). From this we learn the full extent of the colouring. The highly arched eyebrows, drawn down and in at their inner corners to make vertical furrows in the forehead and giving a fierce expression, were originally black, as were the protruding eyeballs, and the small moustache and imperial. The lips were crimson, and the face was coloured red, with a good deal of ochre.
The helmet is close-fitting, made up of leather scales and with a boss to receive a crest and a central projecting piece to protect the forehead between the eyebrows. The temples are protected by check pieces, and a gorget fits closely around the chin and protects the neck and upper chest. According to Stein, the whole helmet was painted in one colour, either red or green. Some of these features are very clearly seen in Mi. xii. 009 (Fig. 137), where the gorget was painted green.
On his body, the warrior wears a long tunic of scale-armour, with a heavy rolled collar, belted with a double cord in red and divided below the waist. The scales, which might be of iron rather than lacquered leather, are arranged in double rows, red, green or gilded. He carries a spear and a circular shield evidently of leather, with five bosses. A similar warrior, but with armour definitely composed of leather scales rounded at the top as seen in some of the Stein lacquered scales (Pl. 49), was found at Ming-oi by Huang Wenbi and is illustrated by him (Huang Wenbi, 1958, Pl. 42).
Many elements, from the projection on he helmet to the single long suit of the main armour, recall Sasanian or Iranian examples. The type appears to have been widespread across Central Asia: similar coats with wide lapels are worn by the aristocratic donors of some of the wall paintings in Buddhist shrines near Kizil. In the Hermitage Museum, Leningrad, are a number of important finds brought from Kucha by Oldenburg. They include both soldiers from Mara’s army, preserved with their colouring largely intact, and a large intact mould for making similar figures. These all have plain tunics rather than scale-armour, but the forms of the rolled collar with its lapels, and of the helmets and gorgets, are the same. Their bright polychrome colouring allows us to imagine the art of the shrines at Ming-oi as it originally appeared and in relation both to the wall paintings of Kizil to the west, and to the later figures found by Kozlov at Karakhoto farther east and now also in the Hermitage Museum.; Chinese
From Whitfield 1985:
由於是用模子製作的像外觀幾乎相同，因此本圖展示的身著鎧甲的武士與槍和盾可以作爲完整的圖像來展示，儘管武士、盾和槍分別從明屋遺迹同一寺址的通路(xii)和小室背後(xi)等不同場所發現的。那個寺址的內部裝飾，是以壁面上加半雕的帶狀裝飾爲主。斯坦因發現的大量這種斷片，由於火災的破壞，如本圖的像一樣保持住原來色彩的極爲罕見。
一連串的半雕像用木釘安裝在牆壁上，在斯坦因所攝的照片中，可見到残留的方洞（參照《西域》第3卷，Fig. 291）。洞是成行排列的，最下邊的離地面60釐米，上邊的約在150釐米處。用木和槁草編織的框架上，泥作突出的壁楣現只剩一處，洞中仍留著固定塑像的小木釘。一連串的半雕像中，有幾个如本圖这样的優美匀称的武士像，它們大概是魔王的士兵。有關其外觀和裝扮，斯坦因就收集品中的一件做了精闢的介紹（參照《西域》第3卷1209頁，Mi.xi.00109的解說）。細看本圖的像可以發現整個像都上了彩。如當初眉用墨描出很彎的弧形，眉間加了縱皺，産生出勇猛形象。另外，突出的眼球和小髭鬍等也用墨描，唇是紅色、臉上塗了赤和黃褐色。
看似革製的兜鍪戴在頭上正合適，頂部有兜飾的座，前面可见突出保護眉間的片。而太陽穴被兩側垂下的部分護着，脖子和前胸上部恰好緊緊包在颚圍中得到保護。據斯坦因講，整个兜鍪都上過赤或綠的色彩。上述的若干特徵，在其他Mi. xii. 009武士的頭部（Fig. 137）也可清楚看到，那武士的喉部上塗了綠色。
本圖的武士著大卷領長裾鱗鎧甲，腰系兩條紅色腰帶，鎧甲從腰以下分叉。鎧甲的鱗片可能不是塗漆的革，是鐵的，紅、綠、金色交替配出兩列。武士持著槍和圓形盾，盾明顯是革製的，有五個浮凸飾。黃文弼從明屋遺迹發現有同樣的武士像，刊載在他的著作（《塔里木盆地考古记》北京，1958年，圖版42）中，但鎧甲與斯坦因發現的若干塗漆鱗片（參照彩色圖版第49圖）相同，上端是圓形，明顯是革製的鱗片。
從兜鍪頂部的突起到長單衣的鎧甲，其風格使人想起薩珊王朝波斯或伊朗的因素。大概此風格曾在中亞廣泛流傳，在克孜爾近郊的佛寺壁畫上也見到有穿相同寬折領大衣的貴族供養人像。另外，聖彼得堡艾爾米塔什美術館收藏的奧登堡從庫車發掘的的大量珍貴文物中，有色彩保留非常好的魔王士兵們，以及兩塊模子。不僅是鎧甲，那些簡單的長襟外衣，翻領的卷邊，以及兜鍪和護喉具的風格等都一樣。那些鮮豔多彩的顔色，不僅與西方的克孜爾壁畫有關，還出現在明屋的美術品中，在時代稍晚，科茲洛夫發現於遙遠的東方黑水城現藏於艾爾米塔什美術館的諸像，也受到波及和影響。 | 6thC-7thC | Unknown | stucco; 灰泥 | mould-made; painted; 模製 (Chinese) | military; 軍事的 (Chinese) |
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9 | 9 | Unknown | Large pot of buff earthenware, with incurved cylindrical neck decreasing abruptly to a smaller cylindrical mouth; patterns in plumbago and red. | Af1892,0714.147 to 149 are illustrated in Nigel Barley, ‘Smashing Pots’, BMP 1994, p.97. | 1891 (circa) | Made in: Zimbabwe | earthenware; pottery | Unknown | Unknown |
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10 | 10 | Unknown | Limestone rectangular plaque with cartouche of Aspelta: a foundation deposit. | Unknown | Unknown | Unknown | limestone | incised; glazed | Unknown |
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11 | 11 | Unknown | Deep porcelain bowl. Underglaze blue with the Three Friends of Winter in a landscape. Central roundel inside with similar Three Friends and rock motif. There is an inscription on the base. | Published PDF date : Ming Xuande; Room 95 label text:
PDF B635
Bowl painted with the Three Friends of Winter
Chinese people read this design of pine, bamboo and prunus as the 歲寒三友 (suihan sanyou ‘The Three Friends of Winter’). Pine trees are evergreen and grow for a long time, representing stability and longevity; bamboo, another evergreen, symbolises the educated Confucian, an ideal gentleman-scholar who should be like a bamboo stem, bending not breaking in adverse conditions; and the plum stands for purity as well as leadership, as it is the first flower to bloom in China in the New Year. There is a six-character Xuande reign mark in underglaze blue on the base.
Porcelain with underglaze cobalt-blue decoration
Jingdezhen, Jiangxi province 江西省, 景德鎮
Ming dynasty, Xuande mark and period, AD1426–35; PDF B635
歲寒三友圖碗
中國人將松、竹、梅組成的紋飾圖案稱為“歲寒三友”（意為冬天的三位朋友）。松樹，長青且生長時間長，代表穩定與長壽；竹子，另一種長青植物，象徵有修養的儒家，即君子應該像竹節一樣，直面逆境彎韌不折；梅花代表純潔，亦象徵領袖風范，因其為中國新春開放的第一種花卉。外底署青花六字宣德年款。
瓷器，青花
江西省景德鎮
明代，宣德，宣德款，1426-1435年 | 1426-1435 | Made in: Jingdezhen | porcelain | underglazed | the three friends of winter |
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12 | 12 | Unknown | Bradawl: bronze blade; wooden handle. | Found in .6027 | Unknown | Unknown | wood; bronze | Unknown | Unknown |
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13 | 13 | Unknown | Greater part of bronze belt; embossed and incised decoration with animals and monsters within a garland-net design, a stylised tree and winged sun-discs; traces of vertical row of nail holes at damaged left suggesting belt may have been shortened in antiquity. | Unknown | 700BC-600BC | Unknown | copper alloy | incised | mythical figure/creature; sun/moon; tree/bush |
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14 | 14 | Unknown | Fragment of a wooden capital decorated with a carved floral decoration. | Unknown | 4thC | Unknown | wood | carved | Unknown |
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15 | 15 | Unknown | Carved panel; cedarwood; from a door; oblong; ornamental design; large central cross with foliated extremities and two medallions containing smaller crosses upon the vertical limb; the ground is covered with a rich decoration of interlacing floral scrolls. | On the el-Muʿallaqah church and it furnishing: E. Maglaque, "Devotional and Artistic Responses to Contested Space in Old Cairo: The Case of Al-Mu’allakah", in: M. Gharipour, ed. Sacred Precincts: Non-Muslim Sites in Islamic Societies (Leiden 2014) 143-57; M. Immerzeel, The Narrow Way to Heaven: Identity and Identities in the Art of Middle Eastern Christianity (Louvain 2017) 69-76.; Found with 1878,1203.1-9 | 1300 (circa) | Made in: Egypt | cedar wood | carved | heraldry; flower; cross |
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16 | 16 | Unknown | Vase of red pottery: originally polished on the exterior, but largely blackened by burning. The vase has a flat base, from which the sides expand to form a wide body, then converge again to a narrow neck. The rim is slightly broken. Within the vase are remains of the original contents. Cracked in places. | Bibliography:
W. M. F. Petrie, 'Abydos' I (London, 1902), 6, pl. VIII, 3 (probably). | Unknown | Unknown | pottery | polished | Unknown |
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17 | 17 | Unknown | Club (with bird) made of wood. | see JCH King `Artificial Curiosities of the North West Coast of America' BMP Ltd 1981; Illustrated in E Gunther 'Indian Life' Chicago 1972, p 209. | 1780 (before) | Unknown | wood | Unknown | Unknown |
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18 | 18 | Unknown | Cap composed of two sections of machine plain woven cotton hand sewn together with dyed blue cotton. The cap is decorated in blocks of cotton embroidery in dyed blue, green, yellow and bleached white cotton. This embroidery forms blocks of blue and green embroidery. The blue sections are decorated in geometric patters and Arabic script in white and the green sections are decorated with geometric patterns in dyed yellow cotton. The cap is finished on top with a 'knot.' | 91 = C204/E179
(Heathcote’s notes)
Cap. Given by Mrs Mary Moss, the sister of the cap’s first owner, Arthur Humphrey, who died in 2000, aged c.90.
Note: “This cap was given to Arthur Humphrey in the summer of 1975 at the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, northern Nigeria, by the Vice-Chancellor Ishaya Audu, in the presence of Iya Abubakar, the head of the maths department., where Arthur was a senior lecturer. It was a private ceremony, described to me by Arthur when I visited him in Sheffield. The presentation of the cap marked the end of Arthur’s stay at the University. He was an extremely good mathematics teacher. He taught the conductor Colin Davis, when Colin was a schoolboy, and they remained good friends. Arthur was a keen musician and had his own harpsichord which he played in his house opposite to ours on the University main campus. I went out with him occasionally on bird-watching trips.
When he left he retired to Sheffield where he died in September 2000. Arthur showed me the cap, which I immediately recognized as decorated with the design that I had also seen on a cap worn by the Vice-Chancellor. [It has a motif that must be the name of the University]. I did not see such a design on a cap worn by anyone else, so it may have been an exclusive item. I cannot say whether Arthur’s was originally that worn by the Vice-Chancellor, but I doubt it, in spite of the Hausa custom of making gifts of clothing – even worn garments – on various occasions. Ishaya Audu was a Christian by practice, not a Muslim. When I heard through a solicitor that Arthur had died, I contacted an executor, and after my address had been passed to his sister she posted the cap to me. I wrote to her to say that I would look after the cap carefully, and intended that it would go to a museum with other articles of Hausa embroidery already forming my collection.” | 1975 | Made in: Zaria | cotton | plain weave; embroidered; sewn | Unknown |
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19 | 19 | Unknown | Head from a monumental statue of King Thutmose I; uraeus head now lost. | Mysliwiec, Royal Portraiture of the Dynasties XXI-XXX (1988): 47, 58.
Published: PM IV, p.52.
M. Müller, Zum Bildnistypus Thutmosis I., Göttinger Miszellen 32 (1979), p. 29.
I. Lindblad, Royal Sculpture of the Early Eighteenth Dynasty in Egypt (Medelhavsmuseet Memoir 5), Stockholm 1984, 53-4 [B], pl. 32. | Unknown | Unknown | sandstone | Unknown | Unknown |
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20 | 20 | Unknown | Wooden chubwan/juban mask, on perspex stand. Oval-shaped mask with pronounced forehead, closed eyes and wide, smiling mouth. | See similar example in Speiser (1990), 'Ethnology of Vanuatu', Plate 90, Fig.1 (southern Pentecost); discussion p.340. See also Bonnemaison (1996), 'Arts of Vanuatu', pp.23-25.
Purchased from: Art and Ethnography from Africa, the Americas and the Pacific; Christie's (London) 7 July 1982, p.44. Sale ARIOI-2442. | Unknown | Made in: Pentecost | wood | carved | Unknown |
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21 | 21 | Moko Jumbie (Object) | Steel sculpture; male figure of a stilt-walker (Moko Jumbie). Figure has articulated limbs, painted black. Wears a loincloth composed of plastic and synthetic fibres, decorated with mesh synthetic fibre vest; metal keys, bells and toy aeroplane; plastic beads; wooden masks. Figure wears gold-sprayed leather and synthetic trainers with toes exposed. Headdress composed of numerous multi-coloured synthetic and cotton doillies. Wings attached to back of figure sprayed black and gold. | Unknown | 2015 | Made in: Greenwich | steel; plastic; synthetic; textile; metal; wood; cotton; leather | painted | carnival |
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22 | 22 | Unknown | Double-tube vase. Made of jade (green-brown). | Unknown | 906-1280 (circa); 16thC-17thC (Rawson 1995) | Unknown | jade | carved | Unknown |
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23 | 23 | Unknown | Painted limestone shabti of Djehutymose; Hieroglyphic text on apron and kilt. | Unknown | Unknown | Unknown | limestone | painted | Unknown |
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24 | 24 | Unknown | Club made of whale bone. Elongated triangular form with intricately carved surfaces including figures of men and dogs. | Illustrated in K. Sloan (ed), 'Enlightenment : Discovering the World in the Eighteenth Century', London, British Museum Press, 2003, fig. 236, p. 251 | Unknown | Made in: Tonga | whalebone | carved | Unknown |
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25 | 25 | Unknown | Chalcedony intaglio, engraved with the refined figure of a naked youth testing the straightness of his arrow, his bow over his arm; archer represented in three-quarter back view, the rest shown in profile; his hair detailed with tight rows of curls in front and his anatomy carefully rendered; hatched border. | Object owned and held by the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. This record is included in the British Museum database as part of the Museum’s Naukratis Project, a research collaboration that aims to virtually re-unite finds from the ancient port city of Naukratis, now distributed over 80 museums worldwide.; Naukratis is first mentioned as the place of origin in Lady Helena Carnegie, ed. 1908. Catalogue of the Collection of Antique Gems Formed by James, Ninth Earl of Southesk K.T. London: B. Quaritch, vol. 1, pp. 27-28, no. B8, pl. II. "Mr. W.T. Ready, from whom I purchased it, informed me that it was said to have been found at Naukratis."
Attributed to Epimenes. Published by Walter-Karydi (1975, Fig.4) who compares this with an example from Boston MFA found in the Nile Delta, and often assumed to be from Naukratis, which was inscribed with the name Epimenes. (Boston 27.677; Walter-Karydi 1975, 11, Fig.5).
Walter-Karydi, E. 1975. Spaetarchaische Gemmenschneider. Jahrbuch der Berliner Museen 17, 5-44. | 500 BC (circa) | Made in: Greece (probably) | chalcedony | carved | archer |
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26 | 26 | Unknown | Rim and body sherd (mended from 6 fragments) of Chian Mature Animal Style pottery heavy chalice white slip; interior: reserved band at rim, glazed streaky black below; alternating lotus flowers and palmettes in added white outline with added red centres, above band of short vertical strokes between red and white bands; exterior: alternating red and black tongues between dilute lines, above zigzag pattern between dilute lines; below, painted decoration consisting of animal frieze (from left, part of rump and tail of undetermined animal, to left; on the right, s[hijnx to left (head with red hair, face and neck with white and dotted chest and wing); pendant triangle, short vertical strokes, elaborate rosettes and dotted squares as filling ornament. | The sherd joins British Museum 1924,1201.537 and Boston 88.830 and belongs to the same vase as British Museum 1888,0601.465.b, 1888,0601.465.c, 1888,0601.465.d, 1888,0601.465.e, London UCL 751, UCL 393 and Paris E8056 bis.22 and probably belongs to the same vase as British Museum 1965,0930.338.
Lemos describes the sherd as coming from a mediocre, but big chalice belonging to the Group of Elaborate Animal Chalices. Chalices that fall into this group are usually large and heavy-walled and are also known as chalice-kraters. Chalices in this group also display elaborate compositions that include polychromy and delicately painted figures (Lemos 1991, 90-1). | 610BC-580BC (circa) | Made in: Chios | pottery | slipped; painted | sphinx |
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27 | 27 | Unknown | Porcelain saucer dish. Covered inside and outside with copper-red glaze, which has been ground down at the rim to expose white body. Clear porcelain glaze on base, with inscription. | Published PDF date : Qing Kangxi 1662-1722; Room 95 label text:
PDF C502
Dish with copper-red glaze
The skills used to create these extraordinary red glazes were lost in China from the mid-fifteenth century until they were rediscovered in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. The glaze has ‘crept’ at the rim of the dish to reveal the pure whiteness of the porcelain body. Although the base carries an incised Xuande reign mark, it was made in the eighteenth century.
Porcelain with underglaze cobalt-blue mark, transparent and copper-red glazes
Jingdezhen, Jiangxi province江西省, 景德鎮
Qing dynasty, AD 1700–1800; PDF C502
銅紅釉盤
在中國，燒造此種非凡紅釉的技術從十五世紀中期就已失傳，到十七世紀晚期至十八世紀早期才又恢復。此盤口沿在燒窯中縮釉形成“脫口”現象，顯露胎體的潔白。儘管外底署有宣德刻款，實為十八世紀作品。
瓷器，青花款，透明釉，銅紅釉
江西省景德鎮 | 18thC | Made in: Jingdezhen | porcelain | underglazed | Unknown |
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28 | 28 | Unknown | Maihi, house panel carved from perspex (pair, 2009,2008.1). End carved with manaia figure and pattern of ridges, grooves and notches. Scalloped edges. Upper end carved with koruru face. Inlaid with paua (haliotis) shell, and decorated with white feathers attached with red polyester cord. | Unknown | 2009 | Made in: British Museum | perspex; haliotis shell; feather; polyester | carved; inlaid | Unknown |
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29 | 29 | Unknown | Bronze figure of Venus putting on a necklace. | Unknown | 1stC-3rdC | Unknown | bronze | Unknown | classical deity |
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30 | 30 | Unknown | Redware pottery shallow bowl. | Unknown | Unknown | Unknown | pottery | Unknown | Unknown |
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31 | 31 | Unknown | Pottery: red-figured hydria.
(1) Menelaos pursuing Helen. Menelaos, a bearded warrior with cuirass, helmet with raised cheek-pieces, and himation, pursues to right with drawn sword and outstretched left arm Helen, who with left on bosom turns as she flees, extending her right towards him with a gesture of supplication. She wears a Doric chiton with border of zigzags and a row of dots near each edge, and apoptygma, undertied, an himation over her shoulders, earrings and sphendone: her hair hangs down her back. On right a woman in long sleeved chiton, mantle and earrings, and head-dress like that of Helen, moves to left, extending both arms as if to protect Helen. In the field above Helen, καλή. On left of her, ό παις; on right of the woman, KAΛΟΣ, καλός.
(2) On shoulder: Symposion. Three wreathed figures wearing himation covering the legs and left shoulder recline to left, leaning each against a folded striped cushion. The one on right is bearded, and looks to right, extending to left on his right palm a cotyle: the central one also looks to right with his right resting on his breast; the third looks to left and twirls aloft on his right forefinger a kylix (κοτταβίζων); between these two hangs a basket. In the field, ό παϊς καλός.
Strong style. Purple inscriptions, wreaths, cords of baskets. Eye archaic. The design on the body (1) is enclosed within a border formed by, below, pairs of maeanders separated by red cross squares; above, zigzag pattern; at sides, net pattern, which also forms the sides of the design 2; above 2, tongue. The lower part of the body is encircled by two thin lines of purple, and below, by a band of rays, black on red. The lip is left red. | BM Cat. Vases
Heydemann, Iliupersis, p. 30, note 5, I.; Overbeck, Her. Bildw. p. 630, no. 117. | 480BC (circa) | Made in: Attica (Greece) | pottery | painted | classical mythology; symposium; mythical figure/creature |
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32 | 32 | Unknown | Collared disc - bi of semi-translucent yellow jade with light brown inclusions finished to a good gloss. | This piece illustrates several features that define the type, but that do not always all occur together. The disc is very thin and beautifully polished; it has concentric grooves, and there is a narrow upstanding flange or collar extending 4 or 5 mm either side of the level of the ring. The central hole is wide relative to the narrow ring. Finely worked collared discs are found both at Anyang in Fuj Hao’s tomb and at several other Anyang period tombs. As mentioned above, similar pieces occur in the south-west, at Sichuan Guanghan Sanxingdui. The present disc bears a close resemblance to one of these south-western pieces and seems unlikely to have been made at Anyang. Its very thinly worked surfaces are not characteristic of Shang works. See Rawson 1995, p.165, cat.no.9.1.; The thinly-worked disc with a flange or collar projecting from the inner rim has fine circular grooves on both sides of the bi. Shang. Diameter 87mm. | 15thC BC-10thC BC | Made in: China | jade | polished | Unknown |
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33 | 33 | Unknown | Cap, with a woven base of brown cotton, embroidered by hand with a pattern in white, black and yellow. | The acquisitions register in 1943 illustrated this hat upside down and did not understood what it was, describing it as a 'Cloth receptacle, brown, with embroidered pattern in white, black, yellow and red colours'. It was recognised by W.B.Fagg as a hat of a type that is conventionally ascribed to Sierra Leone. See Venice & Alastair Lamb, 'Sierra Leone Weaving', 1984, p.144, where this hat is illustrated as an example of Sierra Leone production.
For a very similar hat see the next item, Af1943,02.9. | 1927-31 (circa) | Made in: Sierra Leone | cotton | embroidered; woven | Unknown |
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34 | 34 | Unknown | Case of rectangular wooden inner-coffin of Gua; recessed and coloured Hieroglyphic text and eye-panel on exterior; painted Hieroglyphic text on interior. | Published:
PM IV: p.187
Harco Willems Chests of life, 1988, [cat no. B1L].
Nicholson and Shaw, Ancient Egyptian Materials and Technology (Cambridge 2000), p. 350 | Unknown | Unknown | wood | painted | Unknown |
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35 | 35 | Unknown | Rectangular smoother with integrated handle, carved from one piece of wood. Such tools were used for smoothing plaster, for example in painted tomb chapels, or on the surface of mudbrick house walls. | Another example assigned to Thebes: Egypt's Golden Age (exhibition catalogue, Boston, 1982): 56-7 [no.28] | Unknown | Unknown | wood | Unknown | Unknown |
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36 | 36 | Unknown | Suzhou white jade snuff bottle. | The even coloured pebble carved in relief to depict a scholar seated in a continuous mountainous landscape below pine tree, stopper carved in coral. Signed Zigang. See Rawson 1995, p.401,cat.no.29.15; 18th century: This snuff bottle retains the shape of a pebble. On one side in low relief carving, is a sage seated under a pine tree; on the other is a scene of mountains and clouds. The bottle has a small conical cap and spoon. The bottom is flat. The bottle carries the signature Zigang, an abbreviation of Lu Zigang, the famous late Ming jade carver. Scant textual reference links Lu Zigang with Suzhou in the Ming dynasty. The present bottle, however, belongs to a date later than the sixteenth or seventeenth century, when he is thought to have been active. Indeed, bottles were only explicitly used for snuff from the seventeenth century, after the introduction of the habit from Europe. The present bottle may of course have been made for some other purpose and then converted into a snuff bottle by the addition of a spoon. The side decorated with a scene of sage and pine with mountains shows the conventional metaphors for wisdom in retirement and endurance. | 18thC | Made in: China | jade | carved | landscape |
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37 | 37 | Unknown | Copper alloy mirror handle, decorated with heads of horned animals at end where the mirror plate was originally fixed.
Lower end of the handle terminates in a ring. The main part is moulded with an expansion at each end and a waisted expansion in the middle. The mount for the mirror plate comprises a ring secured to a flat projection at the end of the handle by a rivet, on either side an ox-head is moulded in the round. There is a slot along the upper side of the ring portion of the mount, which continues into the top of each ox-head. The mirror plate would have been secured in the slot by a rivet through the upper part of the ring. Traces of the mirror plate which remain suggest that it was made of iron. | Unknown | 50 BC - AD 120 (circa) | Unknown | copper alloy | Unknown | animal |
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38 | 38 | Unknown | Vase. Made of bronze. | Unknown | 618-906 | Unknown | bronze | Unknown | Unknown |
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39 | 39 | Unknown | Gold coin. | Unknown | 1471 | Minted in: Florence (city) | gold | Unknown | Unknown |
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40 | 40 | Unknown | Bronze bezel of a finger-ring.
The ring has a bust, in relief, of women in profile. The woman does not wear a diadem and may represent a private individual. She has her hair arranged in the so-called melon coiffure. | Walker & Higgs 2001
(Comment written with Cat. No. 33)
Portraits of both royal and private individuals survive on finger rings made in a variety of materials, ranging from gold to glass. They were not exclusively manufactured in Egypt and some may represent rulers of other Hellenistic kingdoms, and members of their courts. The royal images may be positively identified by the presence of a diadem, and perhaps by the use of more expensive raw materials like gold. The aesthetic quality of the portraits varies greatly with the poorer images perhaps belonging to members of the lower social classes who still wished to honour a particular dynast. The rings were used to seal documents. The portraits were either carved in relief or cut in intaglio producing a raised image in clay.
Clay sealings survive from many parts of the eastern Mediterranean, particularly those areas controlled at one time or another by the Ptolemies. On Cyprus a large cache of clay sealings was found at New Paphos, and from the island of Delos come a large number of sealings showing possible Ptolemaic ruler portraits. From Egypt, excavations at the site of Edfu have yielded vast quantities of portraits of Ptolemaic rulers on clay sealings (cat. nos 59-66).
These two rings have busts of women in profile. One woman wears a diadem and may be a Ptolemaic queen, perhaps Berenike II, whereas the other more delicately worked image has no diadem and may represent a private individual. Both women have their hair arranged in the so-called melon coiffure, a hairstyle often associated with the Ptolemaic dynasty and members of their court. Tests of the metal content of the two rings have shown that there is an abnormally high tin content. This may have been added to give an extra shine to the bronze, which, when first made, would have almost imitated gold. | 3rdC BC | Unknown | bronze | Unknown | Unknown |
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41 | 41 | Unknown | Rectangular limestone stela with cavetto cornice and winged sun-disc above a polychrome painted relief representation of Isis suckling Horus with offering-table before; the text is unfinished - although one vertical and one horizontal register of hieroglyphs exist - the cartouches are blank but the names of the deities and the titulary of the king on whose behalf the stela was erected are recorded. | Published in:
C. Thiers, Une consécration à Isis thébaine: la stèle British Museum EA 1633, RdE 73 (2023), 203-211 | 30BC (after) | Unknown | limestone | painted | ancient egyptian deity |
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42 | 42 | Unknown | Register 1941:
Pottery vase, modelled in low relief in human form and painted polychrome slip. | Register addition "Nasca". For a typology of vessel shapes, see Alfred Kroeber and Donald Collier (edited by Patrick H. Carmichael; with an afterword by Katharina J. Schreiber), ‘The Archaeology and Pottery of Nazca, Peru, Alfred L. Kroeber's 1926 Expedition’, 1998, Altamira Press, Walnut Creek-London- New Delhi, pp.: 94-96, figs. 90, 91. For further reading see Donald A. Proulx, ‘A Sourcebook of Nasca Ceramic Iconography, Reading a Culture through its Art’, 2006, University of Iowa Press.
The Date range for the Nasca period is based on Christopher Donnan, 'Ceramics of Ancient Peru', Fowler Museum of Cultural History, University of California, Los Angeles, 1992.; Roll-out drawing by Garth Denning. Nasca Archive Drawing Number: 0200 | 100BC-600 | Unknown | pottery | slip-painted; hand-modelled | Unknown |
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43 | 43 | Unknown | Tubular bead, decorated with spirals. Made of incised jade (ivory). Part of a set which includes two arc-shaped pendants, 'huang' (see BM 1945.1017.119-120). | Unknown | 4thC BC-3rdC BC (circa) | Unknown | jade; nephrite | incised | Unknown |
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44 | 44 | Unknown | Mould-made scaraboid in Egyptian blue; back in the form of a ram's head, with forward curving horns and neck behind the horns decorated with parallel incisions; underside decorated with a crudely incised representation of two monkeys flanking a palm tree; pierced for suspension through diameter near the circular base, so head would hang down; in bright blue paste. | Scaraboids in the shape of a ram's head pertain to a common series produced at the 'Scarab Factory' (on its various productions, see Webb forthcoming). They are normally made in Egyptian blue, like here. The ram's head reproduces the rhyton shape popular in both Greek coroplastic and coins. This shape can also be related to the ram-headed god Amun-Ra of Baded, the main local Egyptian god revered at Naukratis.
This scaraboid belongs to a type which was widely distributed in the Mediterranean area, particularly in Eastern Greece, and Southern Russia (Gorton 1996, 121-127, type XXXIV, subtype B26-29, see especially B26 for this piece).
A similar motif is found on a scarab (BM 1888,0601.56) and scaraboid from Naukratis (Boston, Museum of Fine Arts 88.860).
Gorton, A.F. 1996, Egyptian and Egyptianizing scarabs: a typology of steatite, faience, and paste scarabs from Punic and other Mediterranean sites, Oxford.
Petrie, W.M.F. 1886, Naukratis. Part I, 1884–5 (Third Memoir of the Egypt Exploration Fund), London.
Webb, V. forthcoming, Faience finds from Naukratis and their implications for the chronology of the site, in R. Thomas (ed.) forthcoming. Naukratis in Context I: The Nile Delta as a Landscape of Connectivity. Proceedings of the First Naukratis Project Workshop held at The British Museum, 16th –17th December 2011. | 600 BC-570 BC (mainly) | Made in: Scarab Factory | egyptian blue | mould-made; incised; pierced | mammal; tree/bush |
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45 | 45 | Unknown | Ada, sword (chief's, ceremonial, decorated with leopards, pommel in form of Portuguese head) made of iron, brass, ivory. | Register addition by W B Fagg: "Type Ada, for Oba and senior chiefs". | 16thC - 19thC | Made in: Benin City | iron; brass; elephant ivory | inlaid; carved | Unknown |
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46 | 46 | Unknown | Rope made from woven lengths of halfa grass (Desmostachya bipinnata). One end of the rope is knotted. | Ryan & Hansen, A Study of Ancient Egyptian Cordage in the British Museum (Occasional Publication 62, British Museum), p.7,11,12,13,21,22,23,24,25,33,35; On the use of tough grasses for rope in ancient Egypt, see Wendrich, “Basketry” in P.T. Nicholson and I. Shaw, Ancient Egyptian Materials and Technology, 255. | Unknown | Unknown | halfa grass | knotted | Unknown |
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47 | 47 | Unknown | Dehua porcelain incense burner of 'gui'-like form with two modelled lion masks surrounded by curls of fur. The base is glazed. Reign mark impressed on base. | Published PDF date : Qing 17th century; Room 95 label text:
PDF 422
Incense burner modelled after bronze ‘gui’
Dehua wares of the period AD 1600–1911 are typified by figures and vessels with a granular sugary white body and either a blue tinged or creamy white glaze. The pure whiteness of these ceramics is due to the relative absence of iron impurities in the body - indeed the clay used contains only half a percent of ferric oxide. Body and glaze fuse perfectly in the firing. Plain white porcelains from the Dehua kilns in Fujian, south-eastern China are known in the West by the nineteenth-century French connoisseurs’ term Blanc de Chine. The base carries an impressed apocryphal Chenghua mark 大明成化年製.
Porcelain with transparent glaze
Dehua ware 德化窯
Dehua, Fujian province 德化, 福建省
Qing dynasty, about AD 1700–1900; PDF 422
白釉簋式香爐
1600年至1911年間的德化器物以器皿和各類塑像為特色，其胎體潔白，質如極細沙，釉色閃青或呈奶油白色。鐵元素的顯著降低使得器物呈色更為白淨，事實上胎土的氧化鐵含量僅有0.5%。此器胎釉完美地熔融結合在一起。中國東南部福建德化窯生產的素白瓷，在西方以十九世紀法國鑒賞家所用的“中國白”一詞而聞名。器底有偽托印款“大明成化年製”。
瓷器，透明釉
德化窯
福建省德化
清代，約1700-1900年 | 18thC-19thC | Made in: Dehua | porcelain | glazed | Unknown |
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48 | 48 | Unknown | Limestone false-door of Neferseshemkhufu: at the top, the lintel carries a conventional offering-text in favour of the deceased (here called Ššỉ), and below it there is a panel with representations of Neferseshemkhufu and of his wife, Khentetkai, each seated behind an offering-table. A single line of text with titles separates the upper panel from two lower panels which flank the false door. These latter panels bear representations of Neferseshemkhufu and his wife: on the left Neferseshemkhufu is shown standing and holding the sceptre and staff of office, accompanied by a child, his son ʒbdw; on the right Khentetkai is shown with her daughter Nb-ḥzt, who holds a lotus-flower. The whole is carved in good sunk relief. No remains of colour. | Bibliography:
B. Porter & R. Moss, 'Topographical Bibliography of Ancient Egyptian Hieroglyphic Texts, Reliefs and Paintings' III (Oxford: Clarendon Press), p. 66; Part 2, 307. | Unknown | Unknown | limestone | Unknown | Unknown |
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49 | 49 | Unknown | Cross-shaped 'Katanga Cross' of copper, used as a a currency bar. | These copper ingots were cast in sand moulds in the Katanga copper belt. | 1886 (before) | Made in: Angola | copper | Unknown | Unknown |
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50 | 50 | Unknown | Porcelain bottle with underglaze blue decoration. This bottle has a round drum-like body and a long tapering tubular neck and stands on a rectangular foot with an unglazed base. It is decorated in bright tones of underglaze blue with, on one side, a scholar seated in a landscape approached by a servant carrying a book; on the other side is a European coat of arms showing castles and lions. The neck, sides and foot are ornamented with stylized flowers and foliage. Dots around the edges of the design suggest milling on a coin. Typical of the late Wanli period, the porcelain and the glaze are not well fitting and the glaze has fritted away along the edges. | Harrison-Hall 2001:
A flood of silver was shipped into the Spanish and hence the European economy from mines in the New World, especially Bolivia and Mexico, in the sixteenth century. This silver was then probably copied from the reverse side of a Spanish silver 8-reales or 'piece of eight', such as a 1588 example from the Segovia mint in the Department of Coins and Medals, British Museum. The shape of the bottle is based loosely on a Near Eastern metal or glass vessel. It is not a unique commission. Many identical bottles survive today. Comparable examples are in the private Mottahedeh Collection, the Peabody Museum of Salem, Massachusetts, the Idemitsu Museum of Arts, Tokyo, the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, the Gementemuseum, the Hague, and the Dublin Municipal Gallery of Art. A bottle with the same design shown in another private collection. Another example with a cut-down neck and silver mount and with flowers in place of the figures is in the Museum of Anastacio Goncalves, Lisbon. | 1590-1620 (circa) | Made in: Jingdezhen | porcelain | glazed; underglazed | heraldry; flower; landscape; musical instrument; scholar |
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51 | 51 | Unknown | Wooden game-stick of long rectangular form, semi-circular in section. The surface is divided into three parts by a groups of three parallel incised lines, the space in between then criss-crossed with diagonal lines. The end is carved to intimate a duck's head (?), with inlaid ivory eyes. | Throwsticks were used in sets of four or more, and depending on how they fell (with rounded or flat surface uppermost), could dictate player's moves in a game. This shape of gaming piece is one of two shapes associated with the game senet, as it is featured in depictions in tomb paintings, and found with senet gaming-boards. See Egypt’s Golden Age (exhibition catalogue, Boston, 1982): 271-2 [no.376]. They are a feature of elite burial assemblages of the New Kingdom, but also earlier periods. | Unknown | Unknown | wood; ivory | incised; inlaid | Unknown |
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52 | 52 | Unknown | Redware pottery jar with a rounded base and sides and a short concave neck(incomplete). | Unknown | Unknown | Unknown | pottery | Unknown | Unknown |
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53 | 53 | Unknown | A fragment of the side and part of the base of a calcite bowl, with the name Sekhemib-Perenmaat and a figure of a god incised on the exterior. The god holds a wʒs sceptre and an ‘nḫ. The upper part of the inscription is missing. Good condition. | For other inscribed vessels of Sekhemib-Perenmaat, see P. Kaplony ‘Beschriftete Kleinfunde in der Sammlung Georges Michailidis Ergebnisse einer Bestandsaufnahme im Sommer 1968’ (Istanbul, 1973) , 7, no. 28 and pls.8, no. 28; 21, no. 28;P. Kaplony, ‘Steingefässe mit Inschriften der Frühzeit und des Alten Reiches (Monumenta Aegyptiaca I)’ (Brussels, 1968), 41, no. 19 and pl.23; P. Lacau & J. P . Lauer, 'Pyramide à degrès IV, , 41-3 and pl.18.
Bibliography:
G. D. Nash, ‘Proceedings of the Society of Biblical Archaeology’ (London, 1907), 297-8 and pl.III. | Unknown | Unknown | calcite | incised | Unknown |
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54 | 54 | Unknown | Elliptical palm leaf basket, with painted black and red chequer patterns on the exterior. | Found with .5555.2
Found with .5555.3
Found with .5555.4; For a range of baskets from Deir el-Medina, see Gourlay, Les sparteries de Deir el-Medineh (DFIFAO 17, 1981), esp. pl.22
On basketry in ancient Egypt, see Wendrich, “Basketry” in P.T. Nicholson and I. Shaw, Ancient Egyptian Materials and Technology, 254-67. | Unknown | Unknown | palm leaf | plaited (basketry); painted | Unknown |
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55 | 55 | Unknown | A wrought iron sculpture in the form of a free standing calligraphic figure. | Part of Koraichi's 'Path of Roses' installation conceived as a tribute to the Sufi mystic Rumi | Unknown | Unknown | iron | wrought | Unknown |
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56 | 56 | Unknown | Open silver bracelet, worked in repoussé, engraved with a design of an eagle. | Unknown | 20thC | Made in: Alaska (state) (South); Made in: British Columbia | silver | engraved; repoussé | bird |
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57 | 57 | Unknown | Basketry, shallow basin shaped basket made of rush, using coiled technique; design near the rim and in a spiral pattern from the centre of the basket. | see JCH King `First Peoples, First Contacts' British Museum Press 1999; see JCH King `Artificial Curiosities of the North West Coast of America' BMP Ltd 1981.
A collection of Onchochi (Yerba Mansa/ Anemopsis californica) was left to be with the Chumash basketry collections by a group of Chumash community memebrs in May 2024. It was gathered in 2023 from Modoc Preserve, Santa Barbara, CA. | 18thc (or earlier) | Unknown | rush | basketry | Unknown |
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58 | 58 | Unknown | Plaque; hard-paste unglazed porcelain; ornamented with garland of naturalistically-modelled porcelain flowers tied at top with gilt porcelain bow enclosing gilt laurel wreath of porcelain which frames relief portrait to right of Benjamin Franklin on raised oval medallion; plaque decorated near rim with thick gilt band; mounted in wooden frame; unmarked. | Sold from the William Edkins collection, Sotheby's, Wilkins and Hodge, April 1874, lot 76
A similar Bristol porcelain plaque (but without any gilding) is in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (M.80.205.18) (gift of Catherine Hearst and ex Lewis estate sale of George Washington Estate, 10 December 1890 lot 141).; Dawson 1987
Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790), American statesman, who assisted in drawing up the Declaration of Independence in 1775, is shown without his wig in a view similar to one produced in jasper by Josiah Wedgwood, probably based on a bust by J. J. Caffiéri of about 1777 (see R. Reilly and G. Savage, 'Wedgwood, The Portrait Medallions', London 1973, p. 147 e; the illustration reproduces an example marked Wedgwood in the British Museum reg. no. 1909,1201,151). The Sèvres factory also manufactured a portrait medallion of Franklin in this pose from 1777 (Dawson is grateful to Madame Préaud, archivist of the Sèvres factory, for this information).
In 1873 Owen reproduced the text of a copy of an unsigned letter in Franklin's hand from Paris dated 3rd January 1778 apparently thanking Champion (?) for his present of a medallion portrait (Owen, 1873, p. 93). The Bristol plaque is thought to be the largest and most elaborate example made at the factory, which apparently also produced a white biscuit medallion of Franklin (Edkins sale, Sotheby's, 21 April 1874, lot 77, Owen op. cit., p. 93). Another fine biscuit plaque in the Museum collection ornamented with martial trophies bears a medallion head of George Washington. Both may have been made for the American market. Champion was an active friend of the American cause. Some time after selling his factory in 1781 he emigrated to South Carolina. He presented two examples each of his Franklin and Washington medallions to G. Washington (Sellers 1962, p. 369).
Literature: P. Nelson, Bristol Biscuit Plaques, Connoisseur, vol. IV, no. 23, July 1903, fig. II; C. C. Sellers, 'Benjamin Franklin in Portraiture', New Haven and London, 1962, pp. 369-70. | 1775 (circa) | Factory in: Bristol (England) | porcelain; gold; wood | hand-modelled; gilded; relief | flower |
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59 | 59 | Unknown | Ceremonial sword (ada). ?European blade made of ?steel decorated with figure of leopard in brass and incised intertwined bird motif. Hilt made of brass, brass/steel guards and steel pommel. | See Collection File:Af1944,04.1-77. | 19thC | Made in: Benin City (?); Made in: Europe (? blade) | brass; steel | Unknown | ceremony/ritual; bird; wild cat/big cat |
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60 | 60 | Moko Jumbie (Object) | Steel sculpture; female figure of a stilt-walker (Moko Jumbie). Figure has articulated limbs, painted black. Wears a loincloth composed of plastic and synthetic fibres, shoulder pieces made from nylon netting and gold-sprayed metal breast ornaments. Openwork copper pipe skirt soldered together and hooked onto waist of figure. Numerous composite objects attached to figure including wooden masks and comb; metal bells, keys and toy aeroplane; plastic ornaments sprayed gold; textile decorations. Figure wears gold-sprayed leather and synthetic trainers with toes exposed. Wooden mask with attached vertical headdress made of strips of sheet metal sprayed gold with multiple small metal objects attached including keys, figures, chains, and bells. Wings secured to back of figure, sprayed black and gold. Figure has spiral copper armlet on right proper arm. | Unknown | 2015 | Made in: Greenwich | steel; plastic; synthetic; nylon; textile; metal; copper; wood; leather | painted; soldered | carnival |
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61 | 61 | Unknown | Bronze figure of Osiris in a seated posture; plinth and tang beneath the feet. | Unknown | Unknown | Unknown | bronze | Unknown | ancient egyptian deity |
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62 | 62 | Unknown | Red pottery bowl, hemispherical, incomplete and partially reconstructed. | Unknown | Unknown | Unknown | pottery | Unknown | Unknown |
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63 | 63 | Unknown | Green-glazed porcelain flower vase (Longquan ware). It is in the shape of an ancient jade 'cong'. | Rawson 1992:
Both the green glaze and the shape refer self-conciously to an ancient jade form. Such item would have been used on household altars or on desks in scholar's studies. Although ancient ritual jades and bronzes went out of use for a time after the Han dynasty (206 BC-AD 220), they were revived from the Song period (AD 960-1279), as were ceramics based upon them.; Vase in the form of a cong
In about 3000 to 2000 BC, in China’s southeast, corresponding to modern Jiangsu and Zhejiang province, jade workers of the Liangzhu culture fashioned tubes of jade with square sides pierced by a circular opening called 琮cong. Ancient people buried these cong, which may have had a ritual function with the corpse. Educated men revived interest in antiques and excavated artefacts from the past. The new users adapted the functions of the antique objects thus an ancient jade form becomes a flower vase.
Stoneware with celadon glaze
Longquan ware龍泉窯
Longquan region, Zhejiang province 浙江省, 龍泉地區
Southern Song dynasty AD 1127-1279 | 1127-1279 | Made in: Longquan (town) | porcelain | celadon-glazed | Unknown |
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64 | 64 | Unknown | Dane gun; made of metal and wood; flint lock gun with cloth wound around butt padded with cotton fibre and covered with mud/fibre substance; fringe of cotton cord and band of cowrie shells tied around top of butt; six bands of brown stained leather secured around barrel of gun; small powder flask made from leather-bound wood tied to iron trigger-guard; string of multicoloured glass beads tied around base of barrel; fibre and glass bead charm tied to end of barrrel. | Unknown | 1850-1927 | Made in: Ghana | wood; metal; cotton; fibre; mud; cowrie shell; leather; iron; glass | carved | Unknown |
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65 | 65 | Unknown | Guan stoneware foliated dish in the form of a chesnut flower with eight petal-shaped foliations. The dish has a dark grey body and thick clear blue glaze with wide, fine golden brown crackle. The base is glazed and the foot rim unglazed. | Published PDF date : Southern Song 12th-13thC; Room 95 label text:
PDF A46
Eight-petal lobed dish
The shape of this dish is refined. Each petal lobe is curved and indented to create a naturalistic mallow flower form. Similar dishes made of silver were recovered from a Southern Song dynasty hoard of gold and silver wares at Pengzhou, Sichuan 四川,彭州. The glazer has left his fingerprints in the glaze on the base, a tantalising and rare trace of the craftsman’s hand. Writers described guan ware as having 紫口鐵足(zikou tiezu ‘purple mouth and iron foot’), referring to the dark purplish-grey body showing through the glaze where it runs thin at the rim and to the ferrous-brown colour of the unglazed foot.
Stoneware with celadon glaze
Guan ware 官窯
Hangzhou, Zhejiang province 浙江省，杭州市
Southern Song dynasty, AD1127–1279; PDF A46
八瓣葵花式盤
此盤造型文雅，每個花瓣都有弧度并內凹，模仿出了錦葵花的自然形態。四川彭州南宋金銀器窖藏中曾出土類似器形的銀盤。器外底釉上留有施釉工的指紋，這種古代匠人的遺痕非常罕見引人遐想。學者將官窯器物描述為“紫口鐵足”（意為紫色的口沿和鐵色的足部），指代口沿燒窯時流釉較薄處可見的釉下灰紫色胎體，以及無釉圈足的鐵褐色。
炻器，青釉
官窯
浙江省杭州市
南宋，1127-1279年 | 1127-1279 | Made in: Hangzhou | stoneware | glazed | Unknown |
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66 | 66 | Unknown | Figurine; made of pottery; in the form of standing human with head-dress and apron. | See MS "Acquisitions in the Department of Antiquities since the year 1825" (in Medieval and Later Dept. Register Cupboards). | 19thC(early) | Unknown | pottery | Unknown | Unknown |
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67 | 67 | Unknown | Rounded axe-blade: with single perforation. The butt is slightly concave but also rather irregular, as is the shape of the perforation. The cutting edge has been prepared by hammering from both faces of the blade, one of which has been pitted by corrosion. One section of the cutting edge retains traces of the original grinding. | The date of acquisition suggests that this axe may have come from the Early Dynastic royal tombs at Abydos, where many similar axes were found. See E. Amélineau, ‘Les Nouvelles Fouilles d’Abydos’ II (1896-7), 256-8, 262, 264-5 and pl.XVIII, 3-5. | Unknown | Unknown | arsenical copper | perforated; hammered; ground | Unknown |
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68 | 68 | Unknown | Circular printed badge; made of plastic, alloy and paper.; Ice cream cone with multicoloured ice cream on top. | Unknown | 2007 | Made in: British Isles | plastic; alloy; paper | printed | food/drink; homosexuality |
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69 | 69 | Unknown | Arrow-head made of stone. | Sir Hans Sloane’s ‘Miscellanea’ catalogue is a bound volume in Central Archives containing seven separate catalogues: ‘Miscellanies’, ‘Antiquities’, ‘Seals’, ‘Pictures’, ‘Mathematical Instruments’, ‘Agate Handles’ and ‘Agate Cups, Bottles, Spoons’. Each contains numbered entries that list and describe objects collected by Sloane between the 1680s and 1750s. Each catalogue begins with object number one.
Text from Sloane Miscellanea catalogue: Miscellanea Miscellanies 1254 "1254. The head of and Indian lance. L. 3 1/2. in"; See JCH King `First Peoples, First Contacts' British Museum Press 1999
See Ethdoc 534 - Letter Joffre L Coe/JCH King 29.7.1987
'Point #885 and 1254 are similar to Morrow Mountain #1 and should be earlier than the above (#886), perhaps ca. 4-5000 BC ..' | 1753 (before) | Unknown | stone | Unknown | Unknown |
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70 | 70 | Benin Plaques (Series) | Relief plaque, lost-wax cast in brass. Wide plaque, rectangular in form with side flanges. Background surface decorated with river leaf patterns and stippling. Rosettes in low relief in each corner. Two nail holes at top, two holes at bottom, one partial iron nail in situ at bottom.
Depicts single standing figure, facing front, holding pair of barbed spears in left hand and sword aloft in right hand. Figure has tiered cap or hairstyle. Wears beaded necklace, fringed baldric across chest, animal skin pouch at right side, domed bell at left side, bracelets, armlet on upper right arm, short wrap-around skirt, sash tied over left hip. | The relief brass plaques that used to decorate the Oba's (king's) palace are among the most well-known of all the royal arts of Benin. Although frequently described as 'Benin Bronzes' most plaques are made of leaded brass in various compositions. It is widely accepted that they date to the 16th-17th centuries.
In the years prior to the British Expedition royal influence in Benin was increasingly under threat from rival powers, both internal and external, with a focus on economic power and control of the important trading monopolies. However, the court and palace remained the political and spiritual centre of the Benin Kingdom. Earlier accounts written by Europeans visiting the city describe its size and scale. The palace complex was set up around atrium courtyards; some had galleries with wooden pillars supporting the roof. Brass plaques, probably made in matching pairs, were fixed to these pillars.
The Benin brass plaques represent a distinct and unique corpus of work, unparalleled elsewhere on the continent. They are cast using the cire perdue (lost wax) technique and show significant variation in the depth of the relief. Some of the plaques portray historical events or commemorate successful wars, while others are a vivid depiction of Benin court life and ritual. Several groups of plaques show clear stylistic similarities. William B. Fagg suggested that these plaques represent the work of master brass casters.
Fagg, William, 1973, 'Nigerian Images', London: Lund Humphries
Gunsch, Kathryn, 2018, 'Benin plaques: a 16th century imperial monument', London: Routledge, Taylor and Francis Group; Part of Warrior Set 4. Row 1A (Gunsch, 2018).; Read & Dalton 1899:
Singe figure with a head-dress, resembling that of Af1898,0115.95, and holding up a similar sword. He has a fringed baldric like that in Fig. 3. In his left hand he holds a pair of barbed spears. (Cf. Af1898,0115.35, 112 &c.) His loin-cloth is very short, like that in Af1898,0115.98. A kind of pouch is suspended by a strap from his left shoulder. In the corners are four rosettes. | 16thC-17thC | Made in: Benin City | brass; iron | lost-wax cast | palace/mansion |
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71 | 71 | Unknown | Bowl; slipped and glazed pottery with splashes of green, brown, manganese, incised sgraffiato technique; represents a horseman. | Unknown | 12thC-13thC | Made in: Syria, North (?) | pottery | slipped; glazed; incised | equestrian |
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72 | 72 | Unknown | Pair of moccasins made of skin, thread (cotton), beads (glass), cloth (wool). | Unknown | Unknown | Unknown | skin; cotton; glass; wool | beadwork | Unknown |
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73 | 73 | Unknown | Flat axe of opaque greyish green stone with mist-like inclusions with a sharp biconical perforation. This irregular shaped axe with a slanting roughly finished butt end has sharpened curved sides which have been chipped leading to a sharp cutting edge. | Neolithic period, eastern China, Songze or Liangzhu culture. c.3000BC-2500BC. The cutting edge of this axe is rounded in a rough arc, and the two sides, which are slightly curved, slope inwards towards the irregular sloping top edge. The central hole is sharp and drilled from both sides. The pronounced shape and the choice of a mottled stone are characteristic of axes of the Songze culture. Related examples have come from Beiyinyangying near Nanjing and Huai’an in Jiangsu province. Although by the standards of the fine jade axes and knives such stone axes seem almost rough, the striking stone probably indicates that it was carefully chosen for the purposes of display. The following four axes demonstrate the development of the form in east-coast Neolithic cultures, where similar but neater stone axes were made. See Rawson 1995, p.172, cat.no.10.6.; Neolithic. Length 161mm. | 4000BC-2000BC | Made in: China | jade | drilled | Unknown |
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74 | 74 | Lower Niger Bronzes (Series) | Pendant; lost-wax cast in copper alloy. Semi-circular in form with depiction of a horned ram's head at centre. Large suspension loop at back. Flat surface decorated with geometric motifs; edged with line of herringbone braiding. Twenty-seven large crotal bells hang on chains from small round eyelets around outer edge. | The term ‘Lower Niger Bronze Industry’ was created and first used by William Buller Fagg (1957, 1973, 1990) to identify a miscellaneous group of lost-wax cast objects which were stylistically and/or iconographically distinct from Igbo-Ukwu, Ife and Benin City pieces. The objects are associated with various locations in southern Nigeria, south of the confluence of Benue and Niger Rivers and between the borders with the Republic of Benin and Cameroon. They are thought to have been made prior to European contact, circa pre-1500 A.D. Sometimes referred to as the ‘Lower Niger Bronze Industries’ or ‘Lower Niger Bronzes’.
Fagg, William B. (1957) ‘Introduction’. In Plass, Margaret. Lost wax; metal casting on the Guinea Coast. London: London Institute of Contemporary Arts.
Fagg, William. (1963). Nigerian images: The splendor of African sculpture. New York ; London: Praeger.
Fagg, William. (1970) Divine Kingship in Africa. London: Published for the Trustees of the British Museum by British Museum Publications.; This ram's head, made to wear suspended around the neck, forms part of an extensive hoard of brasswork unearthed in Apapa, Lagos in 1907. In the sixteenth century, Lagos was included in the Benin Empire and still seems to have owed some form of fealty in the nineteenth century. It has been suggested that this piece may have been made in the Yoruba kingdom of Owo, also a vassal of Benin. Similar pieces are known from Benin City.; See Collection File: Af1930,0423.1-16. | 1400-1700 (?) | Made in: Owo (?) | copper alloy | lost-wax cast | ram |
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75 | 75 | Unknown | Glazed composition shabti of Horiraa with a lappet-wig, a modelled face with a beard, crossed hands in relief holding two incised hoes and the string of the seed-basket which hangs over the shoulder, the legs are inscribed with part of Chapter 6 of The Book of The Dead in seven rows of incised Hieroglyphs unseparated by lines; there is a back-pillar and a plinth beneath the feet. | Published:
S. Walker and M. Bierbrier, Fayum. Misteriosi volti dall'Egitto, London 1997, p. 54 [24]. | 589BC-570BC | Unknown | glazed composition | incised; glazed | Unknown |
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76 | 76 | Unknown | Doll carved from animal bone, with incised features and remains of a bitumen wig. | On dolls of this type: A. Shatil, "Bone Figurines of the Early Islamic Period: The So Called 'Coptic Dolls' from Palestine and Egypt", in: S. Vitezović, ed. Close to the Bone: Current Studies in Bone Technologies (Belgrade 2016) 296-314. | 8thC-9thC | Made in: Egypt | bone; bitumen | incised | Unknown |
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77 | 77 | Unknown | Undecorated ostrich egg: intended for use as a container, with an opening in one side. | Bibliography:
F. Ll. Griffith, 'Liverpool Annals of Archaeology and Anthropology 8 (Liverpool, 1921), 14.
See C. M. Firth, ‘The Archaeological Survey of Nubia’ (Cairo, 1909-10), pl. II;
N. Strudwick, Masterpieces of Ancient Egypt, London 2006, pp. 30-1.; Strudwick N 2006
'Nubia' designates an area of southern Egypt and northern Sudan. The southern boundary of the area changed over time, but in the pharaonic period this usually lay between the Fourth and Fifth Cataracts of the Nile. The term 'A-Group' refers to an indigenous Nubian culture roughly contemporary with the Egyptian Predynastic cultures Naqada I-III to the First Dynasty (c. 4000-3000 BC). Most of the remains come from cemeteries, from just north of Aswan to south of the Second Nile Cataract. A non-literate culture, it had a strongly Nubian identity, and perhaps numbered 10,000 persons at most. It probably played an important role as an intermediary between the developing Egyptian cultures and the peoples controlling various sources of raw materials to the south. It maintained close contacts with its northern neighbours, and significant amounts of Egyptian ceramics are found in all its sub-phases, particularly in that contemporary with the First Dynasty. At the very end of the Egyptian Predynastic Period, the culture went into decline, probably largely as a result of Egyptian raids that destroyed contemporary political structures. Inscriptions have been found in the region of the Second Cataract which might belong to late Predynastic Egyptian kings.
Faras lies about 40 km to the north of the Second Cataract, and was first excavated by an expedition from Oxford in 1910-12. As well as these very early finds, the site has produced material from all periods, and is particularly renowned for the wall-paintings in its church, dating from the Christian period. The site was most recently examined during the Nubian rescue campaign of the 1960s, by a mission from Poland.
This object was found in grave 31 in the A-Group cemetery; this tomb contained a range of pots and other items, almost all of which are in the British Museum. The age and sex of the owner are not known.
Ostrich eggs are common finds in A-Group burials and in contemporary Egyptian graves. These large items were evidently valuable, and could be used, after consumption of the contents, as quite sturdy drinking or liquid storage vessels. They may perhaps also have possessed some symbolic value, as they are not so common in later periods. | Unknown | Unknown | ostrich eggshell | perforated | Unknown |
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78 | 78 | Unknown | Porcelain bowl inscribed with a poem and with underglaze blue decoration. This bowl is a lower-quality version of Franks.811. It has a different profile with rounded sides and a flaring foot ring. It is similarly decorated with an apocryphal four-character Yongle reign mark, but surrounding this and repeated around the inner rim is a border of feathery squiggles. The chatter-marked base has a single underglaze blue ring. Outside, the prose poem 'Chi bi fu' [Rhapsody on Red Cliff] by Su Shi is abridged and inscribed by a less literate porcelain decorator. | Harrison-Hall 2001:
Even further-debased examples are known, including a bowl with a barely recognizable 'Red Cliff' scene which was found in south Sulawesi. See also Franks.811 and Franks.812. | 1800-1900 (circa) | Made in: Jingdezhen | porcelain | glazed; underglazed | boat/ship |
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79 | 79 | Unknown | Limestone false door of Bateti: this piece, which is unfinished, consists of a false door with a niche containing a figure in very high relief (almost a free-standing statue) of the deceased Bateti. The drum is inscribed and, in part, carved with the name of the deceased; the lintel carries no traces of text; the two jambs originally bore drawn representations of people, probably relatives, in attitudes of adoration or offering. On the right jamb can still be seen traces of three male figures; on the left are traces of two figures and a few hieroglyphic signs. The statue is moderately well carved. The niche is painted red and the figure in high relief has a black wig, red flesh, and yellow colour on the left flap of the loincloth. | Bibliography.
B. Porter & R. Moss, 'Topographical Bibliography of Ancient Egyptian Hieroglyphic Texts, Reliefs and Paintings' III (Oxford: Clarendon Press), pp. 199-200. | Unknown | Unknown | limestone | painted; incised | Unknown |
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80 | 80 | Unknown | Canoe paddle made of wood. | Unknown | 1795 (before) | Unknown | wood | Unknown | Unknown |
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81 | 81 | Unknown | Porcelain cup with rounded sides. The cup has copper red glaze on the exterior and bluish-white glaze on the interior and on the base. | Published PDF date : Qing 18thC; Room 95 label text:
PDF A543
Cup with copper-red glaze
This straight-sided cup is covered with a copper-red monochrome-glaze. The skills used to create these extraordinary red glazes were lost in China from the mid-fifteenth century until they were rediscovered in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. The glaze has ‘crept’ at the rims of the cups to reveal the pure whiteness of the porcelain body.
Porcelain with clear and copper-red glazes
Jingdezhen, Jiangxi province江西省, 景德鎮
Qing dynasty, Kangxi period, AD 1662–1722; PDF A543
銅紅釉杯
此直口杯施單色銅紅釉。在中國，燒造此種非凡紅釉的技術從十五世紀中期就已失傳，到十七世紀晚期至十八世紀早期才又恢復。杯口沿在燒窯中縮釉形成”脫口”現象，顯露胎體的潔白。
瓷器，透明釉，銅紅釉
江西省景德鎮
清代，康熙， 1662-1722年 | 1662-1722 | Made in: Jingdezhen | porcelain | underglazed | Unknown |
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82 | 82 | Unknown | Granodiorite standing statue of Sekhmet holding papyrus-sceptre; feet and part of proper right arm lost. | PM II (2): p.265
Nicholson and Shaw, Ancient Egyptian Materials and Technology (Cambridge 2000), p. 37;
N. Strudwick, Masterpieces of Ancient Egypt, London 2006, pp. 156-7. | Unknown | Unknown | granodiorite | Unknown | ancient egyptian deity |
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83 | 83 | Unknown | Register 1950:
Beaker, kero made of wood with polychrome ornament. | Register 1950:
Peru.
Probably 17th century, Inca. | Unknown | Unknown | wood | Unknown | Unknown |
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84 | 84 | Unknown | Standing grave figure of a woman, nearly life-size, carved in wood. | The Bongo of the south-western Sudan are an agricultural central Sudanic-speaking people who suffered greatly from the depredations of slavery and the expansion of the Zande kingdoms in the 19th century.
A category of tall slim figures is attributed to the Bongo. These share a general pole-like form in which a human figure stands with flexed knees on a post and, generally, with arms held close to the body. Apart from facial features (including occasionally the inlaying of eyes with beads) there is rarely any other sculptural detail. The antiquity of the practice is not known.
It is not clear if figure sculpture was produced among all groups, nor is it clear that all figures identified as ‘Bongo’ were produced by them rather than by sculptors among such of their neighbours as the Belanda.
It was the practice among at least some Bongo groups to honour a deceased hunter=warrior by erecting on his grave a carved wooden effigy (ngya). This was done by his relatives at a feast held at the graveside a year or so after his death, the intention being to ensure for him a good place in the village of the dead. During his lifetime, a Bongo man could gain prestige and status through successfully hunting large animals and killing enemies in battle, as well as performing meritorious feats. The effigies erected on graves were a reflection of title and rank achieved. These were often accompanied by notched posts that recorded the number of the deceased’s successful kills and sometimes by effigies of his victims. Notches indicating successful kills were sometimes carved on the effigy post itself.
It is not clear to what extent the effigies were supposed to resemble the features of the dead man, but in some cases at least the sculptor represented some of the deceased’s personal adornments, such as scarification patterns and bracelets.
It is not clear how the Bongo regarded the removal of effigies from the graves of their ancestors. It seems that they received little if any attention after their erection and were left to the depredations of bush fires and the weather.
T. Phillips (ed.), Africa, the art of a continent (London, Royal Academy, 1995) cat.2.18c, pp:137-138; A very similar Bongo figure was purchased in 1973 by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York (1973.264), which had also been collected in the Sudan by Christian Duponcheel a few years earlier. See the article by Yaelle Biro, 'Identity, Meaning, Function: Reclaiming the Histories of The Met's Bongo Ngya' (on the website of the MMA). | 1880-1920 (circa) | Made in: South Sudan | wood | Unknown | Unknown |
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85 | 85 | Unknown | Body rasp, skin scraper (bird-shaped) made of pottery. | Unknown | 20thC(early) | Made in: Egypt | pottery | Unknown | Unknown |
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86 | 86 | Unknown | Coffee-pot and cover; salt-glazed white stoneware; pentagonal, tapering from base to rim; ornamented with, stamped and applied, semi-oriental subjects, buildings, animals etc., in panels with cable borders; on the lid a lizard. | A coffee pot (four or five sided) with similar tapering body and dome-shaped lid is shown in Hogarth's 'Rape of the Lock', published c.1717 (see P&D 1842,0806.402.a); it is, however, improbable that a piece of such fine white ware as this was made before 1725. (Hobson 1903). | 1745 (circa) | Made in: Staffordshire (probably) | stoneware | salt-glazed; stamped; applied | reptile; architecture; animal |
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87 | 87 | Unknown | Dish with a buff earthenware body and a thick green glaze imitating Chinese celadon. | Unknown | 15thC | Made in: Egypt | earthenware | glazed | Unknown |
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88 | 88 | Unknown | Palm fibre brush; bound with string and cut at either end. | Found with .5555.1
Found with .5555.2
Found with .5555.3 | Unknown | Unknown | palm fibre | bound; cut | Unknown |
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89 | 89 | Unknown | Sandstone statue of Paser: a kneeling figure of the viceroy of Kush, Paser, holding an altar on the top of which rests a ram's head. An inscription incised down the front of the altar consists of an invocation to Amun-Ra resident in Pr-Rʿmss-mry-‘Imn pʒ dmỉ. Prayers to Min and Isis are incised along the base. The back pillar bears two columns of text containing prayers to Horus, lord of Nubia, and Amun-Ra on behalf of the viceroy of Kush, Paser. The back pillar and edges of the base have suffered much wear on the surface. The statue was broken in two when found and has since been repaired. The flesh of the statue is coloured red, the wig black and the gown white with red stripes, but these colours may have been added in modern times. There are traces of blue paint in many of the hieroglyphs. | The viceroy Paser, son of Minmose, is known only from a series of monuments at Abu Simbel and a statue of his cousin now at Naples. He apparently flourished in the middle of Ramses II's reign. The reference to Pr-Rʿmss-mry-‘Imn pʒ dmỉ may possibly indicate Amara West where there certainly was a temple to Amun-Ra.
Bibliography:
F. Arundale & J. Bonomi, 'Gallery of antiquities, selected from the British Museum' (London, 1842), 119, pl. 51;
The British Museum, 'A guide to the Egyptian galleries (Sculpture)' (London, 1909), 166-7 (no. 604);
H. Gauthier, ‘Recueil de Travaux relatifs à la philology et à ‘archéologie égyptiennes et assyriennes 39 (Paris, 1921), 208-9;
B. Porter & R. Moss, 'Topographical Bibliography of Ancient Egyptian Hieroglyphic Texts, Reliefs and Paintings' VII (Oxford: Clarendon Press), 110;
K. A. Kitchen, 'Ramesside inscriptions : translated & annotated Translations Vol.3, Ramesses II, his contemporaries' (Oxford, 2000), 74. no. 37 (2).
A. Herrero, The "King's Son of Kush" Paser (II), Son of the "High Priest of Min and Isis" Minmose. BACE 13, 78-9, ns.16-17. | Unknown | Unknown | sandstone | incised; painted (in modern times ?) | Unknown |
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90 | 90 | Unknown | Devotional carving in boxwood; pendant from a gold signet-ring; ring with flat hoop engraved on outside and octagonal bezel set with antique intaglio on a nicolo, of a genius with palm branch and crown; rosette with a lozenge on each shoulder, once enamelled; pendant of long oviform shape with four flat faces with smaller faces to form a dodecahedron; on each face is relief carving concealed by hinged lid; larger faces represent Virgin and Child, St John the Baptist, Jesus Christ and St Catherine; upper set of smaller ones contain two censing angels, eagle of St John and angel of St Matthew; lower set contain censing angels, emblems of St Mark and St Luke; rose in relief on each lid, catches in form of grotesque heads or animals with protruding tongues; finial at lower end carved in form of four monstrous quadrupeds with long necks; inscribed. | Text from Tait 1986:-
Origin: The nicolo engraved in intaglio, late Roman; the finger-ring late medieval, perhaps Italian, 14th-15th centuries; later additions, probably second half of the 19th century, include the inscription on the hoop, the three short suspension chains and the attached devotional wood-carving.
Provenance: None is recorded.
Commentary: The tiny bolt (or rivet) piercing the gold hoop in the centre and the tiny suspension ring cannot have been added before 1864. Furthermore, they were evidently intended to be accompanied by a faked black letter inscription, engraved on the exterior of the hoop because the word ‘caro’ has been split on either side of the bolt fixing. Indeed, a whole letter space (or slightly more) was left blank in the middle of the word, so that the rivet or bolt-head would not obscure or impinge on the lettering. Alternatively, the inscription, ‘verbum caro factum e[st]’, was added to the undecorated hoop after the bolt and chains had been attached. Either way the inscription on the hoop cannot have been engraved before the bolt attachment had been planned or completed.
The wooden object has no recorded history or provenance but in the late nineteenth century purported to be a wood-carving of the early fourteenth century, perhaps of English origin. This wood-carving, together with other items of sculpture in the Waddesdon Bequest, will be fully analysed and discussed in a subsequent volume of this catalogue, but here it is enough to summarise the conclusions in so far as they shed light on the origin of the attached signet-ring. The wood-carving totally fails to carry conviction as a medieval object but would seem to be a highly imaginative product of someone well-informed about medieval art, especially German, French and English Gothic sculpture and manuscript illumination of the fourteenth century. The object is completely without parallel both in its shape and construction, and in its function and genre. It can only be left lying on its side, except when worn with the finger-ring and so held in the hand, but it shows no sign of wear, nor has it acquired the patina that always comes to a much handled medieval boxwood object. Neither its size, shape nor its technical features conform with any known class of objects in the fourteenth century such as rosaries; there seems little doubt, therefore, that it was made in the nineteenth century to deceive and the addition of the finger-ring was an integral part of the deception.
It would not have been difficult or expensive to acquire a genuine signet-ring of the fourteenth century for this purpose and a genuine finger-ring would help to convey an impression of authenticity for an otherwise unique type of object, which might therefore be regarded with doubt and suspicion. However, the signet-ring with its late Roman intaglio was evidently thought to be too plain for so grand and rare an attachment. In planning the further enrichment the hoop was evidently to be engraved with a very convincing black letter version of this well-known inscription, but the craftsman was obliged to split the word ‘caro’ when he reached the hole for the bolt and then found he had no room for the last two letters, 'st'. Being rather ill-informed, the engraver left off these two letters without adding an abbreviation sign over the 'e' of 'est'. Dalton, who in 1912 drew attention to the use of this particular inscription on another finger-ring in the British Museum's collection (no. 895), did not question its authenticity at any stage. Furthermore, he remained convinced that the signet-ring itself was an Italian finger-ring of the early fourteenth century and repeated this attribution when, in 1927, he revised Read 1902. No previous publication has expressed doubts about the age of the black letter inscription nor about the attached boxwood carving, but the latter will be dealt with in complete detail in the appropriate volume of this catalogue.
Bibliography: Charles Hercules Read, ‘The Waddesdon Bequest: Catalogue of the Works of Art bequeathed to the British Museum by Baron Ferdinand Rothschild, M.P., 1898’, London, 1902, no. 231, pl. XLIV; H. Clifford Smith, ‘Jewellery’, London, 1908, p. 125; G. C. Williamson, ‘Catalogue of Jewels and Precious Works of Art, the property of J. Pierpont Morgan’, London, 1910, p. 62; A Maskell, ‘Wood Carvings’, London, 1911, p. 189; O.M. Dalton, ‘Catalogue of the Finger-Rings, Early Christian , Byzantine, Teutonic, Medieval and Later in the British Museum’, London, 1912, p. 39, no. 229; O.M. Dalton, ‘The Waddesdon Bequest’, 2nd edn (rev), British Museum, London, 1927, no. 231; Hugh Tait, 'Catalogue of the Waddesdon Bequest in the British Museum. 1., The Jewels', British Museum, London, 1986, no.41, figs. 180-182.; Text from Dalton 1912, Catalogue of Finger Rings, no. 229:
The intaglio is late Roman. The ring is fixed by three chains to the devotional carving (C. H. Read, 'Catalogue of the Waddesdon Bequest', 1902, no. 231).
For Italian ornaments with inscriptions in this style, see also 'Archaeologla', lxii (1911), p. 394 (rings, etc, from Chalcis now in the British Museum and the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford); 'Archaelogical Journal' viii. 418 (ring from Sessa).
For the verse Verbum caro, &c., see text from Dalton 1912 no. 895:
The words 'Verbum caro' are part of a text (John i. 14) which has also occurs on 1872,0604,377 and AF 1023. Rings bearing this legend are sometimes believed to be magical but without precise evidence, such as direct association with a magical formula, this should not be assumed.
Also cf. Pichon Collection, Sale Catalogue, 1897, no. 67. | 1400-1450 (ring); 1800-1898 (boxwood carving and additions) | Made in: Italy (ring) | boxwood; gold; nicolo; enamel | carved; relief; enamelled; intaglio; engraved | bird; mammal; saint/martyr; grotesque; angel; flower; monster; animal; tree/bush; virgin and child |
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91 | 91 | Unknown | Silver pseudo-penannular brooch with plain hoop of oval section cast with subrectangular terminals which are linked by a narrow bar with two lines of hatched ornament. Each terminal has, on the front, a deep circular setting, now empty, framed by a scalloped collar and edged by animal interlace. The back of each has a chunky bird with curled crest and a pair of two-clawed feet, all set in a frame. The body, head and tail are emphasised by an inner line. Worn gilding remains all over the decorated surfaces on the front and runs on to the end of the hoop, and gilding remains in the recessed background of the birds in their panels. The pin is missing and the outer corners of the terminals are cut away and the linking bar cut through at one side. | Youngs 1989a
This brooch is one of two (see 1872,0520.15) found in 1836 near St Senan's Abbey. A very similar example comes from Donegal (1893,0618,25). The Scattery provenances, dating and significance of the group were established by Graham-Campbell (1972). The increased availability and hence use of silver and the development of new styles in the metal characterise the changes in Irish brooch styles in the ninth century under the influence of Anglo-Carolingian art, seen here in the marginal animals and birds. The elusive ancestry of the bird may be connected with the two-footed, crested birds in profile inhabiting a q initial in a late eighth-century gospel book (Alexander, J.J.G. 1978. ‘Insular Manuscripts, 6th to the 9th century, A Survey of Manuscripts Illuminated in the British Isles’, vol. I, London, no. 34). This brooch, along with 1872,0520.15, is an outlier of two groups which appear to be restricted to the northern part of Ireland and perhaps represent regional styles.
Date given as mid-late 9th century.
Bibliography: Smith, R.A. 1914. Irish Brooches of Five Centuries, ‘Archaeologia’ LXV, 248-9, pl. XXVI, 4; Graham-Campbell, J. 1972. Two groups of ninth-century Irish brooches, ‘Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland’ 102, 117ff., pl. 19.; Bibliography: Journal of British Archaeological Association 1848-49 p.316. | 9thC | Unknown | silver; gold | cast; gilded | animal |
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92 | 92 | Unknown | Circular sheet gold pendant with a beaded wire rim and corrugated suspension loop. Three cloisonné birds' heads with cabochon garnet eyes, arranged in the form of a triskele, radiate from a central garnet ring, which encloses a circular setting, now empty. Surrounding the ring are two concentric bands of filigree, edged with twisted wire, containing heart-shaped motifs, S-shaped scrolls and single granules with beaded wire collars. | Webster & Backhouse 1991
Elaborate gold and garnet pendants decorated with filigree are a seventh-century female fashion, occurring mainly in Kent, but spreading from there to other areas such as the Upper Thames and Yorkshire. The filigree bands and the central cloisonné ring on this piece are reminiscent of those found on Kentish disc brooches, but the cloisonné garnet birds' heads suggest continental influence, confirmed by the amount of imported material found in this rich cemetery, as they are related to Frankish bird brooches and bird-headed pins. The motif is probably amuletic; a similar gold pendant with four schematic cloisonné birds' heads in the form of a swastika was found in the Wieuwerd (Friesland) hoard, coin-dated to c. 625-30 (Lafaurie, J., Jansen, B. and Zadoks-Josephus-Jitta, A. 1961, Le tresor de Wieuwerd, ‘Oudheikundige Mededelingen’ 42, 78-107).
Bibliography: Smith, R.A. 1923, ‘A Guide to the Anglo-Saxon and Foreign Teutonic Antiquities in the Department of British and Mediaeval Antiquities, British Museum’, London, 39-40, pl. 1, 4; Åberg, N. 1926, ‘The Anglo-Saxons in England’, Uppsala, 132, 217, fig. 243; Bruce-Mitford, R.L.S. 1974, ‘Aspects of Anglo-Saxon Archaeology’, London, 118, pl. 26c. | 7thC(early) | Unknown | gold; garnet | filigree; granulation; twisted (wire); cloisonné (inlay); beaded wire; cabochon cut | bird |
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93 | 93 | Unknown | Porcelain stem cup with decoration in underglaze blue and overglaze enamel in 'doucai' style. This extremely delicate stem cup is one of the most precious and valuable porcelains ever created. It has a round bowl with sides which gently flare out towards the rim and a hollow flared stem. Outside a design is outlined in underglaze blue and infilled with pale underglaze blue, yellow, red and green enamels on a plain blue-white glaze with a yellowish cast. Four lotus flowers with tiny buds are depicted with the tips of their leaves forming into roundels. In between, pendant from the rim and around the join of foot to bowl, is a motif combining three comma spirals with round dots at the tips. Inside the cup is glazed but decorated with only a single underglaze blue line around the mouth. Double underglaze blue lines adorn the outer edge of the mouth and foot. Inside the foot is a horizontal six-character unframed underglaze blue Chenghua reign mark read from right to left. Inside the stem it is covered with a yellow-tinged blue-white glaze. It has a tiny chip at the rim. | Harrison-Hall 2001:
Doucai [interlocking colours] was not invented, as was once thought, in the Chenghua era but was first made in the Xuande reign. In November 1988 two Xuande marked doucai dishes decorated with mandarin ducks on a lotus pond were found under the west wall of the Ming imperial factory. Another blue-and-white Xuande mark and period bowl with a lotus pond and mandarin duck design in polychrome enamels is in the collection of the Sakyas (Sajia Si) Monastery in Tibet. Production continued in the Interregnum period, as evidenced by a doucai bowl decorated with a lotus pond design excavated from the Zhengtong-Tianshun remains at Dongsiling, but was perfected in the Chenghua reign. A stem cup of this type was excavated from the late Chenghua strata at Jingdezhen. | 1465-1487 | Made in: Jingdezhen | porcelain | glazed; doucai; underglazed | lotus |
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94 | 94 | Unknown | Alloy coin. | Unknown | 117-138 | Minted in: Alexandria (Egypt); Associated with: Roman Empire | alloy | Unknown | Unknown |
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95 | 95 | Unknown | Large marl pottery jar with wide shoulder, direct lip rim and four pierced “handles” applied beneath rim, two in the form of falcons and two possibly representing some sort of weapon or harpoon; the exterior is decorated in red paint with representations of two boats, one on each side, alternating with rows of long-legged birds (ostriches) on a ground line above rows of triangles probably representing mountains. | One of only a few pieces of Petrie’s Decorated ware to have applied plastic figural decoration in the form of its handles. The falcons, decorated with stripes down their back, are amongst the earliest examples of falcon imagery in Egypt. The identity of the object plastically modelled as the two other handle is unclear. The long object with two curved projects on the side is decorated with a double wavy line along its length.
A row of solid triangles encircles the shoulder just below the rim. Below this is a band filled with vertical zig-zag lines arranged in groups of 3-9 lines. The boats are arranged between the handles. Both are similar with regard to the form of the boat, the five-branched frond on the prow, and the cabins. The standard on one side is a Z-sign, the most frequently occurring emblem on standards. The other boat has a unique combination of two standards, both appended to the aft cabin. One is an emblem composed of a row of 5 triangles, the other is a curved motif interpreted as double horns. This is the only known example of two standards attached together to one cabin (but see also EA36326). This boat also has a bush motif over the stern. Alternating with the boats are rows of long-legged birds on a ground line, considered to be ostriches; below them is a row of solid triangles, representing mountains.
Published:
W. Budge, Guide to the 4th-6th Egyptian Rooms, London (1922), p. 247
T.G.H. James, Introduction to Ancient Egypt, London (1979), p. 209, fig 81
G. Graff, Les peintures sur vases de Naqada I–Naqada II: Nouvelle approche sémiologique de l’iconographie prédynastique, Leuven (2009), cat. no. 203
For the falcons on this vessel see S. Hendrickx, R. Friedman and M. Eyckerman, Early falcons, in: L.D. Morenz and R. Kuhn (eds.), Vorspann oder formative Phase ? Ägypten und der Vordere Orient 3500-2700 v. Chr. Philippika 48, Wiesbaden (2011) p. 133, fig. 8. | Unknown | Unknown | pottery | slip-painted | Unknown |
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96 | 96 | Unknown | Serpentine shabti of Amenhotep III; the upper torso and feet are lost; inscribed with four columns of Hieroglyphic text. | Unknown | Unknown | Unknown | serpentine | Unknown | Unknown |
|
97 | 97 | The Younger Memnon (Object) | Head and upper body of pink/grey granite monumental statue of Ramses II (one of a pair placed before the door of the Ramesseum) wearing nemes head-cloth and circlet of uraei (about half now lost), the sculptor has exploited the bichrome nature of the stone to emphasise the division between body and face; the dorsal pillar is inscribed with vertical registers of hieroglyphs - giving the name and titles of the king and part of a dedication to Amun-Ra; in 1817 it was noted that there were traces of colour upon the statue and it may have, therefore, been painted red in antiquity. | Unknown | Unknown | Unknown | granodiorite; red granite | Unknown | Unknown |
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98 | 98 | Unknown | Conical blue glazed composition game-piece with nodular top. | This shape of gaming piece is one of two shapes associated with the game senet, as it is featured in depictions in tomb paintings, and found with senet gaming-boards. See Egypt’s Golden Age (exhibition catalogue, Boston, 1982): 263-9 | Unknown | Unknown | glazed composition | Unknown | Unknown |
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99 | 99 | Unknown | Vase. Made of iron-brown glazed stoneware with rust splashes. | Unknown | 1115-1234 | Made in: Henan (province) | stoneware | glazed | Unknown |
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