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The Wooden Shabti of Amenemhat in the Brooklyn Museum 39 the wooden shabti of amenemhat in the brooklyn museum 39 REUSED OR RESTORED? THE WOODEN SHABTI OF AMENEMHAT IN THE BROOKLYN MUSEUM Edward Bleiberg Brooklyn Museum The Brooklyn Museum Egyptian collection in- The Date of the Shabtis and Box cludes two very fine shabtis of a certain Ame- nemhat, an official who lived during the 18th At some point after the publication of James’s Dynasty. In addition to a limestone shabti (fig. 1, Corpus, the departmental records in the Brooklyn Brooklyn 50.128) and a wooden shabti (fig. 2, Museum were altered to date these objects to the Brooklyn 50.129), there is a wooden box (figs. “Reign of Thutmose IV to Akhenaten.” Though 3-6, Brooklyn, 50.130). The Museum purchased no explanation was included with the change, it is these three objects from a New York dealer. They clear why it was made. The limestone shabti holds were published together in the auction catalogue a hoe and a basket in each hand. Schneider’s study of the Mansoor Collection in 1947, the first pub- of shabtis indicates that this feature of shabtis first lication of these objects known to me.1 The cata- appeared either in the reign of Thutmose IV or logue’s author asserts a connection between these Amenhotep III.6 Moreover, the wooden shabti’s objects and Theban Tomb 82, the burial spot for face, with its narrow, almond-shaped eyes, lower the Scribe of the Counting of the Grain of Amun, inner canthi of the eyes, and a distinctly carved Amenemhat, who lived during the reign of Thut- lip line, suggests a date in the reign of Amenhotep mose III.2 This connection was affirmed by John III. The shabti-box inscription mentions both Cooney in a brief article the year following their Re-Horakhty and the Aten. The spells quoted purchase.3 T.G.H. James echoed Cooney’s opin- on it are Schneider’s Aten-formula spells.7 Thus ion on the provenance and date of these objects, the dates of these three objects seem to cluster in though he reduced the likelihood of the connec- the years between the reigns of Thutmose IV and tion to the tomb to “probable.”4 Akhenaten, a period of roughly 90 years. There- In the course of research on these objects for a fore, the owner of these objects could not be the traveling exhibition in 2007,5 it became clear both same individual for whom Theban Tomb 82 was that the shabtis and wooden box date to later in created. Yet there still might be a connection to the 18th Dynasty than the reign of Thutmose III the tomb owner’s descendants, as can be seen and that the name Amenemhat, inscribed twice through their overlapping titles. on the wooden shabti, was added in ancient times after the shabti was varnished. The following dis- cussion re-dates these objects to the late 18th Connections to Theban Tomb 82 Dynasty, examines other possible connections to Theban Tomb 82, and raises questions about the The two shabtis and the box record Amenemhat’s name change made after the initial manufacture title nine times. Most often, he is merely “the of the wooden shabti. Scribe, Amenemhat.”8 On the limestone shabti 1 Parke-Bernet Galleries, Notable Egyptian Art from the 5 E. Bleiberg, To Live Forever: Egyptian Treasures from Collection of M.A. Mansoor (New York, 1947), 72, lot no. the Brooklyn Museum (London, 2008), frontispiece, pp. 16, 300. 92-93. 2 For the tomb itself, Nina de G. Davies and A. H. Gar- 6 H. Schneider, Shabtis: An Introduction to the History of diner, The Tomb of Amenemhet (No. 82) (London, 1915). Ancient Egyptian Funerary Statuettes 1 (Leiden, 1977), 168. 3 “Equipment for Eternity,” Brooklyn Museum Bulletin 7 Ibid., 289-292. 12, no. 2 (Winter 1951), 4, figs 2-3. 8 On 50.128 (limestone), line 3; on 50.129 (wood), lines 4 Corpus of Hieroglyphic Inscriptions in the Brooklyn 1 & 3; on 50.130, (box), side C. Museum: From Dynasty I to the end of Dynasty XVIII (Brook- lyn, 1974), 81-83. 40 edward bleiberg Fig. 1. Shabti of Amenemhat, Thebes, Egypt, New Kingdom, Fig. 2. Shabti of the Scribe Amenemhat, Thebes, Egypt, 18th Dynasty, reign of Thutmose IV—reign of Akhenaten, New Kingdom, 18th Dynasty, reign of Thutmose IV—reign ca. 1400-1336 BC, limestone, painted, 9 5/8 x 3 1/4 in. (24.5 of Akhenaten, ca. 1400-1336 BC, wood, 8 7/16 x 2 1/2 in. x 8.2 cm), 50.128, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund. (21.5 x 6.3 cm). 50.129, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund..
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