EGYPTIAN ART IN THE AGE OF THE PYRAMIDS THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART, NEW YORK DISTRIBUTED BY HARRY N. ABRAMS, INC., NEW YORK This volume has been published in "lIljunction All ri~llIs r,'slTv"d, N"l'art 01 Ihis l'ul>li,';\II"n Tl'.ul,,,,,i,,,,, f... "u the I'r,'u,'h by .I;\nl<" 1'. AlIl'll with the exhibition «Egyptian Art in the Age of may be reproduced llI' ',",lIlsmilt"" by any '"l';\nS, of "'''Iys I>y Nadine (:I",rpion allll,kan-Philippe the Pyramids," organized by The Metropolitan electronic or mechanical, induding phorocopyin~, I,auer; by .Iohu Md )on;\ld of essays by Nicolas Museum of Art, New York; the Reunion des recording, or information retrieval system, with­ Grima I, Audran I."brousse, .lean I.eclam, and musees nationaux, Paris; and the Royal Ontario out permission from the publishers. Christiane Ziegler; hy .lane Marie Todd and Museum, Toronto, and held at the Gaieries Catharine H. Roehrig of entries nationales du Grand Palais, Paris, from April 6 John P. O'Neill, Editor in Chief to July 12, 1999; The Metropolitan Museum of Carol Fuerstein, Editor, with the assistance of Maps adapted by Emsworth Design, Inc., from Art, New York, from September 16,1999, to Ellyn Childs Allison, Margaret Donovan, and Ziegler 1997a, pp. 18, 19 January 9, 2000; and the Royal Ontario Museum, Kathleen Howard Toronto, from February 13 to May 22, 2000. Patrick Seymour, Designer, after an original con­ Jacket/cover illustration: Detail, cat. no. 67, cept by Bruce Campbell King Menkaure and a Queen Gwen Roginsky and Hsiao-ning Tu, Production Frontispiece: Detail, cat. no. 67, King Menkaure Robert Weisberg, Computer Specialist and a Queen The exhibition is made possible by Lewis B. and Dorothy Cullman. Site and new object photography by Bruce Hieroglyphic dedication on page v from White; additional new object photography at Teachings ofPtah-hotep, 509- I o. Additonal support has been provided by the Metropolitan Museum by Anna-Marie The Starr Foundation. Kellen and Oi-Cheong Lee, the Photograph Stu­ Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data dio, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New Egyptian art in the age of the pyramids An indcmnity has bccn granted by the Federal York. For a more complete listing of photograph p. cm. Council on the Arts and the Humanities. credits, see p. 536. Catalogue of an exhibition held at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Sept. 16, 1999­ Educational programs have been supported by Set in Sabon and Adobe Weiss by Professional Jan. 9, 2000. the Malcolm Hewitt Wiener Foundation. Graphics, Rockford, Illinois Includes bibliographical references and index, ISBN 0-87099-906-0 (HC). - ISBN 0-87099­ The publication is made possible by The Adelaide Separations by Professional Graphics, Rockford, 907-9 (pbk.) - ISBN 0-81°9-6543-7 (Abrams) Milton de Groot Fund, in memory of the de Groot Illinois 1. Art, Egyptian Exhibitions. 2. Art, and Hawley families. Ancient-Egypt Exhibitions. 3. Egypt­ Printed and bound by Arnoldo Mondadori, Antiquities Exhibitions. 4. Egypt-Architec­ Published by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, S.p.A., Verona, Italy ture Exhibitions. I. Metropolitan Museum of New York Art (New York, N.Y.) N5350 •E37 1999 0 2 1 Copyri~ht © 1'J')') by The M,'rropolitan 7 9',3 '074747 -----{\C21 99-22246 Mus,'unl of Art, N,'W YllI'k CIP CONTENTS Lenders to the Exhibition VIII Directors' Foreword Franfoise Cachin, Philippe de Montebello, Lindsay Sharp x Acknowledgments Dorothea Arnold, Krzyszto( Grzymski, Christiane Ziegler XI Contributors to the Catalogue and Key to the Authors of the Entries XIV Maps XVI Notes to the Reader XVIII Chronology A Note on Egyptian Chronology Elisabeth David XIX Dynastic and Regnal Dates James P. Allen XX Introduction Dorothea Arnold, Christiane Ziegler XXI INTRODUCTORY ESSAYS A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE OLD KINGDOM 3 Jean Leclant THE STEP PYRAMID PRECINCT OF KING DJOSER 13 Jean-Philippe Lauer PYRAMIDS AND THEIR TEMPLES 21 Audran Labrousse THE TOMBS OF OFFICIALS: HOUSES OF ETERNITY 27 Peter Jdnosi OLD KINGDOM STATUES IN THEIR ARCHITECTURAL SETTING 41 Dieter Arnold ROYAL STATUARY 51 Krzyszto( Grzymski NONROYAL STATUARY 57 Christiane Ziegler RESERVE HEADS: AN ENIGMA OF OLD KINGDOM SCULPTURE 73 Catharine H. Roehrig ROYAL RELIEFS 83 Dorothea Arnold THE HUMAN IMAGE IN OLD KINGDOM NONROYAL RELIEFS 103 Nadine Cherpion FURNITURE OF THE OLD KINGDOM II7 Julie Anderson STONE VESSELS: LUXURY ITEMS WITH MANIFOLD IMPLICATIONS 121 Dorothea Arnold and Elena Pischikova EXCAVATING THE OLD KINGDOM: FROM KHAFRE'S VALLEY 133 TEMPLE TO THE GOVERNOR'S CITY AT BALAT Nicolas Grimal EXCAVATING THE OLD KINGDOM: THE GIZA NECROPOLIS AND 139 OTHER MASTABA FIELDS Peter Der Manuelian EXCAVATING THE OLD KINGDOM: THE EGYPTIAN 155 ARCHAEOLOGISTS Zahi Hawass CATALOGUE THIRD DYNASTY 168 FOURTH DYNASTY 194 FIFTH DYNASTY 314 SIXTH DYNASTY 434 Glossary 494 Bibliography 495 Indexes 517 Photograph Credits 53 6 EXCAVATING THE OLD KINGDOM The Giza Necropolis and Other Mastaba Fields PETER DER MANUELIAN he Giza necropolis, doubtless the most famous Giza includes the New Kingdom temple of Amenhotep II archaeological site in the world, has experi­ (1427-1400 B.C.E.), built beside the Great Sphinx of the enced two golden ages. The first took place in Fourth Dynasty; the so-called Dream Stela of Thutmose T the Fourth Dynasty, when the pharaoh Khufu IV (1400-1390 B.C.E.), a colossal statue that may have (Cheops) and two of his successors, Khafre (Chephren) been set up under Ramesses II (1279-1213? B.C.E.);4 and and Menkaure (Mycerinus), chose the plateau on the the Saite Period (Twenty-sixth Dynasty, 672-525 B.C.E.) desert's edge west of the Nile for their monumental pyra­ temple to Isis, mistress of the pyramids, east of the Great mid complexes and the surrounding private, or nonroyal, Pyramid of Khufu itself; along with various Late Period cemeteries. The second dates some 4,500 years later, to the burials scattered throughout the site. But these later mon­ twentieth century C.E., when the first scientific archaeo­ uments are scanty indeed compared with the daunting logical investigators excavated the necropolis, revealing amount of chronologically homogenous Old Kingdom countless treasures and invaluable information about material at Giza. In later centuries the site certainly all aspects of Egyptian culture during the Old King­ attracted its share of tourists, historians (such as dom. This second golden age continues to the present Herodotus during the fifth century B.C.E.), and pyra­ day, and, indeed, the spectacular discoveries at Giza midologists (for example, astronomer Charles Piazzi show no signs of abating. These remarks will concentrate Smyth [1819-1900]).5 The only major event prior to the on the new golden age, the era of scholarly discovery at twentieth century C.E. that we will stop to mention here the Giza pyramids. is the removal of many of the pyramids' exterior casing Giza (figs. 79, 80), Saqqara,l and Abusir were clearly stones. These were reused in the construction of medieval the most important necropolises for Egyptian royalty Cairo in the eleventh and fourteenth centuries C.E. and the upper echelons of officialdom during the Old Aside from some early clearance work by Auguste Kingdom. 2 While the principal royal tombs at Giza, the Mariette (1821-1881),6 head of the first national service three pyramids themselves, date to the Fourth Dynasty, to monitor and safeguard Egyptian antiquities, the earliest the necropolis continued to function as a huge bureau­ activity at Giza resembling anything like modern scien­ cratic institution, serving both the living and the dead, tific investigation took place in 1842-43. At this time a right through the Sixth Dynasty, whose conclusion marked Prussian expedition led by Karl Richard Lepsius (1810­ the end of the Old Kingdom. But between the Old King­ 1884) cleared and numbered several private tombs, en­ dom and our own century Giza saw relatively little use tered the Great Pyramid, and drew maps and plans of the and change. 3 site'? In December 1842 Lepsius excavated one particu­ In later antiquity, however, the site was never completely larly well-preserved painted and carved chapel, belonging abandoned. Evidence of post-Old Kingdom activity at to Mer-ib, an official of the early Fifth Dynasty, and in The pyramid of Khufu seen from the Western Cemetery, Giza 139 Fig. 79. Aerial view of the Giza plateau, with the Great Pyramid of Khufu in the foreground and the pyra­ mids of Khafre and Menkaure behind, looking southwest. The mastaba tombs of the Eastern and Western Cemeteries are visi­ ble on either side of the Great Pyramid, and the Great Sphinx appears at the center left edge of the image. 1845 he received permission to ship all the decorated contributions to the field. Reisner led the largest and blocks to Berlin. The first of five Giza tomb chapels that longest-running expedition of all, working almost unin­ came to be exported to Europe, today it awaits recon­ terrupted on the Giza plateau (in addition to investigat­ struction on Berlin's soon-to-be-restored museum island. 8 ing twenty-two other Egyptian and Nubian sites) from In 1880 the pioneering British archaeologist W. M. F. 1902 until his death at Harvard Camp, just west of the Petrie (1853-1942) set out for Giza, responding to the pyramids (fig. 82). various fantastic contentions of the day about the true After earning his B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. degrees at significance of the dimensions of the Great Pyramid and Harvard University, Reisner left the United States to their possible relation to the circumference of the earth. study Semitics in Berlin, which at the close of the nine­ Using an elaborate series of triangulations over the entire teenth century was the primary center for serious philo­ site, in 1881 Petrie was able to provide the most accurate logical and historical learning.