AN EGYPTIAN CARNELIAN INSCRIBED SCARAB New Kingdom, Dynasty XIX–XX, 1307–1070 B.C.

拍品描述

AN EGYPTIAN CARNELIAN INSCRIBED SCARAB, NEW KINGDOM, DYNASTY XIX–XX, 1307–1070 B.C. Of oval form, carved from a translucent carnelian of deep red tone, the underside engraved in intaglio with a symmetrical composition arranged in registers. At the top, a solar disc surmounts a fringed canopy or shrine element above a central emblem of paired T-shaped signs. Flanking this axis, two facing falcons perch with folded wings, their bodies rendered in profile and their tail-feathers hatched. Below runs a horizontal bar supporting a lower register of stylised papyrus or lotus buds flanked by paired volutes. The stone retains a high polish, its faces smoothed to catch and transmit light through the body of the gem. The design draws on the vocabulary of solar and royal protection. The paired falcons, read as Horus in his celestial aspect, guard a central emblem beneath the winged sun-disc, a motif associated across pharaonic amuletic production with kingship, divine sanction, and the daily renewal of the sun. The lower band of papyriform elements and confronted volutes belongs to the decorative repertoire of the Ramesside period, when scarabs increasingly carried composite designs of heraldic rather than strictly hieroglyphic character. The composition is legible less as a written formula than as a device of protective symmetry, worked to be pressed into clay or worn against the body. Carnelian was among the most highly valued of the hardstones used in Egyptian amuletic and jewellery production. Its red colour associated it with blood, the sun, and vital force, and it was linked in funerary texts with the goddess Isis and with regenerative power. The stone was worked with copper-alloy drills and abrasive powders, and the fine internal detail of the falcon plumage and the crisp cutting of the T-signs on the present example indicate a well-equipped workshop rather than provincial production. Scarabs of this material were reserved for a higher tier of patronage than the more common steatite or faience examples, and were often mounted in gold as swivel-bezels for rings or strung as pectoral elements. The scarab beetle itself, Scarabaeus sacer, was understood as an image of Khepri, the morning sun self-generated at dawn, and by extension of transformation and renewal. Worn in life and placed with the dead, the scarab functioned simultaneously as ornament, seal, and amulet, its underside carrying the protective device that was the operative part of the object. This scarab exemplifies the Ramesside taste for symmetrical, heraldic compositions in hardstone amuletic production, where the older tradition of the inscribed royal-name scarab gives way to designs organised around solar and Horus imagery. Its material, cutting, and iconographic programme place it among the more accomplished examples of private New Kingdom amuletic work in carnelian. Dimensions: Height 2.2 cm

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