AN EGYPTIAN FAIENCE AMULET OF HORUS NEW KINGDOM, DYNASTY XVIII, CIRCA 1353-1336 B.C.

拍品描述

AN EGYPTIAN FAIENCE AMULET OF HORUS, NEW KINGDOM, DYNASTY XVIII, CIRCA 1353-1336 B.C. Modelled in the round as a falcon standing on a rectangular base, the body compact and forward-leaning, the tail extending horizontally behind to rest along the plinth. The head is turned frontally, with a heavy, hooked beak set below broad brow-ridges and large circular eyes worked in low relief. The wings are folded tightly against the flanks, their coverts and primaries indicated by finely incised parallel striations, and the powerful legs terminate in clearly articulated talons gripping the base. A suspension loop rises from the back between the wings. The pale blue-green faience glaze pools in the recesses and has thinned across the raised surfaces, revealing warmer buff tones of the underlying body. The falcon is the primary theriomorphic form of Horus, the sky god and dynastic protector of the reigning king, whose living presence on earth was understood to be the pharaoh himself. Worn as an amulet, the falcon extended this protection to its bearer, invoking Horus in his role as guardian of kingship, of the horizon, and of the deceased in the passage through the afterlife. The suspension loop confirms use as a pendant, worn in life or placed within the mummy wrappings, where such amulets were arranged in prescribed positions to guard specific parts of the body. Faience carried meaning in Egypt that went beyond its physical properties. Composed of ground quartz coated in an alkaline glaze, its luminous blue-green surface was associated with the regenerative waters of the Nile, with the fertile fields, and with the substance of rebirth. The Egyptian word for the material, tjehnet, meant "that which is brilliant" or "shining", and connected the substance to the light of the sun and the moon. A faience amulet was therefore not merely an image of Horus but a small vessel of solar and regenerative power, its material actively contributing to its protective function. The Amarna dating supplied by the cataloguer places this piece in the reign of Akhenaten, a period during which the traditional pantheon was officially suppressed in favour of the exclusive worship of the Aten. Amuletic production of older deities such as Horus nonetheless continued at the level of personal devotion, and small faience workshops attached to court and temple sites maintained the older iconographic repertoire alongside the new solar imagery. The stylistic character of the piece, with its softly modelled body, sharply defined wing feathers and pale blue-green glaze, is consistent with the refined faience production of the mid-Eighteenth Dynasty. This amulet exemplifies the intimate, personal scale of Eighteenth Dynasty faience amuletic production, where the protective power of a dynastic god was compressed into an object small enough to be worn against the body. The compact, forward-leaning silhouette and the crisp incised feathering place it among the more carefully modelled examples of the Horus falcon type produced during the Amarna horizon. Dimensions: Height: 2.9cm

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