LOT 0039

Egyptian Limestone Shabti of Neferrenpet

NEW KINGDOM, 19TH DYNASTY, RAMESSIDE PERIOD, CIRCA 1100 B.C.

9 7/8 in. (708 grams total, 25.2 cm high including stand).

Mummiform type with arms crossed and hands modelled in relief; face framed by a tripartite wig with long lappets; four horizontal lines of inscription around the front and back of the lower body, separated by border lines and interrupted by a vertical band on the reverse; accompanied by a custom-made display stand.

Ex Roger Liechti (1934 -2010), Petit-Lancy, Switzerland.
Thence by descent in the family, Switzerland.

This lot has been checked against the Interpol Database of stolen works of art and is accompanied by search certificate no.13472-263059.

Cf. Schneider, H.D., Shabtis. An Introduction to the History of Ancient Egyptian Funerary Statuettes with a Catalogue of the Collection of Shabtis in the National Museum of Antiquities at Leiden, Vol. 3, Leiden, 1977, p.19, no. 3.2.1.7, for another large 19th Dynasty stone shabti with a similar text arrangement.

Neferrenpet was a popular New Kingdom name, borne by a Vizier of the South, one of the most important officials serving Ramesses II. A large (32 cm high) limestone shabti for him is now in Florence (Aubert, J-F., Aubert, L., Statuettes Égyptiennes: chaouabtis, ouchebtis, Paris, 1974, p. 96). The Metropolitan Museum of Art holds a smaller limestone shabti (19 cm) from the time of Ramesses II, inscribed for a sculptor named Neferrenpet (Hayes, W.C., The Scepter of Egypt. A Background for the Study of the Egyptian Antiquities in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Vol 2, New York, 1990 (reprint), p. 426). However, because the inscription on the present shabti includes no titles, it remains uncertain whether it belonged to either of them or to another person with the same name.