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Home > Auctions > 26th November 2024 > Egyptian Limestone False Door Relief Panel

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LOT 0006

Estimate
GBP (£) 1,200 - 1,700
EUR (€) 1,440 - 2,040
USD ($) 1,530 - 2,170

Current bid: £800 (‡+bp*)
(2 Bids, Reserve not met)

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(2 Bids, Reserve not met)   |   Current bid: £800
EGYPTIAN LIMESTONE FALSE DOOR RELIEF PANEL
MIDDLE KINGDOM, CIRCA 1900-1750 B.C.
11 1/4 in. (4.12 kg, 28.7 cm).

Rectangular panel from a false door stela carved in sunk relief with raised vertical borders framing a scene with a male figure wearing a knee-length kilt, collar and short wig, seated on a stool with lion-claw feet, holding a bolt of cloth in his left hand; before him, a pedestal table with splayed feet, the top laden with vertical loaves; traces of pigment to the collar, kilt and table; rear face dressed but plain.

PROVENANCE:
Acquired in the mid 1980s-1990s.
Private collection, Switzerland, thence by descent.
Private collection, since the late 1990s.

LITERATURE:
Cf. Hein, I., and Satzinger, H., Stelen des Mittleren Reiches II: einschliesslich der I. und II. zwischenzeit Kunsthistorisches Museum, Wien ägyptisch-orientalische sammlung, Corpus Antiquitatum Aegyptiacarum, Mainz am Rhein, 1993, pp.136-139 for a complete false door stela with a similar scene of the deceased seated before an offering table.

FOOTNOTES:
The ancient Egyptians believed the soul of the departed could move in and out of the tomb using a ‘false door.’ This door was identified by a recessed surface with a symbolic entrance at its centre. In the Middle Kingdom, the false door design was combined with other elements or represented by a raised border and cornice above on rectangular stelae.

CONDITION