LOT 0171

Roman Bronze Statuette of the God Harpocrates

1ST-3RD CENTURY A.D.

2 7/8 in. (4 in.) (213 grams, 73 mm (276 grams total, 10.2 cm including stand)).

Presented as a very young child sitting on the ground, wearing a long tunic which covers his lower body down to his feet; right arm bent and hand raised to the shoulder, left hand curved around an object (absent); sporting the conventional sidelock behind the right ear; mounted in a custom-made tiered wooden stand.

Ex Hanna Saba collection, Ambassador to Egypt-USA-France (1909-1992).
Private European collection.

This lot has been checked against the Interpol Database of stolen works of art and is accompanied by a search certificate number no.12098-218159.

Cf. similar item in the British Museum, London, under accession no.1896,0724.1 with the god in standing pose; see Swan Hall, E., 'Harpocrates and Other Child Deities in Ancient Egyptian Sculpture' in Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt, Vol. 14, 1977, pp.55-58, fig.1, pl.XXVII; fig.4, for full discussion.

The god's name was Hellenized in the Ptolemaic era and later adopted by the Romans, but it originated in the figure of 'Horus the child', son of Isis and Osiris, who was worshipped especially in Alexandria.