Harnefer son of Paheb (Phibis) and Takerheb (Kalibis)

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This fine head exemplifies a type that emerges strongly in the fourth century and later, termed an 'egghead' for obvious reasons. In this type the large bare skull combines with small sweet facial features to create an almost infant-like appearance; it has been suggested this is perhaps an allusion to rebirth and renewal. The head joins a striding statue that is in the Musée Cantonnal des Beaux-Arts, Lausanne, Switzerland. The wide inscribed back plinth of the statue reveals that Harnefer was a priest of Khonsu the Child, a god who had a temple within the precinct of his mother Mut at Karnak where this statue would have been set up. Harnefer was a member of the so-called Nesmin family, a prominent priestly family at Thebes in the early Ptolemaic Period. Hungarian archaeologists have recognized the family burial place in the in the reused Ramesside Theban Tomb 32, opening up many possibilities for better understanding of this family and the burial practices of this era.

Egyptian Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Met collection of ancient Egyptian art consists of approximately 30,000 objects of artistic, historical, and cultural importance, dating from about 300,000 BCE to the 4th century CE. A signifcant percentage of the collection is derived from the Museum's three decades of archaeological work in Egypt, initiated in 1906 in response to increasing interest in the culture of ancient Egypt.

Metropolitan Museum of Art