Upper part of a statue of Thutmose III

Upper part of a statue of Thutmose III

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This fine indurated limestone torso and head was uncovered in the early Twentieth Century during excavations conducted by Edouard Naville at the mortuary temple of Mentuhotep II at Deir el-Bahri. The face, which had brocken off in antiquity, was discovered in the 1960s by Polish excavators who were clearing the destroyed temple of Thutmose III which is adjacent to Mentuhotep's temple. This piece is now in the Egyptian Museum, Cairo. In the 1990s, the Egyptian Museum made a cast of the face, which is now displayed on the Metropolitan torso. At the same time, a cast of the torso was sent to Cairo and is now displayed with the face. Artist Donald Jensen painted the two casts to match the originals.

Egyptian Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Upper part of a statue of Thutmose IIIUpper part of a statue of Thutmose IIIUpper part of a statue of Thutmose IIIUpper part of a statue of Thutmose IIIUpper part of a statue of Thutmose III

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.