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Tales from the Two Lands @talestwolands.bsky.social · 2d

However I should note that it probably belonged to someone with some degree of wealth. I don’t know any more context for it than “Abydos” but it was probably dug up in the grave of someone whose family were wealthy enough to send such a nice pot into eternity with the deceased.🧵3/4

Painted Jar with Snakes, Scorpions and Crocodiles | Photos by Tales from the Two Lands

Tales from the Two Lands @talestwolands.bsky.social · 2d

The conditions in Egypt are good for preserving colour, so ancient Egyptian artifacts make it obvious that history wasn’t just varying shades of beige & brown endlessly repeating. Here you can see the red, yellow, blue & white almost as vibrant as the day the pot was made. 🧵2/4

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Tales from the Two Lands @talestwolands.bsky.social · 2d

This is a delightful pot, painted with a drake (as in male duck, not dragon) as the centrepiece of the decoration. It’s about 16cm tall (a little over 6 inches) and was found at Abydos by the EEF (now EES) excavations in 1904. 🧵1/4

#Egyptology

A photograph of an ancient Egyptian pot. It is round bottomed and narrows from a widest point at about ¼ of the way up towards the neck. The neck itself does not continue to narrow & is a straight sided cylinder. The pot itself is a reddish brown in colour but not much of that is showing because it is painted. The decoration looks a bit like a broad collar necklace around the shoulders of the pot (leaving the neck bare) coming to about ¼ of the way down, and there is a bib with further decoration running from this to about the widest point of the pot. The decoration is painted with a white background, and the collar part has lots of vertical blue stripes as well as a yellow, red and blue horizontal strip. The bib is outlined with blue and red lines, and the centre has a drawing of a duck with a white body, a blue head, yellow & red wings, and red legs. Surrounding the duck are a few lotus flower motifs and a basket with two eggs.

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Tales from the Two Lands @talestwolands.bsky.social · 9d

This pot is now in the World Museum, Liverpool, acc. no.: 1973.1.365 🧵5/5

See it on my photo site: photos.talesfromthetwolands.org/picture.php?...

Jigsaw Puzzles:
easier: www.jigsawplanet.com?rc=play&pid=...
harder: www.jigsawplanet.com?rc=play&pid=...

From Mo'alla. Predynastic Period, Naqada II, c. 3400-3300 BCE. Acc. No.: 1973.1.365 - DSC_7777.jpg

Statue of Taweret | Photos by Tales from the Two Lands

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Tales from the Two Lands @talestwolands.bsky.social · 9d

And this might indicate some sort of continuity over the millennia with the very much later Horus cippi, little figurines of a child form of Horus standing on crocodiles and clutching snakes. These were used in healing by pouring water over the figurine to be magically activated.🧵4/5

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Tales from the Two Lands @talestwolands.bsky.social · 9d

They are probably grouped together because they are all dangerous creatures. And it is possible that these jars had some sort of protective or healing function, perhaps involving the pouring of liquids as some of these jars have spouts. 🧵3/5

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Tales from the Two Lands @talestwolands.bsky.social · 9d

This is part of a small group of pots from the late Naqada II to Naqada III period which are decorated with the same group of animals: crocodiles, snakes and scorpions. Unlike other contemporary jars these aren’t part of a representation of a landscape. 🧵2/5

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Tales from the Two Lands @talestwolands.bsky.social · 9d

This jar is nearly 5500 years old, and was found at a site in Upper Egypt called Mo’alla that is about 20 miles south of Luxor. It’s best known for the tomb of Ankhtifi who lived about 1200 years after this pot was made. 🧵1/5

#Egyptology

A photograph of an ancient Egyptian pot. It is taller than it is wide, with a narrow based that flares out with the widest point about ¾ of the way up the pot. After that it narrows in to the mouth of the pot which is about twice as wide as the base.

The point is a pale brown-ish orange in colour and has animals painted on it in a brown-ish red paint. At the top on the shoulder of the pot are scorpions, with one visible in full and the tail of another visible to the right. In the centre of the pot is a crocodile painted vertically so it looks a bit like it is standing on its tail with its four paws stretched out to the side like it's clinging on to a wall. To the right and left are three snakes on each side, again painted vertically like they are standing on their tails, They are not straight but are wiggly.

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Tales from the Two Lands @talestwolands.bsky.social · 23d

See it on my photo site: photos.talesfromthetwolands.org/picture.php?...

Jigsaw Puzzles:
easier: www.jigsawplanet.com?rc=play&pid=...
harder: www.jigsawplanet.com?rc=play&pid=...

🧵6/6

Provenance unknown. Late Period, c. 600 BCE. British Museum acc. no.: EA35700 - DSC_7735.jpg

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Tales from the Two Lands @talestwolands.bsky.social · 23d

When I photographed it, it was in the World Museum in Liverpool on long term loan from the British Museum (acc. no. EA35700) but I think it’s back in the British Museum now although not on display. 🧵5/6

Tales from the Two Lands @talestwolands.bsky.social · 23d

This statue is also unusual in how large it is, most figures of Taweret are amulets or small figurines. But this one is a little over a meter tall, so maybe it had been placed in a temple rather than a household. It’s a shame we don’t know where it was found. 🧵4/6

Tales from the Two Lands @talestwolands.bsky.social · 23d

It’s made of breccia which is an interesting choice of stone for a statue – I find the variegated nature of the stone distracts from the shape that the stone is carved in to. I don’t know if it was painted, but that seems unlikely as surely then they’d pick a plainer stone. 🧵3/6

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Tales from the Two Lands @talestwolands.bsky.social · 23d

She wears a wig, you can see the vertical lines of it coming down from the top of her head to her shoulders, and the front of it extends down her front. Her hippo ears poke through it pulled flat back against her head, and on top she wears a cylindrical headdress called a modius. 🧵2/6

Shabti of Amenhotep III | Photos by Tales from the Two Lands

Tales from the Two Lands @talestwolands.bsky.social · 23d

This toothy lady is Taweret, a protective household deity who looked after mothers & childbirth. She’s a composite creature but most of what we see here are the hippo aspects of her imagery, out of frame she also has the legs & paws of a lion and the tail of a crocodile. 🧵1/6

#Egyptology

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Tales from the Two Lands @talestwolands.bsky.social · Sep 12

It is now in the World Museum Liverpool, acc. no. M13937. 🧵8/8

See it on my photo site: photos.talesfromthetwolands.org/picture.php?...

Jigsaw Puzzles:
easier: www.jigsawplanet.com?rc=play&pid=...
harder: www.jigsawplanet.com?rc=play&pid=...

Provenance unknown. New Kingdom, Dynasty 18, reign of Amenhotep III, c. 1390-1352 BCE. Acc. No.: M13937 - DSC_7916.jpg

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Tales from the Two Lands @talestwolands.bsky.social · Sep 12

It’s not known where it was found, but we can assume it was once buried with the king in his tomb WV22 in the western part of the Valley of the Kings. That tomb was robbed in antiquity, then tourists in the early 19th Century took souvenirs from what was left. 🧵7/8

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Tales from the Two Lands @talestwolands.bsky.social · Sep 12

This shabti would once have been beautiful, as befits such a wealthy king: gleaming white stone and brilliant blue paint in the carved inscription. Even missing the head and lower legs, and even tho the paint has started to fade you can see what it must’ve been like. 🧵6/8

Tales from the Two Lands @talestwolands.bsky.social · Sep 12

And he’s responsible for most of the Sekhmet statues that you can see in museums across the world, he commissioned over 700 of them to stand in his mortuary temple and in the temple of Mut at Karnak. These may’ve been to propitiate the goddess in a time of plague. 🧵5/8

Tales from the Two Lands @talestwolands.bsky.social · Sep 12

We also have monuments: the Colossi of Memnon are actually enormous statues of Amenhotep III flanking the entrance to his mortuary temple at Kom el-Hattan. There’s been a lot of archaeological work there over the last few decades, and much more is known of the temple. 🧵4/8

Tales from the Two Lands @talestwolands.bsky.social · Sep 12

Amenhotep III wasn’t a conqueror, he ruled these lands because his predecessors had done the hard work of fighting – there’s only one military campaign of his reign that’s known, but we have quite a bit of diplomatic correspondence preserved at his son’s capital at Amarna. 🧵3/8

Tales from the Two Lands @talestwolands.bsky.social · Sep 12

During his time Egypt exerted its authority over a large area outside of the traditional land of Egypt, stretching south into Kush (in modern Sudan) and northeast up a coastal strip of the Levant to Kadesh (in modern Syria). And their trade networks extended as far as Greece. 🧵2/8