A Fine and Large Egyptian Limestone Relief Carved in Shallow Relief

Period: 2454 BC - 2311 BC

Medium: Limestone

Dimension: 32 x 70 x 5 cm (12⁵/₈ x 27¹/₂ x 2⁰/₁ inches)

Provenance: Ex Private Swiss collection, acquired mid 1960s and thence by descent 
Ex Rupert Wace Limited London 
Ex Private London collection 

cf A similar relief with a procession of ‘waiters’ carrying food-stuffs including live birds from the Mastaba of Thefw is illustrated in Prof. Dr. Selim Hassan’s article ‘Mastabas of Ny-ankh-Pepy and Others’ in ‘Excavations at Saqqara, 1937 - 38, Vol. II’ Cairo 1975, plate LXXXVI

Literature: The relief scene from a wall of a tomb depicts in the lower register a procession of offering bearers carrying a variety of birds. Hieroglyphic inscriptions incised before and behind the figure on the left in part referring to the lost figure ‘overseer of the domain, servant of Ka’. The lower part of the upper register shows a figure pulling on a catch net (the legs lean back to counterbalance the weight of the net) and birds with open wings try to escape capture, while the caught birds are shown within the net in the upper right corner.