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a human male though sculptures of dwarf ptahs also exist in his most recognisable human form he is represented wearing a tight skullcap and clutching a sceptre called a was in his hands with the was itself being a symbol of dominance a long beard also forms part of his image from the middle kingdom onwards his image has been represented almost since the dawn of pharaonic rule with the earliest depictions of his likeness found on pottery dated to the first dynasty in egyptian mythology ptah maintains a key image he is credited with the creation of the universe and of the ennead in his routledge dictionary of egyptian gods george hart illustrates him as the smith and sculptor of mankind which further illuminates his chief importance indeed his position as a sculptor is significant to the interpretation of the limestone stela 4906 as a craftsman himself ptah holds a crucial role as the patron god of craftsmen including amen mes as i have already stated the stela honours ptah as the hearer of petitions this is in reference to one of ptah s most chief roles he retains the title mesedjer sedjem the ear that hears this suggests that religiously he was responsible for attending to the requests of his worshippers and may have carried out wishes on their behalf other stelae object 4906 though still quite unique is not the only tablet of its like other ear stelae have been discovered with the museum having three other similar limestone blocks featuring ears objects 4907 4908 and 4909 below all of these have been dated to the eighteenth dynasty which may be due to the fact that most of the dynasty was centred in memphis the primary seat of ptah object 4909 has as many as 386 ear carvings on its surface acc no 4909 extraordinary limestone stela dedicated to ptah by the chief of sculptors ptahmose photo julia thorne tetisheri share this share on facebook opens in new window facebook share on posterous opens in new window posterous share on x opens in new window x share on reddit opens in new window reddit print opens in new window print email a link to a friend opens in new window email like loading leave a comment filed under uncategorized by campbell manchester october 26 2023 11 37 am summer placements after something of hiatus we return to blogging with reports from our archaeology summer placement student first up sonia prakash on some highlights of the time spent in the museum in july hi everyone my name s sonia and i ve just begun my third year studying classics and egyptology at the university of manchester i have had such a fantastic time doing this placement with campbell as it really gave me a flavour of the wide range of work that goes on at museums a key highlight of mine would have to be sorting through correspondence from the early 1900 s although i have some previous experience of transcribing i found this to be quite a challenging task as a lot of the handwriting was difficult to understand especially petrie s however it was incredibly rewarding after having deciphered a letter especially if it revealed interesting information a particularly exciting letter was one sent by w m flinders petrie 1853 1942 in which he invited the manchester museum to support him in establishing the egyptian research account here he wished to promote scientific research in egypt and allow students to take up their own original research since there was no british school of archaeology in egypt petrie expressed the need for a more definite archaeological school to make excavations the supply of materials and funds easier to acquire this gave me a valuable insight into what egyptology was like at the time how it developed and what a significant role the manchester museum played in the evolution of the field there were also a number of peculiar letters such as one from a costume shop owner who wrote to the museum asking them to assess some objects he was in possession of and to let him know if they were indeed genuine artefacts however when looking at his drawings below they appeared to simply be replicas another fascinating find was an original seal from the egypt excavation fund now known as the egypt exploration society where i currently volunteer the team michelle sonia carlotta minus jordan at work towards the end of the placement we spent the majority of our time in the organic stores sorting through and cataloguing paintings the manchester museum s collection of nina and norman de garis davies paintings was especially exciting as it gave us an opportunity to decipher hieroglyphs analyse small details and decode the artwork these paintings were made by a married couple of illustrators who documented tomb paintings from the theban necropolis one of the most impressive paintings comes from tomb 51 of userhet called neferhabef which displays him wearing a leopard garment an elaborate usekh collar and bearing an offering cup analysing these paintings was a great opportunity to apply the skills and knowledge learnt at university in a sort of puzzle solving activity i thoroughly enjoyed my time at the manchester museum as it was a chance to fully immerse myself in egyptology and museum work a huge thank you to campbell and the other students for making this such an enjoyable placement share this share on facebook opens in new window facebook share on posterous opens in new window posterous share on x opens in new window x share on reddit opens in new window reddit print opens in new window print email a link to a friend opens in new window email like loading leave a comment filed under uncategorized by campbell manchester february 15 2023 11 55 am divinity and display discussing mummified human remains our international touring exhibition golden mummies of egypt returns to manchester museum this week and presents a unique opportunity to display and discuss our collections naturally an exhibition which features mummified remains prompts discussion about the ethics of their display debate on the subject is not new but has attended the display of egyptian mummified people at least since the first western encounters with them in the 17 th century manchester museum itself has been the centre of consideration of the subject since it chose to cover some remains to prompt discussion in connection with an exhibition on lindow man iron age remains preserved in a peat bog in 2008 unlike the previous venues for golden mummies in the us and china we have decided to edit out all images of human remains derived from ct scans and x rays from the final manchester showing digital interpretation now focuses solely on the outer decoration and materials used in the mummification ritual one that was more about transformation of the deceased into a divine being than simply about preservation of the body by doing this the exhibition resists the urge to look inside the default expectation of recent exhibitions featuring mummified human remains but one that was never anticipated by ancient people instead golden mummies addresses the intention rather than the effect of the ritual of mummification and focuses on the transformative imagery on the decorated exterior of carefully wrapped bodies from the earliest identifiable depictions of gods the wrapped shrouded form has indicated and imparted divine status usually egyptology describes gods like osiris and ptah as mummiform when in fact the shrouded forms of mummified bodies imitate images of gods these amorphous forms subsume individual human characteristics and create a divine ancestral image an effigy for eternity funerary mask for a woman 2120 from lahun c 100 bce 100ce photo julia thorne research that enquires into preservation techniques and palaeopathology the study of ancient disease has long fascinated people but by narrowing in on the medical history of mummified individuals this interpretation characterises the dead individual in terms of their illnesses the identification of which is much more contested and subjective than many non specialists realise when understood as transformation of a human body into a divine image mummification actively denies these human frailties texts and images repeatedly assert that the elite dead have become something more than human impervious to change divine and therefore without imperfections this generically god like and mostly androgenous face is what appears in countless plaster and linen masks these were mass produced and subsume individual identity into a standardised even hieroglyphic vision of an eternal face or head of mystery to quote from spell 151 of the book of the dead mummified body of a young man c 2nd century ce from hawara roman period painted wooden panels are often held up as if by contrast they are snapshots of reality a definitive break from the supposedly stiff and caricatured form of pharaonic style mask yet if as seems likely most were painted posthumously then these painted portraits are no simple reflections of what people looked like in life at best they are highly stylised approximations much as we might want these to be the way people actually looked reference to a certain roman emperor s hairstyle is often used to date these images although emperors were themselves deified providing a further divine model to imitate these lifelike images are therefore not less godly than the pharaonic style masks unlike in pharaonic times there is evidence that wrapped bodies with panel paintings and masks were placed on selective display for a period perhaps up to several years after funeral rituals although the archaeologist flinders petrie assumed this to be in a domestic context dedicated sacred spaces seem more likely this kind of direct interaction with the dead present as ancestors is common in many cultures although we are often unfamiliar with such practices in the west the unwrapped mummified body of a woman named asru remains on display in our egypt and sudan gallery as she has for almost 200 years she is covered in ancient linen from collar to feet as are the royal mummies at the national museum of egyptian civilisation in cairo over the next few months we will be consulting with our audiences about how we might approach the display of asru s remains in future share this share on facebook opens in new window facebook share on posterous opens in new window posterous share on x opens in new window x share on reddit opens in new window reddit print opens in new window print email a link to a friend opens in new window email like loading leave a comment filed under uncategorized by campbell manchester october 20 2022 1 03 pm object biography 30 a faience shabti of king senkamenisken manchester museum s egyptology collection holds material not only from egypt but contains almost 700 objects from ancient sudan these come from a range of sites and entered the museum by a variety of means in the case of a small number royal shabtis these were donated to manchester from the sudan museum in 1926 senkamenisken was the grandson of rather better known king taharqa 690 664 bce of the 25 th dynasty who ruled both egypt and nubia after the assyrian incursions into egypt the napatan dynasty was based solely in nubia and was contemporary with the egyptian 26 th dynasty statue of senkamenisken found in the dokki gel cache and now in the sudan national museum khartoum left and a replica showing the statue as it once appeared with gilding right senkamenisken was buried in a pyramid no 3 at the royal cemetery at nuri some 300km north of khartoum the pyramid and associated funerary temple were excavated by a harvard university boston museum of fine arts mission in 1917 under the direction of american egyptologist george andrew reisner in the publication of the site fellow american dows dunham described at least 867 faience shabtis found scattered throughout the pyramid s 3 chambers and at least 410 serpentine stone ones indicating that senkamenisken had the most of any known royal burial though taharqa is often credited with having most at around 1000 faience shabti of senkamenisken acc no 8576 there were three recognised types of faience shabtis many showing the king with a double uraeus at his brow something of an iconographical hallmark of napatan kings and here perhaps an allusion to the time when the family ruled both egypt and nubia this example shows the king with a tripartite headdress without uraei emphasising perhaps the divine nature of the deceased king the kings holds the standard agricultural tools indication an expectation of the role of worker for the king in the afterlife this example carries the standard shabti spell chapter 6 of the book of the dead the text of which unusually extends down the back pillar this feature parallels developments in royal and private shabtis in egypt which favoured faience and included back pillars indeed it may be that these shabtis were made in egypt because they are so similar to contemporary non royal examples found there yet there are napatan royal texts which speak of artisans being brought to nubia from as far away as memphis to work in napatan temples so perhaps the craftsmanship rather than the objects themselves were imported or adapted this example has recently been scanned and replicated for use in an innovative outreach project examining identity and concepts of authenticity by amanda ford spora a doctoral student at ucl another shabti of senkamenisken made of serpentine is loaned out of the museum as part of our award winning shabtis in schools programme share this share on facebook opens in new window facebook share on posterous opens in new window posterous share on x opens in new window x share on reddit opens in new window reddit print opens in new window print email a link to a friend opens in new window email like loading leave a comment filed under object biography tagged as senkamenisken shabti shabtis in schools sudan older posts search for campbell price on twitter tweets by 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