© Michael C. Carlos Museum, Emory University. Photo by Peter Harholdt.

ClassificationsAncient Egyptian Art

Shabti of Neferibresaneith

Place CreatedEgypt, Africa

CultureEgyptian

PeriodLate Period, Dynasty 26

Date664-525 BCE

MediumFaience

Credit LineGift of the Connoisseurs by exchange

Dimensions7 1/4 x 1 5/8 x 7/8 in. (18.4 x 4.1 x 2.3 cm)

Object number1998.011

Label TextThis tall, slender figurine belonged to a man named Neferibresaneith, son of Shepenbaster. Fashioned from pale blue faience with a slightly matte surface, the shabti is typical of the latest Egyptian dynasties and the Ptolemaic Period. The facial features are well-modeled, with almond-shaped eyes, and delicately incised details. The mummiform figure stands in the traditional pose, with arms crossed, grasping a pick in the left hand and a hoe and the cord of a basket in the right.

The text, a standard Late Period version of the shabti spell, reads as follows: The Illuminated One, the Osiris Neferibresaneith, born of Shepenbastet, justified of voice, he says: O, these shabtis, if one counts off the Osiris Neferibresaneith, born of Shepenbastet, justified of voice, in order to do any work which is done therein in the necropolis; indeed, (one) implants an obstacle there as a man at his duty; "here I am," you (pl.) shall say; count yourselves off at the time, daily, to be served therein the necropolis, to make arable a field, to irrigate the riparian land, to transport by boat the sand of the west to the east and vice versa; "here I am," you (pl.) shall say.
Exhibition HistoryMCCM Permanent Collection Galleries, October 1998 - February 2000
MCCM Permanent Collection Reinstallation, September 2001 - June 2006
MCCM Permanent Collection Gallery, 2009 - Present
Published ReferencesPeter Lacovara, "The New Galleries of Egyptian and Near Eastern Art at the Michael C. Carlos Museum," Minerva 12 (2001): 9-16.
Peter Lacovara and Betsy Teasley Trope, The Realm of Osiris (Atlanta: Michael C. Carlos Museum, 2001), 30.
Sara E. Cole, Judith Barr, and Roselyn Campbell, "'A Man in His Duty': An Ushabti of Neferibresaneith and a Case Study in the Dispersal of Egyptian Antiquities," Getty Research Journal 10 (2018): 191-206.
Rune Nyord, Seeing Perfection: Ancient Egyptian Images beyond Representation (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020), 69, Figure 23.

ProvenanceAcquired by MCCM from Merrin Gallery, New York, New York.

Status

On view

Collections