ClassificationsAncient Egyptian Art

Stela of Nebetiotef and Letter to the Dead from Merirtyfy to Nebetiotef

Possible OriginNaga ed-Deir, Egypt, Africa

CultureEgyptian

PeriodFirst Intermediate Period, Dynasty 10 - Dynasty 11

Dateca. 2118-1980 BCE

MediumLimestone, paint

Credit LineGift of Joop Bollen and Pyush Patel

Dimensions10 3/8 x 5 1/2 x 1 1/4 in. (26.4 x 14 x 3.2 cm)

Object number2014.033.001

Label TextFrom the late Old Kingdom (2216-2120 BC) to the late New Kingdom (1292-1077 BC) there survive only about 15 letters like this, written to relatives who had recently died. Examples range widely enough in time and in geographical spread to suggest that they reflect a broader custom of communication. They provide the most compelling evidence for the strength of belief in a life after death. Ill health or property disputes prompted writers to ask their dead relatives to intervene on their behalf because, according to the ancient Egyptians, the dead could identify malevolent forces when the living could not.
This tomb stela belongs to a woman named Nebetitef, who lived during the First Intermediate Period, a time of decentralized authority and economic hardship. The royal scribal and art schools ceased, and local styles emerged characterized by crude figures in cramped compositions. The stela was once placed on a wall over her burial, most likely at Naga ed-Deir in Upper Egypt.
A woman stands in the center of the stela holding an ankh, the symbol of life, and lifts a lotus flower to smell in the other. Surrounding her is the standard offering formula, which reads:
Top: An offering [which the king gives (and) Anubis, He who is on] His Mountain.
Right: An offering which the king gives (and) Osiris, Lord of Busiris, Foremost of the West, Lord of Abydos: An invocation offering
Bottom: A thousand of bread, beer, ox, gazelle, and fowl.
Left: An offering which the king gives (and) Anubis, Lord of Sepa, his {sic} perfect burial for the venerated one before Hathor, Nebetitef, born (of) Inetkaw.
At some point, the deceased's daughter, Merirtyfy, along with her uncle, wrote on the back of the stela in hieratic script (cursive hieroglyphs). In the letter, Merirtyfy asks for her mother's help to cure her illness, mentioning she has faithfully made offerings for her mother. Merirtyfy asks her mother to appear before her in a dream as an enobled spirit "fighting on my behalf" as proof, and then she will present additional offerings. The shorter text belongs to Nebetitef's brother who asks her to fight on behalf of his wife and children.

Exhibition HistoryMCCM Permanent Collection Reinstallation, August 15, 2014 - Present
Published ReferencesEdward F. Wente, "A Misplaced Letter to the Dead" in Orientalia Lovaniensia Periodica: Miscellanea in Honorem Josephi Vergote. Volume 6/7, ed. Jozef Vergote, et al. (Leuven: Departement Orientalistiek, 1975-1976), 595-600.
Edward F. Wente and Edmund S. Meltzer, Letters from Ancient Egypt (Atlanta: Scholars University Press, 1990), 215, number 349.
Richard B. Parkinson, Voices from Ancient Egypt: An Anthology of Middle Kingdom Writings (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1991), 142.
Kasia Szpakowska, Behind Closed Eyes: Dreams and Nightmares in Ancient Egypt (Swansea: Classical Press of Wales, 2003), 22-24; 185-186.
Louise Gestermann, "Ägyptische Briefe. Briefe in das Jenseits," in Texte aus der Umwelt des Alten Testaments: Bd. 3. Briefe, ed. Bernd Janowski and Gernot Wilhelm (Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlag, 2006), 301-302.
Sylvie Donnat, Écrire à ses morts : enquête sur un usage rituel de l'écrit dans l'Egypte pharaonique (Grenoble: Jérôme Millon, 2014), 53-56.
Gianluca Miniaci, Lettere ai morti nell'Egitto antico e altre storie di fantasmi (Brescia: Paideia, 2014), 54-56.
Julia Hsieh, Ancient Egyptian Letters to the Dead: The Realm of the Dead Through the Voice of the Living (Boston: Brill, 2021), 220-232, figures 5.21-5.23.
Rune Nyord, "The Letter to Nebetitef on Her First Intermediate Period Stela in the Michael C. Carlos Museum," The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 107 (2021).
Rune Nyord, “Post til en afdød: Nebetitefs genfundne brev,” Papyrus: Ægyptologisk Tidsskrift 41/1 (2021), 22–29.

ProvenanceProbably ex private collection, United States, purchased from the Cairo art market, 1958. Ex coll. Dr. W. Benson Harer/Harer Family Trust, Seattle, Washington, by 2007. Ex coll. Joop Bollen and Pyush Patel, United States, purchased from Harer Family Trust, 2013.

Status

On view

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