Skip main navigation

Collections: Egyptian, Classical, and Ancient Middle Eastern Art: Miniature Bust

Want to add this object to a set? Please join the Posse, or log in.

Miniature Bust

Found in both houses and funerary chapels, busts such as this one were a focus for ancestor worship during the New Kingdom. Just as unhappy ghosts represented a threat to the living, one's relatives among the glorified dead who had been transformed into beings known as akhs could help with earthly problems and act as intermediaries to the powers on the "other side." Indeed, people even wrote messages to deceased relatives requesting aid in connection with a multitude of problems in their daily lives.

Medium: Wood
Possible Place Made: Deir el Medineh, Egypt
Dates: ca. 1336-1327 B.C.E., ca. 1327-1323 B.C.E., or ca. 1323-1295 B.C.E.
Dynasty: late XVIII Dynasty
Period: New Kingdom
Dimensions: 3 1/16 x 2 1/16 in. (7.8 x 5.3 cm)
Collections: Egyptian, Classical, and Ancient Middle Eastern Art
Museum Location: This item is on view in Egypt Reborn: Art for Eternity, Special Exhibitions, Egyptian Galleries, 3rd Floor
Accession Number: 53.246
Credit Line: Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund
Image: Front, 53.246_reference_SL1.jpg. Brooklyn Museum photograph

Tags

Separate each tag with a space: painting portrait.

Or join words together in one tag by using double quotes: "Brooklyn Museum."

Tags by Posse

moriah11 (8)
- figure
- asian
- man
- carving
- carved
- figurative
- wood
- bust

Search the Collection

Location: 200 Eastern Parkway, Brooklyn, New York 11238-6052
Telephone: (718) 638-5000; TTY: (718) 399-8440
Admission: Suggested Contribution: $10; Students with Valid ID: $6; Adults 62 and over: $6; Members: Free; Children under 12: Free
Hours: Wednesday–Friday: 10 a.m.–5 p.m.; Saturday–Sunday: 11 a.m.–6 p.m. Get detailed hours
Subway: Eastern Parkway/Brooklyn Museum Get detailed directions