Skip Navigation

Chariot

Egyptian, Classical, Ancient Near Eastern Art

On View: Amarna Period, Martha A. and Robert S. Rubin Gallery, 3rd Floor

Relief carvers working at Akhenaten's capital devised a method of using space to imply movement—a method seen in this relief of a chariot drawn by a pair of horses. Besides raising the animals' forelegs off the ground in the traditional Egyptian convention for representing a gallop, the artisan introduced the novel device of leaving blank the entire left half of the block. The viewer is supposed to understand this space as the area into which the chariot is moving.

Amarna relief carvers seemed to delight in adding unusual details that broke with Egyptian artistic tradition. On this relief, for example, one of the horses turns its head to stare directly at the viewer. In earlier scenes of chariots, horses were always depicted in pure profile.

MEDIUM Limestone, pigment (modern)
DATES ca. 1352–1336 B.C.E.
DYNASTY late Dynasty 18
PERIOD New Kingdom, Amarna Period
DIMENSIONS 21 1/16 x 9 x 1 1/4 in. (53.5 x 22.8 x 3.2 cm)  (show scale)
ACCESSION NUMBER 60.28
CREDIT LINE Gift of New Hermes Foundation
PROVENANCE The Great Temple at Tell el-Amarna, Egypt; probably reused inside the pylon of Ramsses II at Hermopolis Magna, Egypt; by 1960, acquired from an unidentified source by the New Hermes Foundation; 1960, gift of the New Hermes Foundation to the Brooklyn Museum.
Provenance FAQ
MUSEUM LOCATION This item is on view in Amarna Period, Martha A. and Robert S. Rubin Gallery, 3rd Floor
CAPTION Chariot, ca. 1352–1336 B.C.E. Limestone, pigment (modern), 21 1/16 x 9 x 1 1/4 in. (53.5 x 22.8 x 3.2 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of New Hermes Foundation, 60.28. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 60.28_SL1.jpg)
IMAGE overall, 60.28_SL1.jpg. Brooklyn Museum photograph
"CUR" at the beginning of an image file name means that the image was created by a curatorial staff member. These study images may be digital point-and-shoot photographs, when we don\'t yet have high-quality studio photography, or they may be scans of older negatives, slides, or photographic prints, providing historical documentation of the object.
RIGHTS STATEMENT Creative Commons-BY
You may download and use Brooklyn Museum images of this three-dimensional work in accordance with a Creative Commons license. Fair use, as understood under the United States Copyright Act, may also apply. Please include caption information from this page and credit the Brooklyn Museum. If you need a high resolution file, please fill out our online application form (charges apply). For further information about copyright, we recommend resources at the United States Library of Congress, Cornell University, Copyright and Cultural Institutions: Guidelines for U.S. Libraries, Archives, and Museums, and Copyright Watch. For more information about the Museum's rights project, including how rights types are assigned, please see our blog posts on copyright. If you have any information regarding this work and rights to it, please contact copyright@brooklynmuseum.org.
RECORD COMPLETENESS
Not every record you will find here is complete. More information is available for some works than for others, and some entries have been updated more recently. Records are frequently reviewed and revised, and we welcome any additional information you might have.