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Lot Essay
This royal shabti has previously been attributed to Psamtik I, who ruled from 664-610 B.C., based upon the presence of the name Wahibre, Psamtik's prenomen. However, the later pharaoh Apries also employed the name Wahibre, but here, rather, as his nomen. According to Reeves (op. cit. p. 95), the "identification of this piece as representing the earlier of these two kings would seem, at first sight, convincing enough: in traditional usage, the title 'King of Upper and Lower Egypt' is regularly associated with the prenomen; and stylistically, the MacGregor figure does share a certain similarity (in its striated wig) to the shabti of an unspecified 'King of Upper and Lower Egypt Psamtik' in the collection of the University of Tübingen (see no. 899 in Brunner-Traut and Brunner, Die Ägyptische Sammlung der Universität Tübingen). Nevertheless, as this same Tübingen shabti highlights, during the 26th Dynasty (and contrary to earlier custom), the practice was to employ the title 'King of Upper and Lower Egypt' not with the prenomen but with the nomen. If this is the usage followed here (which there seems every reason to believe), then the owner of the MacGregor shabti will have been the later of our two candidates, Apries...".
Only three other shabtis attributed to Apries are known: one in the Petrie Museum at University College London, no. 570 in Petrie, Shabtis; and two in the Cairo Museum, p. 385 in Newberry, Funerary Statuettes and Model Sarcophagi, and (from Sais) p. 237 in Daressy, "Report sur des Fouilles à Sa el-Hagar," ASAE 2.
Only three other shabtis attributed to Apries are known: one in the Petrie Museum at University College London, no. 570 in Petrie, Shabtis; and two in the Cairo Museum, p. 385 in Newberry, Funerary Statuettes and Model Sarcophagi, and (from Sais) p. 237 in Daressy, "Report sur des Fouilles à Sa el-Hagar," ASAE 2.