AN EGYPTIAN "BLACK BRONZE" PTAH

LATE PERIOD, DYNASTY XXX, 380-343 B.C.

Details

AN EGYPTIAN "BLACK BRONZE" PTAH
LATE PERIOD, DYNASTY XXX, 380-343 B.C.
Depicted mummiform, the god enveloped in a shroud-like garment, the "collar" rising up at the back, his hands emerging from within, clasping a was-scepter, wearing a cap crown, his flaring false beard striated and merging with the top of the scepter, holding an incised ankh in his left hand over his garment, adorned with incised bracelets and a broad collar, the counterweight incised, his eyes inlaid, the sclerae in electrum, the pupils, lids, brows, and cosmetic lines in copper, standing on an integral plinth in the form of the hieroglyph for ma-at, or truth
7 in. (17.8 cm.) high

Provenance

Collection of H. Hoffmann; Maurice Delestre, Paris, 16 May 1895, lot 373.
Collection of Charles Gillot (1853-1903); Christie's, Paris, 4-5 March 2008, lot 130.

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Lot Essay

For a similar example see no. 88, p. 128 in Schoske and Wildung, Gott und Götter im Alten Ägypten.

According to Élizabeth Delange ("The Complexity of Alloys: New Discoveries About Certain "Bronzes" in the Louvre," in Hill, ed., Gifts for the Gods: Images from Egyptian Temples, p. 39), "black bronze is a "cupreous alloy containing small amounts of gold and silver" which enabled "the creation of black patinas that gleam like haematite"

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