NEW KINGDOM, EARLY 18TH DYNASTY, CIRCA 1550-1425 B.C.

This canopic jar is fashioned out of marl clay and the facial features displayed on the lid were most likely modeled by hand rather than mold-made. The partially-preserved inscription on the body of jar reads, "Honoured of Hapi, Osiris, Menena beatified." Originally, Menena would have had four such jars, each intended to hold one of the internal organs (lungs, liver, stomach, and intestines), which were removed during the mummification process. Close parallels in the collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art excavated from the Asasif region of western Thebes date mainly to the period of the 18th Dynasty from the reigns of Ahmose to Thutmose III (see nos. 75-78 in P.F. Dorman, Faces in Clay: Technique, Imagery and Allusion in a Corpus of Ceramic Sculpture from Ancient Egypt).