Relief Blocks from the Tomb of the Vizier Nespeqashuty, ca. 664–610 B.C.E. Limestone, 11 3/4 x 19 3/4 in. (29.8 x 50.2 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund, 52.131.20. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, CUR.52.131.20_wwgA-3.jpg)
Relief Blocks from the Tomb of the Vizier Nespeqashuty, ca. 664–610 B.C.E. Limestone, 11 3/4 x 19 3/4 in. (29.8 x 50.2 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund, 52.131.20. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, CUR.52.131.4_52.131.5_52.131.6_52.131.8_52.131.9_52.131.10_52.131.13_52.131.14_52.131.15_52.131.17_52.131.18_52.131.19_52.131.20_mc.jpg)
Relief Blocks from the Tomb of the Vizier Nespeqashuty, ca. 664–610 B.C.E. Limestone, 11 3/4 x 19 3/4 in. (29.8 x 50.2 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund, 52.131.20. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: , CUR.52.131.20_NegLL_print_bw.jpg)
Relief Blocks from the Tomb of the Vizier Nespeqashuty, ca. 664–610 B.C.E. Limestone, 11 3/4 x 19 3/4 in. (29.8 x 50.2 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund, 52.131.20. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: , CUR.52.131.20_NegMM_print_bw.jpg)
Relief Blocks from the Tomb of the Vizier Nespeqashuty, ca. 664–610 B.C.E. Limestone, 11 3/4 x 19 3/4 in. (29.8 x 50.2 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund, 52.131.20. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: , CUR.52.131.1a-i_52.131.4-23_52.131.32_68.1_wwgA-3.jpg)
Relief Blocks from the Tomb of the Vizier Nespeqashuty, ca. 664–610 B.C.E. Limestone, 11 3/4 x 19 3/4 in. (29.8 x 50.2 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund, 52.131.20. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: , CUR.52.131.1-32_68.1_wwgA-3.jpg)
Relief Blocks from the Tomb of the Vizier Nespeqashuty
Egyptian, Classical, Ancient Near Eastern Art
On View: Funerary Gallery 3, Martha A. and Robert S. Rubin Gallery, 3rd Floor
The decoration of Nespeqashuty’s tomb was never completed, allowing a rare glimpse into the artist’s working process. The three steps of relief carving are clearly visible here. First, each scene was drawn in color with attention paid to every detail. Next, the outline of each figure was carved and the background cut away. Finally, another carving of the figures softened the contour lines and sculpted the internal details.
The graffiti on the relief were written in both Demotic and Coptic, the two latest stages of the Egyptian language, as well as in Greek, during a thousand-year period after the tomb was prepared for Nespeqashuty. Writing graffiti in the tomb was a pious act, not vandalism.
