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A Wooden Figure of Wadjet with two Painted Representations of Amasis

WOODEN objects have survived from Ancient Egypt in great quantity. In the absence of damp and of predatory insects, survival is often miraculous in its completeness. The excellent condition of the funerary equipment of 'Tutxankhamun owes much to the even, dry environment which it enjoyed from the time of its interment. By contrast, the wood in the surviving burial equipment of Queen Hetepheres was almost wholly decayed, possibly the result of humid conditions.1 Careful excavation and skilful conservation may enable much to be salvaged when wooden objects, in whole, or in part, are retrieved from their ancient resting places, but, sadly, many of the wooden antiquities discovered in the days before the possibilities of care and conservation were appreciated were so roughly treated when they were extracted from the earth or from the tomb that they survive as poor representatives of one very important part of the Egyptian artistic achievement. Fragmentary wooden figures exist, mostly unknown, in significant quantities in the older collections of Egyptian antiquities. In the reserves of museums they form sad ranks, superficially unattractive, and inviting little notice. Nevertheless, such figures deserve attention. An object handled, even for the most modest reasons, is on the way to being an object looked at, cared for, and studied. Many wooden figures are no more damaged than the stone sculptures surviving often in fragmentary state, which excite, quite properly, the close attention of scholars. The wooden figure which forms the subject of this article (see pls, XVIII-XIX) received the modest attention indicated in the last paragraph during a reorganization of storage in the British Museum. It represents a lioness-headed deity, who, in the only published reference to it, is described as 'the goddess Sekhmet seated on a throne. On the sides of the throne are painted figures of Amasis II making offerings to the gods; on the back is the symbol of the union of the South and North. '2 In spite of the specific mention of Amasis II of the Twenty-sixth Dynasty in this description, the figure has seemingly escaped the attention of scholars during a period of intensive study of the Saite Period, even as it has passed generally unnoticed in the British Museum. It may now, however, be taken as a good, perhaps unusually good, example, of what may remain to be found in the examination of divine wooden figures, mostly fragmentary,