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Author Topic: A bronze statuette of Harpokrates, with a provenance dating back to 1910-1912  (Read 3501 times)

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Offline Salaethus

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Ave,

I thought I would make a post here for all who are interested in ancient Egyptian antiquities, especially bronze items.  This is an authentic Late Period bronze statuette of the god Harpokrates that I won at auction several years ago.  It came with a very interesting provenance, described below.  The piece exhibits a beautiful, untouched crystalline patina, and might serve some good to those who are interested in buying similar pieces, and wish to make a comparison with an authentic, unrestored Egyptian bronze.  I also own a bronze statuette of Isis of similar form from the same collection of C.E.Best.  I find the colorful and interesting provenance to add another dimension to the items themselves.  I highly recommend those who are interested in buying Egyptian artifacts to look for pieces with a long, documented history attached to them.

Here is a description of the artifact:


An ancient Egyptian bronze statuette of the God Harpokrates, shown seated wearing the sidelock of youth, sun-disc and tripartite wig, dating to Egypt's Late Period, approximately 664-323 B.C.

Harpokrates is the Greek name for the Egyptian God Horus, depicted in his child form with finger to the mouth - a recognition of the Egyptian "child" hieroglyph. He was the God of the sunrise, and was often depicted as a falcon.

A suspension loop at the back would have enabled the figure to be worn as an amulet.

Height: 3 1/2 inches.

Provenance:
Ex. Collection of C.E.B.Best (died 1973). Cecil Best was an incredibly colorful character. Educated at Ardingley college in the late 1800's, Best trained as a banker but subsequently worked as a miner, soldier, merchant, editor and singer. He served as syllabus secretary at the Theosophical Society, England, where he met his future wife Inayat Khan, who converted him to the Sufism form of Islam and renamed him Shahbaz. Shahbaz Best, as he was now known, traveled to Rio de Janeiro in Brazil to spread his religion and work as a banker. It was during this time that he met H.E.Inman, a marine engineer, who gifted him his collection of antiquities that he had acquired in lieu of payment from the Egyptian government between 1910-1912. The antiquities were excavated from tombs in lower Egypt and were on display at the Southampton Museum in England after the death of Mr. Best in 1973.

For a higher quality picture, here's a link to the piece in my gallery: https://www.forumancientcoins.com/gallery/displayimage.php?pos=-120518

Offline Joe Sermarini

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Very nice.
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Offline Jay GT4

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Yes very nice and what an interesting character Mr. Best was!

Offline Roman_Egypt

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Lovely piece and great provenance with it!

 

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