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Lot 1821
Alabaster Cosmetic Jar Inscribed with the Royal Cartouche of Rameses IV. Egypt, 18th Dynasty, c. 1154-1148 BC. Rameses IV: Hekamaatresetepenamun, the starting dates for his 6 year reign range around 1164-1151 BC. Cosmetic jar of ovoid form, with wide flat everted rim. Neatly fashioned in a patterned (now) tan-brown alabaster, the jar bears to two carefully engraved, crowned cartouches with an abbreviated form of his name -- Hekamaatre Rameses. Jar intact and perfect, with scattered encrustations/patina. The area surrounding the cartouches lightly and very carefully cleaned a very long ago. Height: 3". A splendid, "classically" Egyptian artifact from a short-reigned, yet notable pharaoh. Comes with hand written note, translating the name, by Professor John Callender of UCLA.
Estimated Value $7,000 - 8,000.
Rameses IV was the son of Rameses III, and was the third pharaoh of the Twentieth Dynasty of the New Kingdom era of Ancient Egypt. He survived a "harem conspiracy" which attempted to depose his father and likewise to spoil his claims to the throne. As king, he attempted a building campaign on the scale of Rameses II, but did not live long enough to accomplish his goals -- his reign lasting no more than six years.
His tomb (KV 2) was found in the Valley of the Kings and his mummy is now in the Cairo Museum. The remains indicate that Rameses was a small man, bald, with a long nose and good teeth. His tomb is rather different then most other royal tombs constructed there. Because Rameses IV assumed the thrown in a period of economic decline in Egypt, his tomb, though large, is quite simplistic, nevertheless its layout being unique in many ways. The tomb was known early on, and was frequently used as a sort of hotel by early explorers such as Champollion, Rosellini, Hay, Davis and others. It also appears to have been frequently visited in antiquity. There is considerable Coptic and Greek graffiti on the walls. Little funerary equipment is known to have been found within the tomb itself. The sarcophagus and the tomb was broken into during antiquity and the contents disturbed or dispersed.
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| Realized $8,050 |
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