Object Description
A beautiful Egyptian, turquoise-glazed, faience mummiform shabti wearing a striated, tripartite wig and a plaited divine beard. The shabti is depicted typically with his arms crossed across the chest, right over left. Clenched within his hands, which protrude from a shroud, are the characteristic agricultural tools a shabti would hold. In his left he holds a pick, and in the right, a hoe. The twisted cord of a finely detailed basket is suspended behind the left shoulder. The figure leans against a dorsal pillar and stands upon an integrated trapezoidal base. The body of the shabti has nine horizontal bands of inscription naming the owner as Horwedja, born to Shedet, followed by Chapter 6 of the Book of the Dead.
The hieroglyphic text transliterates and translates as:
sHD Wsir Hm-nTr N.t HrwDA ms (n) Sd.t mAa-xrw (The illuminated one, the Osiris, the God’s servant of Neith, Horwedja, born (to) Shedet, justified,)
Dd.f i w[S]b.ty ipn ir ip.tw Wsir Hm-nTr N.t Hr-wDA ms (n) Sd.t mAa-xrw (O, these shabtis, if one counts, the Osiris, the God’s servant of Neith, Horwedja, born (to) Shedet, justified,)
r ir.t kA.t nb(.t) ir(.t) im m Xr.t-nTr n is[t] Hw sDb.w im m s r Xrt.f m.k wi kA.tn ip.tw.tn r nw nb ir.t im (he speaks: to do all the works that are to be done there in the realm of the dead – now indeed obstacles are implanted therewith – as a man at his duties, ‘here I am,’ you shall say when you are counted off at any time to serve there,)
r srwD sx.t r smH.y wDb.w r Xn.t Say imn.tt r iAb.tt Ts pXr (to cultivate the fields, to irrigate the river banks, to ferry the sand of the west to the east and vice–versa,)
m.k wi kA.tn (‘here I am,’ you shall say”)
The shabti stands on a custom-made stand.
Date: Circa 380-343 BC
Period: Late Period, 30th Dynasty