Ushebti of General Padj-Horem-Hab, Ancient Egypt, Late Period, Dynasties XXVI-XXVII, 664-525 BC.
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Ushebti of General Padjhoremhab in light-blue glazed faience with blue hieroglyphs. Figure in the form of a mummy with a smooth three-part wig, hands crossed on the chest, holding a basket of seeds and a hand plough. Simple back pillar on the back. Beautiful saitic smile. Vertical hieroglyphic inscription on the body: ‘Padj-horem-hab (General) born of Bastet-herti’. The ushabti is characterised by a great delicacy of facial features and hieroglyphs.
Excavated by Gaston Maspero and his restorer Allesandro Barsanti near the pyramid of Unas at Saqqara around 1890. Maspero (Paris, 1846-1916) French Egyptologist of Italian origin, one of the most important of his generation. At the age of fourteen he came into contact with the world of hieroglyphs, in which he soon revealed great skills. It is said that at the age of twenty-one he received from Mariette two newly discovered inscriptions, and successfully translated them in less than two weeks.
D. in Lettres in 1873, he taught Egyptian archaeology and philology at the Collège de France. In 1880 he led an archaeological mission to Egypt, which was to form the basis for the subsequent creation of the French Institute of Oriental Archaeology, based in Cairo, in 1898. In Egypt, he soon became Mariette’s successor and became director of the Antiquities Service, of which he was one of the major driving forces.
