1955.81: Standing Osiris

Published Catalogue Text: Ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern Bronzes at the Harvard Art Museums
Osiris wears the atef crown without ram’s horns. The sharply modeled facial features contrast with the simplified attention to the rather flat body. The hands are positioned side-by-side; the flail is heavy and pendulous. A crude figure of the goddess Isis in profile facing left appears in raised relief on the back of the statuette. Comparable examples appear in faience statuettes of Osiris, although Isis usually faces right (1). Her arms on either side are positioned in a protective gesture, and wings may be visible flanking the body. The incised line down her torso may represent details of her dress. Her headdress consists of a sun disc with a pair of horns above a modius. Immediately above the headdress of Isis is a small round suspension loop on the back of Osiris' neck. A second loop extends out to the side by his feet on the right. The feet stand on a flat base that forms an obtuse angle with the legs. A broken peg on the underside of the base could have served to secure the figure. The surface has a dark brown patina with scattered pitting, particularly around the chest and back of the head.

Osiris was one of the most popular gods of the Egyptian pantheon. Early in Egyptian history he represented a chthonic fertility god that later acquired the royal insignia of the crook and flail. He came to be identified as the ruler of the underworld. The Egyptian ruler, perceived during his lifetime as the incarnation of Horus, became Osiris after death. Over time, Osiris was equated with all deceased individuals and became a symbol of resurrection. The major cult shrine of Osiris was at Abydos in Middle Egypt, where Seti I (c. 1294-1279 BCE) built a magnificent temple in Dynasty 19.

Small bronze figurines representing Osiris show the god wrapped in a form-fitting garment, perhaps denoting a mummified shroud, and carrying the symbols of rulership—the crook and flail—in each hand. Enveloped in his shroud, Osiris’ arms are bound close to his body and his feet and legs stand together. The god is usually depicted wearing the White Crown of Upper Egypt, ornamented with a uraeus (cobra) on the front and sometimes flanked by two feathers (the atef crown). In addition, this crown can rest on a set of spiraling ram’s horns that project to either side.

The bronze figurines take two basic forms: seated or standing. Within each group, several subgroups can be distinguished according to the placement of the hands. The hands can be side-by-side without overlapping, the proper right hand above the left in a vertical alignment, or crossed over one another at the wrists. G. Roeder associates the different poses to geographical areas within Egypt: those with hands side-by-side in Middle Egypt, those with hands one above the other in Lower Egypt, and those with the hands crossed over one another in Upper Egypt (2). The position of the hands also appears to correlate with other broad stylistic features. For example, the ridge created by the shroud pulled around the shoulders occurs primarily on figurines in which the hands are arranged one above the other.

NOTES:

1. J. Baines, pers. comm. Compare an example from a Belgian collection published in J. F. Aubert and L. Aubert, eds., Bronzes et or Egyptiens (Paris, 2001) 215, pl. 30, dated to Dynasties 26-30, which has a raised depiction of Isis in profile on the back. A stone, perhaps steatite, statuette of a seated Harpokrates with a kneeling Isis carved on the back was recently found at Abydos; see L. Bestock, “Brown University Abydos Project: Preliminary Report on the First Two Seasons,” Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt Journal 48 (2012): 35-79, esp. 69-71, figs. 26-27. A flat Osiris figurine very similar to the Harvard piece but without the depiction of Isis on the back can be seen in A. N. Zadoks-Josephus Jitta, W. J. T. Peters, and W. A. van Es, Roman Bronze Statuettes from the Netherlands 2: Statuettes Found South of the Limes (Groningen, 1969) 138-39, no. 60.

2. G. Roeder, Ägyptische Bronzewerke, Pelizaeus-Museum zu Hildesheim, Wissenschaftliche Veröffentlichung 3 (Hamburg, 1937) 89; and id., Ägyptische Bronzefiguren, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin Mitteilungen aus der Ägyptischen Sammlung 6 (Berlin, 1956) 133. See also M. Wuttmann, L. Coulon, and F. Gombert, “An Assemblage of Bronze Statuettes in a Cult Context: The Temple of ‘Ayn Manâwir,” in Gifts for the Gods: Images from Egyptian Temples, eds. M. Hill and D. Schorsch, exh. cat., Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, 2007) 167-73, esp. 169-70.


Marian Feldman