REMARKABLE EGYPTIAN SCRIBE NOT SEEN IN PUBLIC SINCE 1905
An Egyptian Indurated Limestone Figure of the Scribe Nekht-Ankh, late 12th/13th Dynasty, circa 1800-1700 B.C. (est. £1,000,000-1,500,000) For more than 100 years this sculpture has been part of the furnishings and works of art adorning the celebrated Palais Stoclet in Brussels, designed by Joseph Hoffmann and decorated in part by Gustav Klimt. A surviving black-and-white photograph shows the sculpture in the Main Hall.
Research for the cataloguing of this work revealed that the scribe had an even earlier collection history, as it was sold at auction in Paris in 1905.
The most significant example of ancient Egyptian sculpture from the Middle Kingdom to appear at auction in recent memory, the sculpture is identified in an inscription on the front of the base as ‘the Scribe of the Temple of Nekht-Ankh’. The cloaked sitter gazes into eternity with his left hand on his chest, as he would once have sat in a temple while witnessing a sacred rite. A Roman marble portrait head of a man, circa 2nd quarter of the 3rd century A.D. (lot 30, est. £40,000-60,000) In researching this marble portrait of man, the exceptional provenance of the work was brought to light: a photograph, published in 1923, places it within the celebrated collection of Wilton House in Wiltshire.
It first entered the collection in the 17th century under Thomas Herbert, The head was subsequently recorded as a portrait of a Roman Emperor, but it is more likely to be the likeness of a patrician man; under Imperial Roman rule, it became fashionable to commission private portraits resembling the Emperors and their consorts– perhaps the first ever ‘influencers’!