Ushebti. Ancient Egypt, Lower Epoch, 664-323 BC.

Ushebti. Ancient Egypt, Lower Epoch, 664-323 BC.
Fayenza.
Provenance: private collection in Paris. Acquired on the art market in the 1980s.
In good state of preservation.
Measurements: 12 cm (height); 14.5 cm (height with stand).

The ushebtis, Egyptian term that means "those that answer", are small statuettes that, in the Ancient Egypt, were deposited in the tombs as part of the funerary trousseau of the deceased, and whose function was to substitute him in the works that he had to carry out in the Beyond. The ushabties placed in the trousseau were 365 figurines, one for each day of the year. In addition, 36 foremen could be added, who commanded each of the crews composed of 10 workers. Most were made of ceramic, wood or stone, although in the richest tombs they could be found carved in lapis lazuli. The oldest preserved examples come from the Middle Empire, although we already find references to them in texts from the end of the Ancient Empire. The ushebtis are, after the sacred scarabs, the most numerous and possibly the most characteristic pieces of Egyptian art that have survived to the present day. Throughout time they always maintained the same function in the religious field but, while during the Middle Empire they were conceived as the representation of their owner before Osiris in the work of tillage in the kingdom of the shadows, replicas therefore of the deceased, from the New Empire they came to be seen as servants or slaves of the latter, being made in large quantities. The faience is a ceramic material of vitreous finish widely used in ancient Egypt for the production of small statues, amulets, etc. because its chromatic range could imitate more expensive stones such as lapis lazuli.