Egyptian Art Notes summary

 

 

Egyptian Art Notes summary

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Egyptian Art Notes

Fine Arts
Higdon

Egypt- first truly national state

The Nile River-protected from enemies and provided surplus of food

History divided into three kingdoms:  Old, Middle, New.  The Middle was a time of political disturbance and invasions.  The New is considered the Golden Age in Egyptian history

Egyptian art- remained nearly unchanged for several thousand years- is so well preserved because of its hot and dry climate

Imhotep- the first artist in history whose name is known

Egyptians wished to live forever- this desire led to the development of tomb art and architecture in the fourth dynasty- we owe most of what we know of ancient Egypt to ancient pyramids where the pharaoh was buried with his food, servants, art and equipment to accompany him to his second life- Egyptian rulers began to construct their tombs as soon as they were crowned- they believed that a pharoah’s spirit or life force or ka was immortal- the size and decoration of a tomb depends upon a pharoah’s wealth

Book of the Dead- formula for facilitating passage of dead to celestial realm

Religion-polytheistic-worshipped many god

Egyptian creation myth- Osiris placed in tomb to be drowned by his evil brother Set but Osiris’ wife/sister Isis found him; then Set cut up Osiris and scattered his body all over the earth but Isis found all of his body except his _____, but she created one for him, impregnated herself and had a son, Horus, who avended Osiris by killing Set.  Osiris’ death represents triumph over death, immortality and the victory of Horus represents good over evil

Sun god- Amon-Re- the creator of man
God of the Nile- Osiris- first story of resurrection
Isis- goddess of children and mother of Horus
Thebes- the religious capitol of Egypt

Amenhotep-introduced monotheistic religion

Egypt is mentioned in the Bible- plagues- Moses leading the Hebrews away

Egyptian state was a theocracy- no separation of state and religion- law in Egypt is based on a pharoah’s word or whims

Mummification-system of embalming that preserves a body for thousands of years- purpose to preserve body until the soul returns-takes about 70 days- p. 165, an embalmed body is called a mummy- natron is the salty substance used in embalming

The Great Pyramids of Giza- purpose of pyramids is to house the dead pharoahs
Cheop’s Pyramid- the largest
Great Sphinx- carved in bedrock- a monument-body of a lion with the head of the pharaoh Khafre, represents the pharaoh as the god Horus- the protector of kingship

The last Egyptian queen was Cleopatra.

Statues- arms are rigid, faces look straight ahead, frontal view of torso, sense of immobility, each left foot is slightly forward- this is called stylization

System of writing= hieroglyphics, instruction through sacred carvings, only priests could read them, tell stories of battles, life of Egyptians, and other mysteries…helicopter, airplane hieroglyphs, lost city of Atlantis
Rosetta Stone- French officer during Napoleonic conquests- inscription in Greek and hieroglyphs- before this little was known about the Egyptians

Bust of Nefretti- realistic-King Tut’s mother- regal headdress and elongated neck- timeless standard of elegance

Tomb of King Tut- Howard Carter spent ten years looking for it- found completely intact with no disturbance from grave robbers- Tut died at age 18- the most famous art is his burial mask

Overall theme of Egyptian art concerns life after death.

Characteristics of Egyptian sculpture, hieroglyphs, paintings
1.  The most important subject (person) is always the largest in scale
2.  always presents the body in the best physical view
Always balanced
3.  figures look frozen- no movement, attached to the stone from which they were carved
4.  frontal view of body and eye

Egyptian art influenced Greek and Roman art.
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Egypt

1. 4,000BC - 332AD
2. Longest, uninterrupted history of any culture

Egypt Timeline

1. Pre-dynastic
2. 4,000 - 3,000BC
3. Old Kingdom
4. 3,000 - 2,400BC
5. Middle Kingdom
6. 2,400 - 1,575BC
7. New Kingdom
8. 1,575 - 1,100BC
9. Late period
10. 1,100BC - 332AD
11. c. 600BC - conquest by Persia
12. 332AD - conquest by Rome
13. Ptolemaic period (Ruled by Rome)
14. after 332AD

General Concepts

1. Protected by deserts, isolated
2. Depended on yearly flooding of Nile
3. Art in service of the Pharaoh
4. Order and Balance
5. 90% of population within 10 miles of Nile

Maps of Egypt
Egyptian Mythology

INTRODUCTION
The religious beliefs of the ancient Egyptians were the dominating influence in the development of their culture.

A true religion, in the sense of a unified theological system, never existed among them.

The Egyptian faith was based on an unorganized collection of ancient myths, nature worship, and innumerable deities.

In the most influential and famous of these myths a divine hierarchy is developed and the creation of the earth is explained.

CREATION  

According to the Egyptian account of creation, only the ocean existed at first.

Then Ra, the sun, came out of an egg that appeared on the surface of the water.

Ra brought forth four children, the gods Shu and Geb and the goddesses Tefnut and Nut.

Shu and Tefnut became the atmosphere. They stood on Geb, who became the earth, and raised up Nut, who became the sky.

Ra ruled over all.

Geb and Nut later had two sons, Set and Osiris, and two daughters, Isis and Nephthys.

Osiris succeeded Ra as king of the earth, helped by Isis, his sister-wife.

Set, however, hated his brother and killed him.  (Osiris & Isis legend, see below)

Isis then embalmed her husband’s body with the help of the god Anubis, who thus became the god of embalming.

The powerful charms of Isis resurrected Osiris, who became king of the netherworld, the land of the dead.

Horus, who was the son of Osiris and Isis, later defeated Set in a great battle and became king of the earth.
Nut and Geb
The Legend of Osiris and Isis

There were the four children of Geb and Nut;
Boys - Osiris & Set
Girls – Isis & Nephthys

Osiris married Isis

Set married Nephthys

Osiris became the living king of Egypt

Set was VERY jealous of this

Set tricked Osiris into getting into a gold box, which he then closed and threw into the Nile

Set took the throne of Egypt

This upset Set’s wife, Nephthys, and she left him to help her sister Isis

Together, Isis and Nephthys found the body of Osiris on the island of Byblos and brought it back to Egypt

Set found the body and ripped it into 14 pieces, throwing them again into the Nile, where they were scattered.

Isis and Nephthys went all over Egypt and found the 13 of the parts (all except the penis), building a temple to Osiris at each place

Isis then bound up the 13 pieces in cloth (mummification), and constructed a penis

Isis turned into a Kite (a hawk) and flapped her wings on the body of Osiris, breathing the wind of life back into his body

Osiris and Isis then had a child, Hours

Isis raises Horus in secret so Set cannot find him
Osiris becomes the lord of the dead, as he was the fist person to die

When Horus grows up, he avenges his father’s death by defeating Set

Horus castrates Set and sends him into the desert to live forever in isolation

Horus becomes the “prototype” pharaoh, after which all pharaohs are viewed as divine, being “Horus”

LOCAL GODS
 
Ennead, a group of nine divinities, and the triad, consisting of a divine father, mother, and son.

Every local temple in Egypt possessed its own ennead and triad.

The greatest ennead, however, was that of Ra and his children and grandchildren. This group was worshiped at Heliopolis, the center of sun worship.

Their importance increased with the political ascendancy of the localities where they were worshiped.

As the religion became more involved, true deities were sometimes confused with human beings who had been glorified after death. Thus, Imhotep, who was originally the chief minister of the 3rd Dynasty ruler Zoser, was later regarded as a demigod.

ICONOGRAPHY  

The Egyptian gods were represented with human torsos and human or animal heads.

Sometimes the animal or bird expressed the characteristics of the god.
Ra, for example, had the head of a hawk, and the hawk was sacred to him because of its swift flight across the sky

Anubis was given the head of a jackal because these animals ravaged the desert graves in ancient times.

Because of the gods to which they were attached, the sacred animals were venerated, but they were never worshiped until the decadent 26th Dynasty.

The gods were also represented by symbols, such as the sun disk and hawk wings that were worn on the headdress of the pharaoh.


SUN WORSHIP  

The only important god who was worshiped with consistency was Ra, chief of cosmic deities, from whom early Egyptian kings claimed descent.

Beginning with the Middle Kingdom (2134-1668 BC)
Ra worship acquired the status of a state religion.

During the 18th Dynasty the pharaoh Amenhotep III renamed the sun god Aton, an ancient term for the physical solar force.

Amenhotep IV, instituted a revolution in Egyptian religion by proclaiming Aton the true and only god.

He changed his own name to Akhenaton, meaning "Aton is satisfied."

This first great monotheist was so iconoclastic that he had the plural word gods deleted from monuments, and he relentlessly persecuted the priests of Amon.

Akhenaton’s sun religion failed to survive, although it exerted a great influence on the art and thinking of his time, and Egypt returned to the ancient religion of polytheism after Akhenaton’s death.
BURIAL RITUAL - The Book of the Dead  

Burying the dead was of religious concern in Egypt, and Egyptian funerary rituals and equipment eventually became  the most elaborate the world has ever known.

The Egyptians believed that the vital life-force was the ka.

The ka, a duplicate of the body, accompanied the body throughout life and, after death, departed from the body to take its place in the kingdom of the dead.

The ka, however, could not exist without the body; every effort had to be made, therefore, to preserve the corpse.

Bodies were embalmed and mummified according to a traditional method supposedly begun by Isis, who mummified her husband Osiris.
After arriving in the kingdom of the dead, the ka was judged by Osiris, the king of the dead, and 42 demon assistants.

The Book of the Dead also contains instructions for proper conduct before these judges.

If the judges decided the deceased had been a sinner, the ka was condemned to hunger and thirst or to be torn to pieces by horrible executioners.

If the decision was favorable, the ka went to the heavenly realm of the fields of Yaru.

Anubis as the God of Embalming, the son of Nephthys, depicted as a jackal, or as a jackal-headed man probably because of the jackal's tendency to prowl around tombs, he became associated with the dead, and by the Old Kingdom, worshipped as the inventor of embalming, who had embalmed the dead Osiris, thus helping preserve him in order to live again.

Apis- an early deity, probably the best known Egyptian deity represented only as an animal, he was represented as a bull crowned with the solar disk and serpent, he was primarily a deity of fertility.

Aten- the sun-disk itself, depicted as a disk with rays, each ray terminating in a human hand and bestowing symbols of "life" upon those below.

Bast- a cat-goddess, protector of cats and those who cared for cats, as a result, an important deity in the home (since cats were prized pets).

Geb- the god of the earth, he is generally represented as a man with green or black skin - the color of living things, and the color of the fertile Nile mud, Geb is masculine, contrasting with many other traditions of Earth being female.

Hathor- a very old goddess of Egypt, worshiped as a cow-deity from earliest times, she was usually shown with a solar disk flanked by cow horns on her head, she was also the patron of love, dance, alcohol, and foreign lands.

Horus-one of the most important deities of Egypt. As the Child, Horus is the son of Osiris and Isis, who, upon reaching adulthood, avenges his father's death, by defeating and castrating his evil uncle Set, he then became the divine prototype of the Pharaoh.

Imhotep- a historical figure. He was the architect, physician, scribe, and vizier (adviser) of the 3rd Dynasty pharaoh Zoser, conceived and built the Step Pyramid at Sakkara.
In the Late Period, Imhotep was worshipped as the son of Ptah and a god of medicine, as well as the patron of scribes.
He was one of the few mortals born of common blood to be elevated to the rank of deity.

Isis- Perhaps the most important goddess (or god, for that matter) of all Egyptian mythology, her most important functions, however, were those of motherhood, marital devotion, healing the sick, and the working of magical spells and charms, she was believed to be the most powerful magician in the universe, owing to the fact that she had learned the Secret Name of Ra from the god himself, she was the sister and wife of Osiris, sister of Set, and twin sister of Nephthys, and was the mother of Horus, responsible for protecting Horus from Set during his infancy; for helping Osiris to return to life; and for assisting her husband to rule in the land of the Dead.

Nephthy-s"Lady of the House", the youngest child of Geb and Nut, The sister and wife of Set, and sister of Isis and Osiris; also the mother of Anubis, She abandoned Set when he killed Osiris, and assisted Isis in the care of Horus and the resurrection of Osiris, he was, along with her sister, considered the special protectress of the dead, and she was the guardian of Hapi, the protector of the lungs of the deceased.

Nut- the goddess of the sky, depicted as a woman with blue skin, and her body covered with stars, standing on all fours, leaning over her husband Geb, representing the sky arched over the earth.

Osiris- the god of the dead, and the god of the resurrection into eternal life; ruler, protector, and judge of the deceased, Osiris was the first child of Nut and Geb, thus the brother of Set, Nephthys, and Isis, who was also his wife. By Isis he fathered Horus, and according to some stories, Nephthys assumed the form of Isis, seduced him thus, and from their union was born Anubis.Being the first person to die, he subsequently became lord of the dead.

Ra- the god of the sun; the name is thought to have meant "creative power", and as a proper name "Creator", similar to English Christian usage of the term "Creator" to signify the "almighty God."Very early in Egyptian history, Ra was identified with Horus, who as a hawk or falon-god represented the loftiness of the skies. Ra is represented either as a hawk-headed man or as a hawk.In order to travel through the waters of Heaven and the Underworld, Ra was also depicted as traveling in a boat.

Sekhmet- A lioness goddess, created by Ra from the fire of his eyes as a creature of vengeance to punish mankind for his sins.

Selket- A scorpion-goddess, shown as a beautiful woman with a scorpion poised on her head; her creature struck death to the wicked, she was also petitioned to save the lives of innocent people stung by scorpions and was also viewed as a helper of women in childbirth, she is depicted as binding up demons that would otherwise threaten Ra, and she sent seven of her scorpions to protect Isis from Set, she protected Qebehsenuef, the son of Horus who guarded the intestines of the deceased, she was made famous by her statue from Tutankhamen's tomb, which was part of the collection which toured America in the 1970's.

Set- the patron deity of Lower (Northern) Egypt, and represented the fierce storms of the desert that the Lower Egyptians sought to appease.When Upper Egypt conquered Lower Egypt and ushered in the 1st Dynasty, Set became known as the evil enemy of Horus (Upper Egypt's dynastic god).Set is best known for murdering his brother and attempting to kill his nephew Horus.Horus, however, managed to survive and grew up to avenge his father's death by establishing his rule over all Egypt, castrating Set, and casting him out into the lonely desert for all time.

Sobek- the crocodile god, worshipped to appease him and his animals

Thoth-he god of wisdom, Thoth was said to be self-created at the beginning of time, along with his consort Ma'at (truth), depicted as a man with the head of an ibis bird, and carried a pen and scrolls upon which he recorded all things, he was shown as attendant in almost all major scenes involving the gods, but especially at the judgement of the deceased, he served as the messenger of the gods, and was thus equated by the Greeks with Hermes, he is a god of the moon, and is also the god of time, magic, and writing. He was considered the inventor of the hieroglyphs.
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From earliest times in Egypt the pharaohs were worshipped as gods: the son of Ra, the son of Horus, etc.

The pharaoh was looked upon as being chosen by and favored by the gods, his fathers.
Ra

Heiroglyphs

1. Old Kingdom – beginnings of Hieroglyphics - ("sacred carving")
2. Characters in any of several systems of writing in which the characters are pictorial, that is, represent recognizable objects.
3. The term hieroglyph is, however, most generally associated with the script in which the ancient Egyptian language was written; the Greeks applied the term to the decorative characters carved on Egyptian standing monuments.

 Hieroglyphics

1. The word hieroglyphic was later used to describe the pictorial writing systems of the Hittites, Cretans, and Mayans, but their systems are in no way related to one another or to the Egyptian, having in common only that they are pictorial.

IDEOGRAMS AND PHONOGRAMS

1. Egyptian hieroglyphic inscriptions are composed of two basic types of signs: ideograms and phonograms.
2. Ideograms signify either the specific object drawn or something closely related to it; for example, a picture of the sun may mean "sun" or "day".
3. Phonograms, or sound signs, were used purely for their phonetic value and have no relationship to the word they are used to spell.
   
   Hieroglyphic inscriptions could be written either vertically or horizontally, usually from right to left, or top to bottom.
   
   
   DECIPHERMENT OF HIEROGLYPHS  
   
   The Romans believed that Egyptian hieroglyphs were symbolic and allegorical, not phonetic; this theory prevailed into the time of the Renaissance.
   
   The breakthrough came in 1799, when a soldier serving in Napoleon's campaign in Egypt discovered the Rosetta Stone, a bilingual stela inscribed (196 BC) with a decree in honor of Ptolemy V in Greek, hieroglyphic, and demotic (“popular” writing form) Egyptian.
   

It was not until the work (begun 1821) of the French Egyptologist, Jean François Champollion, however, that the two Egyptian scripts were recognized as phonetic.

In earlier stages of the work Champollion had predicted the hieroglyphic spelling of various royal names based on the demotic; these spellings were confirmed by actual cartouches on the Rosetta Stone and other Ptolemaic monuments.

After identifying the names and titles of the Greco-Roman rulers, he combined the phonetic values he had so derived with his knowledge of Coptic, the late stage of the Egyptian language.

This achievement enabled him to decipher earlier Pharaonic cartouches. In 1822  the decipherment of the hieroglyphs was completed.       

Sculpture / "Solid" arts

1. 1st and most important art form of the Egyptians
2. Small to life-sized
3. Realistic, with some idealization
4. Cubic, upright rectangle, frontal
5. To be viewed from the front
6. To glorify the king, and to give the spirit the things it needed for the after-life

Show parts of the body from their most identifiable side;

Head – side
Lower body – side
Eye – front
Upper body – front

Face rarely shown from front

Idea was to preserve the essence of what was being shown, not always realistic.
Old Kingdom

1. Oldest surviving metal statue
2. Pepi I (ruled 2395-2360BC)
3. Copper, circa 2300BC
4. Pottery
5. Well made
6. Variety of shapes
7. Usually un-decorated

Old Kingdom

1. Jewelry
2. Gold and precious stones
3. Animal and plant designs
   
   

Middle Kingdom

1. More realism (less idealization)
2. Jewelry
3. Precious metal inlaid with colored stones
4. Few large sculptures
5.  

New Kingdom

1. Combination of realism and idealization
2. Decorative arts
3. Well designed and made
4. Alabaster, ebony, gold, ivory, precious stones
5. Love of decoration

 

Painting / "Visual" Arts

1. Relief carving
2. Painting on carvings and sculptures
3. Tomb wall painting
4. Palette of King Narmer
5. 3100BC
6. Shows uniting of upper and lower Egypt
7. Make-up palette
8. Shows king in “smiting” pose
9. Arm raised in striking gesture

Treasures of King Tut
Tomb plan
Antechamber as found
Opening the three coffins
Gold mask as found
Gold mask restored
Anubis
Alabaster case
Canoptic shrine
Two part case
Portrait head
Relief of Selket
Tut’s throne
Vulture pendant
Wooden chest
Architecture

2nd most important
art form

Old Kingdom

Imhotep, architect for Zoser
Stepped pyramid at Saqqarah
        c. 2,720BC

Grew from mastaba (Ar. “bench”)
Pyramids - c. 2700BC

1. 80+ still in existence
2. Giza Pyrmid complex most famous
3. Oldest existent complete buildings in the world
4. Only remaining structure of the 7 ancient wonders of the world.
   
5. Necropolis – city of the dead

Reconstruction of the pyramid complex     
Cheops/Khufu (The “Great” pyramid)

1. 755’ 8” on a side (13 acres, area of 10 football fields)
2. 481’ tall (40 story building, 1 and 2/3 football fields)
3. 2.3 million blocks
4. Base covers 13 acres
5. Base is level 1/4 inch from corner to corner
6. Oriented perfectly N and S
7. Used as a Geodetic marker for the entire ancient world
8. Is at the center of a circle drawn around the Nile Delta

 

the other pyrimads at Giza

1. Chephren/Khafre, son of Cheops
2. 707’ on a side
3. 471’ tall
4. appears taller because it’s built on higher ground           
5. Mycerinus, son of Chephren    
6. 356’ on a side
7. Less well made

“Man fears time,

time fears the pyramids.”
Sphnix – head of man, body of lion, guardian of pyramids

Architecture

1. Middle Kingdom
2. Little building, almost none still existing
3. New Kingdom
4. New focus on religious building
   (see following)

Temple at Luxor

1. Temple of Amun, Mut, and Chons
2. Anchorage for the royal boats during the floods
3. Main religious center at various times in Egyptian history

Temple at Luxor
Temple at Al Karnak

1. Valley of the Kings
2. Tombs cut into rock, underground
3. Covered to hide (Tutankhamun)

Temple at Al Karnak
Tomb of Hatshepsut

1. Only true female pharaoh
2. Vast above ground, terraced structure
3. Many shrines to gods and carvings of her accomplishments

Temple at Abu Simbal

1. 4 large statues of Ramses II (pharaoh at the time of Moses)
2. Deep rock-cut temples behind in mountain
3. Moved in 1968 to save it from the rising of Lake Nasser

Temple at Abu Simbal

 

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Egyptian Art Notes summary

 

Egyptian Art Notes summary

 

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Egyptian Art Notes summary

 

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