Relief of Amenhotep, Rennut, and a Priest

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Relief of Amenhotep, Rennut, and a Priest

Dynasty Dynasty 19 (Ancient Egyptian, 1295–1186 BCE)

Place of OriginEgypt, Asyut, Family Tomb of Amenhotep

Dateabout 1280 BCE

Dimensions43 7/8 × 30 5/8 × 2 in. (111.4 × 77.8 × 5.1 cm)

MediumLimestone with traces of polychromy

ClassificationSculpture

Credit LinePurchased with funds from the Libbey Endowment, Gift of Edward Drummond Libbey

Object number

1962.24

On View

Toledo Museum of Art (2445 Monroe Street), Gallery, 02, Classic

Collections

Sculpture

Published ReferencesAhmed Bey Kamal, Annales du Serviers des Antiquités de l'Egypte, vol. XVI, 1916, p. 90ff.

Baedeker's Egypt, 8th edition, 1929, p. 227.

"Treasures for Toledo," Toledo Museum of Art Museum News, new series, vol. 7, no. 4, Winter 1964, repr. p. 77.

Wittmann, Otto, "Treasures at Toledo, Ohio," Apollo, vol. LXXXVI, no. 35, January 1965, pp. 28-35, mentioned p. 29.

"New Accessions U.S.A.," Gazette des Beaux-Arts, vol. 65, no. 1153, Feb. 1965, no. 122, p. 27, repr.

Karig, Joachim Selim, "Die Kutlkammer des Amenhotep aus Dier Durunka," Zeitschrift fur Agyptische Sprache und Altertumskunde, 95, Bd, Erstes Heft, Berlin, 1968, p. 27, 32, repr. abb. 1, p. 29.

Bibliographie Egyprologique, 1964, Leiden, 1968(?), p. 153.

The Toledo Museum of Art, A Guide to the Collections, Toledo, 1966, repr.

Luckner, Kurt T., "The Art of Egypt, Part 2," Toledo Museum of Art Museum News, new series, vol. 14, no.3, Fall 1971, p. 67, repr. fig. 9.

Gempeler, Robert D., Werke der Antike im KUnsthaus Zürich, Zurich, 1976, p. 18, repr. p. 20.

Mistress of the house, mistress of heaven: Women in ancient Egypt, New York, 1996, p. 172, fig. 11.

Toledo Museum of Art, Toledo Museum of Art Masterworks, Toledo, 2009, p. 62, repr. (col.).

Peck, William H., Sandra E. Knudsen and Paula Reich, Egypt in Toledo: The Ancient Egyptian Collection at the Toledo Museum of Art, Toledo, Toledo Museum of Art, 2011, p. 66, repr. (col.) p. 67, (det.) cover.

Exhibition HistoryThe Toledo Museum of Art, Treasures for Toledo, Dec. 1964 - Jan. 1965.

"Hands On Egypt" TMA interactive family gallery, Gallery 3, Sept. 18, 1998 - Aug. 31, 2000, made possible by a grant from the Lila Wallace Reader's Digest Fund.

Toledo Museum of Art, The Egypt Experience: Secrets of the Tomb, October 29, 2010-January 8, 2012.

Label TextThis limestone relief comes from the tomb chapel of Amenhotep, a high-ranking official who served as royal scribe, chief physician, chief lector priest, and overseer of wab-priests of Sekhmet. As a scribe, he worked in the pharaoh’s administration, while his lector priest role involved reciting sacred texts and overseeing religious rituals. His position as Overseer of the Wab-Priests of Sekhmet connected him to purification rites and healing practices, and some sources refer to him as Chief Physician, suggesting he held medical authority in the royal or local administration. Amenhotep was buried in a family tomb in Asyut (modern Deir Durunka). The relief depicts Amenhotep seated on an elegant lion-footed chair, receiving offerings. His wife, Rennut (also spelled Ernutet/Renenutet), kneels beside him, inhaling the scent of a blue lotus flower, a symbol of renewal. Rennut held prestigious religious titles, serving as a Singer of Wepwawet—a war god particularly worshipped in Asyut—and a Singer of Amun-Ra, the supreme deity of the New Kingdom. These roles suggest she was a priestess-musician, performing sacred hymns in temple ceremonies. Both figures wear intricately pleated linen garments and elaborate wigs, reflecting elite fashion of the time. A mortuary priest (sem-priest) stands before them, dressed in a ritual leopard-skin cloak. This costume identifies him as a priest performing funerary rites; the sidelock suggests he is a son or youthful officiant. Indeed, it is likely that this figure represents the couple's son, Yuny, acting in the role of sem-priest to officiate his parents’ mortuary cult. The hieroglyphic inscription, carved in sunk relief, calls for "bread, beer, oxen, fowl, wine, milk, and every good and pure thing" to sustain him in the afterlife. This relief is one of several surviving fragments from Amenhotep’s tomb chapel, which also included depictions of Hathor leading the deceased to the gods. The tomb later became a pilgrimage site, with visitors inscribing hieratic graffiti as they sought healing from the ka (life force) of the renowned physician. Other reliefs from this chapel are now in Cleveland (1), Zürich (1), and Berlin (4).