Fragment from Amenhotep III’s Rock-Cut Relief at Tura

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Fragment from Amenhotep III’s Rock-Cut Relief at Tura

Place of OriginEgypt, carved into the rock at Tura

Date1390 BCE

DimensionsH: 32 in. (81.3 cm.); W: 24 3/4 in. (62.9 cm).

MediumLimestone relief with traces of pigment.

ClassificationSculpture

Credit LineGift of Edward Drummond Libbey

Object number

1925.522

Not on View

DescriptionCarved in sunk relief, this limestone fragment preserves a scene of King Amenhotep III wearing the blue crown and royal kilt. He holds a censer and a triple hes-vase pouring water onto offering stands. Pigment traces remain in blue, red (now brown), and yellow. The relief is fragmentary, with surface pitting and calcium carbonate deposits noted. Inscriptions include cartouches of the king and captions reading “making incense” and “may all protection and life be behind him like Re.”

Label TextAn early representation of one of the most powerful of all Egyptian kings, this relief carving was part of a larger composition known from 19th-century drawings. It represents Amenhotep honoring the gods by offering them incense and pure water. It also reflects the king’s extraordinary achievements as a patron of architecture. The relief stood at the Tura quarries, near the ancient capital of Memphis—a site famous as the source of the finest white limestone in all of Egypt. More than 1,000 years before Amenhotep III, it had provided the outer casing stones for the great pyramid at Giza. Amenhotep reopened and expanded the quarries at the beginning of his reign, which was marked by the construction or expansion of many great temples. This limestone relief fragment is the earliest dated image of Pharaoh Amenhotep III known to survive. As identified in a 1992 letter by Egyptologist W. Raymond Johnson, it stands as “one of the most significant pieces in any museum collection anywhere in the world.” The fragment comes from a monumental stela originally carved directly into the cliff face at the Tura limestone quarries, about 13 kilometers south of modern Cairo. Dated to Year 2 of Amenhotep’s reign (around 1390 BCE), the relief formed part of a public inscription marking the reopening of these vital quarries—Egypt’s premier source of fine white limestone, used since the Old Kingdom for royal monuments including the casing of the Great Pyramid. The Tura stela was recorded by explorers such as Karl Richard Lepsius in the 1840s, and portions remained visible into the early 20th century. This fragment, now the only known surviving piece, shows the king making offerings of incense and water, sanctifying the quarry and its function within his ambitious construction program. In the original stela’s inscription, Amenhotep III commands the quarry chambers at Tura (then known as Ainu) to be reopened so that “fine limestone” could be extracted to build his “mansions of millions of years”—a phrase used for royal temples intended to last eternally. The use of Tura limestone, prized for its exceptional whiteness and fine grain, was typically reserved for the most elite architectural and ritual projects. Its quality allowed craftsmen to execute intricate carving, from monumental wall reliefs to luxury furnishings. This fragment thus links Amenhotep’s early reign not only to royal ritual and divine legitimacy but also to a deliberate return to Egypt’s most prestigious materials and sacred sites.Published ReferencesVyse, Richard William Howard, Appendix to Operations Carried on at the Pyramids of Gizeh in 1837, vol. III, London, James Fraser, 1842, pp. 97–98 and plate opposite p. 97 (tablet no. 4).

Lepsius, Karl Richard, Denkmäler aus Ägypten und Äthiopien, Berlin, Nicolaische Buchhandlung, 1849–1856, pt. III, vol. V, pl. 71b.

Daressy, Georges, "Inscriptions des carrières de Tourah et Mâsârah," Annales du Service des Antiquités de l'Égypte, vol. 11, 1911, p. 259.

Helck, Wolfgang, Urkunden der 18. Dynastie, Heft 20: Historische Inschriften Amenophis' III., Berlin, Akademie-Verlag, 1957, no. 571, pp. 1680–1681.

Luckner, Kurt, "The Art of Egypt, Part 2," Toledo Museum of Art Museum News, new series, vol. 14, no. 3, Fall 1971, p. 60, fig. 1.

Kozloff, Arielle P., and Elisabeth Delange, Egypt’s Dazzling Sun: Amenhotep III and His World, Cleveland, Cleveland Museum of Art, 1992, p. 116-117, Cat no. 3, repr., p. 116.

O'Connor, David, ed., Amenhotep III: Perspectives on His Reign, Ann Arbor, 1998, p. 64, no. 4, 81, no. 104, fig. 3.1, 3.15 (det. dwg.).

Grallert, Silke, Bauen – Stiften – Weihen: Ägyptische Bau- und Restaurierungsinschriften von den Anfängen bis zur 30. Dynastie, Archäologische Veröffentlichungen des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts Kairo 18, Berlin, Achet Verlag, 2001, pp. 537, 611, no. A3/Kb001.

Klug, Andrea, Königliche Stelen in der Zeit von Ahmose bis Amenophis III, Turnhout, Brepols, 2002, pp. 361–365, 530.

Beylage, Peter, Aufbau der königlichen Stelentexte vom Beginn der 18. Dynastie bis zur Amarnazeit, Wiesbaden, Harrassowitz, 2002, pp. 435–439, 753–755.

Ullmann, Martina, König für die Ewigkeit – Die Häuser der Millionen von Jahren: Eine Untersuchung zu Königskult und Tempeltypologie in Ägypten, Ägypten und Altes Testament, Band 51, Wiesbaden, Harrassowitz, 2002, pp. 121–124.

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. 51, repr. (col.) p. 51, (det.) p. 15. Dodson, Aidan, Amarna Sunrise: Egypt from Golden Age to Age of Heresy, Cairo, The American University in Cairo Press, 2014, p. 56.

Harrell, James A. “Mapping the Tura-Masara Limestone Quarries,” Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt, vol. 52, 2016, p. 201, n. 16.

Exhibition HistoryCleveland, Cleveland Museum of Art; Fort Worth, Kimbell Art Museum; Paris, Galeries Nationales Du Grand Palais, Egypt’s Dazzling Sun: Amenhotep III and His World, July 1992 – May 1993.

Toledo Museum of Art, The Mummies: From Egypt to Toledo, February 3- May 6, 2018.