DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.4858#0083
THE TOMB OF NAKHT
Description husband and wife (completely destroyed) ministered to by two men
of the upper * J J J
scene who carry gifts of food (?) from which vine cuttings hang down. The
guests sit facing them in two rows.1 In the one, four ladies sit on
low chairs; in the other, six kneel on mats. Each group is served by
a girl; one being gowned, the other nude. The latter is perhaps quite
young, for her task is the light one of arranging the earrings of the
guests. At such feasts it was the custom to provide the ladies not
only with wine and fruit but also with flowers and simple ornaments,
as well as with cosmetics for the head and for the skin. Their smart
attire includes a gay fillet binding the hair round the brows, a pinch
of fragrant ointment on the top of the head, which served also to fix
a lotus bud there and let it droop coquettishly between the eyes,
round earrings, a broad collar of colored beads, bracelets, and a long
mantle hanging from the shoulders and dyed a deep yellow as far
down as the hips.2 Great water-jars wreathed with sprays of vine
are set on stands close by the guests, and in front of them squats a
harper who is perhaps to be associated with the musicians below.
He is blind and fat, his comfortable habit of body being cleverly sug-
1 There is not quite room for three registers of guests. The space left under the frieze must therefore
have been occupied by inscriptions or by a row of vessels, as in the lower scene. This is the arrangement
in Tomb 38, the form, decoration, and inscriptions of which so closely follow those with which we are dealing
that it may be called a sister-tomb to this. It is the burial-place of one Joserkerasonb and dates probably to
the reign of Thothmes IV (Mem. Miss. Francaise, V, pp. 571-9).
2The simple ancient gown has become an undergarment more decollete than ever and a flowing
mantle thrown over the shoulders has been adopted as well. The ends were knotted together across the
breast. Sometimes while one side is shown drawn across the arm in this way, the other only rests on the
tip of the shoulder. This is a trick of the artist to allow the outline of the bosom to be displayed. (Cf.
Scheil, Tombeau des Graveurs, PI. V.) For festal occasions this mantle was sometimes dyed a ruddy saffron
in the upper parts, the dye having been allowed to run irregularly instead of ending abruptly at the hips.
The mode is confined to this period (Amenhotep II to Amenhotep III) and is occasionally used by men;
representations of it in the XlXth dyn. are still more fanciful. Probably at such feasts women would
come into closer contact with men than on ordinary occasions and this darkening of the thin dress may
have been adopted as a defense of modesty, a deepened female flesh tint being chosen. Dr. Wreszinski,
in his Atlas zur Kulturgeschichte, pp. 28b, 3gb, expresses the opinion that it is not dye, but shows the gar-
ment soiled by the pomade which trickles down from the top of the head and spreads over the body (cf.
Psalm 133). Certainly it exactly resembles the ointment in color. If this sordid explanation of the color-
ing had to be adopted, I would regard it as a perverted impulse to realism on the part of an influen-
tial artist which was propagated by his pupils, but speedily misinterpreted by their successors. An
alternative suggestion is that the color of the dye was chosen to obviate the danger of chance stains be-
coming too apparent. In Coptic times woolen garments of this peculiar hue are known.
56
Description husband and wife (completely destroyed) ministered to by two men
of the upper * J J J
scene who carry gifts of food (?) from which vine cuttings hang down. The
guests sit facing them in two rows.1 In the one, four ladies sit on
low chairs; in the other, six kneel on mats. Each group is served by
a girl; one being gowned, the other nude. The latter is perhaps quite
young, for her task is the light one of arranging the earrings of the
guests. At such feasts it was the custom to provide the ladies not
only with wine and fruit but also with flowers and simple ornaments,
as well as with cosmetics for the head and for the skin. Their smart
attire includes a gay fillet binding the hair round the brows, a pinch
of fragrant ointment on the top of the head, which served also to fix
a lotus bud there and let it droop coquettishly between the eyes,
round earrings, a broad collar of colored beads, bracelets, and a long
mantle hanging from the shoulders and dyed a deep yellow as far
down as the hips.2 Great water-jars wreathed with sprays of vine
are set on stands close by the guests, and in front of them squats a
harper who is perhaps to be associated with the musicians below.
He is blind and fat, his comfortable habit of body being cleverly sug-
1 There is not quite room for three registers of guests. The space left under the frieze must therefore
have been occupied by inscriptions or by a row of vessels, as in the lower scene. This is the arrangement
in Tomb 38, the form, decoration, and inscriptions of which so closely follow those with which we are dealing
that it may be called a sister-tomb to this. It is the burial-place of one Joserkerasonb and dates probably to
the reign of Thothmes IV (Mem. Miss. Francaise, V, pp. 571-9).
2The simple ancient gown has become an undergarment more decollete than ever and a flowing
mantle thrown over the shoulders has been adopted as well. The ends were knotted together across the
breast. Sometimes while one side is shown drawn across the arm in this way, the other only rests on the
tip of the shoulder. This is a trick of the artist to allow the outline of the bosom to be displayed. (Cf.
Scheil, Tombeau des Graveurs, PI. V.) For festal occasions this mantle was sometimes dyed a ruddy saffron
in the upper parts, the dye having been allowed to run irregularly instead of ending abruptly at the hips.
The mode is confined to this period (Amenhotep II to Amenhotep III) and is occasionally used by men;
representations of it in the XlXth dyn. are still more fanciful. Probably at such feasts women would
come into closer contact with men than on ordinary occasions and this darkening of the thin dress may
have been adopted as a defense of modesty, a deepened female flesh tint being chosen. Dr. Wreszinski,
in his Atlas zur Kulturgeschichte, pp. 28b, 3gb, expresses the opinion that it is not dye, but shows the gar-
ment soiled by the pomade which trickles down from the top of the head and spreads over the body (cf.
Psalm 133). Certainly it exactly resembles the ointment in color. If this sordid explanation of the color-
ing had to be adopted, I would regard it as a perverted impulse to realism on the part of an influen-
tial artist which was propagated by his pupils, but speedily misinterpreted by their successors. An
alternative suggestion is that the color of the dye was chosen to obviate the danger of chance stains be-
coming too apparent. In Coptic times woolen garments of this peculiar hue are known.
56