Description

Egypt, Late Period, Ca 715 BC. Honey color alabaster jar carefully inscribed with four columns of hieroglyphic text which has been fully translated as follows:

Line 1: Words to be spoken by Nephthys: I hide / protect the secret(s), doing "bs.t"
Line 2: while giving protection for Hapy, who is within me [text has "you" (fem)]
Line 3: the protection for the Osiris Pairikap, whom Imenetes… made, is the protection
Line 4: of Hapy. The Osiris Pairikapu is Hapy.

Hapy (one of the children of Horus) protects Pairikap (more in particular his lungs, since that is the organ which Hapy protects; this jar therefore must have contained the lungs), and to make this protection more effective Pairikap is even identified with Hapy, making him a god himself. Nephthys in turn protects Hapy, thereby making the protective action of Hapy even more successful.

Notes:
Line 1: What the term "bs.t" in column 1 has to do with notions of introducing (a person to another person or to a place, also in the hereafter, and also to a secret) as well as, intransitively, with having access (also to secrets).
Line 2: The name "Hapy" is apparently considered feminine here in view of the grammatical form of the word following it; similarly the text says "within you" in the feminine form, whereas normally the spell has "within me."

9-1/2"H (24.1cm)

Provenance: Ex-private collection of Bernice Greenberg of Art Resources, Michigan, ex-1993 Drouot Saleroom, ex-French Private Collection before that.

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Condition

Aged irregular and eroded surface.