Neferure - Christies Auction House

Here is a limestone Stela which i have never seen before. This is a PAST auction and the costs and details involved in the sale are of little value to me. What is of value is the existence of a stela featuring Neferure, complete with a depiction of her as well as her cartouche.

Neferure, Christies

This may be a well known item, but my own limited research has drawn blanks in every direction available to me. I would therefore like to ask a few questions:

1. Who is the goddess to the left. she is a personification of fields, etc but the description does not name her. Perhaps this may give us the information which will allow us to see where this stela would have been erected (?)
2. Neferure is depicted as "the divine wife [of the god Amun]". Would this suggest a date during the sole reign of Hatshepsut? - where it seems (Deir el Bahri) Neferure's status was elevated from Kings Daughter to Gods Wife of Amun (please correct me if i am wrong here).
3. Provenance:
   

   Provenance

   Otto Wegener Collection, Munich, collected in the 1950s
   Edgar Wegener, Hamburg, 1983
   Thomas Wegener, 1995 

No mention here of an excavation. Collected in the 1950's means very little if we wish to bring the stela to life. No excavation reports, no photographs of this item in-situ. I'm also not sure how i include such items in the database.

Regards,
Stuart

Hatshepsut - Auctions

I posted recently about my concerns about private collections. Rather than assuming that all private collections are black market born collections, I wanted to show that well- known auction houses have been selling Egyptian antiquities for many years.

The Griffith Institute (University of Oxford) is one source of information which highlights some previous auctions, which have included Hatshepsut- related artifacts.

Seen here are a few items mentioning Hatshepsut, which have changed hands over the years through auction houses. I am unsure as to the rules concerning modern auctions - this is a very small glimpse into the world of the auctions houses and their role in moving Egyptian artifacts from collector to collector.

This is also a great opportunity to welcome the Griffith Institute to the Hatshepsut Project. The information which can be gained from visiting their site is worth sharing.

A link specifically to their "collections" page can be seen here. I have only introduced these collections. I leave the browsing to you as your interests may differ slightly from mine.

I am sure more will follow, regarding the Griffith Institute and their site.

Regards,
Stuart

Hatshepsut - Private Collections

Private collections of antiquities have been a concern of mine since i first learned of the great rush for Egyptian artifacts at the very early stages in the life of Egyptology. My concerns:

1) Acquisition - Some (not all) of these collections may have items acquired on the black- market and therefore could have been looted from tombs/ temples within Egypt.

2) Provenance - Many items within these collections may not have arrived through meticulous archaeology and therefore the locations of their finds, and the dating layers are lost to those of us who need this information. Many museum collections around the world have many tags which suggest "provenance unknown".

3) Preservation - Are 100% of the artifacts held in private auctions given the correct conservation, using non- evasive techniques (particularly concerning mummies)? I doubt it.

4) Shared knowledge - Is there a worldwide database of all the Egyptian artifacts in private collections? See this story posted by Paul Boughton on Egytotology News Network (these items were found by accident).

Without the ability to study artifacts, information is lost. Every scrap of information is vital- everything. We are not talking of course about gold. Gold is a distraction many Egyptologists could do without having to inform the authorities and stop working at a drop of a hat. We are talking about anything with hieroglyphic/ hieratic/ demotic inscriptions. Even seemingly insignificant wall fragments may be the key to understanding a scene.

At this stage i must add that not all private collections are illegal. Not by far. My concerns lie in those undocumented collections - hidden away in private where i feel time is absolutely NOT on their side.

Stuart