Home › Browse › WALTERS-EG › Object 220321
Walters Art Museum (Egyptian) · statue

Ushabti-Figure of Irtu

Source of record: Walters Art Museum (Egyptian) — catalogued by the holding institution. View the original record →

Description

<p>An ebony ushabti was produced for Irtu, a Royal Scribe and Overseer of the Horses of the Lord of the Two Lands. The eyes and eyebrows accented in black pigment. The body is enveloped in a mummiform garment and a tripartite wig. The arms are visible in outline only from the shoulder to the elbow. There are 14 horizontal lines of text across the form of the figure, including the name and titles of the man and an excerpt from Chapter 6 of "The Book of the Dead." There is a small hole in the top of the foot. The back is subtly modeled but is void of detail.</p><p>For the latest information about this object, <cite><a href='https://purl.thewalters.org/art/22.180' rel='external'>Ushabti-Figure of Irtu</a></cite>, visit the Online Collection of the Walters Art Museum.</p>

AI image analysis GPT-5.4-nano

Machine-generated from the object's image on Jul 2026. Not curatorial; treat deities, names, and signs below as the model's best reading, not authority.

A standing, mummiform ushabti figure of Irtu with incised painted hieroglyphic inscriptions across the body.

The artifact shows a human-shaped, mummiform statue standing upright on a rectangular base. The head has a stylized wig covering the sides and a smooth, rounded face with hands clasped at the chest (or held close to the torso). The torso and legs are covered by dense hieroglyphic signs, incised into the surface and filled with dark pigment. Horizontal bands of text appear along the midsection and continuing down the legs, with some signs also on the chest area. No separate cartouches are clearly identifiable in the provided image, and there is no clearly legible non-hieroglyphic text. The surface appears dark with reflective highlights, consistent with a dark material and pigment remaining in the incisions.

funerary unknown (likely Late Period to Ptolemaic ushabti style, but not certain from this single image) good
Materials dark (ebony-like) substrateblack pigment in incised hieroglyphs
Signs incised hieroglyphic signs in horizontal registers (exact signs unclear) ×60
Visible text "Greek/Coptic/Arabic text: none visible. Hieroglyphic inscription: present but too unclear to accurately transcribe from this resolution."

Inscriptions (1)

Inscription #1

English description

[Translation] The Illuminated One, The Royal Scribe, The Overseer of the Horses of the Lord of Two Lands, He says: O' these shabtis who are numerous, if this one is assembled to any work in the Necropolis, to cultivate the fields, to irrigate the riverbanks, to ferry sand of the east to the west, or any unpleasant task that is imposed upon him there, as a man at his duties. ""I am here,"" shall you say, The Royal Scribe, Keeper of the Horses

Cross-references (2)

  • Walters-AccNum 22.180 tier-2
  • Walters-id 32509 tier-2

Similar inscriptions · by content embedding

About this record's data
  • From the source institution — accession, description, dimensions, and dating are as catalogued by Walters Art Museum (Egyptian).
  • AI-inferred — the image-analysis panel (deities, names, signs) is machine-generated and may be wrong.
  • Approximate location — most map points are plotted at the site centroid, not the exact findspot.
  • Inferred links — cross-references marked with a match method other than explicit-source-field were matched by us, not stated by the source.