Walters Art Museum (Egyptian) · statue

Relief with Husband and Wife

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

Description

<p>The sculptor Mentu-user and his wife Hepu are shown seated before a table heaped with various offerings, including a haunch of beef, a goose, and a bunch of grapes. The inscriptions beside their heads identify them. Note that the hieroglyphs face in the same direction as the figures. The two columns of hieroglyphs on the right are a request to the living to recite the offering text calling for fowl and a thousand loaves of bread for Mentu-user. The red flesh tone of the man and the yellow of the woman are an artistic convention to differentiate the sexes.</p><p>For the latest information about this object, <cite><a href='https://purl.thewalters.org/art/22.134' rel='external'>Relief with Husband and Wife</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 painted limestone relief shows two seated human figures facing each other across a table, with Egyptian hieroglyphs and additional small figures in the surrounding field.

The image depicts a rectangular limestone relief slab with traces of pigment. On the left, a male-presenting figure sits on a low chair/seat, holding one arm inward and the other resting near his body, rendered in profile with characteristic Egyptian proportions. On the right, a female-presenting figure sits facing toward the left figure; she appears to hold an object or gesture toward the central area. Between and in front of the figures is a low offering or serving surface/table. Above and around the tableau are multiple lines of Egyptian hieroglyphs in black and/or dark pigment. Smaller incised/painted figures and symbols appear toward the right side beneath the main text area, suggesting an inscription or ritual context. No clearly legible cartouche or royal titulary is visible at this resolution; the hieroglyphs are present but not securely transcribable. No Greek/Coptic/Arabic text is visible.

daily life unknown (likely New Kingdom to Late Period based on style of painted relief, but not confidently determined from the image) good
Materials limestonepaint (traces of pigment)
Signs Egyptian hieroglyphs (unreadable at this resolution) ×30

Inscriptions (2)

Inscription #1

English description

[Above heads] The sculptor Mentu-user and his most beloved wife Hepu.
Inscription #2

English description

[At right, two vertical lines] (You) who love living and hate dying, say: 'a thousand bread, beer, a thousand oxen and fowl, to the sculptor Mentu-user

Cross-references (2)

  • Walters-AccNum 22.134 tier-2
  • Walters-id 19382 tier-2
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.