SANOUOSRÎT AND THE GOD PHTAH.
Fine sandstone.
III
It is with the statues of the XVIIIth Dynasty discovered at Karnak by M. Legrain as with those of the XIIth: directly we look at them we notice distinctive signs of the school, with modifications that are explained when we consider the position of Thebes at that period. The favourite residence of the Pharaohs and permanent seat of their government, its prosperity was continually increased by the booty gained in Syria or Ethiopia, and as wealth increased, so did the taste for building. Not only did the kings never tire of embellishing the city, but, following their example, private individuals built sumptuous palaces and tombs there. For so much activity a large supply of artists was needed: studios multiplied, sculptors came from all parts of the country to supplement the few Theban sculptors. Those strangers did not join the local school without exercising some influence on it: it was subdivided into several branches, each of which, while preserving a common ground of precepts and habits, soon assumed its personal physiognomy. We already know two or three of them, but how many must there have been during the three centuries that the Dynasty lasted, all the work of which is lost for us or confused with the mass?
BUST OF THOUTMÔSIS III.
Grey Schist.
I like to attribute to the same studio, besides a certain number of pieces recently acquired by the Cairo Museum, three of the best fragments extricated by M. Legrain from the favissa, the Thoutmôsis III, the Isis, and the Sanmaout. The Thoutmôsis III is in a very supple schist that allows the most delicate chiselling, and no engraving can do justice to the delicacy of the modelling: the play of the muscles is discreetly noted, but with extraordinary sureness, and, the imperceptible shadows it produces varying in proportion as we walk round the figure, the aspect of the physiognomy seems to change from moment to moment. Isis was not of royal birth, and perhaps came from one of the lower strata of society: five-and-twenty years ago her existence was not suspected, and the Karnak statue in pink granite is the first portrait we have of her. It is through her, however, that Thoutmôsis III possesses the features by which he differs from his predecessors, the large aquiline nose, wide-opened, almost protruding eyes, full mouth, rounded face. The heavy wig he wears made the sculptor’s task difficult; so much the greater then is the merit in conceiving a work before which we pause, even by the side of the preceding one. It contains all the characteristics of the Theban school, the seeking after the personal expression, the sincerity of the rendering, the width of the shoulders and, as a set-off, the intentional smallness of the waist between the ample breasts and broad hips. Study of the composition compels us to attribute it to the same studio, if not to the same artist to whom we owe the statue of Thoutmôsis III. I think the same about the group representing Sanmaout and the little princess Nafêrourîya whose steward he was: nothing could be less conventional than the free, firm gesture with which he holds the child, or the posture of trusting abandon with which she leans against his breast. The frankness of the movement well harmonizes with the spiritual gentleness of the face and the smile that animates the eyes and the full lips. Sanmaout was Queen Hachopsouîtou’s major-domo, and his sovereign had authorized him to erect his statues in the temple of Amon. After examining those that remain to us, it cannot be doubted that they all come from one of the royal studios, most probably the one whence came later the statues of Thoutmôsis and his mother Isis.
