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    • IS THIS A GENUINE PIECE: Section 2
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YOU ARE HERE: >>REAL or FAKE>>Is this genuine? Section 2, page 2

  From Stephane

This shabti is 180 mm

I was going to place this in "What is this"? but it seems more suitable for this section as most people will identify it as a shabti...

In a word, yes.

But let Tim explain.

   From Tim

Nice! 

These are known as 'contours perdus' shabtis, they come from XX dynasty and examples are known for many of the late Rameseses, VI - XI. 

See Glen Janes, also my shabti archive, photos from The Cairo Museum (attached) - these I think Rameses VI as I suspect this one also.

  From Stephane

Mine has two cartouches as Ramses XI

Which Rameses is mine?

As below

Yours is very faded as you had said; very difficult to read.

Hope someone will assist.

     From Dik

24th July 06

Not very great photo (BM 2005), but you can see the difference between VI and IV. The one with the double cartouche is IV.

   From indianazollman

9th July 06

An fragmentary Philistine anthropoid coffic mask/lid

But is it real?

Stylistically, it looks fine.

Compare.

What does worry me a bit is the surface accretions.

am I becoming overly suspicious of fakery!!?

We would be very interested to know what others think.

7th August 06

I stumbled across this website a couple of years ago.

Leroy Golf was an American archaeologist (professional or amateur) who came from Oklaholma and worked in the oil industry in the Middle East in the 1930s and 1940s. While there he assembled a modest collection of artifacts that was exceptional both in its choice of subject and its quality. His specialty was seals, especially those depicting complex mythological scenes and unusual symbolism. He returned home around 1950 and died shortly thereafter. He had no family and only one close friend, a Mr. Henderson in Kansas who inherited his collection. Mr. Henderson died in 1974, and by that date the collection was carefully wrapped up and placed in a carpenter's wooden chest in the attic (photo of chest below). Mrs. Henderson died in 2001 and the collection, along with the contents of the house, was then sold to a local second hand dealer. The items were sold by her on eBay or to other dealers in 2002 and 2003. Some of the original items sold on eBay have reappeared on the market within a few months.

I was in touch with the website owner especially as I cannot see a single genuine antiquity there!

What really puzzled me is that an archaeologist, even an amateur one, would surely immediately recognize the falsity of these pieces and the silliness of the cuneiform and the glyphs.

He told me that the authenticity of some of the Egyptian pieces had been previously questioned.

As I say.  I cannot see a single thing there which is genuine.

Have a look

  From scarus

7th August 06

Hi Bron,

This is very interesting. Has the website been created in order to try to sell

these pieces, or is it intended as a resource?

I only looked at the Egyptian, and there's nothing even close to authentic, is there? I'd have liked to see more pictures of the scarabs, in case, as a group, they reminded me of anyone we know from eBay.

I formed the impression that this database was  formed after the pieces were sold.

I agree, it would be useful to be able to see the images of the "scarabs" as well.

From AldoTT

8th august 06

Glad to see your coments on Golf's artifacts.

I  also found the web site a couple of years ago, when I was just starting to learn Sumerian.

It was very dissapointing at that time, because I was not able to read anything, barely I could identify some isolated signs. It looks now that it was not my fault!!

You posted the image of  "G-Syr 7: Rock Crystal Cylinder Seal With Naked, Winged Ishtar". (above bottom right)

The caption to that image says: "...

The boxed inscription is in two horizontal registers; the top a linear cuneiform, but the bottom appears to be Egyptian hieroglyphics. Nonsense hieroglyphics appear frequently on Syrian seals of this period as magical signs, and so these may have no decipherable meaning... "

According to your knowledge, is it true the statement about "Nonsense hieroglyphics "?

Whereas a few Egyptianising motifs are certainly found on Sumerian seals I am not aware of any groups of signs or pseudo signs  being represented. Certainly not impossible though.

One comes across such as this in some ANE seals: from the Yale collection. Though these are of course not Sumerian, this is the type of Egyptianising motif one can find in non Egyptian seals.

If  anyone has some good images of ANE cylinder seals with Egyptianising motifs do please send them to me.

Inscription: Belonging to Ushna servant of Ahaz

Scaraboid of orange carnelian, double line border and field dividers; sun-disk with ram's horn, pendant uraei (snakes) and three Osiris (ancient Egyptian deity) crowns flanked by uraei in top register. Inscription with word dividers in two lower registers. The use of the scarab (beetle) shape as well as the motifs of the uraeus (the sacred asp of the headdress of the Pharaohs) and the Osiris crowns suggest that the iconography is borrowed from Egyptian prototypes. The inscription is written in the ancient Hebrew script and not the square Assyrian characters which were introduced in the Second Temple period and are in use till the present. Though we do not know who Ushna was, the Ahaz of this seal was the eighth century king of Judah mentioned in II Kings 16.

Inscription: Belonging to Hanan`el son of Matan`el

Scaraboid of amethystine quartz, perforated. Single-line border, double-line field dividers, ram's head in middle register flanked by monkeys?, plant behind each, inscription in top and bottom registers. The name Hanan'el means graced by God and Matan'el, gift of God

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