Archaeological Museum of Bologna

The ushabti are funerary statuettes generally no higher than 20 inches tall and are made in different materials - wood, terracotta, faïence, bronze and various stones. From the end of the the Middle Kingdom to the Roman era, Egyptians placed these statuettes in the tombs. Ushabti are represented with the body wrapped in bandages, with two small hoes in the hands and with a bag for seeds on the shoulder; thanks to the formula of the Book of the Dead inscribed on their body (Chapter 6) would be revived to replace the deceased in heavy agricultural work of the Egyptian paradise.

More info

The Bologna museum owns eleven ushabti statuettes of the “Lord of the Two Lands” Seti I, ten made of wood and one in faïence. Highly artistic in quality and larger in size, the latter shows the sovereign with the regal nemes headdress, the usekh pectoral and wide bracelets on his wrists, dotted with cobalt blue on a ground the colour of lapis lazuli. These ushabti, discovered in 1817 by Giovanni Battista Belzoni in the pharaoh’s tomb along with hundreds of other specimens, were created to be resuscitated magically through the formula written on their bodies - Chapter 6 of the Book of the Dead - responding to their owner (ushabti means “answerer”) and standing in his stead in the agricultural work of the afterlife. The weeding hoes in the ruler’s hands and the sack for seeds on his shoulders served this purpose.

Provenance: West Thebes: Valley of the Kings, tomb of Seti I. Palagi Collection
Datation: Nuovo Regno: XIX dinastia, regno di Sety I (1290 - 1279 a.C.)
Material: faïence
Dimensions: h cm 26
Inventory #: KS 2056