Hedvig Győry: Mélanges offerts a Edith Varga „Le lotus qui sort de terre” (Bulletin du Musée Hongrois des Beaux-Arts Supplément 1. Budapest, 2001)

LADISLAV BARES: Shabtis from the Late Period tombs at Abusir (Preliminary remarks)

To be complete, a fragment of a small faience shabti (only 3.2 cm long from the head to the knees), coloured light blue-green, should be mentioned. This piece was found in the thick layer of crushed mudbrick to the north of the structure dug in tail immediately in front of the eastern façade of Iufaa's main shaft. The shabtis found so far on the Saite-Persian cemetery at Abusir thus belong to the usual Late Period types. At the same time, they show a remarkable variety in details even among the items belonging to one owner. Except for those destined for Udjahorresnet, where the number is perhaps too small, they are not uniform concerning their dimensions and even the inscriptions. Most probably, therefore, they were made in several moulds at once and decorated by more than one craftsman. All that might point to the need to produce them as quickly as possible; we might even speculate whether they were not produced, in some cases at least, only after the death of their owner. As the shabtis were found in all large Late Period tombs cleaned at Abusir until now, much more finds of this kind can be expected in the yet unexcavated burial structures there. Ladislav Bares Czech Institute of Egyptology, Charles University, Prague