Votive Head of a Woman with a Towering Hairstyle from Antinoupolis

Culture: Egyptian

Period: Roman Period, 2nd-3rd century A.D.

Material: Terracotta

Dimensions: 8.9 cm high

Price: 1 200 Euro

Ref: 1613

Provenance: From a French collection, acquired by Marie Margaux Cohen, Paris.

Condition: Unrestored. A small hole on the right side, which, however, does not detract from the overall impression of this opulent little head.

Description: This terracotta head of a woman, closed at the bottom, with elaborately and almost monumentally piled-up hair, belongs to a group of votive heads produced in Egypt during the Roman period. They followed the Greek tradition of hair offerings, which were intended to draw upon the fertilising power of water and the life-giving forces of the ancestors. Whereas the Greeks still cut off their braids in order to offer them to the gods, in Egypt of the 2nd and 3rd centuries A.D., the practice shifted to the production of these votive heads. Their friendly faces, with slightly chubby cheeks, full lips, and somewhat blurred eyes, are for the most part similar, but the hairstyles reflect the fashions of the period and became increasingly elaborate. Our female head features five thick rows of braided curls on the side, extending down to the ear, which has a wide piercing, in which earrings of precious metal may once have been threaded. Above the forehead appears a large rosette, crowned by rows of curls braided crosswise and overlapping in the middle. On the back of the head, incisions indicate the course of the hairstyle. Probably from Antinoupolis. See for the type the six heads in: „Egypte Romaine. L’autre Egypte“, Exhibition catalogue in the Musée d’archéologie méditerranéenne in Marseille from April 4 to July 13, 1997, p. 114, no. 121. Mounted.