THIRD INTERMEDIATE PERIOD, 21ST-22ND DYNASTY, CIRCA 1069-730 B.C.

The figure in profile to the left, wearing a long wig and broad collar, holds an incence censer aloft, the instrument adorned with a falcon-headed terminal. Scenes with the present composition typically portray a priestly or royal figure offering incense and a libation of water to an enthroned deity. A relief from the Temple of Seti I at Abydos, dating to the New Kingdom, 19th dynasty, fully illustrates this supernatural ritual, with the pharaoh Seti I offering gifts to the seated Amun-Re (cf. R.H. Wilkinson, Reading Egyptian Art, London, 1991, p. 204, ill. 1). As K. Mysliwiec explains in Royal Portraiture of the Dynasties XXI-XXX, the artistic output of the beginning of the Third Intermediate Period is characterised by a continuation of New Kingdom models, such as in this example. The figure depicted in this relief is close to portraits of Shoshenq III, with elongated cosmetic lines and eyebrows in the form of thick, sharply-contoured strips, see, Mysliwiec, op. cit., pp. 25-26, pl. XXVII c-d.
Prof. Herbert Kühn was a celebrated German archaeologist and art historian. During his long and succesful academic career he produced several ground-breaking publications on Paleolithic art and pioneering studies on cave paintings. In 1946 he became the first professor of Prehistory at the then newly-founded University of Mainz.