Object: Figurines

E/1957/21/21
India
1950’s
Materials: Ceramic, metal, paint

These tiny, yet beautiful figurines, standing merely 2 inches tall, were made to be purchased by Ganges pilgrims at Benares, India as token of having made the journey. Each of the figurines were hand-painted with a great deal of detail and most of the figures can be identified as specific Hindu deities.

These figurines represent many important deities of the Hindu religion. They include Parsam Ram (an incarnation of Vishnu), Saraswati, Krishna, Sita, Rama (an incarnation of Vishnu), an unidentified female figure, Kunti, Vishnu, Radha, Hannuman, and Rishi (the figures are shown from left to right, in this order, in the photograph below).

While the pantheon of Hindu deities is quite extensive, most of these characters are mentioned in the more famous ancient epics of India: the Ramayana and the Mahabharata, and are fundamental to Hindu belief. These epics are long heroic tales originally written in Sanskrit. Of the figurines held by the Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History, Rama, Sita (Rama’s consort), and Hanuman are extremely important characters in the Ramayana epic. In this legend, Hanuman is a monkey who discovers he has special powers given to him by the gods. He and Sita assist Rama in his heroic battle against Ravana and his plot to conquer the heavens.

Of the many Hindu deities, there are three that are commonly grouped as the primary trinity of Hinduism. These are Vishnu (the protector), Brahma (the creator), and Siva (the destroyer). These three deities are believed to create a balance in the universe. In the group of figurines held at the Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History, Vishnu is depicted three times (he is the first, fifth, and eighth figure shown below) [Chenoa Copeland].

Object: Bronze Statuette

AS-04-16-009
Bronze Statuette
China
T’ang Dynasty, 618-907 B.C.E.
Materials: Bronze, Gold leaf

This object is a bronze figure of a woman who is standing on a platform. The bronze statuette has been gilded at one time, though there is not much left on the figure today. The statuette is dressed in a robe that covers her hands, which are placed in front of her. Both humans and animals are popular forms of Chinese bronze figurines. It is believed that this figure probably represents an attendant of Kuan Yin, the goddess of Mercy in Chinese culture. It is hollow which indicates how the figure was originally constructed. There is a hole located in the front of the object which probably resulted from the casting process.

The most common way in which bronze figurines were made was through the lost wax casting technique. This process is also called the cire-perdue method. During the lost wax casting process, clay is molded around a wax model of the object to be created. Next the clay and wax object is baked, changing the clay into ceramic and melting the wax. Molten metal, in this case bronze, was then poured into the empty space left by the wax, creating a mold for the figure. The lost wax process is perfect for irregularly shaped objects such as statuettes because the flexibility of the wax allows for casting bronze objects other than bowls. One common problem that occurs with the cire-perdue process is the formation of small holes in the surface of the metal figure, resulting from bubbles in the wax.

For more information about the lost wax casting process, see Joseph Veach Noble (1975: 368-369). Also see, Langdon Warner (1937: 17-20) to learn more about bronze statuettes and Dawn Ho Delbanco (1983) to find more information on the history of Chinese bronzes and an example of a Chinese bronze catalog.

SNOMNH invites you to comment on this bronze statuette or on the use, history, or construction of Chinese bronze figures. [Heléna Cohen]

Object: Ushabti

C/53-4/58/1
Faience ushabti
Egypt
XXVI Dynasty (ca. 664-525 BCE)
Materials: faience

Ushabtis, also known as shabtis or shwabtis, are small figurines usually modeled out of Egyptian faience. These figurines are associated with burials and always show a human figure wrapped as a mummy with the traditional false beard and headdress of the pharaoh and the god Osirus. The arms of the figure are crossed and when the burial in question was royal, they would carry the crook and flail signifying kingship or divinity. Ushabtis were intended to function like servants for the deceased in the afterlife. Ancient Egyptians believed that after death the soul of the individual continued to live a similar existence to that on the physical earth. In order to assure that one could have a pleasant and relaxed afterlife, free from labor and discomfort, it was necessary to bring along servants in the form of ushabtis. The ushabtis were all inscribed with a verse from Chapter 6 of the Book of the Dead which asks the ushabti to take the place of the deceased whenever he is called upon to perform any task in the afterlife.

The ushabti in the Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History is made of green Egyptian faience. Faience is a type of fired ceramic with a tin glaze, that was common in the Middle East and Europe. Unlike traditional faience, Egyptian faience is made by heating a mixture of sand and minerals. This mixture, when heated would essentially melt together into a solid stone-like material with a glassy finish. By combining different types and quantities of minerals different colors could be created.

A preliminary examination of the inscription on this ushabti indicates that this figurine belonged to a person named Ptah-ir-dy-es, and the museum’s records indicate that the figure dates from the XXVI Dynasty. The XXVI Dynasty, often called the Saite Dynasty, once again united both Upper and Lower Egypt under one king following the Third Intermediate Period. It begins just after the Assyrian invasion of Egypt and is brought to an end by the Persian invasion. This dynasty represents the end of native rule in ancient Egypt, as the power of kingship passed to their southern Kushite neighbors.

For more information on Egyptian funerary customs and grave materials see:

El-Shahawy, Abeer. The Funerary Art of Ancient Egypt: A Bridge to the Realm of the Hereafter. Cairo: Farid Atiya Press, 2005.

Smith, William S., and William K. Simpson. The Art and Architecture of Ancient Egypt. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998.

For more information on the XXVI Dynasty see:

Welsby, D.A. The Kingdom of Kush: The Napatan and Meroitic Empires. London: British Museum Press, 1996. [Kate Barr]