The Ptolemies in Memphis, 130-80 B.C.: A Testimony of the Artists' Workshops

The ruins of ancient Memphis (Mit-Rahine) yielded a significant number of Ptolemaic and Roman Period artifacts over the 19th and early 20th centuries, some delivered to the Egyptian authorities and ultimately to the Cairo Museum, others excavated mainly by Petrie, and other sold - fortunately as fairly intact find groups - on the art market. A large portion of the finds comprised plaster casts, molds and sculptors' models and a number of small bronzes from one or more ateliers of metalworkers trained in Hellenistic style. Their products were primarily votives and objets d'art connected with the propaganda and worship of the Ptolemaic rulers, celebrations of the predominantly Greco-Macedonian military and some agrarian religious customs - presumably including the Nile/New Year's festivals. A selection of some of the finest and most informative of these pieces within a fifty-year period of heightened political activity in Memphis is discussed in the present volume as introduction to a broader study in preparation.