Sunday, May 14, 2017 B
Progress Report - Throne
8:22am

I discovered I needed to change the design, nine stripes work better than ten stripes. (I could say nine stripes represent the nine members of the Ennead. :) ) Looking at the photo, I see more flaws than I do "in person". But overall, I'm pleased.

Next step is the inscription on the back. As this is a throne that could be used for the figure of any Egyptian deity, I wanted a general purpose statement.

While reading one of my Egyptology books, I learned of a name popular in the Old Kingdom era, NiankhHathor, "Life Belongs to Hathor":

One of my expert colleagues said this could be expanded to a more general statement. So hopefully, I can engrave these seemingly simple glyphs on the back of the throne? We'll soon find out.

Sunday, May 14, 2017 C
Progress Report - Throne Hieroglyphs
3:36pm

No, it doesn't look like the original design idea. I simplified it a bit. The ancients simplified the glyphs, too. I found three Old Kingdom examples of the name Niankhhathor, and found two were simplified, and one was partially simplified:


Example #1, tomb of Kaninisut, "register of offering bearers below, including Niankhhathor". The 'kh' glyph is included.


Example #2, "Lower part of seated statue, side of seat inscribed for Niankhhathor". This example, which also declares she is someone's honored wife, shows the simplified version.


Example #3. Again, this example is from Kaninisut's tomb. This "detail of south entrance thickness, west side, detail of upper part of figure of Niankhhathor" shows the simplified spelling of the name, with just the ankh to represent "ankh".

So I went with simple. For the Netjer flags, I originally only had the outlines. Julia said, "Oh, they look like nines." She belongs to a group called Triple Nine Society, so this association came readily to her. She thought if I made the inside of the flags recessed a bit, this would remove the look of nines.

I turned to the ancient engraver, Ramesses III, with his deeply incised glyphs at Karnak. Yes, the whole flag is cut back:


Excerpted from Cairoinfo4u's panorama of the east exterior wall (southern half). He says Ramesses II did these engravings. Ramesses III's hieroglyphs are gouged in much deeper, as we can see in this example from Medinet Habu.

Maybe I should have carved a little deeper?


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