The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of April 18, 2024

Vulture Headdress Inlay

Vulture Headdress Inlay

100–1 BCE
(332 BCE–395 CE), Ptolemaic dynasty (305–30 BCE)
gold and semi-precious stones
Overall: 3 x 2.8 cm (1 3/16 x 1 1/8 in.)
Gift of the John Huntington Art and Polytechnic Trust 1920.1991
Location: 107 Egyptian

Did You Know?

When creating this headdress, artisans used numerous semiprecious stones with inset partitions to keep them separate. To ensure that the stones would stay in place, a resin-like material was used as an adhesive.

Description

The vulture headdress was worn by goddesses and queens. This inlay in the form of a vulture headdress has more than 100 stones: lapis lazuli (dark blue), turquoise (light blue), petrified wood (red), and an unidentified white stone painstakingly cut to shape and separated by thin plates of gold. Body, wing, and tail feathers are carefully distinguished in minute detail.
  • Said to be from the "Treasure of Dendara."
    -1920
    Ralph H. Blanchard, Cairo, Egypt, through Howard Carter, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art
    1920-
    The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
  • The Illustrated London News (3 November 1928) p. 825
    Bates, Kenneth F. The Enamelist. Cleveland and New York: World Pub. Co, 1967. p. 4
    Cooney, John D. "Three Minor Masterpieces of Egyptian Art." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 62, no. 1 (1975) pp. 11-14, figs. 1-3 www.jstor.org
    Cleveland Museum of Art, and Arielle P. Kozloff. An Introduction to the Art of Egypt in the Cleveland Museum of Art. [Erscheinungsort nicht ermittelbar]: [Verlag nicht ermittelbar], 1983. p. 16
    J. Paul Getty Museum, and Getty Conservation Institute. In the Tomb of Nefertari: Conservation of the Wall Paintings. [Malibu, Calif.]: J. Paul Getty Museum, 1992. p. 59, fig. 29
    Reeves, Nicholas, and John H. Taylor. Howard Carter: Before Tutankhamun. New York: H.N. Abrams, 1993. cat. p. 176
    Berman, Lawrence M. “La Collection Egyptienne du Cleveland Museum of Art,” Bulletin de la Societe francaise d’egyptologie.(October 1995): 14-29. p. 19, fig. 3
    Berman, Lawrence M., and Kenneth J. Bohač. Catalogue of Egyptian Art: The Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1999 Reproduced: p. 495; Mentioned: p. 495-6
    Ziegler, Christiane. Queens of Egypt: From Hetepheres to Cleopatra. Monaco: Grimaldi Forum, 2008. cat. no. 137, p. 311
    James, T. G. H. Howard Carter and the Cleveland Museum of Art. Object Lessons, Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1991. p. 69
  • Queens of Egypt. Grimaldi Forum - Monaco, MC 98001 Monaco cedex (organizer) (July 12-September 10, 2008).
    Howard Carter: Before Tutankhamun, The British Museum, London, England, (November, 18, 1992-May 31, 1993).
    Howard Carter: Before the Discovery of Tutankhamun's Tomb. The British Museum, London, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (organizer) (November 13, 1992-May 31, 1993).
  • {{cite web|title=Vulture Headdress Inlay|url=false|author=|year=100–1 BCE|access-date=18 April 2024|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1920.1991