The Meaning Behind a Nubian Ruler’s Offering to a Falcon God

Taharqa offering to Hemen. The Louvre, Paris.

This image is part of a weekly series that The Root is presenting in conjunction with the Image of the Black in Western Art Archive at Harvard University’s W.E.B. Du Bois Research Institute, part of the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research.

For many, the grandeur of ancient Egypt is evoked by its great monuments of architecture and colossal sculptures. Works of more modest dimensions, however, are far more numerous and quite arguably more revealing of the complex culture that produced them.

Such is certainly the case with the small-scale, delicately crafted work shown here. On a silver base, the figure of Taharqa—ruler of the 25th Dynasty of Egypt—kneels before the giant figure of the falcon god Hemen.

This stunning work is both aesthetically and technically unique. The most straightforward part of its manufacture is the solid-bronze figure of Taharqa, cast and then incised with linear detail. The image of Hemen, on the other hand, is carved from stone and covered with sheets of thin gold. The figures rest on a wooden base covered with a silver revetment.

Dressed only in the pleated linen kilt worn by Egyptian royalty, Taharqa offers the god two small jars of wine. He wears the double-uraeus headdress representing rule over his native Nubia as well as the whole land of Egypt to the north. An inscription on the back of his belt identifies him by name and extols his divine status: “The perfect god. Taharqa alive for eternity.”