Ostracon with the Head of Ramesses VI
Unknown · Reign of Ramesses VI, c. 1144-1136 BC
On a flake of limestone the size of a hand, an artist has drawn the head of a king in profile, wearing the blue crown with its cobra and a broad collar. The lines are in black over a first sketch in red, and the flesh is washed in yellow ochre. Look at the ear: it is pierced for an earring. The nose is sharp, the chin firm, the eye elongated with a cosmetic line. Turn to the other side, where the same hand has drawn a rearing uraeus cobra and a royal crown, practice pieces for the decoration of a tomb.
Ostraca are the sketchbooks of ancient Egypt: cheap chips of stone on which the craftsmen of the royal necropolis tried out figures, noted accounts or simply doodled. This one comes from the Valley of the Kings and is attributed by style to the reign of Ramesses the Sixth, around eleven forty BC, whose tomb has some of the finest painted decoration in the valley. It reached the Louvre in eighteen twenty seven with the collection of the consul Drovetti, and shows the freedom of a draughtsman working without the constraints of a finished wall.
Did You Know? The king's ear is shown pierced for an earring, a fashion that Ramesside pharaohs wore in life but rarely in their official stone portraits.
Unlock the Full Guide
Read every room and listen to every work in all museums with premium.