OLD KINGDOM, 5TH DYNASTY, REIGN OF UNAS, CIRCA 2345-2315 B.C.

Now divided into two pieces, these fragments of limestone raised relief originally formed part of a single scene representing the Inspector of the Great House (i.e. Pharaoh) Isheb facing left and censing before a statue of his father, the Judge and Keeper of Nekhen, Niankhmin. Niankhmin’s name and titles stretch in a horizontal line of inscription facing right across both fragments. Isheb is identified in typical manner as “his beloved son” together with his titles and name in two short horizontal registers facing left; a caption above the head of Isheb might be interpreted as his statement that “I shall do that which he (i.e. Niankhmin) continually praises”. That Niankhmin’s substantial figure is to be interpreted not as the representation of a living man, but as a statue of the deceased man is made clear from many examples studied by Eaton-Krauss, of which only a few depict a portly male figure of middle age or older (see M. Eaton-Krauss, The Representations of Statuary in Private Tombs in the Old Kingdom, Wiesbaden, 1984). The presence on more completely preserved examples of a statue base and even a sledge for dragging the statue allow no doubt that the two-dimensional reliefs refer to a ritual performed on a statue of the deceased. A late Dynasty 5 parallel in Brooklyn (37.25E) from Saqqara belonging to a man called Semenkhu-Ptah/Itwesh shows a man depicted at life size showing similar signs of age: soft, rounded chin and thickened neck. Another example from the tomb of Seshemnofer at Giza shows the portly belly and full breasts noticeable on Niankhmin’s relief; here too a statue of an older man is receiving incense from a younger man, presumably his son. Although no color remains, it is likely that the original color of Niankhmin’s statue would have been painted yellow, an indicator of old age for men and male statues discussed by Fischer in 'Yellow-Skinned Representations of Men in the Old Kingdom', in Varia Aegyptiaca, New York, 1963, pp. 17-23. Niankhmin’s tomb may have been at Saqqara, but it has not been relocated in modern scientific excavation.