Horemheb, The Man Who Become God

Granodiorite. New Kingdom. Reign of Tutankhamun. 1334-1325 B.C. Probably from Saqqara, Tomb of Horemheb. The figure’s costume with a long wavy wig and flaring sleeves of pleated linen, identify this man as a high official from the reign of Tutankhamun. The inscription on an almost identical but complete figure, now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, names Horemheb. It is likely that the two figures both came from his tomb at Saqqara. Horemheb’s tomb at Saqqara was buried under the shifting sands of the desert. Informal excavations in the nineteenth century brought some of its reliefs and statues to museums outside Egypt, but it was lost again until excavations by a British-Dutch team uncovered it in 1975. Now restored, it is one of the highlights of visit to Saqqara.