Statuette of Kneeling King (304–30 BCE): Art, History and Details

Statuette of Kneeling King (304–30 BCE) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

As the chief intermediary between gods and men, the Egyptian king is often shown kneeling in adoration. Enough remains of this king's arms to indicate that his hands may have held offering jars or were extended with the palms facing each other around a naos, or shrine, containing a divine image. In Egypt, adoration required a divine recipient. This example was undoubtedly part of a group composition in which the king faced a larger figure of a god.

Object facts

• Title: Statuette of Kneeling King
• Date: 304–30 BCE
• Culture: Egypt, Greco-Roman period (332 BCE–395 CE), Ptolemaic dynasty (305–30 BCE)
• Type: Sculpture
• Technique: bronze, solid cast
• Dimensions: Overall: 4.2 x 5.5 cm (1 5/8 x 2 3/16 in.); with tang: 12.7 cm (5 in.); without tang: 11 cm (4 5/16 in.)
• Collection: Egypt - Ptolemaic Dynasty
• Department: Egyptian and Ancient Near Eastern Art
• Accession number: 1914.575

Collection credit

Gift of the John Huntington Art and Polytechnic Trust

Further reading listed by the museum

• Berman, Lawrence M., and Kenneth J. Bohač. Catalogue of Egyptian Art: The Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1999

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.