Ushabti arrive home

Al Ahram Weekly (Nevine El-Aref)

The Egyptian Museum in Tahrir Square played host this week to a funerary statuette of a woman named Hener. The statuette, which has been in the Netherlands, will be restored and put on display as a special exhibit.

The statuette story began at the National Museum of Antiquities in Leiden in 2006 when a Dutch collector, who had bought the ushabti from an antiquities auction room, showed it to experts and curators of the museum to check its authenticity and historical value. Shortly after examining it the curators identified the ushabti as one of a group of six unearthed inside the tomb of Iurudef, excavated at Saqqara in 1985 by archaeologists from Leiden and published in 1991. Iurudef was the Scribe of the Treasury of Amun and Scribe of the God's Offerings during the reign of Ramses II. He seems to have acted as the latter's private secretary, and may even have been responsible for the construction of Tia's tomb in Saqqara. This would explain the fact that Iurudef is not only represented in a number of places in the tomb but even had his own burial-shaft within the precinct of his master. If we add that Iurudef may have been the tutor of Ramose, the famous scribe of the village of Deir Al-Medina, he becomes a fascinating figure in his own right.

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