Late Period-Ptolemaic Period, 664-30 B.C. A naturalistic black jasper or steatite funerary scarab, carved in the round with detailing to the head, carapace and legs; large fan-shaped clypeus, the prothorax marked by a row of decorative hemispheres and the elytra of several vertical lines; ribbed suspension loop beneath. See The Metropolitan Museum, accession number 89.2.398, for comparable; Petrie, W.M.F., Amulets, London, 1914. 47 grams, 53 mm (2 in.). Collection of Fernand Adda, formed in the 1920s. Collection of Mrs Petra Schamelman, Breitenbach, Germany. Private collection of a Kensington collector. Property of a London gentleman. Accompanied by an academic report by Dr Alberto Maria Pollastrini and a scholarly note no.TL05392 by Dr Ronald Bonewitz. This lot has been checked against the Interpol Database of stolen works of art and is accompanied by search certificate no.10845-178140. The scarab beetle?s behaviour of rolling large dung balls was associated in the ancient Egyptian mind with the movement of the sun through the sky and came into being through a process of spontaneous generation. The belief in the scarab?s self-generation and its association with the sun god made it a potent amulet that was thought to wield the power of life and regeneration.