Egypt, Pre-Dynastic, Chalcolithic Period, Bronze Age II, ca. 2700 to 2500 BCE. Three stunning mace heads, each one carved from exquisite banded alabaster of creamy hues, their rounded piriform bodies conically drilled down the center to create a shaft hole. The piriform rounded mace head was used throughout Egypt and the Levant, and replaced the disk-type mace during the Naqada II period of Pre-Dynastic Egypt. Size: largest mace head measures 2.875" W x 2.125" H (7.3 cm x 5.4 cm); 8.5" W x 5.625" H (21.6 cm x 14.3 cm) on included custom stand

Alabaster was quarried along the length of the Nile, from Giza to just south of Luxor. Offering vessels made of alabaster were used in temples and placed in the tombs of people at all class levels. For example, Auguste Mariette, the famous French Egyptologist of the 19th century, found a cemetery for the poor in Memphis where the dead had been buried without wrappings only three feet below the ground - but each had a small alabaster bowl and some animal bones, as they had been given food and drink for the afterlife. Meanwhile, kings were buried with many alabaster objects, often of the highest quality, necessary to provide for them during their time in the underworld.

Provenance: private prominent New York, USA collector

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#127778

Varying levels of surface wear - commensurate with age - and a few chips/losses commensurate with use.