This document provides an overview of the art of ancient Mesopotamia and Egypt. It discusses the origins and developments of these early civilizations, including their systems of writing, forms of government, and role of religion. Key artistic periods and works are highlighted for both Mesopotamian cultures like the Sumerians, Akkadians, Babylonians and Assyrians as well as the dynasties of ancient Egypt. Major artistic mediums, styles and architectural achievements are summarized for each era and place.

1. The Art of Mesopotamia
and Egypt
In Art: A Brief History, 2nd ed. (2004) by
Marilyn Stokstad

2. INTRODUCTION

3. Introduction
Mesopotamia
Egypt
• Tigris and Euphrates
• Agriculture: basis of
wealth
• Kingship: government
• Religion: central role in
government and daily life
• Few natural defenses
• Repeated invasions and
internal conflicts
• Nile
• Agricultures: basis of
wealth
• Kingship: government
• Religion: central role in
government and daily life
• Mountains and deserts
• Remained a unified state
for some 3,000 years

4. Introduction
Mesopotamia
Egypt
• Pictographs – simple
pictures that represent a
thing or concept
• Phonograms –
representations of the
sounds of syllables
• Cuneiform – Latin
“wedge-shaped;” named
after the shape of the
marks made by the stylus
• Hieroglyphs – earliest
Egyptian writing system
which employed symbols
• Hieratic writing –
shorthand version of
hieroglyphs
• Demotic writing – 18th C;
from demos, “the people;”
less formal and easy to
master

5. Cuneiform
Symbols evolved from pictures into phonograms thus
becoming a true writing system.

6. Hieroglyphs
Used in combinations, such phonogramic hieroglyphs were
especially useful in rendering foreign names.

7. MESOPOTAMIA

8. Mesopotamia
• Means “between the rivers”
• Developed around 3500 BCE into
independently governed city-states
• Sumerians, Akkadians, Babylonians,
Assyrians

9. Mesopotamia: Sumerians
• Invented the wagon wheel and the plow
• First to cast objects in copper and bronze
• Invented a system of writing, cuneiform,
between 3300 and 3000 BCE
• Ziggurat – stepped pyramidal structures
with a temple or shrine on top

10. Anu Ziggurat and White Temple
The Anu Ziggurat, Uruk (modern Warka, Iraq). c. 3100 BC.
This was built up in stages over centuries, rising to a height
of about 40 feet. (reconstruction drawing)

11. Cone Mosaics
A decoration invented at Uruk. This decorates the courtyards
and interior walls of the Inanna and the Anu Compounds.

12. Carved Vase
From Uruk. c. 3500-3000 BCE. Alabaster, height 91
cm. Iraq Museum, Baghdad. Design shows the
ritual marriage between the goddess and a human.

13. Nanna Ziggurat
Located in Ur (modern Muqaiyir, Iraq), c. 2100-2050 BCE. A
mud-brick ziggurat dedicated to the moon god Nanna.

14. Mesopotamia: Sumerians
• Sculpture was associated with religion
• Large statues were commonly placed in
temples as objects of devotion
• Votive figures – small statues that
individual worshippers identified as
portraits of themselves

15. Votive Statues
From the Square Temple Eshunna (modern Tell Amar, Iraq),
c. 2900-2600 BCE. Limestone alabaster, and gypsum, height
of largest figure approx. 76.3 cm. The Oriental Institute of the
University of Chicago; Iraq Museum, Baghdad.

16. Bull Lyre
From the tomb of Queen Pu-abi, Ur (modern
Muqaiyar, Iraq), c. 2680 BCE. Wood with gold,
lapis lazuli, and shell, reassembled in modern
wood support. University Museum, University
of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia.

17. Mythological Figures
Detail of the sound box of the bull lyre from the tomb
of Queen Pu-abi, Ur (modern Muqaiyir, Iraq), c.
2680 BCE. Wood with shell inlay, 31.1x11cm.
University Museum, University of Pennsylvania,
Philadelphia.
The top and the bottom registers – bands – seem to
illustrate scenes that are found in the epic of
Gilgamesh, a 3,000-line Sumerian epic poem.

18. Mesopotamia: Sumerians
• Developed flat stamps and more elaborate
cylinder-form seals for securing and
identifying documents and signaling
property ownership
• Cylinder seals – usually less than 2
inches high; made of hard and/or semiprecious stones with designs incised into
the surface

19. Cylinder Seal
From Sumer and its impression, c. 2500 BCE. Marble, height
approx. 4.5 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
(Gift of Walter Hauser, 1955)

20. Mesopotamia: Akkadians
• Warring invaders who settled the area
north of Uruk (near modern Baghdad)
• Spoke a Semitic language
• Sargon I – ruled c. 2332-2279 BCE;
powerful military and political figure;
conquered Sumerian cities
• Akkadian empire fell around 2180 BCE to
the Guti

21. Stela of Naramsin
c. 2254-2218 BCE. Limestone, height 1.98m.
Musée du Louvre, Paris. Commemorates a
military victory of Naramsin, Sargon’s grandson
and successor.
Stela means upright stone slab.

22. Votive Statue of Gudea
From Lagash (modern Telloh, Iraq), c. 2120
BCE. Diorite, height 73.7cm. Musée du Louvre,
Paris.
The cuneiform inscription on the statue relates
that Gudea dedicated himself, the sculpture, and
the temple in which the sculpture resided to the
goddess Geshtinanna, the divine poet and
interpreter of dreams.

23. Mesopotamia: Babylonians
• Amorites, a Semitic-speaking people from
the Arabian Desert, reunited Sumer under
Hammurabi (ruled 1729-1750 BCE)
• Babylon – capital city
• Written legal code that recorded laws and
penalties

24. Stela of Hammurabi
From Susa (modern Shush, Iran), c. 1792-1750
BCE. Basalt, height of stela approx. 2.13m, height
of relief 71.1cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris.
This contains the written legal code. Most of the
three hundred entries deal with commercial and
property matters. Only sixty-eight relate to domestic
problems, and a mere twenty deal with physical
assault. Punishments depended on the gender and
social standing of the offender.

25. Stela of
Hammurabi
In the introductory section of
the stela’s long cuneiform
inscription, Hammurabi
declared that with this code of
law he intended “to cause
justice to prevail in the land
and to destroy the wicked and
the evil, that the strong might
not oppress the weak nor the
weak the strong.”

26. Mesopotamia: Assyrians
• Rose to dominance in 1400 BCE and
controlled most of Mesopotamia by the
end of the 9th century BCE
• Early 7th century BCE: extended their
influence as far west as Egypt
• Adopted the ziggurat and preserved the
Sumerian texts
• Built fortified cities and vast palaces

27. Human-Headed Winged
Lion (Lamassu)
From the palace of Assurnasirpal II, Nimrud.
883-859 BCE. Limestone, height 3.11m.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
(Gift of John D. Rockefeller, Jr., 1932)

28. Assurbanipal and His Queen in the
Garden
From the palace at Nineveh (modern Kuyunjik, Iraq), c. 647
BCE. Alabaster, height approx. 53.3cm. The British
Museum, London.

29. Mesopotamia: Assyrians
• Assurbanipal – powerful Assyrian king
ruled 669-c. 627 BCE)
• After his reign, the empire collapsed by
600 BCE
• Mesopotamia was absorbed by the
Persian Empire under Cyrus II (ruled 559530 BCE)

30. EGYPT

31. Egypt
• Fertile valley and delta of the Nile
• Predynastic period – 4500-3300 BCE;
Egypt was unified under a succession of
powerful families or dynasties
• Manetho – Egyptian priest and historian;
drew up a list of rulers in the third century
BCE

32. Early Dynastic & Old Kingdom
• Egypt became a consolidated state along
the banks of the Nile River
• Evolved along into Upper Egypt (south)
and Lower Egypt (north)
• King-god Menes – merged the lands into
a single kingdom (King Narmer, Dynasty
1, ruled c. 3150-3125 BCE)

33. Palette of Narmer
From Hierakonpolis Dynasty 1, c. 3150-3125 BCE. Slate,
height 63.5cm. Egyptian Museum, Cairo. This may have
been a votive offering.

34. Early Dynastic & Old kingdom
• Conventions of Egyptian Painting and
relief sculpture (dignitaries):
(1) heads are shown in profile to best
capture the subject’s identifying feature
(2) eyes are rendered in frontal view
(3) shoulders are represented frontally
(4) hips, legs and feet are drawn in profile
• Persons of lesser social rank are
represented more naturalistically

35. Early Dynastic & Old Kingdom
• Central to ancient Egyptian belief was the
idea that every human being had a life
force – the ka or spirit. The ka lived on
after the death of the body, forever
engaged in the activities it had enjoyed
during his earthly existence.
• Ka statues, and elaborate funerary rites
and tombs filled with supplies and
furnishings

36. Early Dynastic & Old Kingdom
• Mastaba – most common type of tomb
structure; a flat-topped, one-story building
with slanted walls erected above an
underground burial chamber
• Necropolis – a city of the dead; at the
edge of the desert on the west bank of the
Nile

37. Stepped Pyramid of Djoser
Saqqara, Limestone, height 62m. This is the earliest truly
monumental architecture in Egypt.

38. Plan of Djoser’s Funerary Complex
Saqqara. Dynasty 3, c. 2681-2662 BCE. The designer of the
complex, a man called Imhotep, laid out Djoser’s tomb as a stepped
pyramid consisting of six mastabalike elements placed on top of each
other, and originally covered with a limestone facing, or veneer.

39. Early Dynastic & Old Kingdom
• Characteristics of 3D-sculptures:
(1) lifelike figures
(2) rigidly frontal, simple conceptions
(3) rectilinear and block-like
(4) figures mostly stands in a typical
Egyptian balanced pose with one foot in front of
the other, arms straight on the side, fist clenched

40. Khafre
From Giza. Dynasty 4, c. 2570-2544 BCE.
Diorite, height 1.68m. Egyptian Museum,
Cairo.
An over-lifesize statue of the Old Kingdom,
the Dynasty 4 King Khafre (ruled c. 25702544 BCE), represents the ruler enthroned
and protected by the falcon-god Horus.

41. Menkaure and His Wife,
Queen Khamerernebty
From Giza. Dynasty 4, c. 2515 BCE.
Graywacke with traces of red and black
paint, height 142.3cm. Museum of Fine Arts,
Boston (Harvard University-MFA Expedition)

43. The Red Pyramid
Dahshur, height 104m. This is the first true pyramid, and
was built by Pharaoh Sneferu. This is believed to be the final
resting place of “Sneferu the Great Pyramid Builder.”

44. Great Pyramids
Giza. Dynasty 4, c. 2601-2515 BCE. Erected by Menkaure,
Khafre (Chephren) and Khufu (Cheops). Granite and
limestone, height of pyramid of Khufu 137m.

45. Plan of
the
Funerary
Complex
at Giza

46. Ti Watching a
Hippopotamus Hunt
Tomb of Ti, Saqqara. Dynasty 5, c.
2510-2460 BCE. Painted limestone
relief, height approx. 114.3cm.
The relief forms part of the
decoration of a mastaba tomb
discovered by the French
archeologist Auguste Mariette in
1865.
The hunt depicted on the relief had
symbolic value.

47. The Middle Kingdom
• Political authority became less centralized
• The grid pattern became the first rational
city plan
• Subdivided into lots for houses which
indicates three distinct economic and
social levels within the population:
(1) governmental and ceremonial center
(2) the quarter with large dwellings
(3) large district of smaller mud-brick homes

48. The Middle Kingdom
• During Dynasties 11 and 12, wealthy
members of the nobility and high-level
officials commissioned labor-intensive
rock-cut tombs that proclaimed their status
• Artists are admired and respected
• The patron’s and the artist’s desire for
clarity permeates Egyptian art

49. Harvest Scene
Tempera facsimile by Nina de Garis Davies of a wall painting in the
tomb of Khnumhotep, Beni Hasan. Dynasty 12, c. 1928-1895 BCE.
The farm workers are shown with their shoulders in profile, not in the
unnatural pose prescribed for royalty.

50. Pectoral with the name of Senwosret II
From el-Lahun. Dynasty 12, c. 1895-1878 BCE. Detail of a
necklace. Gold and semi-precious stones, length 8.3cm. The
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. (Purchase, Rogers Fund
and Henry Walters Gift, 1916.

51. The New Kingdom
• Egypt prospered both politically and
economically
• Tuthmose III – the most dynamic king of
Dynasty 18; ruled 1479-1425 BCE;
extended Egypt’s influence along the
eastern Mediterranean coast; first ruler to
refer to himself as pharaoh (“great
house”)
• Extensive building programs along the Nile

52. Funerary Temple of Hatshepsut
Deir el-Bahri. Dynasty 18, c. 1478-1458 BCE. At the far left
are the ramp and base of the funerary temple of Mentuhotep
I. Dynasty 11, c. 2009-1997 BCE.

53. Plan of the funerary temple of Hatshepsut
Deir el-Bahri. Hatshepsut’s temple was constructed on three levels,
which were connected by ramps and adorned with rows of columns,
or colonnades. The temple’s innermost sanctuary was cut deep into
the cliff in the manner of Middle Kingdom rock-cut tombs.

54. Great Temple of Amun Karnak
Dynasty 19, c. 1294-1212 BCE. Access to the heart of the
temple, a sanctuary containing the statue of Amun, was
through a series of pylons and courtyards.

55. Plan of the Great
Temple of Amun
Karnak
New Kingdom

56. Hypostyle hall
Great Temple of Amun Karnak. Hypostyle hall is a vast
column-filled space. This is the principal structure of the
temple.

57. Pylon of
Ramesses II
Temple of Amun, Mut and
Khonsu, Luxor. Dynasty 19,
c. 1279-1212 BCE.

58. Pylon of Ramesses II
Two colossal statues of Ramesses and a pair of obelisks
stood in front of his pylon.

59. Queen
Nefertari
Making an
Offering to
Isis
Wall painting in the tomb of Nefertari, Valley of Queens near Deir el-Bahri.
Dynasty 19, c. 1279-1212 BCE. (J. Paul Getty Trust, 1991)

60. The New Kingdom
• Amenhotep IV – Dynasty 18, 1352-c.
1348 BCE; founded a new religion
demanding a belief in a single god, the
life-giving sun disk Aten; changed his
name to Akhenaten (“one who is effective
on behalf of Aten”)

61. Akhenaten and His Family
From Akhetaten (modern Tell el-Amarna). Dynasty 18, 13481336/5 BCE. Painted limestone relief, 31.1x38.7cm.
Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Preussischer Kulturbesitz,
Ägyptisches Museum.

62. Queen Tiy
From Kom Mendinet Ghurab
(near el-Lahun). Dynasty 18,
c. 1390-1352 BCE. Boxwood,
ebony, glass, gold, lapis lazuli,
cloth, clay, and wax. Height
9.4cm. Staatliche Museen zu
Berlin, Preussischer
Kulturbesitz, Ägyptisches
Museum.
“The Woman who Knows”

63. Nefertiti
From Akhetaten (modern
Tell el-Amarna) dynasty
18, c. 1348-1336/5 BCE.
Limestone, height 51cm.
Staatliche Museen zu
Berlin, Preussischer
Kulturbesitz, Ägyptisches
Museum.
She is sometimes called
“The lady of the two lands,”
“Fair of Face,” “Mistress of
Happiness,” and “Endowed
with Favors.”

64. The New Kingdom
• Tutankhaten – ruled 1336/35-1327 BCE;
returned to all traditional religious beliefs;
changed his name to Tutankhamun
(“Living Image of Amun”)
• He died at a young age and was buried in
the Valley of the Kings near Thebes. His
tomb was discovered in 1922 containing
amazing treasures.

65. Inner coffin of Tutankhamun’s sarcophagus
From the tomb of Tutankhamun, Valley of the Kings. Dynasty 18,
1336/5-1327 BCE. Gold inlaid with glass and semiprecious stones,
height 1.85m. Egyptian Museum, Cairo.
In November 1922, English archeologist Howard Carter discovered the
entrance to the tomb of King Tutankhamun.

66. Funerary mask of
Tutankhamun
This is as it appears today. Gold inlaid
with glass and semiprecious stones,
height 54cm. Egyptian Museum, Cairo.
In this image, Egyptian artists
emphasized clarity of line in color,
simplified forms, and the reduction of
nature to elemental geometric shapes,
thus establishing an unsurpassed
standard of technical and aesthetic
excellence.

67. The New Kingdom
• Egyptian funerary practices revolved
around Osiris, his resurrection, and a
belief in the continuity of life after death by
Egyptians of all ranks.
• These beliefs gave rise to additional
funerary practices popular among nonroyal classes. Family members
commissioned papyrus scrolls containing
magical texts or spells to help the dead.

68. Judgment before Osiris
Illustration from a Book of the Dead. Dynasty 19, c. 1285
BCE. Painted papyrus, height 39.8cm. The British Museum,
London.

69. The Late Period
• C. 747-332 BCE
• Saw the country and its arts in the hands
and service of foreigners
• Piye – Nubian leader from the Kingdom of
Kush conquered Egypt and established
capitals at Memphis and Thebes
• The Nubians adopted Egyptian religious
practices and architectural forms.

70. Sphinx of Taharqo
From Temple T, Kawa, Nubia. Dynasty 25, c. 690664 BCE. Height 74.7 cm. The British Museum,
London.

71. The Late Period
• The Nubians were followed by Assyrians,
Persians, and Macedonians until the
Ptolemies regained control of Egypt after
the death of Alexander the Great in 323
BCE.
• In 30 BCE the last Egyptian ruler,
Cleopatra VII, dies a suicide and the
Romans added Egypt to their empire.

72. LRMC/2013

73. The Middle Kingdom
Inscription on the tombstone of a Middle
Kingdom Sculptor:
“I am an artist who excels in my art, a man
above the common herd in knowledge. I know
the proper attitude for a statue [of a man]; I know
how a woman holds herself, [and how] a
spearman lifts his arm…. There is no man
famous for this knowledge other than myself and
my eldest son”
(cited in Montet, page 159)

74. Mummification
• Remove brain
• Empty body of internal organs
• Soak body and internal organs in “vat of
natron” for more than one month
• Retrieve body → dry → dye
• Body cavity packed with clean linen
• Wrap major organs separately
• Wrap body; limb first