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NOTES
updated provenance and geo-x refs in TMS
These are my rough research notes, but I was unable to find any similar iconography in any medium in art from Egypt in the 6th-9th centuries C.E. I encountered nude Aphrodite, Isis nursing Horus, nude Daphne, many Virgin and Child figures, but no birth figures. I've seen a few Coptic textiles (such as this: http://www.christies.com/lotfinder/Lot/a-coptic-fragmentary-textile-hanging-of-the-4169318-details.aspx featuring the Virgin and Child arranged in a similar way, but not "birth giving."
Coptic Orthodox Church founded by Saint Mark the Evangelist, the first patriarch of Alexandria. By the early seventh century, Egypt was an almost exclusively Christian province of the Byzantine Empire. Then, between 639 and 642, Muslim Arabs conquered the country. At first the Copts functioned much as they had under the Byzantines, continuing to serve as civil servants in the new administration. Their lives began to change significantly, however, in 705, when Arabic replaced Greek as the language of government. Christian officials were obliged to become bilingual, and the process of their Arabization began. By the end of the ninth century, the Egyptians had widely adopted Arabic, and a substantial number of them, especially those residing in the Delta, had converted to Islam.
meaning of the term "Coptic:: originally applied to the Egyptian Christians. Today we use this theological classification as the designation of a style. In the Brooklyn catalog many objects are termed Coptic which have no Christian association. Coptic style a combination of Ancient Egyptian, Greek, Roman, Near Eastern. At the present time it is impossible to race the geographical distribution of Coptic art within Egypt at any given period.
Purely Christian subjects are infrequent in Coptic art before the sixth century and are not common until the seventh. With their decorative point of view, the Copts had little feeling for three-dimensional sculpture and it probably did not appeal to their taste. While there is nothing in Christianity to prohibit the use of sculptures the common use of them by the pagan religions and the associations with the multitudes then surviving from the Pharaonic period, must have prejudiced the Copts against them. Coptic crafts are not of outstanding quality, perhaps because they were interested primarily in the general effect and not in perfection of detail.
https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/opencollection/objects/9498
toy? http://www.louvre.fr/en/moteur-de-recherche-oeuvres?page=2&f_search_art=coptic
The largest category of sculpture was architectural: door jambs, lunettes, door lintels, gables for niches, cornices and friezes, pedestals and bases, columns and pilasters, capitals, latticework screens and windows, and posts. Most tomb reliefs were for architectural decoration
Marble. Sculpture in marble, in keeping with the origin of the stone, was subject to continual foreign influence. Its forms and motifs were based on prototypes produced in the eastern Roman empire, especially Constantinople. This association was so close, as, for example, in the case of column capitals, that pieces from imported, rough-cut marble clearly made in Egypt, probably in Alexandria, as a rule betray Egyptian workmanship not by their type and form but only through some iconographical detail, or occasionally through a lower level of quality. The marble pilaster capitals, however, were less closely connected with eastern models and reveal rather local forms and motifs. As a rule, these pieces must have been prepared for special architectural positions, were therefore less often brought into the country as finished imports, and may thus have offered a better starting point for local taste and local traditional forms than did the standardized column capitals
Sources
- Elizabeth S. Bolman, "Coptic Christianity" in Helen C. Evans, ed, with Brandie Ratliff, Byzantium and Islam: Age of Transition, 7th-9th century, (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2012), 69-70.
- Pagan and Christian Egypt: Egyptian Art from the First to the Tenth Century A.D., (Brooklyn: Brooklyn Museum Press, 1941), cat. 24, cat. 28.
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1969-1982: Mr. and Mrs. Stanley Marcus
From 1982: Dallas Museum of Fine Arts, Foundation for the Arts Collection, The Mr. and Mrs. Stanley Marcus Collection of Fertility Figures [1]
[1] The Foundation for the Arts is a non-profit corporation created as a title-holding entity to serve the people of Dallas but to operate independently of the City. The Dallas Museum of Art (at its own cost) is responsible for the care, storage, insurance, conservation and maintenance of the collection, and agrees to maintain the highest museum standards in the management and handling of the Foundation's collection. The title to all works of art purchased or otherwise acquired by the Foundation for the Arts is retained by the Foundation. The name of the Dallas Museum of Fine Arts, founded in 1933, was changed to the Dallas Museum of Art in 1983
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Notes
updated provenance and geo-x refs in TMS
These are my rough research notes, but I was unable to find any similar iconography in any medium in art from Egypt in the 6th-9th centuries C.E. I encountered nude Aphrodite, Isis nursing Horus, nude Daphne, many Virgin and Child figures, but no birth figures. I've seen a few Coptic textiles (such as this: http://www.christies.com/lotfinder/Lot/a-coptic-fragmentary-textile-hanging-of-the-4169318-details.aspx featuring the Virgin and Child arranged in a similar way, but not "birth giving."
Coptic Orthodox Church founded by Saint Mark the Evangelist, the first patriarch of Alexandria. By the early seventh century, Egypt was an almost exclusively Christian province of the Byzantine Empire. Then, between 639 and 642, Muslim Arabs conquered the country. At first the Copts functioned much as they had under the Byzantines, continuing to serve as civil servants in the new administration. Their lives began to change significantly, however, in 705, when Arabic replaced Greek as the language of government. Christian officials were obliged to become bilingual, and the process of their Arabization began. By the end of the ninth century, the Egyptians had widely adopted Arabic, and a substantial number of them, especially those residing in the Delta, had converted to Islam.
meaning of the term "Coptic:: originally applied to the Egyptian Christians. Today we use this theological classification as the designation of a style. In the Brooklyn catalog many objects are termed Coptic which have no Christian association. Coptic style a combination of Ancient Egyptian, Greek, Roman, Near Eastern. At the present time it is impossible to race the geographical distribution of Coptic art within Egypt at any given period.
Purely Christian subjects are infrequent in Coptic art before the sixth century and are not common until the seventh. With their decorative point of view, the Copts had little feeling for three-dimensional sculpture and it probably did not appeal to their taste. While there is nothing in Christianity to prohibit the use of sculptures the common use of them by the pagan religions and the associations with the multitudes then surviving from the Pharaonic period, must have prejudiced the Copts against them. Coptic crafts are not of outstanding quality, perhaps because they were interested primarily in the general effect and not in perfection of detail.
https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/opencollection/objects/9498
toy? http://www.louvre.fr/en/moteur-de-recherche-oeuvres?page=2&f_search_art=coptic
The largest category of sculpture was architectural: door jambs, lunettes, door lintels, gables for niches, cornices and friezes, pedestals and bases, columns and pilasters, capitals, latticework screens and windows, and posts. Most tomb reliefs were for architectural decoration
Marble. Sculpture in marble, in keeping with the origin of the stone, was subject to continual foreign influence. Its forms and motifs were based on prototypes produced in the eastern Roman empire, especially Constantinople. This association was so close, as, for example, in the case of column capitals, that pieces from imported, rough-cut marble clearly made in Egypt, probably in Alexandria, as a rule betray Egyptian workmanship not by their type and form but only through some iconographical detail, or occasionally through a lower level of quality. The marble pilaster capitals, however, were less closely connected with eastern models and reveal rather local forms and motifs. As a rule, these pieces must have been prepared for special architectural positions, were therefore less often brought into the country as finished imports, and may thus have offered a better starting point for local taste and local traditional forms than did the standardized column capitals
Sources
- Elizabeth S. Bolman, "Coptic Christianity" in Helen C. Evans, ed, with Brandie Ratliff, Byzantium and Islam: Age of Transition, 7th-9th century, (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2012), 69-70.
- Pagan and Christian Egypt: Egyptian Art from the First to the Tenth Century A.D., (Brooklyn: Brooklyn Museum Press, 1941), cat. 24, cat. 28.
Catalogue essays
Artist/designers
Cultures
Geography
Process/materials
Historical periods
Individuals
Subject terms
RELATED OBJECTS
PROVENANCE
1969-1982: Mr. and Mrs. Stanley Marcus
From 1982: Dallas Museum of Fine Arts, Foundation for the Arts Collection, The Mr. and Mrs. Stanley Marcus Collection of Fertility Figures [1]
[1] The Foundation for the Arts is a non-profit corporation created as a title-holding entity to serve the people of Dallas but to operate independently of the City. The Dallas Museum of Art (at its own cost) is responsible for the care, storage, insurance, conservation and maintenance of the collection, and agrees to maintain the highest museum standards in the management and handling of the Foundation's collection. The title to all works of art purchased or otherwise acquired by the Foundation for the Arts is retained by the Foundation. The name of the Dallas Museum of Fine Arts, founded in 1933, was changed to the Dallas Museum of Art in 1983
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