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(c) 2015 Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston
Canopic Jar with Cover
(c) 2015 Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston
(c) 2015 Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston

Canopic Jar with Cover

sculptor
Date1570 BCE - 1085 BCE
Place MadeEgypt, Ancient & Byzantine World-Africa
MediumAlabaster
Dimensions35 cm (13 3/4 in.)
ClassificationsFunerary Containers
Credit LineIsabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston
Accession numberS15w7.a-b
eMuseum ID726565
EmbARK ObjectID15745
Original NumberS15w7
TMS Source ID4277
Last Updated8/14/24
Status
Not on view
Web CommentaryCanopic jars preserved the internal organs of the deceased in ancient Egypt. Embalming the dead was an important part of Egyptian death rituals and ensured passage of the spirit into the afterlife. Isabella Stewart Gardner’s friend Joseph Lindon Smith, an artist who documented murals excavated at archaeological sites in Egypt for the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, helped her to acquire this jar in 1913.
BibliographyNotesGilbert Wendel Longstreet and Morris Carter. General Catalogue (Boston, 1935), p. 101. (Egyptian, Middle Kingdom or 18th Dynasty; cover is likely not original)
Betty Chamberlain. “Italian Rooms” in Alfred M. Frankfurter (ed). The Gardner Collection (New York, 1946), p. 9.
Clara Strauss. “Notes, Records, Comments.” Gardner Museum Calendar of Events 9, no. 32 (10 Apr. 1966), p. 2. (Egyptian, Middle Kingdom or 18th Dynasty)
Cornelius C. Vermeule III et al. Sculpture in the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum (Boston, 1977), p. 1, no. 1. (Egyptian, New Kingdom or later, 1570-1085 BCE)
ProvenanceNotesPurchased by Isabella Stewart Gardner in Cairo for $325 in November 1913, through the painter Joseph Lindon Smith (1863-1950).
(c) 2019 Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston
Unknown
about 1498-1500
(c) 2021 Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston
Unknown
19th century
(c) 2017 Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston
Unknown
about 150 BCE
Fragment of a Sarcophagus
Unknown
3rd century
Fragment of a Sarcophagus
Unknown
3rd century
Fragment of a Sarcophagus
Unknown
2nd century - 3rd century
Circular Cinerarium
Unknown
60 - 90
(c) 2019 Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston
Unknown
27 BCE - 81 CE
Cinerary Urn
Unknown
late 1st century