The Ka statue of king Hor dates to the

Thirteenth Dynasty In music or music theory, a thirteenth is the Musical note, note thirteen scale degrees from the root (chord), root of a chord (music), chord and also the interval (music), interval between the root and the thirteenth. The interval can be ...

of Ancient Egypt around 1750 BC. It is now on display in the

Egyptian Museum The Museum of Egyptian Antiquities, known commonly as the Egyptian Museum or the Cairo Museum, in Cairo, Egypt, is home to an extensive collection of ancient Egyptian antiquities. It has 120,000 items, with a representative amount on display a ...

Cairo Cairo ( ; ar, القاهرة, al-Qāhirah, ) is the Capital city, capital of Egypt and its largest city, home to 10 million people. It is also part of the List of urban agglomerations in Africa, largest urban agglomeration in Africa, List of ...

and regarded as one of the major works of Egyptian art. The statue was excavated in 1894 in the tomb of king

Hor Hor Awibre (also known as Hor I) was an Egyptian pharaoh of the Thirteenth dynasty of Egypt, 13th Dynasty reigning from c. 1777 BC until 1775 BCK.S.B. Ryholt, ''The Political Situation in Egypt during the Second Intermediate Period'', ''Carsten ...

that was found by a team of excavators under the direction of

Jacques de Morgan Jean-Jacques de Morgan (3 June 1857, Huisseau-sur-Cosson, Loir-et-Cher – 14 June 1924) was a French mining engineer, geologist, and archaeologist. He was the director of antiquities in Egypt during the 19th century, and excavated in Memph ...

. The tomb is located close to the pyramid of Amenemhat III at

Dahshur DahshurAlso transliterated ''Dahshour'' (in English often called ''Dashur'' ar, دهشور ' , ''Dahchur'') is a royal necropolis located in the desert on the west bank of the Nile approximately south of Cairo. It is known chiefly for several p ...

. The statue proper is 135 cm high. With base and ka-sign on the head, it is 170 cm high. The statue is made of wood, that was once covered with a thin layer of stucco that is gone today. The king is shown naked but there are traces on the wood, belonging to a belt. The statue might once have been adorned with a kilt. Around the neck the king bears a broad collar. The statue once was holding a staff and a scepter. On the head he bears today a Ka-sign. That was found next to the statue within a naos. The statue was found in the king's tomb within a wooden naos that was lying on the back side. The statue there also on the back. The wooden naos was once partly adorned with gold foil and hieroglyphic inscriptions presenting the king's names, but these are today lost. Ancient Egyptians believed that they have several types of souls or spirits. The Ka was the most important one and the statue evidently shows the king as his Ka. Dorothea Arnold observed that many offerings were found around the statue. She wonders whether the statue was once made for the king's cult temple. However the king reigned only very briefly; the temple was never built and the statue was placed into the tomb chamber. As an important work of art, the statue appears in many art histories of Ancient Egypt. W. Stevenson Smith sees in the figure an ''idealized naturalism'',W. Stevenson Smith: ''The Art and Architecture of Ancient Egypt'', revised with additions bt

William Kelly Simpson William Kelly Simpson (January 3, 1928 – March 24, 2017) was an American professor of Egyptology, Archaeology, Ancient Egyptian literature, and Afro-Asiatic languages at Yale University.The Cambridge University Catalogue. (2009)The Great Pyramid ...

, Harmondswoth, New York 1981, , p. 179 as other works of royal sculpture dating to about the late Twelfth Dynasty show often an elderly face, while that of Hor is idealized young.

References

{{Commons category, Ka statue of Horawibra (Egyptian Museum in Cairo) Sculptures of ancient Egypt Thirteenth Dynasty of Egypt Egyptian Museum