The lunette spatial region in the upper portion of stelas, became common for stelas as a prelude to a stele's topic. Its major use was from ancient Egypt in all the various categories of stelas: funerary, Victory stelas, autobiographical, temple, votive, etc. The lunettes are most common from ancient Egyptian stelas, as not only is the topic of the stele presented, but honorific gods, presenters, individuals, etc. are previewed, and often with

Egyptian hieroglyphic Egyptian hieroglyphs (, ) were the formal writing system used in Ancient Egypt, used for writing the Egyptian language. Hieroglyphs combined logographic, syllabic and alphabetic elements, with some 1,000 distinct characters.There were about 1,00 ...

statements. The main body of the stele is then presented below, often separated with a horizontal line (

register Register or registration may refer to: Arts entertainment, and media Music * Register (music), the relative "height" or range of a note, melody, part, instrument, etc. * ''Register'', a 2017 album by Travis Miller * Registration (organ), th ...

), but not always. In Egyptian stelas, many have horizontal lines of hieroglyphs; often the lunette will contain shorter vertical statements in hieroglyphs, sometimes just names of the individuals portrayed, hieroglyphs in front, or behind the individual.

19th Dynasty Egypt, post Amarna

From the post-

Amarna Amarna (; ar, العمارنة, al-ʿamārnah) is an extensive Egyptian archaeological site containing the remains of what was the capital city of the late Eighteenth Dynasty. The city was established in 1346 BC, built at the direction of the Ph ...

period onwards, many personal stelas made exhortations to the

ancient Egyptian deities Ancient Egyptian deities are the gods and goddesses worshipped in ancient Egypt. The beliefs and rituals surrounding these gods formed the core of ancient Egyptian religion, which emerged sometime in prehistory. Deities represented natural f ...

; stelas to specific gods "were erected to intervene personally with the local god, often to seek justice or offer an explanation for things that had gone wrong in their lives. The deceased is shown kneeling, holding up his hands in prayer, ....." Some of the personal votive stelas had ears (hieroglyphs), to represent the gods listening to the supplicant.Hobson, Ibid., p 17

Gallery

Ancient Eyptian

File:Museo archeologico di Firenze, Museo Egizio, stele del sacerdote Gedhor (età tolemaica).JPG, Example of Lunette with Wings, (filling the ''semicircle'' top of stele) File:Luxor temple46.JPG, Lunette of upper Ancient Egyptian stele, filled with vertical

s of hieroglyphs File:Stele of Amenhotep I.jpg, File:NectaneboI-Stele.png, Twin steles of Decree of Nectanebo I, for

Nectanebo I Nectanebo I ( Egyptian: ; grc-gre, Νεκτάνεβις ; died 361/60 BCE) was an ancient Egyptian pharaoh, founder of the last native dynasty of Egypt, the 30th. Name Nectanebo's Egyptian personal name was Nḫt-nb.f, which means "the stron ...

File:Stele cobra goddess Louvre N4193.jpg, Ancient Egypt stele (a snake aficionado) File:Egypte louvre 269 stele.jpg, (minor upper ''lunette'')
Deeply incised,

bas-relief Relief is a sculptural method in which the sculpted pieces are bonded to a solid background of the same material. The term '' relief'' is from the Latin verb ''relevo'', to raise. To create a sculpture in relief is to give the impression that th ...

main body of stele

Non-Egyptian

File:Victory stele of Naram Sin 9064.jpg, Upper scene from

Naram-Sin of Akkad Naram-Sin, also transcribed Narām-Sîn or Naram-Suen ( akk, : '' DNa-ra-am D Sîn'', meaning "Beloved of the Moon God Sîn", the "𒀭" being a silent honorific for "Divine"), was a ruler of the Akkadian Empire, who reigned c. 2254–2218 BC ...

's stele

References

*Hobson, ''The World of the Pharaohs: a Complete Guide to Ancient Egypt'', Christine Hobson, c 1997, Thames and Hudson, Steles Ancient Egyptian stelas {{AncientEgypt-stub