Requires Photography

Shawabty of Queen Akheqa

Napatan Period, reign of Aramatelka
568–555 B.C.

Findspot: Nubia (Sudan), Nuri, Pyramid 38


Overall: 15.8 x 6.9 cm (6 1/4 x 2 11/16 in.)

Accession Number


Medium or Technique


Not On View


The Ancient World


Shawabties and shawabty boxes

This is a shawabty of Queen Akheqa. The female figure wears the queen’s vulture headdress over the tripartite wig. There are seven horizontal lines of incised text encircling the body. The text is framed and there is a narrow blank area up the center of the back. The text is painted black. Here the hands are opposed and the arms are not crossed. In each hand the figure holds a hoe. In addition the left hand holds a cord to a seed bag which is slung over the left shoulder. The object was broken in five pieces and three of them are mended. The lower legs and feet are missing. The hands, nose, vulture, forehead and wig are chipped.



From Nubia (Sudan), Nuri, Pyramid 38 (tomb of Queen Akheqa). 1917: excavated by the Harvard University–Boston Museum of Fine Arts Expedition; assigned to the MFA in the division of finds by the government of Sudan.

Credit Line

Harvard University—Boston Museum of Fine Arts Expedition