Watercolour, A Nubian Girl standing beside the First[?] Cataract of the Nile, about 1839. Achille-Constant-Théodore-Emile Prisse d'Avennes

Watercolour drawing

Purchased with the assistance of the National Heritage Memorial Fund, Art Fund, Shell International and the Friends of the V&A

According to Rodney Searight: - `Bt. Covent Gdn. Gallery (Exhibn.), [Summer Exhibition, 1977 (3)] June 1977, £125'.

For a similar subject, see E. Prisse and J. A. St. John, Oriental Album, 1848, Pl.XXV, Nubian Females; Kanoosee Tribe. Philae, lithograph by E. LeRoux. Possibly drawn on the same Nile voyage as SD.853. The girl stands beside a Roman grave stone, inscribed in Latin, and an ancient Egyptian block inscribed with hieroglyphs.

n January 2012, Val Maxfield, a scholar specialising in Roman Egypt and Roman forts in Nubia, sent, via Dr Robert Morkot, these comments on the inscription placed on the altar in the image: -

It is, [the inscription] I suspect, made up. There are a number of problems:

1. The text is that of a tombstone, as the introductory phrase, DM (Dis Manibus) makes clear, but the the form of the stone is an altar. While there are altar-form tombstones they are rarely highly decorative altars like this one and I know of none in Egypt;
2. The man's name incorporates a family nomen (Aemilius) as what I assume is meant to be the name of his father (since it is in the genitive) which should be a praenomen; meanwhile there appears a praenomen (Gaius) where there should be a nomen;
3. There is no legion XXIV - the nearest numbered Egyptian legion was XXII (Deiotariana), the others being III Cyrenaica and II Traiana (+ XII Fulminata but only till AD 10)
4. The only legion I know to have got the honoric P V (Pia Vindex) is III Augusta, based in Numidia, who acquired it at the time of Septimius Severus. Of the legions known to be in Egypt, II Traiana had PF (Pia Fidelis) while III Cyrenaica and XXII Deiotariana are not known to have any. Elsewhere, XIV Gemina was MV (Martia Victrix); XX was VV (Valeria Victrix); XXX was VV (Ulpia Victrix);
5. The line with A N in is, I assume, meant to reflect the age element of a tombstone (for example AN(norum) LIV) but you would not expect a stop between the A and the N;
6. The phrase 'sub ascia' is not common - I know of no examples on military tombstones;
7. I have not tried to transcribe the final line, but it could be trying to incorporate the phrase 'bene merenti' which sometimes occurs on tombstones.

So all of the elements of the text (except legion XXIV) do exist individually (including having stops in odd places) but they have come together in an impossible way.

Prisse d' Avennes journeyed up the Nile on several occasions in the company of travellers who commissioned watercolours of local scenes from him. [See SD.853]. It seems that he saw girls like the one depicted here, since a similar figure appears in the lithograph Nubian Females; Kanoosee Tribe. Philae, published in his Oriental Album (1848). He must also have been aware that the skirt and hair-style resemble those of the Nubian dancing girls depicted in Ancient Egyptian reliefs. The whole scene is a delightful capriccio in which Prisse has brought together a variety of Egyptian components: as well as the girl with her wicker basket, there is a Nile cataract, a Roman gravestone inscribed in Latin, an ancient Egyptian stone block inscribed with hieroglyphics, and even some typical local flora and fauna.

SD.854