Commemorative stela of limestone

Commemorative stela of limestone, with a pointed top; containing a fruit or flower and two leaves. Beneath the triangular top portion of the relief is an inscription in Coptic text. The lower portion is decorated with a cross within a wreath.

Purchased from Mr Henry Wallis in 1896 with 13 other slabs of stone all carved with ornaments in the Coptic style . The papers in the museum's nominal file for Henry Wallis indicate that the purchase was intended to enrich the Egyptian holding of the museum. Other pieces purchased with this gravestone have now been given to the British Museum.

The majority of Coptic limestone stelae were erected in the vicinity of the grave to commemorate the deceased and provide a point of communication between the living and the dead. The term gravestone may not be entirely appropriate for such objects as they did not necessarily mark the exact place of burial. Some stelae are commemorative of a saint, perhaps presented as ex-voto. Coptic commemorative stelae vary widely in size, and this is one of middling dimensions.

The triangular shape to which the top of the present stela tapers, can be found on several other surviving examples. The triangular pediment, is so shaped in order to deliberately recall and substitute for a tomb chapel. On other stela this intention is made much more apparent, by the inclusion of side columns to support a more obviously architectural triangular pediment and the present stela undoubtedly follows in this tradition.

Inscriptions in Greek or Coptic are present on a great deal of Coptic funerary sculpture, usually containing a biographic epigram and a demand for prayer and remembrance - in their content such inscriptions follow an established Greek and Egyptian practice. The inscription on the present cross has not been successfully translated but would be expected to have a commemorative content.

Beneath the pediment and inscription, an aperture has been incised in the stone, in which a cross within a garland, an emphatically Christian emblem, has been situated. The origins of Christianity in Egypt are not entirely clear. According to the unproven tradition of the Coptic Church, reported by Eusebius, Christianity was introduced into Egypt by St Mark who landed in Alexandria between AD. 40 and 49 and indeed, the faith probably arrived from Judea sometime in the first century AD and probably became first established in Alexandria, which was both an intellectual centre and the home of a large Jewish community. Coptic Christians were fiercely persecuted in the third century AD under the reign of Diocletian. Thousands perished in The Great Persecution, but Christians were widely accepted again by the end of the fourth century and continued to practice their faith freely until the Arab conquest in 641AD. In attempts to represent Christian themes, the Copts drew on late Hellenistic and Roman motifs, such as the fish and the lotus flower. The cross within a wreath or crux immissia was another such motif. It appears in many media of Coptic art and can be found in mural paintings, carved in stone architecture and also in wooden friezes. The wreath appeared in earlier Coptic art, where it was used to glorify pagan deities, such as can be seen on a textile panel depicting a Nile river God in the Pushkin Museum and on a similar panel in the Hermitage Museum of the Goddess Gaea. Surrounded by a wreath, the crucifix is transformed in to a triumphal cross a symbol of Christian resurrection entirely appropriate for a Christian commemorative stela. Another good example of the crux immissa can be seen on a Coptic stela in the British Museum (museum number EA618) dated to the eighth century.

Vines, acanthus leaves and fruits occur within the corpus of surviving Coptic sculpture however the appearance of the plant which features within the pediment at the top of the present stela is quite singular. The shape of the fruit, the use of the emblem in association with death and the conjunction of the fruit with the triumphal cross suggest that it may represent a pomegranate; a middle-eastern fruit which became a symbol of Christian resurrection after its classical association with the descent of Proserpine into the underworld. The concentric rings on the fruit may be an attempt to create a degree of perspective on an otherwise two dimensional relief, or simply abstract ornament.

The majority of Coptic limestone stelae were erected in the vicinity of the grave to commemorate the deceased and provide a point of communication between the living and the dead. The triangular shape to which the top of this object tapers, can be found on several other surviving examples. The triangular pediment, is so shaped in order to deliberately recall and substitute for a tomb chapel. The stela is decorated with a cross within a wreath a symbol of Christian resurrection and an inscription which has not been successfully translated but which would be expected to commemorate the deceased and possibly demand a prayer on their behalf.

148-1896