An exceptional Egyptian Red Jasper Torpedo Vase, Third Intermediate Period, ca. 1069 - 664 BCE

A rare and exceptional vessel carved from jasper, that graduates in color from dark red to yellow green, the ovoid body tapering to the pointed base, the short straight shoulders sloping slightly downward, continuing on each side to a perforated lug extending to flanges below, the short neck with a flaring flat rim, grooved on the interior. The vessel features incised lines on one side with a ray motif.

Jasper is a hard, often mottled red, green, or yellow form of quartz (silicon dioxide). Only the red variety, which is found in a number of localities in the Eastern Desert, and the green type, which occurs naturally alongside or even within layers of red, as found in this example, were generally used in manufacture. Khemnet, the word for red jasper, was derived from the verb nm', to delight', and links this stone with the positive aspect of red which was the colour of blood with all its connotations of energy, dynamism, power, even life itself. It was the red stone par excellence, prescribed by Chapter 156 of the Book of the Dead as the material for the Girdle Tie of Isis amulet.

Cf: Andrews, Carol, Amulets of Ancient Egypt, London: British Museum Press, 1994, p. 103. 

Medium: Jasper

Dimensions: Height: 3 7/8 inches (9.8 cm)

Condition:  The vessel is intact and in excellent condition overall.  A rare and exceptional example.

Provenance: Royall Tyler (1884 - 1953), thence by descent. Royall ("Peter") Tyler was an historian, diplomat, economist, and art connoisseur. He was his the deputy commissioner general of the Economic and Financial Section of the League of Nations in Geneva (1924–1928). In 1923, Royall Tyler and Elisina Tyler acquired (and later restored) the historic garrison-castle, Antigny-le-Château, in Burgundy. Tyler was instrumental in organizing the first international exhibition of Byzantine art in Paris in 1931. In the same year, he became the League of Nations Financial Committee’s financial advisor to the Hungarian government in Budapest (1931–1938). In 1938, Tyler was appointed as expert in the Economic and Financial Section of the League of Nations in Geneva (1938–1943). Between 1943 and 1949, Tyler served as the Swiss representative of the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA) and, in 1944, as the special attaché to the U.S. Legation in Bern. He died at the age of sixty-eight on March 2, 1953, in Paris, apparently by suicide.