Bull Pallete Palette à fard célébrant une victoire. (Pallete celebrating a victory) Date Nagada III, vers 3300-3100 av. J.-C. Collection Louvre Museum
(upper figure detail) .
. (lower detail) Bull Pallete , obverse side
The Bull Palette (French: palette célébrant une victoire) is the fragment of an Ancient Egyptian greywacke palette, carved in low relief and used, at least in principle, as a cosmetic palette for the grinding of cosmetics. It is dated to Naqada III, the final two centuries of the fourth millennium BC, immediately preceding the Early Dynastic Period). It is in the collection of the Louvre, inventory no. E11255.[1]
The palette is broken and only a portion of half of it remains. Both sides of it are carved, with some figures on each side differing from the other. The accompanying image presents both sides.
The obverse of the cosmetic palette contains a large circular fortified city that is identified in its interior with a "larger-lion-and-'Nu'-(vessel)"–
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a hieroglyph represented to the right of the lioness.
The reverse of the cosmetic palette has iconography that became hieroglyphs for the: clenched fist,[2] five standards surmounted by animals, being represented by two hippopotamuses, the "Sacred Ibis", the Horus-Falcon, and the thuderbolt of Min–symbol.
A presumed 'fortified city' on the obverse (front) in the upper register has a major loss of the city-rectangle on upper left showing this medium-level bas relief. The register below appears to be a smaller area of the palette, and has the remains, (approximately one quarter), of a second fortified city; a bird is one identifier in the second city-fortified interior, with the rest missing.
The reverse (back) of the palette has the same bull overpowering a warrior motif.
A rope appears to encircle, or is at least part of the entire reverse, as one of the reverse motifs. The remaining piece-(of this broken cosmetic palette) has possibly one of the more important motifs preserved in the palettes corpus. Five standards are shown collectively on the right of the palette, and each is an iat standard (hieroglyph), but notably the base of each standard transforms into a 'clenched hand', which embraces the large-diameter rope encircling the reverse side.
The five standards are:
A hippopotamus with open mouth
A hippopotamus with open mouth
The "Sacred Ibis"
The standing Horus-Falcon
Symbol: "Thunderbolt of Min"-(an encircled snake on standard?)
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I'm not sure what the nationality of the above people on the palette, could be Near Eastern Mesopotamian, Libyan maybe. Nobody knows who they are. I also notice the rows in the beard are multiple, 3 of them.
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________________________________________________ Not clear if these are the same people or not
The Battlefield Palette
The Battlefield Palette (also known as the Vultures Palette, the Giraffes Palette, or the Lion Palette)[1] may be the earliest battle scene representation of the dozen or more ceremonial or ornamental cosmetic palettes of ancient Egypt. Along with the others in this series of palettes, including the Narmer Palette, it includes some of the first representations of the figures, or glyphs, that became Egyptian hieroglyphs. Most notable on the Battlefield Palette is the standard (iat hieroglyph), and Man-prisoner hieroglyph, probably the forerunner that gave rise to the concept of the Nine bows (representation of foreign tribal enemies).
The palettes probably date mostly from the Naqada III (ca. 3300–3100 BC),[2] i.e. late predynastic period, around 3100 BC.
An individual in robe appears fragmentarily behind a naked prisoners. He may be wearing a full-length dress made of leopard skin, and is probably a representative of the victorious Pharaoh standing behind one of the naked prisoner (naked, but for a penile sheath). The fragment in front of the prisoner may possibly be part of the ancient sign for "Lybia", an early enemy of pre-Dynastic Egyptian kings.The character would consist in the throwing stick on top of an oval, meaning "region", "place", "island", a toponym of Libya or Western Delta pronouced THnw, Tjehenw, as seen on the Libyan Palette.
this, one of a group of unidentified enemies on the Narmer palette looks more Libyan (or type of Libyan)
Tehenu Libyan captive Relief from Sahure's pyramid complex in Abusir Old Kingdom 5th dynasty of Egypt ca 2487–2475 BC Neues Museum, Berlin
One can see penis sheaths on the figures on the bull palette and battlefield palette and the older elongated wood figures of Naqada I. The Libyans seem to have one of a different type. There are also seen in ancient Crete.
The enemies on these palettes are naked. It is not clear if that's how they were in battle or if they were stripped of perhaps a skirt or other garment after capture and then fed to lions or mauled by bulls
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