Female Figurines from the Mut Precinct

Context and Ritual Function

By (author) Elizabeth A. Waraksa

Book cover: Female Figurines from the Mut Precinct

Extent: 263 pages

Publisher: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht

Subjects: Ancient Egypt

Language: English

Hardback (Published)

(December 2009)

ISBN: 9783727816536

Price: $82.00

In stock

Presenting a catalogue and typology, this book also examines the manufacture of the figurines as standardized objects, and focuses on their decoration with red pigment and their fragmentary nature, implying deliberate breakage.


This study, prompted by the excavation of ceramic female figurines by the Johns Hopkins expedition between 2001-04 at the Mut Precinct in Luxor, aims to define more fully their function as ritual objects. After presenting a catalogue and typology, Waraska examines the manufacture of the figurines as standardised objects, and focuses on two particular features, their decoration with red pigment and their fragmentary nature, implying deliberate breakage. She argues that ceramic female figurines were produced in workshops, utilized by magician/physicians in healing rituals, and regularly snapped and discarded at the end of their effective lives.

  • By (author) Elizabeth A. Waraksa