Face of Senwosret III

In the pictureOnly the face remains from a block of red quartzite. The eyelids hang heavy, the folds between nose and mouth are deep, and the corners of the mouth turn down. Traces of the stripes of a headdress remain above the forehead, showing that this was a statue of a king. It is a little over 16 cm tall.

BackgroundEgyptian sculpture usually showed kings as eternally young and perfect, but the portraits of Senwosret III in the 19th century B.C. are the exception. An aged, care-worn face recurs across his many surviving statues, and whether it reflects his actual face or carves an ideology of "the king who worries for his people," it is counted as the most individual royal face in the history of Egyptian art. He was the king who led the Middle Kingdom to its height through campaigns in Nubia and administrative reforms.

Puzzle tipEven with few pieces, the texture of the stone makes it hard. Fit the pieces with the dark shadows of the eyes, nose and mouth first, and establish the shape of the face with the outline pieces where the gray background meets the red surface of the stone. Fill in the uniform red pieces inside the face last.