National Museum in Warsaw

The Gallery of Ancient Art

A temporary exhibition embraces monuments from the sections of the art of Egypt, the Ancient East and Antiquity (Greece, Etruria and Rome).

Head of a statue of Ammon, Egypt

On display in the Egyptian section are copper, stone and clay vessels and sepulchral stelae from the Polish-French excavations at Edfu; a donation from the Institut Français d'Arch´ologie Oriental du Caire (sarcophagi and elements of grave equipment found, among other places, at Deir el-Medina); a deposit from the Louvre (stone sculptures) and items from the Polish private collections: of the Czartoryski family at Goluchow (a small Anubis figure, a cartonnage mask and small bronze figures) and of the Tyszkiewicz family at Lohojsk (Book of the Dead of the Nurse Kai).

Idol, Iran-Luristan

The Ancient East section is represented by Mesopotamian stamps and tablets with cuneiform writing, Assyrian reliefs and Luristan bronzes. In 1995 the Museum acquired a valuable set of monuments, mostly ceramic ones, from the Polish excavations at Tell Abu Hafur and Jesse el-Gharbi (Syria) .

Kantharos in the shape of satyr's head, Athens

Ancient monuments constitute the main body of the exhibition and account for its international rank. The most noteworthy include an ample set of painted Greek pottery (Attic vases from the Czartoryski Goluchow collection: the Panathenaic amphora by the Berlin Painter, the amphora by Euthymides, a hydria with the oldest known representation of Sappho) and South-Italian vases from the Branicki Wilanow collection. The exhibition documents the development of art, primarily that of Grecian drawing between the 10th and 1st c. B.C. Distinct among the Roman works on show are portraits from between the 1st and 3rd c. A. D., glass vessels and bronze monuments (a silver encrusted vase support found at Zakrzow, now a district of Wroclaw).

(J. L.)

(Plan: ground floor, I)

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