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| Tenderly holding Neferure on his lap, British Museum |
He made for the sculpture gallery.
Egypt, both divinely monumental and
naturalistic, surrounded him. Two statues of Pharaoh Amenhotep III, powerfully
formed in dark granodiorite, flanked the entranceway to a hall, granting
admittance, and inside, as stone slid by, other familiar sights came into view,
a red granite lion with charmingly crossed forepaws, and further on, the statue
of the Chief Steward Senenmut tenderly holding the daughter of Queen Hatshepsut,
the little princess Neferure, on his lap - the child wrapped within his cloak
and her face peeping out - then a soaring, crowned head of Pharaoh Amenhotep in
the background. And people everywhere, creating a sound of buzzing like voices
in a cathedral at prayer time...
