Identification

ID in this catalogue	WCO 1
Type	Outflow water clock
Current Location	Egyptian Museum, Cairo
Catalogue Numbers	JE 37525
Provenance	Burial cachette in the court of the seventh pylon at Karnak (Legrain (1906), 65)
Date	Amenhotep III, 18th Dynasty, New Kingdom
Dimensions	External: height 34.5 cm; upper diameter 46 cm; lower diameter 26 cm Internal: height 30.6 cm; upper diameter 44.4 cm; lower diameter 23 cm Thickness of material: 2 cm (average) (After Mengoli (1989))
Material	Calcite (alabaster) or travertine (Müskens (2017))
Condition	Mostly complete - reassembled from fragments
Publications	As this is the most complete example of an Egyptian water clock, JE 37525 is widely referred to in passing throughout Egyptological scholarship. For the sake of brevity, this following list includes only work that provides significant detail: Legrain (1906); Daressy (1915); Sloley (1924, 1931); Pogo (1936b); Chatley (1940); Neugebauer & Parker (1969); Leblanc and Nelson (1976); von Mackensen (1978); Curto (1984); Dorner (1985); Cotterell, Dickson & Kamminga (1989);  Mengoli (1989); Mills & Symons (2000); Müskens (2017)

Content

External registers	3
External upper band of text	Not present
External lower band(s) of text	Not present
Exterior Astronomical Diagram	Yes, AR1 Water clock (Amenhotep III)
Rim	Civil month labels around the rim of the vessel, labelling the twelve columns of hour-marks on the interior surface by season and month.
Interior markings	Twelve columns of small round holes, each corresponding with a month name on the rim. Below each of these vertical scales is a raised relief symbol of either an anx or a Dd-pillar which alternate around the interior of the vessel.
Other features	The astronomical diagram's upper two registers are interrupted by scene of  Amenhotep III offering to Re-Horakhty (the Sun) and Thoth (the Moon).

Notes

This is the earliest surviving example of an ancient Egyptian outflow water clock. Originally discovered in pieces in Karnak, it has been restored and is on display in Cairo. The incised decoration has remnants of inlay in semi-precious stones.

See also the entry in: Schomberg, A., Berlin Waterclock Project, ID 15 Karnak, 2019, Edition Topoi, DOI: 10.17171/2-10-7. (Berlin cast of this object is ID 1.)

Images

The majority of images found online (by Googling for "Karnak clepsydra" or similar) are of replicas or reconstructions. The Global Egyptian Museum website has one photo here accompanying a record here.

 

Identification

ID in this catalogue	WCO 18
Type	Outflow water clock vessel, represented by two extant fragments
Current Location	Fragment a: Petrie Museum, London Fragment b: Sold at Sotheby's, now presumably in a private collection
Catalogue Numbers	Fragment a: UC55487 Fragment b: N/A
Provenance	Athribis/Mostai in the Nile Delta (Sotheby's listing), from the identification of an epithet of Thoth on the Petrie Museum fragment
Date	Dynasty 30, ?Nectanebo
Dimensions	Fragment a (from the Petrie Museum catalogue): height 12.7 cm; width 18.8 cm; thickness 4.5 cm Fragment b (from the Sotheby's catalogue): height 13.8 cm; depth 3.6 cm
Material	Basalt
Condition	The two fragments show careful manufacture but together make up very little of the original vessel. Both fragments come from the area near the bottom of the interior hour scales.
Publications	Online Petrie Museum catalogue can be visited here. Sotheby's sale catalogue listing here .

Content

External registers	Unknown
External upper band of text	Unknown
External lower band(s) of text	Partially preserved: Fragment a includes "Thoth son of the two Lords, he who emerges from the forehead". A vertical label on fragment b: "To consecrate the bread for his father who ensures that he is endowed with life" (Sotheby's sale catalogue listing)
Exterior Astronomical Diagram	The lower parts of the pharaoh and deities appear on both fragments, but it is unclear whether there were upper registers with astronomical material above.
Rim	Not preserved
Interior markings	Columns of dots, with Dd and wAs symbols underneath
Other features

Notes

Fragment b sold for 60,000 USD on 12 December 2013 at Sotheby's, New York.

See also the entries in:

Schomberg, A., Berlin Waterclock Project, ID 40 Petrie Museum, 2019, Edition Topoi, DOI: 10.17171/2-10-35 [Fragment a]
Schomberg, A., Berlin Waterclock Project, ID 23 Private Collection, 2019, Edition Topoi, DOI: 10.17171/2-10-16 [Fragment b]

Images

Fragment b: Sotheby's sale catalogue listing has intererior and exterior views here with high resolution zoomable images.

Fragment a: Exterior view, courtesy of The Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology UCL

Fragment a: Interior view, courtesy of The Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology UCL

 

Identification

ID in this catalogue	WCO 2
Type	Outflow water clock
Current Location	Egyptian Museum, Cairo
Catalogue Number(s)	JE 67096
Provenance	Tanis
Date	Necho II, 26th Dynasty, Late Period, based on the appearance of the prenomen wHm-ib-ra
Dimensions	The dimensions of this fragment remain unpublished, however Neugebauer and Parker (EAT 3) provide an estimation of the complete vessel to be: height: 37 cm; upper diameter 57 cm; lower diameter 52 cm.
Material	?Limestone
Condition	Incomplete. Four remaining and adjacent fragments have been joined.
Publications	Kircher (1654) Montet (1946) Schott (1950) Neugebauer & Parker (1969)

Content

External registers	A unique arrangement such that 4 distinct bands or subregisters are visible.
External upper band of text	Unknown. Top preserved register contains lunar months.
External lower band(s) of text	Unknown. Lowest preserved register contains hours of the night.
Exterior Astronomical Diagram	Yes. See here.
Rim	Not preserved.
Interior markings	According to Montet (1946), the interior is divided by bands of regular dots which end with the was sceptre or ankh sign.
Other features	The outflow hole of this vessel is on one of the remaining fragments and is located between the legs of a seated baboon.

Notes

This water clock is the only known example to contain (at least) four registers. The first contains the names of the lunar months. The second register contains the names of decans with their associated deities in a subregister below. A vignette of the pharaoh and Amun spans some of the second and third registers, while the remaining portion of the third contains a line of a text. The fourth register seems to have contained the hours of the day and night.

See also the entry in: Schomberg, A., Berlin Waterclock Project, ID 2 Necho, 2019, Edition Topoi, DOI: 10.17171/2-10-12

Schematic

Details of the exterior decoration can be found in the Astronomical Respresentations section of this database here.

Images

Montet (1946) has a line drawing. Figure 9 in Egyptian Astronomical Texts vol 3 reproduces Montet's drawing.