70An object worked in stone is a document that, correctly understood, describes its own manufacture. This is especially true of unfinished works, of which there are many, but it is also true of finished works. A piece of worked stone has a language inscribed on its surface that can be read by those who have learned the signs.

Peter Rockwell, The Art of Stoneworking, 1993

For millennia ancient Egyptians quarried vast quantities of stone from the Nile Valley and the deserts beyond, and turned it into sculpture ranging from miniature to monumental. Particularly impressive is their exploitation of hard stones, such as granite, granodiorite, graywacke, anorthositic gneiss or basalt. While tomb paintings can provide some insight into hard stone working methods, there is significant disagreement among scholars about the forms and materials of the tools themselves, how they were used by ancient stoneworkers, and how these factors relate to the broad range of surface textures we observe. This paper addresses these questions through a systematic characterization of the tool marks remaining on the objects’ surfaces.

The need for an in-depth study of tool marks on stone sculpture, particularly for the benefit of authenticity studies, has already been noted,1 and the case studies presented in this paper come out of a multidisciplinary research project addressing this gap in scholarship. Open questions about the forms and materials of the tools themselves and the processes used by ancient stoneworkers to produce a wide range of surface textures were explored through the following methods: documentation of tool marks with Reflectance Transformation Imaging (RTI); examination of ancient tools; experimental archaeology; and consultation with stone carvers.2 This paper will largely focus on the evaluation of imaging results, presenting case studies that illustrate useful comparisons between tool marks observed and recorded on Egyptian stone sculpture in the collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art. The specific objects explored in this paper are relatively small-scale sculptures, and although the means of their production undoubtedly has overlap with large-scale sculpture, lapidary work, architecture, and stone vessel production, I have attempted to limit the number of variables explored. Most of the objects included in this study were excavated by The Met in the early 20th century.

My observations are grounded in a comprehensive review of previous scholarly work,3 and are especially indebted to the work of Peter Rockwell and Denys Stocks. Stocks’ in-depth exploration of Egyptian stoneworking technology takes into consideration environmental factors, natural resources, evaluation of unfinished artifacts and existing tools, as well as other archaeological and pictorial evidence, and combines this research with experimental work.4 Rockwell, a traditionally trained sculptor and expert on the history of the craft, published important works on stone carving technology5 and taught this subject extensively. I had the privilege of learning from him first-hand through an independent study and then as a Fellow at the American Academy in Rome. My assessment of tool marks builds on Rockwell’s comprehensive tool mark analysis, some of which has been recorded in The Art of Making in Antiquity: Stoneworking in the Roman World (https://artofmaking.ac.uk/), a web feature on which he collaborated. Although little of Rockwell’s published work deals directly with stone carving in ancient Egypt, the methodology he employed is broadly applicable. Indeed, in their essay on stoneworking tools and tool marks for the website The Art of Making in Antiquity, Wootton, Russell and Rockwell observed that “practitioners are often the best guides for interpreting toolmarks on ancient carvings and how these were made because they are used to working in a wide variety of stones and are aware of the ranges of tools in existence.”6

I collaborated with Rockwell on a series of experiments in soft and hard stone carving, most of which were based on the previous experiments of Zuber7 and Stocks. In fact, many assumptions about stone carving tools and methods are based at least in part on replication experiments and the observation of contemporary workshop practice. Replication experiments can be invaluable in informing our understanding of ancient technology. Craft production is simultaneously a visual, audio and tactile experience, and while we might be able to understand the 71main steps in the chaîne opératoire from more conventional investigations, there are many micro-decisions in the craft process that can only be guessed at.8 Well-researched replication might help us understand some of those unknowns – the sound the tool makes, the changing nature of the tools as they are damaged through use, etc – and should be driven by the objects themselves, based on a systematic cataloguing of toolmarks. While it is important to recognize the impossibility of replicating all variables in the system, and that ancient craftspeople lived in a completely different environment and developed collective skills over millennia,9 it is clear that an intimate knowledge of craft practice must inform all scholarship on stone carving in the ancient world.

When looking at tool marks it is important to understand the physical properties of the substrate. Hardness and homogeneity are critical factors that inform how and with what a stone can be carved.10 In this paper, as in most literature on the subject, the term “soft stone” is used to describe stones such as limestone, sandstone and steatite which have an equivalent scratch hardness of 3 or below on the Mohs Scale.11 Stones such as indurated limestone, graywacke, granite, granodiorite and silicified sandstone, which have an equivalent scratch hardness that is greater than 3 on the Mohs Scale, are classified as “hard stones”. However, these categories are not rigid and can vary based on the geological origin of the stone. For example, as will be discussed later, serpentinite is classified by Aston, Harrell and Shaw as a hard stone, but, according to Klemm and Klemm, Egyptian serpentinite has a hardness equivalent to that of calcite, which is Mohs 3. Of equal importance is the recognition that the Mohs scale was developed for assessing mineral hardness; the equivalent Mohs hardness of a rock reflects that rock’s cohesiveness, and may have little to do with the hardness of the minerals that compose it.12

Scratch hardness is a useful determination when discussing the ease with which a stone is carved, but I am not aware of any systematic study of the scratch hardness of Egyptian stone types. Where Mohs numbers are presented in this paper, it should be noted that they come from literature references where the method used to calculate the Mohs number is not reported.

Fig. 1

Nina de Garis Davies (1881–1965). Sculptors at Work, Tomb of Rekhmire, Dynasty 18, ca. 1479–1425 BCE. Original from Egypt, Upper Egypt, Thebes, Sheikh Abd el-Qurna, Tomb of Rekhmire (TT 100). Tempera on paper, facsimile: h. 54 cm (21 1/4 in); w. 38.5 cm (15 3/16 in) scale 1:1. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Rogers Fund, 1930 (30.4.90).

This paper focuses predominantly on the implications of tool marks on our understanding of tool kits and carving methodology. Much has been written on quarrying methods,13 the extent to which statues were carved at the quarry site,14 what can be learned about sculpture production through the study of the few urban workshops that are known to us,15 and stone-working debris at building sites.16 However, Stocks notes the difficulty in assessing the chronological development of ancient Egyptian technology, especially because we don’t know if there are any tools missing from the archaeological record.17 Painted depictions of sculptors at work, such as that represented in Fig. 1, provide insight about tool form and use, but it has been generally acknowledged that these images are not always reliable sources for technological information – Egyptians tend to show statues in their finished state, even when they are at an early stage in the sculptural process.18

72What is known about stone carving tools and methods can be summarized as follows. The ancient Egyptians, and indeed most cultures across time and geography, worked stone with a combination of percussion and abrasion.

Percussive tools take a variety of forms: they can be simply held and struck against a stone surface, they can be mounted to a handle and wielded, or they can be held and struck with a mallet.

They include pounders, axes, mauls, adzes and chisels19 and they either cut or fracture the stone, depending on the form of the tool and the nature of the stone. Abrasive tools include grinders, rubbers, scrapers and loose abrasive particles or abrasive slurries used on their own or with saws and drills.

Fig. 2

a) Stone mason's chisel and mallet; chisel: Middle Kingdom, Dynasty 11, reign of Mentuhotep II, ca. 2051-2000 BCE. Egypt, Thebes, Deir el-Bahri, Tomb MMA 101, in front of chamber 3 west, MMA excavations, 1926–27. Hammered bronze or copper alloy, L. 19.5 cm, W. 2.2 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Rogers Fund, 1927 (27.3.12); mallet: Middle Kingdom, Dynasty 12, reign of Senwosret I, ca. 1961–1917 BCE. Egypt, Memphite Region, Lisht South, Pyramid Temple of Senwosret I, MMA excavations. Wood, H. 28 cm, W. 15 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Rogers Fund and Edward S. Harkness Gift, 1924 (24.1.76).

b) Scraper, probably New Kingdom, Ramesside – Third Intermediate Period, ca. 1184–664 BCE. Egypt, Memphite Region, Lisht North, MMA excavations. Flint, L. 4.5, W. 3.2cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Rogers Fund, 1948 (48.105.38n).

c) Grinding stone, New Kingdom, Ramesside, Dynasty 19–20, ca. 1295–1070 BCE. From Egypt, Memphite Region, Lisht North, Late New Kingdom Settlement, MMA excavations, 1906–08. Silicified sandstone (?), L. 9 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Rogers Fund, 1915 (15.3.1717).

In the Predynastic Period, craftspeople employed stone tools, including axes, adzes and grinders; these tools were predominantly used in the prolific stone vessel industry. Skills honed in this era were integral to early experimentation with hard stone carving in the Early Dynastic Period20 and the proliferation of statuary production in the Old Kingdom. Cast copper tools first appear from Nagada II,21 and Petrie suggested that certain stone tools were imitated in copper.22 However, copper and bronze tools, such as adzes and chisels,23 were almost certainly used exclusively for the working of soft stones like limestone. My experimental work,24 and that of Zuber and Stocks, demonstrates that percussive tools made from copper or bronze are ineffective on hard stone, suggesting instead the use of stone percussive tools.

Mauls, hammers and pounders made from dense hard stones would have been used for rough shaping and creating flat surfaces. Interestingly, Arnold notes that Incan stone workers in 15th-century South America dressed their granite, porphyry and andesite with practically the same tools.25 These tools varied in shape and size and were used for almost the entire carving process. The marks left by this category of tools generally appear as shallow pits or depressions, formed as the stone is shattered or fractured from impact. The worked surface always has contiguous depressions, most often with no discernible direction.26

Fine carving, on the other hand, was likely done with chisels made from flint.27 Although flint tools definitively 73identified as implements for stone working have yet to be identified, a few flint tools knapped to the appropriate shape have been noted,28 and flint flakes have been found among builders’ debris, although the relative absence of deposits of flint debris is noteworthy.29 This might be explained by the presence of finished flint tools at quarry sites,30 suggesting that tools were knapped at the flint quarries rather than in sculpture workshops, but this point requires further investigation. More critical evidence for the use of flint can be found in the examination of tool marks,31 a point which will be reinforced later in this paper. Flint chisels driven by wood or stone mallets could have been effectively used on both hard and soft stones throughout Egyptian history. Stocks also convincingly proposes the use of flint tools as gravers and scrapers to create fine lines and sharp outlines, respectively.32

While it is likely that the use of flint tools extended well in to the first millennium, the place of iron tools in this narrative is still debated. Arnold notes that by the 26th Dynasty iron was as common a material as bronze, and he believes that tool marks indicative of iron can be seen on hard stone at this time33 while Devaux writes that iron tools capable of working hard stones come into use in the 27th Dynasty.34 Stocks, on the other hand, argues that Late Period iron chisels could not have been used to cut hard stone, and that flint tools were still used for this task.35 Despite disagreement about the exact timing of this technological shift, there is evidence that the process for making quenched and tempered steel was known in the Mediterranean region by the 7th century BCE, and this would have had significant impact on the utility of metal tools on hard stones.

Regardless of the type of percussive tool used, it is clear that abrasive methods were especially crucial for the working of hard stones, not just to impart the desired surface but also for rough shaping. Copper drills and saws first appear in the Old Kingdom, and these were used in combination with an abrasive slurry for cutting hard stones.36 In fact, it is highly likely, from an efficiency perspective, that a significant amount of stone removal and rough shaping were accomplished with abrasive technology. Finishing was likely carried out with a combination of rubbing or grinding stones37 and abrasive slurries. Rubbing or grinding stones were often made from silicified sandstone38 and other stones with a high quartz content. The composition of the abrasive materials used has been extensively debated:39 were hard stones shaped and polished using solely quartz-based abrasives, or did the Egyptians have access to harder materials? It has been demonstrated through archaeological evidence and experimental data40 that corundum, a mineral with a hardness of Mohs 9, and emery, a stone containing corundum minerals, were employed by craftsmen in the ancient Mediterranean and Near East, but were these materials part of the Egyptian tool kit? Although some scholars have posited the use of emery abrasive powder,41 this was countered by others citing the lack of direct evidence for the use of this material in Egypt, as well as the lack of known sources of emery in Egypt and the presence of quartz sand embedded in ancient drill holes.42 However, abundant corundum particles were found in the base of a drill hole in a small fragment of indurated limestone (57.180.142), excavated at the Great Temple of the Aten at Amarna.43 These particles were mixed with powdered limestone, and corroded fragments of a bronze drilling tool. This discovery suggests that corundum could have been introduced as an abrasive material by 1350 BCE, but in order to draw any inferences about the implications of this on sculpture production more data points are necessary.

In terms of methodology, unfinished statuary demonstrates that the basic sculptural process was to rough out a cube of stone, execute preliminary drawings on all sides, and then to work inwards from each side.44 Thinking specifically about hard stone statuary, Rockwell cites the unfinished seated statues of Mycerinus in the MFA Boston, the carving of which is also discussed in detail by Devaux.45 They are carved in “a hard-stone technique, whereby the stone is removed by vertical pounding so that it is shattered into small bits as the carver moves over the surface. The surface is pitted, and the pitting becomes finer and finer as the carving nears completion.”46 Rockwell compares these third millennium statues with unfinished works from the second and first millennia.47 All of the statues demonstrate a method in which the form evolves using a sequence of progressively more complex geometric solids. The 74difference lies in which geometry was used as the basis for the finished form: for example, the second millennium carver has a more sophisticated sense of geometric solids than the third millennium carver, and the first millennium carver uses a series of sequential planes rather than squared or curved solids of the earlier works.48 Regardless of manufacture date, the subtractive nature of stone carving usually ensures that completed works will bear little or no evidence of the vast majority of the carving process; often the only marks preserved will be from finishing, such as the percussive carving of fine details or abrasive processes.

An equally important methodological point relates to tool usage. Rockwell notes that granite is often worked by holding a tool vertical to the stone and smashing it. Therefore, tools are thicker and blunter than those for softer stones and must be sharpened or re-forged more often.49 Rockwell was referring to granite carving after pharaonic Egypt – should we assume that flint chisels were used in the same manner? The mechanism by which a tool is used to remove stone has direct bearing on the tool marks left behind, as does the material from which a tool is made, its shape, and the methodological approach that the carver takes to realize the finished work. This is the salient point when assessing a stone sculpture from a technical perspective, whether one’s interest is in the relative effort that went into an object's production, workshop practice, or authenticity. What can tool marks tell us? Does an iron chisel bruise the stone differently than flint? What is the difference between abrasive marks from quartz and harder minerals like corundum? What is the relationship between tool marks on a surface and how can we use this relationship to make observations about tool usage and methodology? As Rockwell writes, “[i]n a technology where the written documentation is scarce and often confusing, or written by those who were not familiar with it, usually the only accurate evidence is the object itself.”50

Most investigations of tool marks on stone present them either using conventional photography or SEM images of silicone rubber impressions. The merits and drawbacks of these methods have been previously discussed,51 and on this basis, RTI was used here as the primary method for visual analysis and documentation.52 With RTI, a series of high-resolution images, each with distinct information about highlights and shadows, are synthesized to create interactive image files. RTI reveals texture and detail that are often difficult to see with the naked eye or challenging to record due to an object’s optical properties. Color and shape information are encoded in each pixel, allowing the user to re-light the object from an infinite number of angles and facilitating the mathematical enhancement of surface features.53

All images presented in this paper are exported from RTI files that were generated using the Highlight-based RTI Capture and Processing methods published by Cultural Heritage Imaging (CHI).54 RTI data sets were captured using a Canon 5D Mark II DSLR with a Canon 100mm f/2.8L Macro lens. The light source was a Canon speedlight that was triggered with a remote transmitter mounted on the lens and a hand-held remote. Enhancement modes applied in RTIViewer are noted in the caption of each image. The two enhancement modes found to be most useful for visualizing the surfaces of the objects presented in this paper are specular enhancement55 and coefficient unsharp masking.56

The visualizations generated through this relatively inexpensive, readily available technique are qualitative and their limitations must be recognized,57 but if executed according to CHI Guidelines RTI can reduce some of the subjectivity of standard photography and can be highly accurate and reproduceable.58

In the process of recording tool marks on a wide range of stone objects, several interesting threads of inquiry emerged: differences in hard stone and soft stone carving; variations in finishing work on statuary elements; variations in the carving of hieroglyphs; and possible evidence of a changing tool kit. I explore these topics below through a series of case studies which lay out a methodology for the exploration of stone carving tools and technology. The objects presented here come from a range of time periods and vary in place of origin and function. The majority are from the collection of The Metropolitan 75-76Museum of Art, most of which were excavated by The Metropolitan Museum and acquired through the division of finds.

It should also be noted that the stone identifications presented in this paper have most often been carried out by visual examination rather than scientific analysis. In general, the misindentification of stone types in museum labels and publications is common. The stone identifications in this paper are most often based on visual characteristics and comparison with scientifically identified samples and relevant literature, in consultation with geologists. Detailed petrographic classification would require the preparation and analysis of thin sections.

As this article has demonstrated, documentation with RTI allows for a more detailed comparison of tool marks on a wide variety of stone types and a more accurate recording of complex surfaces. RTI documentation brings to light a wide variety of tool marks, many of which can reasonably be assigned to tools in the ancient stoneworker’s tool kit. However, this systematic recording of tool marks also generates a number of new questions, and there are still some tool marks that cannot yet be explained by existing scholarship. For example, could flint chisels really be used to produce the incredibly fine and relatively deep hieroglyphs on the seated Middle Kingdom statue from Museo Barracco? Are there, as Stocks suggests, tools that are completely missing from the archaeological record? Perhaps there are flint nodules that are especially tough and which could be knapped in a particular fashion so that they held a very fine point. Or perhaps chisels with incredibly fine points could be fashioned from dolerite or a similarly dense stone. Maybe points made from hard minerals like corundum, microcrystalline varieties of quartz or other gemstones could be embedded in another material like copper or wood and used as a graver. All of these hypotheses require further investigation, including the consideration of contemporary gemstone carving technologies around the region.82

Given the challenges to interpretation already mentioned, the images and observations presented in this article should serve not as definitive examples of a particular tool or technique, but rather as a starting point for useful comparison. Despite the seemingly programmatic approach to sculpture production, Egyptian stone statuary exhibits tremendous technical variation at the micro level. This makes sense – the ancient world had craftspeople with skill levels that were miraculous, mediocre, and everything in between. Tools must also have varied in quality 88and certainly their efficacy changed with use. And despite the seeming consistency in tools and techniques throughout the Pharaonic era, no doubt there were many minor shifts in practice that resulted in variation which may now seem puzzling to us.

A better understanding of all of this variation would be greatly aided by further exploration of the relationship between tool marks over the entire surface of an object. This is, of course, part of standard visual examination, but really understanding the relationship of toolmarks across a sculpture’s surface may benefit from from technology beyond RTI. The creation between high-resolution 3-D models could facilitate the recording and scholarly exploration of tool marks across a surface while also providing actual geometric data, such as the specific angle and depth of a mark. This technology is rapidly advancing, and I plan to explore its possibilities in future work.

Another useful avenue to explore would involve looking beyond the borders of Egypt. What can we learn by exploring other ancient stone carving traditions? Sculptors of hard stone in the ancient Near East, South America, Asia and elsewhere faced similar challenges to their Egyptian counterparts. Cross-cultural comparison of tool marks might shed some additional light on questions such as the distinction between abrasive marks made by quartz and harder minerals, or the distinction between marks made from stone and iron chisels.

And lastly, in the realm of authenticity studies, it will be necessary to thoroughly understand the carving technology employed in the creation of forgeries. Documenting tool marks on known forgeries would provide another critical point of comparison.

This study leaves many questions unanswered and raises many new questions that are equally challenging to address. However, it is clear that learning to read the marks inscribed in a surface helps us to tell the production story of an object. Even if there are gaps in the story, the actions illuminated by the study and documentation of tool marks may give significant insight into the context of a sculpture’s production. Tool marks can help us better understand aesthetics and style, and they can also hint at energy expenditure and the resources required for sculpture production. Lastly, tool marks have an immediacy. They can give us access to the individuals who created an object, including their handling of tools, micro-mistakes and decision-making – sometimes this is the closest we can get to these often extraordinarily skilled individuals who were rarely memorialized.

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