About this artwork

This piece is described as a stele, and it may have been intended as a funerary object to be placed in a tomb or temple. The particular shape and arrangement of the features – the ears high up on the head, the small mouth, the fully frontal gaze – are characteristic of such anthropomorphic funerary sculptures from the region in the late 1st millennium BCE. These sculptures were often carved in alabaster (or limestone). Various kingdoms – including most prominently the Saba’, Ma’in, Qataban, and Hadramawt – emerged in southern Arabia (modern-day Yemen) during that time. The legendary wealth of the region was fueled in part by trade in two of the most sought–after commodities in the ancient world, frankincense and myrrh, which are resins grown on trees native to certain parts of the Arabian Peninsula.