Iconography

The iconography of Ptah was particularly stable and persisted in essentially the same form throughout most of the dynastic age - beginning with the earliest known depiction of the god on a 1st-dynasty bowl from Tarkhan. Ptah was almost invariably represented anthropomorphically as a .standing, mummiform figure with feet together and with his hands protruding from his tightly wrapped shroud to hold his characteristic sceptre (comprising a was sceptre surmounted by ankh and djed symbols). The god usually wears a close-fitting skull cap without any additional elements of headdress, though in his association with Osiris Ptah sometimes is depicted with a small disk atop his head flanked by the two tall plumes worn by rhat god.

From the Middle Kingdom onwards he wears a distinctive straight beard rather than the usual curved divine beard found on representations of

(Above) Ptah unthin his shrine. The straight beard and particular style of necklace counterpoise at the god’s back are distinctive attributes rarely seen with other deities. Tomb of Amenherkhepeshef Valley of the Queens, western Thebes.

(Left) Gilded statuette of Ptah the creator from the tomb of Tutankhamun.

The pedestal on which the god stands may represent the mound of creation or the craftsmans level and the hieroglyphic symbol for truth. 18th dynasty. Egyptian Museum, Cairo.

Other Egyptian gods. Ptah is also usually depicted wearing either what appears to be a large tassel at the rear of his garment or a broad collar which is balanced by a counterpoise hanging behind his back. This counterpoise is rounded at the top and sometimes flared at the bottom like a narrow, tubelike bell and is distinctive enough to allow even partial images of Ptah to be differentiated from similar representations of the god Khonsu who wears a key-hole shaped counterpoise. Usually Ptah is represented standing on a narrow plinth like one of the hieroglyphs used to write the word maat or ‘truth’ and which also resembles the measuring rod used by Egyptian workmen, or upon a stepped dias suggestive of the primeval mound. Frequently he is depicted within an open shrine.

The god was perhaps also depicted as a dwarf, as Herodotus claimed to see statues in this form in the temple of Hephaistos (Ptah) at Memphis (see Pataikos), and though these statues could also have been votive representations of dwarf workmen rather than the god himself, the god also appears in the form of a dwarf on some of the magical cippi (healing plaques) of the Late Period.