the young king probably once facing a deity holding an ankh, symbolizing life, to the king’s nose, and wearing a a Nubian wig with echeloned curls and uraeus, his youthful face with lips outlined and eyebrow incised.

probably the 5th Earl of Carnarvon (1866-1923), thence by descent to one of his nieces or cousins in North Norfolk, where it was re-discovered in the late 1980s or early 1990s by the present owners of the cottage, in the garden rockery

Reliefs which are close in style appear in Amenhotep III’s sandstone desert chapel at El-Kab, dating from the early part of his reign; see Arielle P. Kozloff, Betsy M. Bryan, and Lawrence M. Berman, Egypt’s Dazzling Sun, Amenhotep III and His World, pp. 79-82, and fig. IV.5, which shows Amun-Ra giving life to the king.

Also close are early reliefs from the Luxor Temple sanctuary, as well as a private tomb wall painting in the Luxor Museum showing the enthroned king with his mother Mutemwuya standing behind him, before his marriage to Tiy in the second year of his reign. The painted eye of the king gives a good idea of what the present relief would have looked like with its polychrome still present. See James F. Romano, ed., Catalogue: The Luxor Museum of Ancient Egyptian Art, American Research Center on Egypt, Cairo, 1979, no.. 101, p. 79, and color♐ pl. VII, p.74.