Why are the noses broken on so many Egyptian objects?
When a statue falls forward, the nose is the first point to hit the ground. Broken noses are often found on ancient Greek, Roman, Chinese, and Southeast Asian statues. But archaeologists in Egypt have also found mutilated statues upright in sealed tombs, showing evidence of deliberate disfiguration with a hammer and chisel. Such mutilation reflects the function of Egyptian art. The Egyptians believed that tomb statues could be transformed into living beings through a funerary ritual called the Opening of the Mouth Ceremony. A “living” statue served as an eternal home for the deceased’s soul, and smashing its nose effectively “killed” the statue and the soul of the deceased. Statues’ noses were probably sometimes broken by those who wished to defeat or harm the individual represented. Statues could also have been broken intentionally by later generations. Ancient Egyptian statues were sometimes cleared out of temples and put in a pit to make room for new statues. After the rise of Chris
