The Hermitage’s extremely rich collection of late Egyptian artefacts from the 3rd–12th centuries AD can stand comparison with those in any of the world’s major museums.
The collection comprises more than 3,200 examples of fabrics and 1,000 other items made of metal, ivory, stone, glass and ceramics.
Coptic fabrics represent one of the most brilliant pages in the artistic culture of 6th–12th-century Egypt. There are articles made for a wide variety of purposes (curtains, shawls, tunics, bedspreads, napkins) woven from undyed linen and coloured wool yarn using the Gobelins technique. The Hermitage collection provides the opportunity to study all periods of late Egyptian textile-making, including individual masterpieces: a medallion containing a depiction of the earth goddess Gaea (4th c.), a purple inset featuring a composition on the Twelve Labours of Hercules (6th c.), a large curtain with images of a column and two trees (5th c.) and a clavus (a vertical embellishment running from the shoulder to the hem of a piece of clothing) carrying scenes from the life of Christ (7th–8th cc.).
*The word Copt comes from the Arabic qubt, which derives in turn from the Greek Aigýptios, meaning “Egyptian”. After their conquest of Egypt in 642, the Arabs used the word for the inhabitants of the Nile valley who continued to profess Christianity and speak the Egyptian language. The term Coptic has come to be applied to the entire culture of Egypt’s local population from the 4th to 12th centuries. Today a new definition is being proposed for Coptic artefacts – “Egyptian articles of Late Antiquity, the Byzantine or Islamic Period”.
