Study and Genius Unveil Ancient Egypt to Greece

When this ceiling was painted, Egypt had only just started to speak. In 1822 Jean-François Champollion announced that he could read hieroglyphs, and in 1826 the Louvre made him curator of a new Egyptian department, with rooms of its own in a fresh suite of galleries named the Musée Charles X, after the king. The same year, on 9 August, the royal museums ordered this ceiling from Picot for the fourth of those rooms. He signed it in 1827, and it was ready when the galleries opened that December.

The subject is a claim about history. A seated figure of Egypt has a veil lifted from her by Study and by Genius, so that Greece, standing before her, can see what she holds. Greek writers themselves, Herodotus among them, said that their ancestors had learned from the Egyptians, and Paris in 1827 liked the idea of Greek art and wisdom drawing on an older, deeper source. Around the central picture, painted in oil straight onto the plaster, run curved coves with Egyptian motifs and hanging garlands.

The ceiling was cleaned and repaired in 1978 and 1979. The room beneath it, number 644, now shows Egypt under its last native pharaohs and under the Greek dynasty that ended with Cleopatra.