Head of a Kushite Ruler

Art historians assign this head to the very end of the Twenty-fifth Dynasty. It may represent the ultimate Kushite king, Tanwetamani (circa 664–653 B.C.), who was defeated by the Assyrian army that invaded Egypt and sacked the capital city of Thebes. After Tanwetamani's defeat, descendants of the Kushite royal house continued to rule Nubia from the area around Napata until the first quarter of the third century B.C.