Tablet from the foundation deposit of Mentuhotep II

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This tablet comes from a foundation deposit placed at the southeast corner of the terrace of Mentuhotep II's mortuary temple. There were four such deposits, each containing food offerings laid out in pottery dishes and miniature jars with mud stoppers that once held wine or beer. Across the top of each deposit were laid four flat mud bricks. One of these was solid; embedded in each of the other three was tablet, inscribed with the king's names and made out of one of the other materials to be used for building the temple, namely wood, stone, or metal. This example is made of travertine (Egyptian alabaster).

Egyptian Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Met collection of ancient Egyptian art consists of approximately 30,000 objects of artistic, historical, and cultural importance, dating from about 300,000 BCE to the 4th century CE. A signifcant percentage of the collection is derived from the Museum's three decades of archaeological work in Egypt, initiated in 1906 in response to increasing interest in the culture of ancient Egypt.

Metropolitan Museum of Art