Ax head

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

"Duckbill-shaped" axes like this one were produced primarily in Syria-Palestine during the Middle Bronze Age IIA phase, which is roughly contemporaneous with the 12th Dynasty in Egypt. They are attested throughout the eastern Mediterranean world from Anatolia in the north to the Nile Delta in the south. An ax head very similar to this one, for example, was found in a tomb in the late 12th Dynasty stratum at Tell el-Daba (ancient Avaris) in the delta, where many Asiatic people settled during the Middle Kingdom and later established the capital city of the Hyksos Dynasty. Instead of having a series of small binding-holes like a typical Egyptian ax, this Asiatic type has a large socket to receive the haft. Its cutting edge is much smaller than that of its Egyptian counterpart due to its narrow shape, but the force generated by swinging this hefty ax would have been so focused that a single blow might have proven lethal, especially since armor and helmets were apparently unknown to Egyptian soldiers until the New Kingdom.

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