Pair of clappers

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Clappers are among the earliest percussion instruments in ancient Egypt. This pair of clappers, straight and shaped like a pair of hands and forearms, belongs to a type that was most commonly used in the Middle Kingdom. The fingers, fingernails, and joints are all indicated by incised lines; a broad bracelet adorns each wrist. The roundel ornaments decorating the forearms are typical of Middle Kingdom clappers, but their significance is unclear. The striking sides are flat and undecorated.

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