Spoon with a falcon on the handle

Spoon with a falcon on the handle

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This early example of a toilet spoon (partly reconstructed) has a long handle, rounded for most of its length, and then tapering and flattening toward one end. Vertically through the flattened end is a hole, perhaps for suspension. At the other end is a hemispherical bowl to hold cosmetic material. Facing the bowl is the figure of a falcon that rests its beak on the rim. Although falcons are rarely depicted during this period, this high-soaring bird of prey was already beginning to take on solar connotations. The ivory from which this spoon was carved could be from either a hippopotamus or an elephant tusk.

Egyptian Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Spoon with a falcon on the handleSpoon with a falcon on the handleSpoon with a falcon on the handleSpoon with a falcon on the handleSpoon with a falcon on the handle

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.