Tablet with Chariot Scene

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

During the New Kingdom, a new image emerged: the pharaoh alone in his chariot. Horses and chariots had been introduced to Egypt around 1600 B.C. by the Hyksos, foreign rulers of Levantine origin who controlled Lower Egypt at the time. By Dynasty 18, this mode of transport had been adopted by the Egyptian court. At some point, Egyptians improved chariot design, making the vehicles lighter and faster. This drawing on faience of a man driving a chariot pulled by two galloping horses in a food-producing garden illustrates how these new means of transport were gradually adopted by people outside the Egyptian court and army.

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