Scarab With an Image of the Gods Ptah and Sakhmet

Scarab With an Image of the Gods Ptah and Sakhmet

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The scarab was shaped like a dung beetle, "scarabaeus sacer," which is also the source of its modern name. The dung beetle was "kheperer" in ancient Egyptian. Having watched the small creatures push huge balls of dung, the ancient Egyptians compared the sun being pushed into the sky at dawn to the beetle, and they referred to the rising sun as "Kheperi." The word for "to become" or "come into being" was "kheper," and the beetle hieroglyph was used to spell all of these words. As such, the scarab became a powerful amulet for rejuvenation in this life and reincarnation in the next. The scarab is inscribed on its base with a standing image of Ptah holding a was-scepter and with Sakhmet behind him. The god is facing a djed-pillar supporting Re-Harakhty.

Egyptian Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Scarab With an Image of the Gods Ptah and SakhmetScarab With an Image of the Gods Ptah and SakhmetScarab With an Image of the Gods Ptah and SakhmetScarab With an Image of the Gods Ptah and SakhmetScarab With an Image of the Gods Ptah and Sakhmet

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.