Heqanakht's account, written over an effaced letter regarding two female servants

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Heqanakht was a native of Thebes (present day Luxor) during the early Dynasty 12. Letters and accounts written by Heqanakht and one or more scribes on sheets of papyrus were discovered by Museum excavator Herbert E. Winlock in one of the rock cut tomb complexes along the cliff overlooking the temples at Deir el-Bahri. The documents - some still folded, tied and sealed, when found - provide unique insights into the domestic and financial affairs of an average middle class family that lived almost four thousand years ago.　 In this papyrus, Heqanakht wrote an account of flax and grain, which he sealed with the mud sealing (2018.595.2) whose impression matches that on another letter by him in our collection (22.3.518). However, he was not the first to use this sheet of papyrus. Traces of ink reveal an effaced letter from a man named Intef to a steward by the name of Ineswisetekh regarding copper and two female servants.

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