Composite Papyrus Capital

Composite Papyrus Capital

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This capital was set atop one of the ten columns of a kiosk built in front of the temple of Amun at Hibis in Kharga Oasis. It is an early example of a composite capital, which included several kinds of plants combined into a design that, with time, became increasingly more elaborate and fanciful. Here, the composition is still rather simple, consisting of two cyperus species: eight plants of the common papyrus (Cyperus papyrus, above) alternating with eight foxtail flatsedge plants (Cyperus alopecuroides, below). The capital still shows remnants of its original paint.

Egyptian Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

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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.