Oarsmen and an Official

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

In the upper register, rowers wield their oars, each man with one foot braced on a rail to increase leverage. Lashed to the deck behind them is the ship's cargo, perhaps a large block of stone or an architectural element for a royal construction. The faint shapes of the oar blades beneath the zigzag lines of the water indicate the water's partial transparency. In the lower register, an official wearing a cylinder seal on a cord around his neck seems about to put on another such cord, which he holds in his hands-perhaps an award bestowed by the pharaoh. The small bow in the official's hair and the complex overlay of carved levels in the rowing scene point to a date in the reign of Userkaf.

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