Preserved Shoulder of Beef and Half of a Food Box

Preserved Shoulder of Beef and Half of a Food Box

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This preserved shoulder of beef was placed in a wooden box of the same shape (the lid is now missing). It was found with other boxes of preserved meat near the entrance of a cliff tomb in Western Thebes by the Museum's Egyptian Expedition. The boxes were intended as food offerings for the spirit of the tomb's owner who may have been a young prince named Amenemhat whose coffin was found nearby.

Egyptian Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Preserved Shoulder of Beef and Half of a Food BoxPreserved Shoulder of Beef and Half of a Food BoxPreserved Shoulder of Beef and Half of a Food BoxPreserved Shoulder of Beef and Half of a Food BoxPreserved Shoulder of Beef and Half of a Food Box

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.