Metropolitan Museum of Art — Egyptian Art (Open Access) · architecture

Fragment of a Door Drum

Source of record: Metropolitan Museum of Art — Egyptian Art (Open Access) — catalogued by the holding institution. View the original record →

Description

Door drum fragment, tomb of Meni. Old Kingdom, Dynasty 6, ca. 2323–2150 B.C. Limestone. H. 10.9 × W. 44.2 × D. 10.6 cm (4 5/16 × 17 3/8 × 4 3/16 in.). From: Dendera, Northern Upper Egypt, Egypt. Excavation: Egypt Exploration Fund excavations, 1898. Credit: Gift of Egypt Exploration Fund, 1898.

AI image analysis GPT-5.4-nano

Machine-generated from the object's image on Jul 2026. Not curatorial; treat deities, names, and signs below as the model's best reading, not authority.

Stone fragment showing relief carving of a decorated element with nested rectangular shapes and a central vertical motif.

The object is a long, horizontally oriented fragment of stone with a worn, chipped surface. One face contains incised/relief ornament: at center-left there is a stack of rectangular blocks with alternating bands (suggesting stylized architectural or panel decoration). To the right of this, a cross-like/vertical element with small projecting lobes is carved, with surrounding geometric borders. The right end is more damaged, with portions of the relief abraded. No clear human figures, animals, or identifiable deity attributes are visible. No cartouches or royal titulary are apparent. The carving appears to be architectural/ornamental rather than figural.

decorative Old Kingdom (per catalogue); motif style appears consistent with a carved architectural/ornamental fragment, but exact dynasty cannot be confirmed from the visible portion. fragmentary
Materials limestone

Connections

Found at Dendera
Materials Limestone
About this record's data
  • From the source institution — accession, description, dimensions, and dating are as catalogued by Metropolitan Museum of Art — Egyptian Art (Open Access).
  • AI-inferred — the image-analysis panel (deities, names, signs) is machine-generated and may be wrong.
  • Approximate location — most map points are plotted at the site centroid, not the exact findspot.
  • Inferred links — cross-references marked with a match method other than explicit-source-field were matched by us, not stated by the source.