Portion of a Historical Text
Description
Object Label: When complete, the papyrus to which this fragment belonged measured almost seven feet long. The texts are written in a cursive form of hieroglyphs called hieratic. Differences in handwriting and in the historical events described demonstrate that different scribes added new inscriptions over several generations. The most important text recounts the efforts of a Thirteenth Dynasty Theban noblewoman named Senebtisi to establish legal ownership of ninety-five household servants, whose names indicate that forty-five were of Asiatic origin. The presence of so many foreigners in a single household suggests that the Asiatic population was increasing rapidly in Thirteenth Dynasty Egypt. As was customary, some of these foreigners no doubt married Egyptians, adopted Egyptian beliefs and cultural traditions, and were absorbed into the cultural mainstream. Others, especially prisoners of war or descendants of military captives, remained loyal to their Asian heritage. Some of these foreigners facilitated the collapse of the Middle Kingdom and the later conquest of Egypt by the Asiatic Hyksos in the Second Intermediate Period. Caption: Portion of a Historical Text, ca. 1809–1743 B.C.E.. Papyrus, ink, 35.1446a-e: 11 1/2 × 71 5/8 in. (29.2 × 182 cm) 35.1446a: 10 3/8 x 11 13/16 in. (26.3 x 30 cm) 35.1448b: 6 1/2 x 20 11/16 in. (16.5 x 52.5 cm) 35.1446c: 11 1/2 x 20 in. (29.2 x 50.8 cm) 35.1446d: 11 x 19 3/8 in. (28 x 49.2 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Theodora Wilbour, 35.1446a-e. (Photo: Brooklyn Museum)
AI image analysis GPT-4o-2024-08-06
Machine-generated from the object's image on May 2026. Not curatorial; treat deities, names, and signs below as the model's best reading, not authority.
A fragmented ancient papyrus with black and red inscriptions.
The papyrus is heavily fragmented and features a series of black and red ink inscriptions. The text is organized in rows and shows signs of aging with several missing portions. The structure suggests it might have been a document of significance, possibly legal or administrative, owing to the organized manner of the text.
Cross-references (2)
- BKM-Accession 35.1446a-e tier-2
- BKM-Object 3369 tier-2
About this record's data
- From the source institution — accession, description, dimensions, and dating are as catalogued by Brooklyn Museum — Egyptian, Classical, Ancient Near Eastern Art.
- 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.