Coffin Texts from the Tomb of Harhotep
Description
Object Label: Egyptians believed that placing certain funerary texts close to the body could help the spirit of the deceased continue his or her existence in the afterlife. Originally these texts were used exclusively in the pyramids of kings and queens, but in the Middle Kingdom they were adapted for use in the tombs of non-royal individuals. Inscribed primarily on coffin interiors, they became known as Coffin Texts. While Coffin Texts occur mostly on wooden coffins, here they are found on a limestone wall. Caption: Coffin Texts from the Tomb of Harhotep, ca. 2008–1630 B.C.E.. Limestone, pigment, 39 x 3 7/8 x 20 3/4 in. (99.1 x 9.9 x 52.7 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund, 37.1507E. (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.
An ancient Egyptian tablet featuring rows of hieroglyphic inscriptions.
The artifact is a rectangular stone tablet with multiple vertical columns of hieroglyphs, arranged neatly in rows. The style suggests careful craftsmanship and the inscriptions are densely packed. This layout is a common feature in official or administrative documents. The stone appears weathered, with surface wear that slightly obscures some of the glyphs. Border decorations are minimal, focusing the attention on the inscriptions.
Cross-references (2)
- BKM-Accession 37.1507E tier-2
- BKM-Object 118038 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.