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

Papyrus fragment

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

Description

Middle Kingdom, Dynasty 12–13, ca. 2030–1640 B.C. Papyrus, ink. Framed: H. 18.6 cm (7 5/16 in.); W. 22.9 cm (9 in.). From: Cemetery, Lisht North, Memphite Region, Egypt. Excavation: MMA excavations, 1908–09. Credit: Rogers Fund, 1909.

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.

A rectangular papyrus fragment covered with red and black ink that preserves multiple lines of densely written Egyptian hieroglyphs.

The object appears as a flat, brown papyrus sheet broken along the top edge and with an irregular, partially damaged left margin. The surface is filled with tightly packed ink signs arranged in horizontal rows. Both red and black inks are present: red ink is used more prominently in the right half and in some clustered marks, while black ink forms most of the legible linework. The writing is clearly Egyptian hieroglyphic-style, though the fragment’s damage and overlap prevent confident identification of specific royal names or deities. No Greek, Coptic, or Arabic text is visible. No cartouches are clearly outlined in a way that allows secure extraction of a royal name.

hieroglyphic only Middle Kingdom (consistent with catalogue; script style uncertain due to damage) fragmentary
Materials papyrus (fibrous sheet)ink (red and black)
Signs Egyptian hieroglyphs (various; exact signs unclear due to damage/overlap) ×50
Visible text "Multiple lines of Egyptian hieroglyphic signs in red and black ink; specific readable excerpts are unclear because most signs are fragmentary/overlapped."

Inscriptions (1)

Inscription #1 AI reading of the photograph

Visible text (machine reading)

Multiple lines of Egyptian hieroglyphic signs in red and black ink; specific readable excerpts are unclear because most signs are fragmentary/overlapped.

Connections

Found at Lisht
Materials Papyrus
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.