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

Forearm with pleated garment, Aten cartouches

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

Description

New Kingdom, Amarna Period, Dynasty 18, reign of Akhenaten, ca. 1353–1336 B.C. Indurated limestone. H. 9 × W. 10 × D. 5 cm (3 9/16 × 3 15/16 × 1 15/16 in.); cartouche: W. about 2.7 cm (1 1/16 in.). From: Great Temple of the Aten, Pit outside southern wall, Amarna (Akhetaten), Middle Egypt, Egypt. Excavation: Petrie/Carter excavations, 1891–92. Credit: Gift of Edward S. Harkness, 1921.

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.

Two adjoining carved stone pieces depict a human forearm wearing a pleated garment and include incised hieroglyphic decoration within cartouche-like ovals.

The image shows a pair of broken, vertically oriented limestone (?) blocks/segments forming a composite relief. The left face preserves a relief of a forearm angled diagonally upward, with surrounding pleated garment indicated by regularly spaced, shallow folds. Within the central/upper field on the left segment there is an oval/cartouche-like frame containing stacked signs that appear to include a seated/abstract royal figure and associated determinatives, though the exact arrangement cannot be read confidently from the photo. The right segment continues adjacent relief: a curved, arm-like form and garment folds are visible, and a larger oval/cartouche frame on the upper portion contains additional incised signs that are partially abraded. No clear Aten-specific sun disk signs are definitively readable, but the presence of cartouche-like inscriptions is consistent with an Amarna-era royal inscription theme at least at the level of “cartouches.” No Greek, Coptic, or Arabic text is visible.

royal New Kingdom, Amarna Period (18th Dynasty), approximate fragmentary
Deities unknown
Royals unknown (Aten cartouches claimed by catalogue; exact name not legible)
Materials stone (appears like limestone; catalogue states indurated limestone)
Signs Cartouche-like oval frames containing incised hieroglyphs ×2
Visible text "Incised hieroglyphic signs inside two oval/cartouche-like frames; exact text unreadable from the provided image. No definite “Aten” sign sequence confirmed."

Inscriptions (1)

Inscription #1 AI reading of the photograph

Visible text (machine reading)

Incised hieroglyphic signs inside two oval/cartouche-like frames; exact text unreadable from the provided image. No definite “Aten” sign sequence confirmed.

Connections

Found at Amarna (Akhetaten)
Deities Aten

Cross-references (4)

  • Wikidata-Q Q116273123 tier-1
  • Collection-QID Q160236 tier-2 (wikidata-mediated)
  • Inventory-Number 21.9.500 tier-2 (wikidata-mediated)
  • MET-Object 549784 tier-2 (wikidata-mediated)
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.