The Egyptian Museum

The Egyptian Museum is the oldest archaeological museum in the Middle East, and houses the largest collection of Pharaonic antiquities in the world. The museum displays an extensive collection spanning from the Predynastic Period to the Greco-Roman Era.

          The architect of the building was selected through an international competition in 1895, which was the first of its kind, and was won by the French architect, Marcel Dourgnon. The museum was inaugurated in 1902 by Khedive Abbas Helmy II, and has become a historic landmark in downtown Cairo, and home to some of the world’s most magnificent ancient masterpieces.

          Among the museum’s unrivaled collection are the complete burials of Yuya and Thuya, Psusennes I and the treasures of Tanis, and the Narmer Palette commemorating the unification of Upper and Lower Egypt under one king, which is also among the museum’s invaluable artifacts. The museum also houses the splendid statues of the great kings Khufu, Khafre, and Menkaure, the builders of the pyramids at the Giza plateau. An extensive collection of papyri, sarcophagi and jewelry, among other objects, completes this uniquely expansive museum.

Statue of the Dwarf Seneb and his Family

This group statue of the dwarf Seneb and his family was found in a naos in his mastaba tomb in Giza. Seneb is represented seated, with his legs crossed, beside his wife who embraces him affectionately. His wife is of normal height. For the sake of the symmetry of the composition, the sculptor carves the couple’s two children where Seneb’s legs would have been, had he been of the same height as his wife. The children are represented naked, with their index finger in their mouth–the standard manner in which children were typically depicted in art. The boy is seen on the viewer’s left, wearing a sidelock of youth and depicted in skin that is darker than his sister’s, who stands on his left. The sidelock of youth was typically worn by male children, and was cut off at puberty

The inscriptions on the base and the front of the seat tell us that Seneb was the funerary priest of the deceased kings Khufu and Djedefra, and in charge of the royal wardrobe 

Seneb’s tomb is very interesting, for it has the first ceiling dome over a square chamber 

Late Dynasty 5- Early Dynasty 6 (24th – 23rd Century BC) 

Provenance: Giza, Tomb of Seneb 

Medium: Painted Limestone.