Model of a Slaughter House

This model of a slaughter house was discovered in a hidden chamber beside twenty-three other models of boats, gardens, and workshops that led to the royal chief steward Meketre’s rock-cut tomb. Meketre started working for the kings of the 11th Dynasty under King Nebhepetre Mentuhotep II and continued to serve them until the early 12th Dynasty.

In the big hall, two oxen are being slaughtered. Two men are stabbing their necks while their legs are trussed together. Two guys stand beside them, holding bowls to gather the blood that the men in the corner, fanning fires beneath kettles, will turn into pudding. Holding batons, a supervisor and a clerk supervise the slaughtering and plucking of a goose. Meat joints dangle overhead on the balcony. Meat joints are held together by repaired cords.

All the accessible rooms in the tomb of Meketre had been robbed and plundered already during Antiquity; but early in 1920 the Museum’s excavator, Herbert Winlock, wanted to obtain an accurate floor plan of the tomb’s layout for his map of the 11th Dynasty necropolis at Thebes and, therefore, had his workmen clean out the accumulated debris.

It was during this cleaning operation that the small hidden chamber was discovered, filled with twenty-four almost perfectly preserved models. Eventually, half of these went to the Egyptian Museum, Cairo, and the other half came to the Metropolitan Museum in the partition of finds.

Middle Kingdom, 12th Dynasty, ca. 1981-1975 BC. From the Tomb of Meketre (TT280), Sheikh Abd el-Qurna, West Thebes. Now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. 20.3.10