The MacGregor Plaque (or MacGregor Tablet, also King Den's sandal label) is an artefact that was probably found in the tomb of King Den at Abydos, and dated circa 2985 BCE. According to its inscriptions, the plaque was originally attached to the king's

sandal Sandals are an open type of shoe, consisting of a sole held to the wearer's foot by straps going over the instep and around the ankle. Sandals can also have a heel. While the distinction between sandals and other types of footwear can sometim ...

. The plaque is displayed in the

British Museum The British Museum is a Museum, public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is the largest in the world. It documents the story of human cu ...

. It is, with the depictions of

Narmer Narmer (, may mean "painful catfish", "stinging catfish", "harsh catfish", or "fierce catfish"; ) was an ancient Egyptian king of the Early Dynastic Period, whose reign began at the end of the 4th millennium BC. He was the successor to the Prot ...

, among the oldest images of a ruler.

Origin and description

The MacGregor Plaque is a tablet is made of carved

ivory Ivory is a hard, white material from the tusks (traditionally from elephants) and Tooth, teeth of animals, that consists mainly of dentine, one of the physical structures of teeth and tusks. The chemical structure of the teeth and tusks of mamm ...

that measures 4.5 cm x 5.4 cm; it is about 0.2 cm thick. Images are engraved and fired into it. The artefact was probably found in the

mastaba A mastaba ( , or ), also mastabah or mastabat) is a type of ancient Egyptian tomb in the form of a flat-roofed, rectangular structure with inward sloping sides, constructed out of mudbricks or limestone. These edifices marked the burial sites ...

tomb of the

ancient Egypt Ancient Egypt () was a cradle of civilization concentrated along the lower reaches of the Nile River in Northeast Africa. It emerged from prehistoric Egypt around 3150BC (according to conventional Egyptian chronology), when Upper and Lower E ...

ian king Den ( First Dynasty), and dated circa 2985 BCE. It derives from the excavations of French

archaeologist Archaeology or archeology is the study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of Artifact (archaeology), artifacts, architecture, biofact (archaeology), biofacts or ecofacts, ...

Coptologist Coptology is the scientific study of the Copts, Coptic people. Origin The European interest in Coptology may have started as early as the 15th century AD. The term was used in 1976 when the First International Congress of Coptology was held in ...

, and

Egyptologist Egyptology (from ''Egypt'' and Greek , ''-logia''; ) is the scientific study of ancient Egypt. The topics studied include ancient Egyptian history, language, literature, religion, architecture and art from the 5th millennium BC until the end ...

Émile Amélineau Émile Amélineau (1850 – 12 January 1915 at Châteaudun) was a French Coptologist, archaeologist and Egyptologist. His scholarly reputation was established as an editor of previously unpublished Coptic texts. His reputation was destroyed ...

. The artefact is also known as ''MacGregor Tablet'', also ''King Den's sandal label''. The plaque was acquired by the

in 1922; before that it, was part of the MacGregor collection. The plaque is displayed in the British Museum with the inventory number BM EA 55586.

Front side

On the front side, king Den is depicted. He wears a

loincloth A loincloth is a one-piece garment, either wrapped around itself or kept in place by a belt. It covers the genitals and sometimes the buttocks. Loincloths which are held up by belts or strings are specifically known as breechcloth or breechclo ...

, a

nemes Nemes () consisted of pieces of striped head cloth worn by pharaohs in ancient Egypt. It covered the whole crown and behind of the head and nape of the neck (sometimes also extending a little way down the back) and had lappets, two large flaps ...

headdress with a Uraeus-snake, and an animal tail which hangs down from the back of his skirt. Den is labelled with his

Horus name The Horus name is the oldest known and used crest of ancient Egyptian rulers. It belongs to the " great five names" of an Egyptian pharaoh. However, modern Egyptologists and linguists are starting to prefer the more neutral term "serekh name". T ...

. His pose belongs to the motif of the " slaying the enemy": the king has his right hand raised, holding a mace; with his left hand, Den holds an enemy in place with his hair. The enemy is already on his knees, but attempts to ward off the king's blow. He can be identified as an Asiatic on account of his hairstyle (goatee and braids). Along the plaque we find a

hieroglyphic Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs ( ) were the formal writing system used in Ancient Egypt for writing the Egyptian language. Hieroglyphs combined ideographic, logographic, syllabic and alphabetic elements, with more than 1,000 distinct characters. ...

inscription, with a left to right reading direction: "I was the one who completed the first strike to the east," accompanied by the

jackal Jackals are Canidae, canids native to Africa and Eurasia. While the word has historically been used for many canines of the subtribe Canina (subtribe), canina, in modern use it most commonly refers to three species: the closely related black-b ...

standard of the god

Wepwawet In Egyptian mythology, Wepwawet ( hieroglyphic ''wp-w3w.t''; also rendered Upuaut, Wep-wawet, Wepawet, Apuat, and Ophois) was originally a jackal deity of funerary rites, war, and royalty, whose cult centre was Asyut in Upper Egypt (Lycopolis in ...

. This inscription is telling us that king Den himself conducted his first victory against the easterners. The fact that it is very important to state that it is the "first victory" is telling us that more battles will come, that other battles were lost, and that other first dynasty kings were engaged in protecting and expanding Egypt's frontiers and territories: from Nubia with the A-group to the Easterners in the north. In the Palermo stone, in its third row that it is considered to belong to Horus Den, appears in the second register "Smiting the

bedouin The Bedouin, Beduin, or Bedu ( ; , singular ) are pastorally nomadic Arab tribes who have historically inhabited the desert regions in the Arabian Peninsula, North Africa, the Levant, and Mesopotamia (Iraq). The Bedouin originated in the Sy ...

s", that it could refer to this label, but with all likelihood it refers to subsequent campaigns, since this one happened in the second half of Den's reign. This plaque is the earliest attestation for the long head-dress known as the

khat Khat (''Catha edulis''), also known as Bushman's tea, especially in South Africa, is a flowering plant native to eastern and southeastern Africa. It has a history of cultivation originating in the Harar area (present day eastern Ethiopia) and ...

-head-dress. Horus Den is also the first king known to display the double crown, indicating us that he was an innovative and active developer of royal iconography.

Back side

On the other side of the plaque, a pair of sandals are depicted, although the left part is severely damaged by abrasion. According to its inscriptions, the plaque was originally attached to the king's

Cultural impact

The artifact appeared in '' A History of the World in 100 Objects''.

References

Bibliography

Wolfgang Helck Hans Wolfgang Helck (16 September 1914 – 27 August 1993) was a German Egyptologist, considered one of the most important Egyptologists of the 20th century. From 1956 until his retirement in 1979 he was a professor at the University of Hamburg. ...

. ''Untersuchungen zur Thinitenzeit'' (= ''Ägyptologische Abhandlungen.'' Vol. 45). Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 1987, , S. 161 & 187. * R. B. Parkinson, Whitfield Diffie, Mary Fischer, R. S. Simpson. ''Cracking codes: the Rosetta stone and decipherment.'' Vol. 2. California Press, New York 1999, , p. 74. * A. J. Spencer. ''Early Dynastic Objects'' (= ''Catalogue of the Egyptian Antiquities in the British Museum.''). British Museum, London 1980, , p. 65, No. 460.

External links

MacGregor-Plakette
on the British Museum website. {{Rulers of the Ancient Near East 30th-century BC works 1922 archaeological discoveries Archaeological discoveries in Egypt Den (pharaoh) Ancient Egyptian objects in the British Museum Ivory works of art Abydos, Egypt