Raised Relief: Daily Life, Children
From Giza (?)
Old Kingdom, Fifth Dynasty (about 2494-2345 B.C.)
Limestone, 20 x 35 in.
EA 994, acquired in 1879, purchased via the Reverend Greville Chester (cat. no. 7)
©Trustees of The British Museum, Courtesy AFA

The incomplete scene at the top of this relief depicts boat building, and at the bottom, harvesters cut and transport grain and boatmen net fish. Such daily life activities were represented on tomb walls to magically ensure their continuation in the Afterlife and, especially, to provide the deceased with eternal sustenance. The middle row shows an unusual scene: two girls dance on the left, followed by several boys, one wearing a lion mask. At right, a boy tries to escape from an enclosure. His companion states, "You must flee from it alone."