Group of ancient flint inserts set into a modern reconstruction of a sickle

This sickle reconstruction was made in 1915 based on two sickles found by Petrie in Kahun (Petrie 1890, 1891). It provides an idea of the basic size and shape of dynastic Egyptian sickles. More sickles have been found since this example was made, and it is now clear that this reconstruction varies in a few ways from ancient sickles. For instance, in this reconstruction, the flint inserts extend almost all the way to the pointed end of the sickle, for a combined length of 36 cm. However, in the ancient examples, the flint inserts did not reach as far along the length of the haft, usually only extending for 12-23cm, leaving a length of wood ending in a point. This means that fewer flint inserts were needed to form the cutting edge. The pointed wooden end may have been used to gather a group of grain stalks together. Tomb scenes show harvesters grasping stalks in one hand and then cutting them with the sickle in the other hand (e.g. MMA 08.201.1, 30.4.2).

Early sickles were made from a single piece of wood. Examples include those found in Neolithic storage pits in the Fayum (Caton-Thompson and Gardner 1934:45), the Early Dynastic tomb of Hemaka (Emery 1938:33-34) and one from the Old Kingdom settlement at Elephantine (Kaiser et al. 1980:175). Sickles made from multiple pieces of wood are known from the Middle Kingdom on, such as ones from Kahun (Petrie 1890:29, 1891:12), the tomb of Tutankhamun (Carter and Mace 1933:143; Murray and Nuttall 1963:17-18), and examples in the British Museum (E.A.52861) and Brooklyn Museum (48.27). These show that the handle was often a made as a separate piece, and it was always attached on the back of the sickle. This reconstruction has the handle attached on both the back and the front of the sickle and that does not match what we now know about ancient Egyptian sickle handles. Attaching the handle only on the back would have used less wood, and helped to keep the sickle lighter in weight. Piecing together the sickles from multiple smaller pieces of wood may have also been a pragmatic strategy, since wood was a relatively scarce resource in Ancient Egypt.

Six ancient flint inserts were set into this reconstruction (MMA 09.180.1605, .1608, .1613, .1616, .1721, .1762). The exposed edges range in length from 3.9-8.6cm long. The average number of denticulations per cm ranges from 1.9 to 3.3. White cortex is visible on the dorsal surface of each insert. Based on their size, the presence and frequency of cortex, and the presence of rather steep, well-formed denticulations, these inserts are similar to many other examples in the collection from Lisht, which were made on large flakes (e.g. MMA 09.180. 1686, .1760, .1768, .1975, .1978, .1991, .2029).

Flint inserts were held in a shallow groove in the wood by an adhesive. On this reconstruction the adhesive is a homogenous black (unknown) material. However, adhesive remains on a wooden sickle fragment (MMA 22.1.661) and a number of inserts in the collection (MMA. 09.180.1377-.1379, 48.105.41m,o,p,r) are different. The adhesive on these examples is light grey with sand inclusions, and is lime-based, probably a lime plaster. Other possible ancient Egyptian sickle adhesives involve organic materials such as gums, resins, and beeswax, or mixtures of these with inorganic materials (Caton-Thompson and Gardner 1934:45; Graves-Brown 2010:420; Lucas 1948:8; Spurrell 1892, 1894). Bitumen was a sickle adhesive in the Near East (Copeland and Verhoeven 1996).

On The Met’s sickle inserts from Lisht, the adhesive was not applied evenly, and often covered more of the dorsal surface than ventral surface. This pattern of application is also apparent from the differential invasiveness of sickle gloss on inserts without adhesive. This reconstruction, however, has the adhesive applied evenly on both faces. The differential reach of the adhesive may have related to how the insert was used, providing more support on the face that received more pressure during cutting.


Elizabeth Hart, J. Clawson Mills Research Fellow, 2019


References

Carter, Howard, and Arthur Cruttenden Mace 1933. The Tomb of Tut·ankh·Amen: Discovered by the Late Earl of Carnarvon and Howard Carter. Vol. III. London: Cassell.

Caton-Thompson, G., and E. W. Gardner 1934. The Desert Fayum. Vol. I–II. London: The Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland.

Copeland, L., and M. Verhoeven 1996. “Bitumen-Coated Sickle-Blade Elements at Tell Sabi Abyad II, Northern Syria.” In Neolithic Chipped Stone Industries of the Fertile Crescent, and Their Contemporaries in Adjacent Regions: Proceedings of the Second Workshop on PPN Chipped Lithic Industries, Institute of Archaeology, Warsaw University, 3rd-7th April 1995, edited by Stefan Karol Kozłowski and Hans Georg Gebel. Berlin: Ex oriente, pp. 327–330.

Emery, Walter B 1938. Excavations at Saqqara. The Tomb of Hemaka. Cairo: Government Press.

Graves-Brown, Carolyn Anne 2010. The ideological significance of flint in Dynastic Egypt. Thesis (Ph.D.)--University College London (University of London).

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Kaiser, Werner, Robert Avila, Gunter Dreyer, Horst Jaritz, Ewa Laskowska-Kusztal, Stephan Seidlmayer, and Martin Ziermann 1980. “Stadt Und Tempel von Elephantine/ Elfer/Zwolfter Grabungsbericht.” In Mitteilungen Des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts, Abteilung Kairo 40, pp. 169–205.

Murray, Helen, and Mary Nuttall 1963. A Handlist to Howard Carter’s Catalogue of Objects in Tut’ankhamūn’s Tomb. Oxford: Griffith Institute.

Petrie, William Matthew Flinders 1890. Kahun, Gurob and Hawara. London: Trübner and Co.

——— 1891. Illahun, Kahun, and Gurob. London: D. Nutt.

Spurrell, F. C. J. 1892. “Notes on Early Sickles.” In Archaeological Journal 49 (1), pp. 53–68.

——— 1894. “Flint Tools from Tell El Amarna.” In Tell El Amarna, by William Matthew Flinders Petrie. London: Methuen, pp. 37–38.

Excavated by the Egyptian Expedition of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Acquired by the Museum in the division of finds.

Hayes, William C. 1959. Scepter of Egypt II: A Background for the Study of the Egyptian Antiquities in the Metropolitan Museum of Art: The Hyksos Period and the New Kingdom (1675-1080 B.C.). Cambridge, Mass.: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, p. 411, fig. 261.