An approximately 5,000-year-old Egyptian artifact that had been missing for decades has been found in a box in the Scottish city of Aberdeen. The University of Aberdeen announced this today.
The wooden artifact was one of three objects discovered in 1872 in the queen chamber of the Pyramid of Cheops, on the Giza Plateau in Egypt. The two other objects, a ball, and a hook, are currently in London’s British Museum.
Engineer Waynman Dixon, who found the objects, donated the wooden artifact to Dr. James Grant, of the University of Aberdeen. His daughter donated the “5-inch (12.7-centimeter) piece of cedar” to the university in 1946, where it was lost.
Abeer Eladany, an Egyptian university assistant, found the box containing the artifact late last year while examining the Asian artifact collection.
“When I went through our Egyptian files, I immediately knew what it was and that it had been stored in the wrong collection for years,” she says.
“I am an archaeologist and have worked on excavations in Egypt. But I never thought I would find something so important to my country’s heritage here in North East Scotland.”
There is no clarity about the function of the artifact. The object may have been used as a measuring stick.
