Stela of Senu Adoring Osiris in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, January 2026

Title: Stela of Senu Adoring Osiris

Period: New Kingdom

Date: ca. 1390–1352 BCE

Medium: Limestone

Dimensions: H. 62.9 × W. 33 × D. 5.7 cm, 22.2 kg (24 3/4 × 13 × 2 1/4 in., 48.9 lb.)

Credit Line: Rogers Fund, 1918

Object No.: 18.2.5

In an exquisitely carved limestone stela, the royal scribe Senu worships a seated figure of Osiris, "Foremost of the Westerners, Great God, Ruler of Eternity." Osiris is depicted in a formfitting shroud decorated with alternating circles and wavy lines that mimic a net of beads, which may allude to the starry night sky. Rather than the white crown he wears most frequently, Osiris is shown here in the atef crown. It has a central element of bundled reeds, flanked by ostrich plumes and balanced on horizontal ram horns. The crown is usually topped with a sun disk, but here a persea (ished) fruit, which also has solar connotations, replaces it.


Text from: www.metmuseum.org/exhibitions/divine-egypt/exhibition-objects