Harpoon Head

1973.4.56a

Information

Copper alloy (?) harpoon now heavily corroded. At one end is a barbed head, with a single curved backed tooth near the centre on same side, and three teeth for attachment to a line near the end. Provenance unknownbut of the same type as Petrie Museum UC30335 dated to the 1st Dynasty. Compare with W. M. F. Petrie (1917) 'Tools and Weapons' pl. XLIV no. 33. Wellcome Historical Medical Museum accession no. 128804. Purchased by Webb for Wellcome at Stevens's Auction Rooms, 15 October 1930, lot 704, "Two flat bronze axes, 3 barbed harpoons, rare; a valve of a mould, and an Arab bowl". These are WHMM nos. 128801-6.