King Menkaure and Queen. Menkaure, ruler of Egypt’s 4th Dynasty (2490–2472 BCE), is best known for commissioning the smallest of the three Great Pyramids at Giza.

The identity of the queen remains uncertain. Now in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

The sculpture is carved from greywacke, a dark, coarse-grained sandstone, with traces of its original paint still preserved after thousands of years.

This masterpiece (Accession No. 11.1738) is now in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, USA.