Shabaka Stone Monument

Address: The British Museum, Great Russell St, London WC1B 3DG, United Kingdom

Website: https://www.britishmuseum.org/

Hours: British Museum: Daily 10:00am-5:00pm (Fridays 10:00am-8:30pm; check website for variations)

Admission: Free to view in the British Museum (general admission free); some special exhibitions may charge

The Shabaka Stone is an inscribed ancient Egyptian stone slab now held in the British Museum in London. The inscription preserves a theological text traditionally associated with the 25th Dynasty ruler Shabaka of Egypt.

The slab bears hieroglyphic text that has been studied by Egyptologists as a key statement of Memphite theology and cosmogony. The stone is displayed among the museum’s Egyptian collections and is referenced in discussions of Late Period textual preservation.

The inscription was carved in ancient Egypt and later moved into modern collections; scholarly work has focused on its language, provenance, and the religious doctrines it records. The slab is part of the corpus of monumental Egyptian inscriptions used to reconstruct ancient religious beliefs.

Geographically the object is located in the British Museum in central London, within the museum’s Egyptian antiquities galleries.

• Textual importance: The inscription on the stone preserves a theological and ritual text from ancient Egypt that is an important source for understanding Memphite religious ideas associated with the 25th Dynasty ruler Shabaka.

The British Museum sits in Bloomsbury, central London-around a 5-10 minute walk from Tottenham Court Road or Holborn tube stations (Central and Northern lines). Numerous bus routes stop on Great Russell Street.

• See the Shabaka Stone in the Egyptian sculpture and reliefs galleries-ask museum staff for the current display room (it has been moved between rooms).
• Visit early or late on a Friday (when the British Museum opens late) to avoid the thick mid-day crowds in the Egyptian rooms.
• Pair the Shabaka Stone with a close look at the Memphis reliefs nearby to understand the Memphite theological program it preserves.