This little 6-color paint box is 3400 years old. Tweeted out the other day by the Metropolitan Museum without much more info or even a link to their collection, it struck me as amazingly modern in appearance. Like a mini-cosmetic kit that you’d buy at Sephora as a stocking stuffer for your teenage daughter. Complete with a little ankh branding at the top.

Searching online for more info, it seems that these were not uncommon. Guessing on the pigment selection, based on a similar post with more info from the Cleveland Museum of Art: two blacks (top and bottom) - one fine, one coarse, an Egyptian Blue frit (a compound that included malachite - heated to make blue), a red iron oxide, and what looks like two yellow ochres (?). The base is carved from boxwood.