4,000 year old Egyptian model tools - images

[wizard69]

I believe those are the originals, displayed today at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. And that the originals were models or miniatures themselves.

What I don't understand is how the joints on that wood and plaster box survived thousands of years.

A surprising amount of material lasts for thousands of years in those tombs. Not everything was made of gold in Egypt. {had to laugh at that} Even the Egyptian embalming processes preserved the bodies in surprisingly efficient manner. The extremely dry weather is of course a factor as is the fact that the sealed up tombs prevented a lot of handling for thousands of years.

On the flip side the box looks surprisingly utilitarian for burial in a tomb. Egyptian wood working was very advanced with examples of Dovetails being used in wood objects.