Oracle Bone Fragment

The Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Oracle Bone Fragment by Unknown. A broken piece of animal bone with writing on it. The bone is tan and roughly quadrilateral with one long edge curved and uneven; the other long edge has two straight segments that meet at a rounded point. The bone piece is lying on a flat surface with the curved edge on the left; the top right edge has a jagged gap. The bone has several lines of etched writing on it; the writing starts in the upper left and goes diagonally down to the right. The lines of writing are in a language that is not recognizable. The background is gray.