The Solar Barque of Ra (Book of Gates)

The image features the sun god Ra standing in the center of a stylized golden boat, wearing a striped headcloth and a red-brown tunic with a white kilt. He is contained within a rectangular shrine framed by a large, upright serpent that arches over his head. Two human figures, rendered in profile, stand on either side of the shrine within the boat, facing toward the center. The boat itself is elongated and curved with flared ends, colored in gold and green. Above the scene are vertical registers of Egyptian hieroglyphic text, and to the right, a tall, vertical panel contains additional hieroglyphs and the representation of a long, thin, speckled serpent.

This scene originates from the 'Book of Gates', a New Kingdom funerary text that describes the passage of the sun god through the twelve divisions of the underworld. It reflects the complex Egyptian theology surrounding the cycle of day and night and the protective mechanisms required for the solar barque to traverse the realms of the Duat.