Our scarab is just such a variation. Its head together with its eyes and its plate and clypeus are well-articulated. Its thorax and elytra, or wing case, are treated as a single unit, unusually decorated with a raised, reticulated pattern of lozenges formed by the intersection of diagonally incised lines.

A single, large male figure, to the right, fills the field on the scarab’s flat bottom. He is depicted wearing a belted kilt and his hair is closely cropped. One arm is held along the side of his body while the other is bent at the elbow and raised in the air with its hand holding a floral attribute, perhaps to be identified as a papyrus stem. The field to the left is occupied by a second floral element whereas a vessel over a uraeus, or sacred cobra, fills the field in front of the figure’s legs. A stylized sign, perhaps to be understood as the nefer-sign, is found in the space between his two legs.

The concentration on a single male figure as the dominant element in the design of the bottom find its closest parallels on scarabs found at such Canaanite sites as Megiddo, Lachish, and Tell el-Ajjul. These appear to be imports dating from the Second Intermediate Period, during which time contacts between Canaan and Egypt were intensified. The reticulate pattern appears to be unattested elsewhere.

References: For parallels, see, Daphna Ben-Tor, The Scarab. A Reflection of Ancient Egypt (Jerusalem 1993), page 62, numbers 7 and 8, and page 63, number 10.