Sources. Egyptian love poems provide a rare view of human feelings in the ancient world. Four collections of love poems survive from ancient Egypt. They are known as Papyrus Chester Beatty I and Papyrus Harris 500 in the British Museum in London, Papyrus Turin 1966 in the Egyptian Museum in Turin, Italy, and Cairo Ostracon 2518 in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, Egypt. They all date to Dynasty 19 (1292-1190 B.C.E.) but might have been composed somewhat earlier.

Poetic Structure. Egyptian poetry did not have end rhyme or meter as does most English poetry written before the twentieth century. Instead, Egyptian poets organized verses into structures called couplets, triplets, and quatrains. A couplet has two related phrases, a triplet has three related phrases, and quatrains have four related phrases. The relationship between and among these phrases is a single thought expressed in variations either two, three...