“This text, one of the undisputed masterpieces of ancient Egyptian literature, dates possibly from as early as the late Sixth Dynasty of the Old Kingdom…The text was composed under the guise of an elderly vizier who was on the verge of retirement and desirous of handing his position on to his son who also bore the name Ptahhotep.” – William Kelly Simpson, The Literature of Ancient Egypt (New Haven & London: Yale University Press, 2003), 129.