* The quantity of gold in ingots or rings, mentioned in the
Annals of Tkutmosis III., represents altogether a weight
of nearly a ton and a quarter, or in value some £140,000 of
our money. And this is far from being the whole of the metal
obtained from the enemy, for a large portion of the
inscription has disappeared, and the unrecorded amount might
be taken, without much risk of error, at as much as that of
which we have evidence—say, some two and a half tons,
which Thûtmosis had received or brought back between the
years XXIII. and XLII. of his reign—an estimation rather
under than over the reality. These figures, moreover, take
no account of the vessels and statues, or of the furniture
and arms plated with gold. Silver was not received in such
large quantities, but it was of great value, and the like
may be said of copper and lead.
* The facts justifying this position were observed and put
together for the first time by Chabas: a translation is
given in his memoir of a register of the XXth or XXIst
dynasty, which gives the price of butcher’s meat, both in
gold and silver, at this date. Fresh examples have been
since collected by Spiegelberg, who has succeeded in drawing
up a kind of tariff for the period between the XVIIIth and
XXth dynasties.
This custom, although not yet widely extended, placed at the disposal of trade enormous masses of metal, which were preserved in the form of ingots or bricks, except the portion which went to the manufacture of rings, jewellery, or valuable vessels.*
* There are depicted on the monuments bags or heaps of gold
dust, ingots in the shape of bricks, rings, and vases,
arranged alongside each other.
The general prosperity encouraged a passion for goldsmith’s work, and the use of bracelets, necklaces, and chains became common among classes of the people who were not previously accustomed to wear them. There was henceforward no scribe or merchant, however poor he might be, who had not his seal made of gold or silver, or at any rate of copper gilt. The stone was sometimes fixed, but frequently arranged so as to turn round on a pivot; while among people of superior rank it had some emblem or device upon it, such as a scorpion, a sparrow-hawk, a lion, or a cynocephalous monkey. Chains occupied the same position among the ornaments of Egyptian women as rings among men; they were indispensable decorations. Examples of silver chains are known of some five feet in length, while others do not exceed two to three inches. There are specimens in gold of all sizes, single, double, and triple, with large or small links, some thick and heavy, while others are as slight and flexible as the finest Venetian lace. The poorest peasant woman, alike with the lady of the court, could boast of the possession of a chain, and she must have been in dire poverty who had not some other ornament in her jewel-case. The jewellery of Queen Âhhotpû shows to what degree of excellence the work of the Egyptian goldsmiths had attained at the time of the expulsion of the Nyksôs: they had not only preserved the good traditions of the best workmen of the XIIth dynasty, but they had perfected the technical details, and had learned to combine form and colour with a greater skill. The pectorals of Prince Khâmoîsît and the Lord Psaru,now in the Louvre, but which were originally placed in the tomb of the Apis in the time of Ramses II., are splendid examples.
Drawn by Faucher-Gudin,
from the jewel in the
Louvre.
The most common form of these represents in miniature the front of a temple with a moulded or flat border, surmounted by a curved cornice. In one of them, which was doubtless a present from the king himself, the cartouche, containing the first name of the Pharaoh-Usirmari, appears just below the frieze, and serves as a centre for the design within the frame. The wings of the ram-headed sparrow-hawk, the emblem of Amonrâ, are so displayed as to support it, while a large urseus and a vulture beneath embracing both the sparrow-hawk and the cartouche with outspread wings give the idea of divine protection. Two didû, each of them filling one of the lower corners, symbolise duration. The framework of the design is made up of divisions marked out in gold, and filled either with coloured enamels or pieces of polished stone. The general effect is one of elegance, refinement, and harmony, the three principal elements of the design becoming enlarged from the top downwards in a deftly adjusted gradation. The dead-gold of the cartouche in the upper centre is set off below by the brightly variegated and slightly undulating band of colours of the sparrow-hawk, while the urseus and vulture, associated together with one pair of wings, envelope the upper portions in a half-circle of enamels, of which the shades pass from red through green to a dull blue, with a freedom of handling and a skill in the manipulation of colour which do honour to the artist. It was not his fault if there is still an element of stiffness in the appearance of the pectoral as a whole, for the form which religious tradition had imposed upon the jewel was so rigid that no artifice could completely get over this defect. It is a type which arose out of the same mental concepts as had given birth to Egyptian architecture and sculpture—monumental in character, and appearing often as if designed for colossal rather than ordinary beings. The dimensions, too overpowering for the decoration of normal men or women, would find an appropriate place only on the breasts of gigantic statues: the enormous size of the stone figures to which alone they are adapted would relieve them, and show them in their proper proportions. The artists of the second Theban empire tried all they could, however, to get rid of the square framework in which the sacred bird is enclosed, and we find examples among the pectorals in the Louvre of the sparrow-hawk only with curved wings, or of the ram-headed hawk with the wings extended; but in both of them there is displayed the same brilliancy, the same purity of line, as in the square-shaped jewels, while the design, freed from the trammels of the hampering enamelled frame, takes on a more graceful form, and becomes more suitable for personal decoration.
