This summer and autumn, Egypt was not only a celebrated tourist route, but also a fashionable jewelry trend. One of the reasons is that the ethnic theme is again on the front burner. Most brands, from very democratic to luxury, have ethno in their collections and its variations are polymorphic. The hankering “to origins” may be manifested in different ways. If mild, it may turn into a collection of sweet coral rings, like those of Christian Dior. However, the designer may fall into an extreme grade of ethno euphoria, like Oscar de la Renta, who created a wild, in all the meanings of this word, necklace made of mother-of-pearl and ostrich-feathers in which some tribal chief would not be ashamed to step onto the warpath. There is yet another instance with Italian company Fray Wille, which released a collection of gold adornments in the run-up to this summer, whose main theme was Ancient Egypt. It was not by chance such a theme was chosen. The ethnic trend is generally distinguished by a wide use of natural and semi-precious stones, such as turquoise, agate, amber, obsidian, as well as corals and yellow gold. Egyptiac adornments are really very well built into this concept.
“The flesh of the gods”
Jewelry played a very important role in the lives of ancient Egyptians. Besides their decorative function they also served as social status markers, religious attributes and protective charms. Jewelry in Ancient Egypt was based on yellow gold. Its mining in the country was not just very well developed – because of the gold fields in the Eastern Desert Egypt was one of the richest countries in the ancient world. “Gold” in the Egyptian language was denoted by the word “nub,” which pointed to the Aswan area, where it was mined. Greek historian Starbo called this region “Nubia” and this name is used today too. Ancient Egyptians called silver as “nub hedj” or “white gold.” In Ancient Egypt there was no separate silver mining. Sterling silver was imported from abroad and cost higher than gold. Unfortunately, there is a quite small number of silver adornments, which survived to these days since ancient people, alas, were unable to make allowance for the short life of silver due to its oxidation.
Ancient Egyptians’ love for gold was not only stipulated by material reasons. “The flesh of the gods,” this was the name given to gold by the inhabitants of Ancient Egypt. The gold color symbolized the sun with all the consequences ensuing for ancient Egyptians and related to the cult of Amon, Amon-Ra, Hor, etc. Since gold is not oxidized and after centuries looks and shines as almost new, it brought the idea of eternity to the inhabitants of the Nile banks. This is why pure gold was used to make burial adornments and masks because nothing could be better than “the flesh of the gods” to protect the deceased on his uneasy way through eternity to the after world.
“We shall pay with gold!”
In the living world gold was the symbol of power. The pharaoh was the embodiment of “Golden Hor,” the son of god Osiris. Gold was also an efficient instrument of diplomacy for Egyptians. Many Asian countries flourished mainly because of trade with Egypt. Even in the Amarna Period, when the empire decayed due to heretic pharaoh Ehnaton, there was still enough gold in its treasury. We can easily deduce this by the gold wealth discovered in Tutankhamen’s sepulcher. The so-called Turin papyrus, a unique document, which is the most ancient geological and topographic map in the history of mankind, provides a clue to the number of gold fields in Egypt and their location. No one knows how and where this document was discovered. For the first time it surfaced in 1824, when Bernardino Drovetti, a collector of Egyptian antiquities, sold one of his collections, which included the papyrus, to the king of Piedmont and Sardinia. The king, whose residence at that time was in Turin, donated the collection to the city. It took several years to the Turin Museum employees to put Drovetti’s collection in order. German Egyptologist Lepsius was the first to take interest in the papyrus. He recovered one part of the document now known as Papyrus I or “the papyrus of the gold fields.” In the 1850s-1860s the hieroglyphic inscriptions on the papyrus were deciphered. The document described a mountainous terrain harboring a great number of gold deposits, as well as sanctuaries and settlements inhabited by miners. Incidentally, the ancient authorities treated the workers of the gold mining industry with great care and attention. The pharaoh personally inspected the deposits and there is an inscription telling that Seti I dissatisfied with the workers’ living conditions ordered to dig a well in the desert and to build a temple, where anyone could find a desired shelter from the scorching sun on the way to the gold fields. The Turin papyrus was completely recovered and deciphered by 1870-71. And in 1914, it was established that the deposits pointed out in the papyrus were located in the area of Wadi Hammamat.
There were reports in the modern Egyptian mass media that the results of recent geological exploration works and satellite images point to large-scale gold reserves in the Eastern Desert of Egypt.
According to the report issued by the Egyptian Ministry of Petroleum and Mineral Resources and cited by publications, Egypt may become one of the global gold mining leaders in the nearest 10 years.
“With annual output of over 30 tons of gold, sales could exceed revenues from tourism, agriculture and even oil,” the document says. Proven reserves at the Wadi Hudain deposit alone exceed 50 million ounces, worth around $50 billion.
“Nine foreign companies are active in the sphere in Egypt, and another two are involved in exploration,” an Egyptian spokesman told to the journalists.
A fly for courage
In Ancient Egypt gold was used to make devotional articles but even more often jewelry. The Egyptians did not put on their adornments for no particular reason; a jewelry piece was always a symbol worn with some aim – for protection or indication of status or as an award. Adornments in Ancient Egypt were worn by people of all social classes, by women and men, and men’s “bling” was very popular. Animal figures were in great honour. For example, a tiny gold hippo turned upside-down was to scare away evil forces. This darling – at first sight – creature was conceived by the ancient Egyptians as a symbol of aggression and associated with Set, a god of darkness. All this because hippopotamuses were a natural hazard for the Nile farmers since they used to raid their fields trampling everything they left uneaten. Amulets shaped as heads of dogs, lions, panthers and bulls were also in vogue. It was assumed that the best qualities of a chosen animal, such as courage, strength, and devotion could be passed over to the amulet bearer. In the New Kingdom Period a golden fly was used as a state award; it was given to worriers as an order “For Courage.” Mirrors were also rated as jewelry. Their reflective surface was manufactured of imported polished silver valued higher than gold, so such mirrors could be afforded only by very rich people. In the Ipwr Papyrus, which contains a description of distemper and class revolution in the end of the Old Kingdom, the author says that now, thanks to the Great Revolution, a plain Egyptian woman, who could see her face reflected only in a jar with water, has an opportunity to see herself in a mirror. Of course, no one could do without those things that are now heaped in all jewelry stores and outlets of modern Egypt – scarabs and “ankhs.” The scarab symbolized Ra, the Sun God, and one of its meanings was “revival” associated with the daily sunrise. The hieroglyph ‘Ankh” was used in writing to denote the word “life” and was an often decorative element in jewelry pieces.
Impossible is possible!
The modern Egyptian jeweler very much resembles Dima Bilan repeating the phrase “Impossible is possible!” almost as often as this domestic pop-activist. Mind that “impossible” may happen to you quite unexpectedly. Thus, during the excursion at the Cairo State Museum the Rough&Polished correspondent asked the guide whether the ancient Egyptians used diamonds. “Diamonds were not known to Ancient Egypt. Adornments were made of stones, which are now called semi-precious – turquoise, malachite, coral or their imitations of glass. The most expensive stone was lapis-lazuli of the night-sky color and it was shipped from the north-western part of Afghanistan…” the guide said. After that he called me behind someone’s sarcophagus taking away from the rest of the group and whispered, “They did not use them. But we can set them in!” My emerging suspicions that someone now will try to fence a bracelet of some Ramses issued around five hundred years before Christ with an enormous strass glued to it (the Egyptians like everything big and sparkling) fortunately did not come true. After the excursion I happened in a small jewelry workshop just across the road from the main Egyptian museum. “Yes, we are making copies of ancient Egyptian adornments and we are getting more orders lately, all of them coming from the Europeans,” the workshop’s owner Ali told me. “We can make everything. Even impossible.” “Can you make a Bvlgari?” I asked unable to check myself. The previous evening I happened to watch family promenades of Cairo residents along the downtown streets which turned the city looking like a huge Cherkizovski Market in Moscow – in Russia, one can see so many kinds of clothes ornamented with unbelievable variations of logos belonging to world-famous fashion brands only visiting this sales point. “Exact copies” of Rolex and Patek Phillip are sold in the center of Cairo at every corner, like shawarma. “We can make Bvlgari! And Tiffany! And Cartier!” Ali said animatedly and again added something about impossible. It turned out that in his workshop the Europeans with catalogues of the above mentioned and many other manufacturers were not at all a rare case. In the same manner such “exact copies” are ordered by Egyptian neighbors from the Middle East, Dubai, Iran, and Saudi Arabia. Even Egyptian girls, as it turned out, prefer Tiffany earrings to scarabs. On the average, this cuts the cost of a jewelry piece by 25-50 percent compared to the original item. After I stoically withstood a half-hour attack aimed to make me happy with a silver Bvlgari ring at $50, Ali got somewhat upset and made a not so confident offer saying, “Well, may be it will be a copy of an ancient adornment? We can set a tiny diamond in it…” “OK, can you make a copy of Tutankhamen’s mask?” some mischievous ancient Egyptian deity jerked me for this joke. “Of course! I can do everything! You’ll have the best quality of gold and the copy will be as exact as no other! As for the price, we are sure to come to terms!” the goldsmith gave me a look of hope. “We can put a Bvlgari trademark on it! Well, somewhere in the corner…” Having imagined the prospects of getting “agreed” on the price of 19 kilos of gold (this was the weight of the original) and attempting to take the shining monster with a Bvlgari sign across the regal forehead out of the country I scurried away… But for me one thing was true and sure 100 percent – there was really nothing impossible for a professional in this country.
Anna Tishinski, Rough&Polished – the Middle East
The information for the historic note was furnished by the Egyptian National Museum in Cairo
