Ancient Egyptian jewelry combined gold with colored stones and glazed faience to make broad collars, bracelets, pectorals, rings and amulets. Egyptians wore it in life and were buried with it for the afterlife, and almost every piece carried religious meaning. The favorite stones were lapis lazuli, turquoise and carnelian, and the best surviving set comes from the tomb of Tutankhamun, found in 1922.
Gold, the flesh of the gods
Egypt had its own gold. Mines in the Eastern Desert and in Nubia, to the south, supplied the pharaohs for thousands of years, and Egyptian gold was famous across the ancient Near East. Egyptian texts describe the skin of the gods as gold, and gold's resistance to tarnish linked it with permanence and eternal life.
Goldsmiths hammered gold into sheet, cast it in molds, drew it into wire and soldered parts together. They also used electrum, the pale natural alloy of gold and silver, and silver itself, which was scarce in Egypt and at times rarer than gold. Our electrum page covers that metal.
The stones and their colors
Egyptian jewelers chose stones mostly for color, and colors carried meaning.
| Material | Color | Source | Associations |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lapis lazuli | Deep blue with gold flecks | Badakhshan, Afghanistan | The night sky, the hair of the gods |
| Turquoise | Sky blue to green | Sinai Peninsula | Joy, new growth, the goddess Hathor |
| Carnelian | Orange to red | Egyptian deserts | Blood, life, energy |
| Green feldspar | Pale green | Egyptian deserts | Fertility and renewal |
| Amethyst | Purple | Wadi el-Hudi | Popular in the Middle Kingdom |
| Faience | Blue-green glaze | Made in Egypt | An affordable substitute for stone |
Lapis lazuli traveled overland from Afghanistan, the same source Mesopotamian jewelers used. Egyptians mined turquoise themselves at Serabit el-Khadim and Wadi Maghara in the Sinai, where a temple to Hathor, "Lady of Turquoise," stood near the workings. Carnelian was gathered as pebbles in the Egyptian deserts.
Faience and glass
Faience is a glazed ceramic made from crushed quartz, with small amounts of lime and alkali, coated in a glassy blue or green surface colored with copper. It could be molded into beads, rings and amulets in large numbers. Faience let ordinary Egyptians wear the colors of turquoise and lapis without the cost of the real stones, and it filled the bead collars that appear on so many tomb paintings.
From about the middle of the second millennium BC, Egyptian workshops also made glass. Jewelers cut and set colored glass alongside stones, sometimes so well that the two are hard to tell apart without close study. Our page on glass in jewelry follows that long tradition of imitation.
Broad collars and pectorals
The broad collar, called a wesekh, is the most familiar Egyptian ornament. It is made of many rows of beads, often tube-shaped or shaped like flowers and leaves, strung between two end pieces and fanned across the chest and shoulders. Some had a counterweight hanging down the back to keep the collar in place.
Pectorals were large pendants worn on the chest. Middle Kingdom princesses buried at Dahshur and Lahun had pectorals of gold set with carnelian, lapis and turquoise in tiny cells. This technique, with stones cut to fit gold compartments, is a form of inlay closely related to cloisonne, though the cells held cut stone or glass instead of fused enamel. The jewelry of these Middle Kingdom princesses is often judged the finest goldwork Egypt produced.
Scarabs and amulets
The scarab beetle rolls balls of dung across the ground, and Egyptians linked that image with the god Khepri pushing the sun across the sky each morning. The beetle became a symbol of rebirth. Scarabs were carved from stone or molded in faience and set in rings, strung on necklaces, or used as seals with names and titles on the flat underside.
A heart scarab, larger than the rest, was placed over the heart of a mummy and inscribed with a spell from the Book of the Dead asking the heart not to speak against its owner at judgment. Other common amulets included:
- The ankh, a sign for life
- The eye of Horus (wedjat), for protection and health
- The djed pillar, for stability
- The tyet knot, linked with the goddess Isis
Mummies were wrapped with dozens of amulets placed in specific positions among the linen. Egyptians believed these objects protected the dead person on the journey through the underworld. Many of these symbols turn up in modern gemstone folklore.
Tutankhamun's tomb
Howard Carter found the nearly intact tomb of the boy king Tutankhamun in the Valley of the Kings in November 1922, working for Lord Carnarvon. The tomb held over 5,000 objects, and jewelry formed a large part of them. The king's gold mask, inlaid with lapis, quartz, obsidian, carnelian and colored glass, is the best-known image of ancient Egypt.
Among the jewelry were pectorals, collars, earrings, rings and bracelets. One pectoral centers on a scarab carved from a yellow-green glass. That glass was much later identified as Libyan desert glass, a natural silica glass formed in the Sahara, probably by an ancient impact. Tutankhamun was a minor king who died young. The richness of his burial suggests what the tombs of greater pharaohs, robbed in antiquity, once held.
The collection belongs to Egypt's national museums, and the Grand Egyptian Museum near Giza was built to show it in full.
Egyptian revival jewelry
Interest in Egyptian design flared repeatedly in Europe. Napoleon's expedition to Egypt at the end of the 18th century sparked one wave. The opening of the Suez Canal in 1869 brought another, and Victorian jewelers made scarab brooches and lotus motifs. The discovery of Tutankhamun's tomb set off an Egyptian craze during the 1920s that shaped much Art Deco jewelry, with sphinxes, scarabs and hieroglyph patterns in platinum and colored stones.
For how Egyptian jewelry compared with work in neighboring cultures, see Mesopotamian jewelry and the jewelry history overview.
Frequently asked questions
What gems did ancient Egyptians use?
The most common were lapis lazuli, turquoise and carnelian, along with green feldspar, amethyst, garnet and rock crystal. Faience and glass often stood in for these stones.
Why were scarabs important in ancient Egypt?
The scarab beetle was linked with the sun god Khepri and with daily rebirth. Egyptians wore scarabs as amulets and seals and placed heart scarabs on mummies for protection in the afterlife.
What is Egyptian faience?
Faience is a glazed material made from crushed quartz with a glassy blue or green surface. It was molded into beads and amulets and gave people an affordable substitute for turquoise and lapis lazuli.
When was Tutankhamun's tomb discovered?
Howard Carter discovered the tomb in the Valley of the Kings in November 1922. It held thousands of objects, including some of the best-preserved Egyptian jewelry ever found.