Ancient Egypt: Personal adornment - jewelry, body painting, tattoos
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Personal adornmentOrnamentation is much more than a matter of esthetics. By choosing a certain kind of jewellery one makes statements as to one's wealth, social status, or religious beliefs. The wealth of a pharaoh, even an insignificant one like Tutankhamen, was of a different order when compared to the affluence of a regional official, who himself was oppulent compared with the humble peasant whom he lorded over. Such differences were expressed by, among other means, the exquisiteness of one's adornments.JewelleryPeople have a propensity to explain their worldly successes as the result of being morally superior, and earning divine favour by pleasing the gods. Beauty has - more wrongly than rightly - always been equated with goodness; in Egyptian nefer (nfr) was used for both 'good' and 'beautiful'. Wearing ornaments was a way to improve one's attractiveness in the eyes of both people and the gods.They were symbols of wealth and power, which had to be given up when one was defeated in battle: Tell if I have concealed from his majesty anything of my father's house: gold [bars (?)], precious stones, vessels of all kinds, armlets, bracelets of gold, necklaces, collars wrought with precious stones, amulets for every limb, headbands, earrings, all royal adornments, all vessels for the king's purification of gold and precious stonesThey were a means to impress one's status, one's dominance and one's opulence upon others by distributing them as largesse: Babay: [rings (?)] mounted in gold - 124They were used to show appreciation for services rendered when they were bestowed upon deserving soldiers or officials: I fought hand to hand before the king, I brought off a hand there. He (i.e. Thutmose) gave me the gold of honor; list thereof: /// /// two silver rings.To the ordinary Egyptian they represented savings which did not decay, protection from disease and ill fortune, or a means to impress one's neighbour or win one's love. The materials used for producing ornaments were varied: shells, stones, clay, pieces of bone, wood, resin, and ivory. Later man-made materials were added to this list: metals like copper, bronze, gold, silver and more rarely lead and iron, faience and glass in many colours. Some of the materials had to be imported, others mined and worked at great expense. |
Bracelets
From left to right:
1. Bone - pre-historic (UC15495) 2. Gold - 8th dynasty (UC18955) 3. Ivory (UC15785) | ||
ButtonsButtons were sewn onto the clothes, were decorative only and did not perform any useful function.
From left to right:
1. Bone - Middle Kingdom (UC11112) 2. Carnelian (UC17125) 3. Faience - 18th dynasty (UC1348) 4. Steatite (UC11115) | ||
Ear rings and ear studsUnlike their neighbours to the south who wore nose and lip studs, the ancient Egyptians seem to have had few body piercings, mostly limited to their ear lobes. The practice seems to have been most popular during the early New Kingdom.
Top row from left to right: 1. Faience - 18th dynasty - Ø c. 18 mm (UC1863) 2. Glass - 18th dynasty (UC22089) 3. Gold wire - 2nd Intermediate Period (UC26018) Second row from left to right: 1. Base metal - Ø c.11cm (UC25385) 2. Silver wire - 12th dynasty - Ø c.15mm (UC17809) 3. Gold - Roman Period - width c.11mm (UC34351) Third row from left to right: 1. Ivory - New Kingdom - Ø c.4cm (UC38313) 2. Limestone - New Kingdom - Ø 21 mm (UC38379) 3. Pottery - 18th dynasty (UC38280) Bottom row from left to right: 1. Glass - Ø c.9 mm(UC19525) 2. Faience - 18th dynasty (UC1281) 3. Glass - 18th dynasty - 20 to 25 mm long (UC22879) | ||
Finger ringsSeals were proof of authority since earliest days. Keeping them safe was of vital importance. They were therefore often worn as rings. The official Tjetji records on his stela thatHe (i.e. Intef II) made me great, he advanced my seat, he set me in his confidential office, in his palace because of [/// ///]; the treasury was put in my charge, under my seal-ring...Seal rings also appear in New Kingdom belles lettres. Nakht-Sobk, a scribe of the necropolis, describes in a love poem how the lover is under the spell of his beloved: She captures me with her eye; 
Top, from left to right:
1. Inscription: Neferkheperure (Akhenaten) and winged uraeus - bronze (UC12439) 2. Winged uraeus and sun boat - faience - 22nd dynasty (UC16079) 3. Inscription: Nebmaatre (Amenhotep III) - faience - 18th dynasty (UC12365) Bottom, from left to right 1. Cartouche inscribed Djeserkare (Amenhotep I) - gold (UC11881) 2. slate - pre-dynastic (UC10842) 3. Wedjat eye - faience - 18th dynasty (UC1003) | ||
Necklaces and collarsUntil the New Kingdom men were often depicted with a bare upper body, wearing only a loincloth and some jewellery, frequently a collar or necklace.
Top row from left to right
1. Carnelians - 12th dynasty (UC31472) 2. Faience - 12th dynasty (UC31478) 3. Faience - Middle Kingdom (UC51363) Bottom row from left to right 1. Cowrie shells - 3rd Intermediate Period (UC37327) 2. Glass - 18th dynasty (UC31421) 3. Silver - Late Period (UC58151) | ||
The wesekh (wsx), a broad golden collar, was worn by the pharaohs at the beginning of the 18th dynasty. Later it was conferred by the king on deserving dignitaries as an honorary decoration. The menat, worn by priestesses of Hathor, was an ornamental collar which also served as a musical instrument:
I executed for him the offering tables, /// (sxm-) sistrums and (Ssj.t-) sistrums, necklace rattles (mnj.wt), censer ... 
From left to right
1. Collar - faience - 9th dynasty (UC31717) 2. Menat - steatite (UC11925) 3. Menat - leather - inscribed Menkheperre (UC13011) 4. Menat dedicated to Bastet - bronze - 30th dynasty (UC30482) | ||
PectoralsPectorals were worn on the chest as protective amulets. They were often decorated with religious scenes such as Nefer-Hor adoring Isis, Anubis with a flail behind his back, a judgment of the dead, or inscribed with spells:Words spoken by Thoth, lord of Hermapolis, great god, lord of heaven: May life , prosperity, breath be given to the son of the chief Prophet of Amen, Waskusa, justified son of the chief prophet 
From left to right
1. Papyrus cartonnage - Ptolemaic Period (UC45857), about 24cm wide 2. Shrine shaped pectoral - faience - 20th dynasty (UC55175), about 6x6cm 3. Nefer-Hor adoring Isis - gold (UC12977), 24x23mm | ||
PendantsPendants, like pectorals, were often amuletic in character. They were frequently hung around the necks of babies and toddlers, the death-rate of young children being very high and their parents doing all they could to protect them from the evil spirits which killed so many of them.
Top, from left to right:
1. Depiction of the sacrifice of Isaac - glass - LP (UC22398), 22mm wide 2. Forehead pendant - resin - pre-dynastic (UC10814), 54mm high, 30mm wide 3. Cartouche inscribed Ka-mes - gold - 17yh dynasty (UC11850), 18mm long Bottom, from left to right 1. Lily - faience - 18th dynasty (UC1473), 16mm long 2. Magic slate - bone - Naqada period (UC16273), 63mm high 3. Pomegranate - faience - 18th dynasty (UC1580), 13mm high |
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Body painting
Some prehistoric figurines made of ivory and clay display geometrical markings which may be testimony to body painting or tattooing being known in Egypt.
Make-up TattoosNot all tattoos served as ornaments. Foreign prisoners of war were at times marked, as were slaves who had to bear the name of their owner inscribed on their hand. If these people had markings inflicted on them, others chose them for protection:Now there was upon the shore, as still there is now, a temple of Heracles, in which if any man's slave take refuge Schematic view of the tattoos of Amunet, priestess of Hathor, Middle Kingdom 
The Middle Kingdom Hathor priestess Amunet buried at Deir el-Bahari and two further female mummies found there were liberally tattooed on their arms, shoulders and abdomen. The pigment used was of blackish-blue colour, possibly inserted under the skin with needles made from fish bone or the like.
Lower parts of a pottery figurine with markings on its abdomen, From the Late Period there is pictorial evidence of tattoos in the form of the god Bes having been made on the thighs of Nubian dancing girls and musicians. It appears that tattooing in ancient Egypt was not done for aesthetic purposes, but had connotations of sexuality and fertility. | ||
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Source of pictures: Petrie Museum collection [1] |
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© January 2005
and have the sacred marks set upon him, giving himself over to the god, it is not lawful to lay hands upon him; but this custom has continued still unchanged from the beginning down to my own time.