maintain so high a level. The fashions changed, and jewellery became
heavier in design. The ring of Rameses II., with his horses standing upon
the bezel (fig. 308), and the bracelet of Prince Psar, with his griffins
and lotus flowers in _cloisonne_ enamel (fig. 309), both in the Louvre, are
less happily conceived than the bracelets of Ahmes. The craftsmen who made
these ornaments were doubtless as skilful as the craftsmen of the time of
Queen Aahhotep, but they had less taste and less invention. Rameses II. was
condemned either to forego the pleasure of wearing his ring, or to see his
little horses damaged and broken off by the least accident. Already
noticeable in the time of the Nineteenth Dynasty, this decadence becomes
more marked as we approach the Christian era. The earrings of Rameses IX.
in the Gizeh Museum are an ungraceful assemblage of filigree disks, short
chains, and pendent uraei, such as no human ear could have carried without
being torn, or pulled out of shape. They were attached to each side of the
wig upon the head of the mummy. The bracelets of the High Priest Pinotem
III., found upon his mummy, are mere round rings of gold incrusted with
pieces of coloured glass and carnelian, like those still made by the
Soudanese blacks. The Greek invasion began by modifying the style of
Egyptian gold-work, and ended by gradually substituting Greek types for
native types. The jewels of an Ethiopian queen, purchased from Ferlini by
the Berlin Museum, contained not only some ornaments which might readily
have been attributed to Pharaonic times, but others of a mixed style in
which Hellenic influences are distinctly traceable. The treasure discovered
at Zagazig in 1878, at Keneh in 1881, and at Damanhur in 1882, consisted of
objects having nothing whatever in common with Egyptian traditions. They
comprise hairpins supporting statuettes of Venus, zone-buckles, agraffes
for fastening the peplum, rings and bracelets set with cameos, and caskets
ornamented at the four corners with little Ionic columns. The old patterns,
however, were still in request in remote provincial places, and village
goldsmiths adhered "indifferent well" to the antique traditions of their
craft. Their city brethren had meanwhile no skill to do aught but make
clumsy copies of Greek and Roman originals.

In this rapid sketch of the industrial arts there are many lacunae. When
referring to examples, I have perforce limited myself to such as are
contain