iture
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 Ahhotpu shows to what degree
of excellence the work of the Egyptian goldsmiths had attained at the
time of the expulsion of the Nyksos: they had not only preserved the
good traditi