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The Mounted Earring and the Jointed Bracelet

The consideration of the earring, No. 7, and the bracelet, No. 8, has been reserved to the last, because they present features of a character very different to the other examples. The earring, which is from Babylon, is, to judge from its elaborate character, the most recent production of any here shown. It is not without a certain beauty of form, and is peculiar in the number of pieces of which it is composed, and in the fact that it is a "mounted" piece of work. Its component parts are neither cast nor struck with a punch, but made up in pieces from thin plate, soldered together, and filled with gum. It is made, in fact, in the same way as it would be made at the present day, with the exception of the gum; and could only be executed by a skilful hand with the aid of small round and flat plyers. Here, again, we are forced to the belief that such tools were known to the Babylonians at least, if not to the Egyptians. The lozenge-shaped stones are inlaid and flat, supported by the gum; the others are cut cabochon. The bracelet, although apparently a complicated piece of workmanship, is in reality very simple; and this again is "mounted" out of thin flat plate and chaneer, i. e., hollow wire. Its great peculiarity is that it is jointed. The skill required, and the tools necessary for the drawing of wire, has already been dwelt upon, but the difficulty of making hollow wire from flat plate is even greater. Yet this is no new feature in Egyptian jewelry, for among the relics of Queen Aah-hept, b.c. 1800, 3600 years ago, is a bracelet having a joint containing fifteen divisions, technically called "knuckles;" that is to say, seven divisions fitting into eight, like a wellmade modern snuff-box. In both these bracelets there are two joints, and they are placed just so wide apart as to admit of the passage of the wrist, when the pin was again passed into the open joint, and the bracelet, or rather armlet, thus became permanently fastened.