|
Industry : Metalworking
Metalworking
Egyptian skill in metalworking was less advanced than in some other techniques, and they did not develop in this field as rapidly as other peoples of western Asia. This was due to the fact that local conditions did not favor metalworking: Minerals were not plentiful or easy to obtain, and there was relatively little timber for fuel. Whereas metal was preferred and used for tools and weapons in other countries, the Egyptians had developed stone and flint for this purpose from earliest times and, being innately conservative, felt little incentive to take up the new technologies. A metalworking industry, however, gradually emerged. The principal metals in use were copper, gold, iron, lead, silver, and tin. In addition, there were four principal alloys bronze (an alloy of copper and tin), a copper-lead alloy, electrum (an alloy of gold and silver), and brass (an alloy of copper and zinc), which was introduced at a very late date.
COPPERCopper
began to be used toward the end of the Predynastic Period and was
probably introduced to Egypt from Asia. Copper ores occurred in
areas such as eastern Turkey, Syria, the Zagros Mountains, Cyprus,
Sinai, and Egypt’s Eastern Desert. The earliest method of working
copper was to hammer the small pieces of metal with rounded pebbles,
but they discovered that beyond a certain point the metal became
brittle and cracked. Therefore, in predynastic times, only pins,
beads, and simple objects were produced from copper. It was
eventually discovered, however, that the stresses that built up
within a piece of hammered metal could be relieved by heating the
metal to quite a high temperature. Subsequently, the cooled metal
could be hammered to a required shape until it began to harden, and
then it could be reheated. This process known today as annealing
marked an important stage in the development of metalworking
techniques since it demonstrated that metals could be altered by
using high temperatures. A further important discovery indicated
that metallic copper, reduced from its ores, would become molten and
could be poured into molds. Special molds were gradually developed
to cast metal objects; the earliest were simple and consisted of a
negative cut into a piece of stone into which the molten metal was
poured; the metal object was then hammered and annealed to produce
the required shape. Later, two-piece molds of fired clay were
introduced. Sometimes these were first molded around a carved wooden
pattern that was later removed, and the two pieces were fired and
joined together. The molten metal was then poured into the hollow
center. Later, a clay core was included in the mold for casting
objects such as socketed axes. In the New Kingdom and later periods,
the cire perdue (lost wax method) was introduced for casting
delicate copper items such as statuettes. A beeswax model of the
object to be produced was coated with clay to form the mold; this
was then embedded in sand or earth, which formed a support, and was
heated so that the beeswax melted and ran out of the holes in the
mold. Hardened and rigid, the mold was then ready to receive the
molten metal, which was poured in through the holes. Once this had
cooled down, the mold was broken and the metal object was released.
The Egyptians exploited the copper mines in Sinai from Dynasty 3
onward, sending great expeditions there, but when this source began
to be exhausted after the Middle Kingdom it was increasingly
necessary to import copper from Cyprus and Asia. At first, and for
many years, Egyptian copper ores were obtained entirely from surface
deposits, employing only flint tools, but later, for underground
mining, copper chisels were used to cut shafts.
.
BRONZEEarly
bronze consisted of copper and tin, and although tin ore occurs in
Egypt there is no evidence that it was worked in antiquity. Bronze
produced and used in western Asia long before it reached Egypt was a
major discovery in metalworking (probably occurring prior to 3000
BC) that marked a significant advance. The process involved adding a
small quantity of tin ore to the copper ores during smelting, which
yielded the harder and more easily worked metal. During the second
millennium BC the Egyptians began to import bronze ingots from Asia,
and gradually bronze replaced copper for industrial uses.
Experiments with methods of alloying and heating the furnace where
the metals were smelted were undertaken. In early times bellows
consisting of a reed or pipe attached to a bag and blown by several
boys were used to increase the heat of charcoal fires, but a new
type of bellows made of a pair of goatskins and operated by a man
who stamped on them was later introduced. These raised the
temperature of the furnace to a higher level, enabling larger scale
production. Experiments adding low or high tin contents to the
copper also allowed materials of different strengths to be produced
for various purposes. Stone and copper tools, however, continued to
be used alongside bronze ones for many years.
.
GOLDGold was
found in the desert between the Nile Valley and the Red Sea. It
occurred both in alluvial sands and gravels and in veins in quartz
rock. Ancient workings were situated in the northern part of the
Eastern Desert, around Wadi Hammamat; in the central area of the
Eastern Desert; and along the Nile Valley, from Wadi Halfa to Kerma.
These respectively provided the “gold of Coptos,” “gold of Wawat,”
and the “gold of Kush.” The Nubian mines of Kush, which came into
production in the Middle Kingdom, continued throughout the New
Kingdom and into later times. Egyptian goldsmiths were among the
most skillful and highly regarded craftsmen and produced fine
jewelry, statuary, and coffins. Electrum, a natural or artificial
alloy of gold and silver, was probably nearly always used in its
natural state in ancient Egypt and was employed for jewelry and also
for overlaying obelisks. Native silver, however, does not occur in
Egypt and had to be imported from Asia. Thus, it was comparatively
rare before Dynasty 18, and until the end of the Middle Kingdom it
seems to have been considered more valuable than gold.
.
IRONIron was
only introduced into Egyptian industry between 1000 and 600 BC,
although iron ores found in the Eastern Desert and Sinai had been
made into beads and amulets since predynastic times. Although the
Egyptians were probably aware of the existence of smelted iron
during the New Kingdom (the Hittites had developed production
techniques in the fifteenth century BC), they were the last people
in the area to use this technology, which was brought into Egypt
several hundred years later.
.
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Industry : Metalworking
|
||||
