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COSTUMES AND ADORNMENTS
151
should define their meaning for clarification. The word amulet, according to J. T. Shipley, derives from the Latin amolire letum, i.e. "to turn away death."202 The amulet is an object worn on or carried by the person as a preventative, to protect from something that is feared.203
Originally a charm was an incantation, a formula chanted to bring about a desired effect. Amulets were "charmed" in this fashion at times. They were also issued in written form.204
A talisman's magic function is to ensure good luck or to bring about beneficial qualities.205
The modern fad for charm bracelets is as new as ancient Egypt. H. E. Winlock in describing an unearthed treasure pertaining to three princesses states that "each of the three ladies had some eight strings with one or more amulets" which were worn around the neck or arm.206
b) Materials. The raw materials for making jewelry in ancient Egypt were of a wide variety. Among them we find animal products such as bones, teeth, shells and even ostrich egg-shell. The vegetable world provided resins, seeds, straw and wood. Pebbles, faience, glass, gold, silver, electrum, copper, and precious and semiprecious stones derived from the realm of minerals.207 A small number of beads made of meteoric iron and pertaining to the predynastic age of Egypt have been found.208
Among the precious and semiprecious stones there were those known in the general era which the picture The Ten Commandments portrays. Others did not make their appearance till a later date, or were never known in the Egypt of antiquity. We shall list them in the order indicated. The stones employed were the agate, onyx, amethyst, alabaster, carnelian, sard, chalcedony, chrysoprase, green felspar (Amazon stone), garnet, jasper, lapis lazuli, malachite, peridot (olivine), quartz (rock crystal) and turquoise.209
Sardonyx is one of the stones not known in the
202. Dictionary of Word Origins (Ames, Iowa, 1955), p. 21.
203. Encycl. of Rel. and Ethics, III, 392-393.
204. Ibid., p. 393.
205. Ibid.
206. Winlock, Three Princesses, p. 25.
207. Lucas, pp. 52-53, 442.
208. Ibid., p. 270.
209. Ibid., pp. 442-461.