Page:Outlines of European History.djvu/59

 The Story of Egypt 35 here in the Age of Copper gives the workman the same advan- tage obtained in the Age of Iron by the invention of steel. On the same wall we see the lapidary holding up for the noble's The lapidary, admiration splendid stone bowls, cut from diorite, a stone as fnd jeweler hard as steel. Nevertheless the bowl is ground to such thinness that the sunlight glows through its dark gray sides. Other work- men are cutting and grinding tiny pieces of beautiful blue tur- quoise. These pieces they inlay with remarkable accuracy into recesses in the surface of a magnificent golden vase, just made ready by the goldsmith. The booth of the goldsmith is filled with workmen and apprentices, weighing gold and costly stones, hammering and cast- ing, soldering and fitting to- gether richly wrought jewelry ^ which can hardly be surpassed by the best goldsmiths and jewelers of to-day. In the next space on this wall we find the potter no longer building up his jars and bowls with his fingers alone, as in the Stone Age. He now sits before a small horizontal Fig. 19. Donkey carrying a Load of Grain Sheaves in THE Pyramid Age The foal accompanies its mother while at work. Scene from the chapel of a noble's tomb (Fig. 15) wheel, which he keeps whirling with one hand. Upon this potter's wheel, the ancestor of the lathe, he deftly shapes the vessel as it whirls round and round under his fingers. When The potter's the soft clay vessels are ready, they are no longer unevenly J'ur^ace ; the burned in an open fire, as the Late Stone Age potter in the earliest glass Swiss lake-villages managed it (Fig. 7) ; but here in the Egyp- tian potter's yard are long rows of closed furnaces of clay as 1 Among the marvelous works of the ancient Egyptian goldsmith one of the best pieces now surviving is a beautiful golden tiara in the form of a chaplet of flowers, found on the brow of an Egyptian princess just as it was put there in the Feudal Age nearly four thousand years ago. It may be seen drawn as rest- ing on a cushion at the end of Chapter II (p. 55).