Egypt Bronze Weapons

Ancient Egyptian bronze dagger that can be found in Thebes in the town of Abydos Upper Egypt at around 1600-1400 BC.

Bronze weapons were made until after 2000 BC in Egypt, the common Egyptian daggers had a bronze blade and the handle consisted of gold, wood and alabaster material, the pummel of the dagger had the name of its pharaoh Ahmose I written in hieroglyph. The object was actually made in a sort of military factory in Abydos where they used bronze anvil to craft these fine weapons and each have a label of their pharaoh . The blade is 20 cm long and the handle is about 7-10 cm long. It looks like silver but it made of hardened bronze. The handle is very delicately crafted with an Alabaster stone heel in the bottom and wood for grip in

There actually is some gold in the dagger, the gold in the dagger shows that Egypt is a wealthy nation with plenty of gold. Gold is considered by the ancient Egyptians to be a divine and indestructible metal. It was associated with the brilliance of the sun. The sun god Re was called “The Mountain of gold” during the old Kingdom. Many deities are believed to be golden colored, also most royal tombs inside are made of pure gold. Copper was the most common metal for everyday use in ancient Egypt so it was not particularly hard for them to make bronze since bronze is just copper with a tin alloy and when the two metals are alloyed there is a high increase in hardness and sharpness of the blade. Before they found out about bronze most weapons were made of copper but it was obvious how much sharper and stronger bronze was. Bronze made the dagger very powerful when used against an enemy, though strength of the soldier using it still mattered. To make metals craftable they used an Egyptian heating process called smelting to removing the impurities of the ores and make it into something good to work with. Egypt was very much desert so Egypt did not have any great forest nor many tall trees. Most of Egypt wood were imported from Lebanon or Central Africa. Because of Egypt’s shortage in wood it

Alabaster is the fine- grained form of the mineral gypsum (calcium sulfate). Marble, especially white marble, is mainly calcite (calcium carbonate). Alabaster was clearly important to ancient Egypt because it helped them create very beautiful sculptures, jars, and was used as a material for many handles. The ancient Egyptian prized alabaster and even thought of it as being worthy of possession by their gods. The name alabaster is derived from the Egyptian word A-labastre, it means it honors the Egyptian goddess Bast who is the goddess of cats and is a guardian of the pharaohs. Alabaster metals were produced near the eastern desert by the granite quarries. The design of the blade was probably given how they saw how the Hyksos weapons where and they implemented their own way. Daggers made in ancient Egypt are mostly made of bronze, stone, copper. Most were very elaborate and with extraordinary craftsmanship, not many Egyptian weapons have survived the 5000 years since they were created. Despite the time difference the blade looks like any other modern dagger blade and the handle looks very similar too many daggers, but more modern dagger have more grip while this is just a wooden handle. It’s very fascinating how a dagger all the way in 1500 BC survives today and it makes it more extraordinary that many Egyptian weapons aren’t found, clearly the