ABSTRACT
Bead-making began in the Epi-palaeolithic period (ca. 10,000-5500 BC).1 At first, craftworkers utilized natural objects, such as pebbles, shells and teeth. In the Predynastic period, beads were made from copper, gold, silver, greenish-blue glazed quartz and steatite, glazed faience cores and stones; these included agate, calcite, carnelian, diorite, garnet, limestone and serpentine.2 The Egyptians’ most favoured bead shapes were rings, barrels, cylinders, convex bicones and spheroids, but amulets and pendants were also threaded into strings. A comprehensive classification and nomenclature of bead shapes has been assembled by Horace Beck.3
