Jewellery history of the Levant

Ancient jewellery from Lebanon

Published Dec 27, 2023

What is the history of traditional jewellery in North Africa and the Middle East? Historical context and cultural heritage have left their traces in the traditional jewellery worn in countries as we know them today, and so this blog series takes us back to the distant past. In this blog, I will look at jewellery history in Lebanon in very broad strokes: what is the history of Lebanese jewellery?

Lebanon: early jewellery history

The geographical area which is now Lebanon is, historically, part of the larger Syro-Palestinian cultural sphere. That is reflected in its ancient jewellery: it shows continuity and connections. One of the earliest occurrences of adornment and the production of adornment in Western Asia is found in Lebanon.

A few kilometers from Beirut lies Ksar ‘Akil, a rock shelter where people lived some 40,000 years ago. These people created beads of shell, and not just any shells: they were very particular about their choices. They liked to mix very white and colourful shells. And it doesn’t end there: they selected shells specifically to create ornaments. So, it’s not creativity with left-over shells from food production, as you might think, but a very selective process to gather exactly those shells they wanted. [1]

These Lebanese shell beads are among the oldest ornaments in the world, and are instrumental in understanding the development of cognitive capacities of humans: it is by decorating ourselves that we show awareness of how others see us.

Lebanon in the Bronze Age: beads of history

It is beads again that tell us about long distance trade in the early Bronze Age, around 3000 – 2500 BCE. In Tell Fadous-Kfarabida, in the north of Lebanon, a small urban center flourished. Here, inscribed cylindrical beads were found. These are seals, that were used to sign administrative documents: rolling the bead over wet clay would leave the impression of the image on the seal. They tell us a lot about organization and administration. A gold ring with a lapis lazuli cylinder seal, shown above, was possibly found in the city of Byblos: I am showing it to you next to a cylinder seal, possibly from Iraq, to give you an idea of such a bead.

The materials used to make beads are as informative about long distance trade. Seven unassuming steatite beads reveal a trade network that reached as far as the Indus Valley. On the site, no evidence for bead production was found, making it likely that these beads were traded. And here again, their colours seems to have been significant: it’s the type of steatite that turns white when burned that seems to have been preferred. [2]

Bronze beads from Lebanon

In the Middle Bronze Age, cast bronze beads have been found on various sites in Lebanon. Here again, we see how Lebanon formed part of a wider world in the Levant: the Lebanese beads have been created using the same metallurgical practices such as alloy composition and techniques used as elsewhere in Southwest Asia.

What metallurgical analyses of the Lebanese beads also reveal is the practice of reuse: lead has been added to the mix in some ornaments. Did the people who made these beads have difficulty accessing tin and copper, or could they simply not afford it? [3]

Byblos: a Mediterranean trade hub

The city of Byblos was a major trading port on the Mediterranean and received ships from all over the sea, as well as trade routes that came from further inland. An example is the trading ship that sank off the coast of Turkey: among its cargo were thousands of beads and gold jewellery that came from the southern Levant. This ship would also have traded in the port of Byblos.

In the city of Byblos, a gold disc was found which shows us an example of cultural exchange around 4,000 years ago. The workmanship is Mesopotamian in technique, but not in execution. It is the disc shown in the gallery above: click to enlarge the photos.

Perhaps this is the work of a local craftsman, who learned to work with granulation in the style of current-day Iraq. The disc is unique and no other parallels for the use of granulation in a similar item exist. While Byblos has revealed quite a lot of Egyptian or Egyptianizing jewellery, this piece is neither.

Byblos: Egyptian influences

How did Egyptian jewellery end up in Byblos? That is because the region that is now Lebanon was located within the Egyptian sphere of influence for much of the Bronze and early Iron Age. The Egyptian court would send gifts to other kings, and as the collection in the National Museum in Beirut shows, these were of very high quality. The kings of Byblos were considered important partners.

Jewellery in the Egyptian style became very popular. It was also preferred by the non-elite, as the spread of relatively low-quality scarabs made of amethyst shows: these have been found throughout the southern Levant. [4]

In the gallery above (click to enlarge the photos), you will see a few examples of this cultural exhange: amethyst scarabs in gold rings and bracelets, and the continuation of the ancient Egyptian Eye of Horus-symbol in jewellery from Lebanon.

From Lebanon across the Mediterranean: Phoenician jewellery

Trade in the Mediterranean world was dominated by the Phoenicians during the first millennium. They operated from Lebanon. From their main ports in Beirut, Byblos, Sidon and Tyre they established colonies throughout North Africa and Europe. Carthage, in current-day Tunisia, is one of their most famous cities which would become an empire of itself.

Because of the origins of the Phoenicians in current-day Lebanon, Phoenician jewellery is heavily influenced by that of ancient Egypt, too: you will find lots of scarabs and other Egyptian motifs in Phoenician jewellery. These are combined with other cultural influences, like that of the Aegean world.

Very specific for Phoenician jewellery are the famous face-beads: these have been found widely throughout the Mediterranean, for example also on Sardinia. A few examples are in the image above: Phoenician jewellery requires its own article, which I will add soon!

Roman jewellery in Lebanon

When Lebanon was part of the Roman Empire, here, too, Roman jewellery became popular. Funerary stelae show images of men and women dressed in Roman fashion, and excavations of Roman cemeteries brought Roman jewellery to light. [5]

And that was not just for ordinary people: the gods, too, were believed to be adorned with jewellery. The arm of a statue found in Beirut was shown with no less than thirteen (!) bracelets on its upper arm. This was a statue of the god Jupiter Heliopolitanus, who, as supreme deity, needed opulent jewellery to reflect his status. The impression shown above shows the splendour with which divinities were imagined. [6]

Ancient jewellery of Lebanon: a cultural treasure

The wide variety in ancient jewellery from Lebanon testifies to millennia of cultural exhange, innovation and trade. If you’d like to see more of this in person, I highly recommend a visit to the National Museum in Beirut: there is much more to admire than one blog article can accommodate!

This blog will continue with the traditional jewellery of Lebanon.

This is an updated, adapted and expanded version of a blog I wrote earlier for the Zay Initiative.

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References

[1] Kuhn, S. et al. 2001. Ornaments of the earliest Upper Paleolithic: New insights from the Levant, in: PNAS 2001, vol 98 (13), pp. 7641-7646.

[2] Damick, A. & M. Woodworth 2015. Steatite beads from Tell Fadous-Kfarabida: A case study in early Bronze Age technology in Northern Coastal Lebanon, in: Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports 3, pp. 603-614.

[3] Morr, Z. el & M. Mödlinger 2014. Middle Bronze Age Metal Artefacts and Metallurgical Practices at the Sites of Tell Arqa, Mougharet el-Hourriyeh, Yanouh and Kharihi in Lebanon, in: Levant 46:1 pp 27-42.

[4] David, A. 2019. Uninscribed Amethyst Scarabs from the Southern Levant, in: Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 381, pp. 57-81.

[5] Jong, L. de 2010. Performing Death in Tyre: the Life and Afterlife of a Roman Cemetery in the Province of Syria, in: American Journal of Archaeology Vol 114 no. 4, pp. 597-630.

[6] B. Fowlkes-Childe & M. Seymour, 2019, The World Between Empires. Art and Identity in the Ancient Middle East, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, p. 126. I would like to thank Tania Zaven of the DGA for providing me with this reference and showing me this fragment in the National Museum of Beirut.

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