Egyptian bead found in Denmark Bronze Age grave

Analysis of glass beads found in a Bronze Age grave in Denmark have revealed that one of them was made in Egypt.

Twenty-three glass beads from Denmark were analysed using plasma-spectrometry. Without destroying the fragile beads, this technique makes it possible to compare the chemical composition of trace elements in the beads with reference material from Amarna in Egypt and Nippur in Mesopotamia, about 50 km south east of Baghdad in Iraq. The comparison showed that the chemical composition of the two sets of trace elements match.

The researchers’ first object for comparison was a bead from a wealthy woman’s grave at Ølby, about 40 km south of Copenhagen. The woman had been buried in a more extravagant fashion, lying in a hollowed-out oak trunk and wearing a beautiful belt disc, a smart string skirt with tinkling, shining small bronzes tubes, and an overarm bracelet made of amber beads, and a single blue glass bead.

[Full story]

Story: Jeanette Varberg, Aarhus University, Flemming Kaul, National Museum of Denmark, Bernard Gratuze, Université dOrléans, ScienceNordic

| Photo: ScienceNordic