The craftsmen who made these ornaments were doubtless as skilful as the craftsmen of the time of Queen Aahhotep, but they had less taste and less invention.

Rameses II.

was condemned either to forego the pleasure of wearing his ring, or to see his little horses damaged and broken off by the least accident.

Already noticeable in the time of the Nineteenth Dynasty, this decadence becomes more marked as we approach the Christian era.

The earrings of Rameses IX.
in the Gizeh Museum are an ungraceful assemblage of filigree disks, short chains, and pendent uraei, such as no human ear could have carried without being torn, or pulled out of shape.