Golden sandals

From The Metropolitan Museum of Art Guide, 1983 page 147.

Click to enlarge.

Click to enlarge.

29 Sandals and Collar
Probably from Thebes, Dynasty 18, ca. 1479-1425 B.C.
Gold; I. of sandals 97/8 in. (25 cm), I. of collar 131/2 in. (34.3 cm)

The fragility of this collar and pair of gold sandals would have prevented their being actually worn, even for ceremonial occasions. They were made as funerary objects for a woman of the royal family during the reign of Tuthmosis Ill. The sandals are replicas of leather ones commonly worn by Egyptian men and women. The collar, reminiscent of jewelry the woman would have worn during her lifetime, assures her the use of precious objects in the afterlife. Five rings of cylindrical beads are engraved in the thin sheet of gold, while the outer band has a flower-petal motif. The two falcon heads that terminate the collar at shoulder level had attached loops to accommodate the cords that secured the collar to the mummy wrappings. Fletcher Fund, 1926, 26.8.147; Fletcher Fund, 1920, 26.8.101