| Blown glass, a very ancient technique, is the | | | | glass-blowing took place, probably in Syria, during |
| oldest among the handicrafts. It is said by some, | | | | the 1st century BC, though the technique did not |
| that ancient Egyptians were the original inventors | | | | reach Alexandria until the latter half of the |
| of glass making techniques. Production of | | | | following century when it was introduced by the |
| metallurgy and faience helped a great deal in the | | | | Romans. The new discovery widely increased |
| manufacture of glass afterwards. The earliest | | | | production and glass then ceased to be either a |
| Egyptian glass known to us was in the form of | | | | rarity or an upper-class prerogative.Blown glass |
| small beads and pendants found in sites dating | | | | vessels were created by sticking a piece of |
| back to the 3rd millennium B.C. At that time glass | | | | molten glass onto one end of a blowpipe and |
| was made by melting a combination of silica-sand, | | | | through the other end introducing pressurized air |
| lime, and soda. The interaction of the heated soda | | | | into the pipe. This was done by mouth blowing. At |
| and the hot sand formed a transparent flowing | | | | that stage, the art of transformation into |
| liquid, which was then permitted to cool forming | | | | attractive shapes began. It was then cut with a |
| glass.The first glass vessels appeared in Egypt in | | | | copper wheel and ground with emery powder. |
| the middle of the 2nd millennium B.C. These were | | | | After the vessel took its shape, decorations were |
| made by the technique of molding on a core | | | | added by pinching the hot glass, adding handles or |
| made of mud and sand to form the shape of the | | | | other features to it, changing simple straight |
| vessel's interior. Then the core was submerged | | | | patterns into more intricate ones. After the |
| into viscous molten glass. Once the vessel was | | | | coloring and hand painting process was completed, |
| cold, the core had to be scraped out.At that time, | | | | the bottles were put into a furnace with a very |
| glass was regarded, as an artificial semi-precious | | | | high temperature to set the color on the glass so |
| stone and it was a costly novelty material, most | | | | that it is permanent. Afterwards, the bottles |
| likely the aristocracy owned no glass workshops | | | | needed to be left out to cool. Then they were |
| since it was a royal monopoly.The decline of royal | | | | ready.Nowadays, blown glass products are still |
| power after the end of the New Kingdom put a | | | | made the same way our ancient ancestors used |
| stop to glass production for a time. Not till the | | | | to make them. No extras are used but the very |
| Greco-Roman Period did new Egyptian glass | | | | primitive tools used 7000 years ago and the |
| centers arise in the Hellenistic cities of Alexandria | | | | golden fingers of the Egyptian craftsmen.A. |
| and Naucratis.The revolutionary invention of | | | | |