And thou shalt overlay it with pure gold, within and without shalt thou overlay it, and shalt make upon it a crown of gold round about.
Thou shalt overlay it with pure gold. That this special mode of applying the precious metal to other substances, especially wood, was practiced in Egypt, undoubted evidence is furnished by the numerous remains of overlaid work still in existence. Some of them, in the form of miniature figures, are deposited in the British Museum; while the process of overlaying is represented frequently on the monuments of that country. Osburn ('Egypt's Testimony,' p. 176) describes a picture from the ancient tomb of Roti, at Benihassan, in which the practice of this art appears to be represented.
'A person stands handing out to workmen thin slips of gold latten, which they are fixing, by means apparently of strong pressure, on a block bearing some resemblance to an ark, or sacred chest. There is something beside them resembling a hook, which would be useful for holding or fastening; and from the appearance of the men, the bodily exertion of the labourer was in no degree spared in this process, either by means of tools or any other contrivance.' In this case the chest was overlaid with thin plates of gold. But Wilkinson has shown that substances were on some occasions only gilded, on others covered with gold leaf ('Ancient Egypt,' vol.
iii., p. 224; also Hengstenberg, 'Egypt and Books of Moses, p. 136).
Dr. Taylor, editor of the latter work, maintains that the 'overlaying' the furniture of the tabernacle must have been by gilding, both because if plates of gold, however thin, had been used, the weight of the plates would have rendered the tabernacle very difficult of transport, and because all the gold that Moses collected would not have sufficed to furnish plates for every article that was to be covered. The ark was to be overlaid with "pure gold." The same writer, after describing how the ore was subjected to the heat of a furnace in a capsule, to remove the dross and make pure gold - i:e., distinguished from gold unworked and not purified-says, 'In the hieroglyphic inscriptions which enumerate the gifts of the Pharaohs to the temples of the gods, the golden offerings are always designated "pure gold;" thus proving to a demonstration that as a certain standard or assay of gold existed in Egypt, and that the metal which bore it was applied to sacred purposes, this standard was known to the Israelites in the desert, and the metal so distinguished employed in a similar way.'
And shalt make upon it a crown of gold round about, х zeer (H2213)] - a border, rim, or cornice. This golden wreath, which was to encircle the upper edge, was probably intended more to decorate than to strengthen the lid.