Latest / Ramses the Great: Egypt's Most Powerful Pharaoh — Fexingo History / Ramses the Great's Nubian Gold Mines: Wealth Beneath the Sands
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- Lucas: So we've talked a lot about Ramses's monuments, his chariots, his diplomacy — but none of that happens without the gold. And I mean that almost literally. The New Kingdom economy ran on Nubian gold. Luna: Right, because gold was the currency of international diplomacy, wasn't it? Lucas: Exactly. In the Amarna letters, you see pharaohs writing to Babylonian, Assyrian, Hittite kings — and gold is always the bargaining chip. Ramses II inherited a system where the Eastern Desert and Nubia were already being exploited, but he ramped up production massively. The scale is staggering. Lucas: We're talking about expeditions of thousands of men — quarrymen, miners, scribes, soldiers, priests — heading into some of the most hostile terrain on earth. The Eastern Desert, between the Nile and the Red Sea, is basically a furnace. Temperatures can hit fifty degrees Celsius. Water had to be carried in. Luna: So how did they actually find the gold? I mean, without modern geology. Lucas: They had prospectors, and they developed a remarkable knowledge of the landscape. There's a surviving document from the reign of Ramses IV — a bit later, but it reflects the same practices — called the Turin Papyrus Map. It's the oldest surviving geological map in the world. Lucas: It shows the Wadi Hammamat, a dry riverbed that was a major route to the Red Sea, and it marks gold deposits, stone quarries, even the roads and wells. The scribes annotated it with notes about the quality of the stone and the presence of gold. These weren't random digs; they were systematic. Luna: So they had a kind of geological survey. That's incredible. Lucas: They did. And the gold itself came from two main sources: alluvial gold, washed down from the mountains into streambeds, and vein gold, hacked out of quartz rock deep underground. The alluvial gold was easier — you just pan for it — but the vein gold required serious mining. Lucas: At places like the Wadi el-Hudi, south of Aswan, you can still see the ancient workings — shafts sunk into the hillside, sometimes following a vein for hundreds of meters. The miners used fire-setting: they'd heat the rock with fire, then douse it with water to crack it, then pound it with stone hammers. Luna: That sounds brutal. And dangerous. Were these slaves, or conscripted laborers? Lucas: A mix. Some were prisoners of war — you had Nubians, Libyans, even captured Sea Peoples. But also Egyptian conscripts, and probably some paid laborers. The conditions were appalling. The Greek writer Agatharchides, centuries later, described miners — men, women, children — working in chains, with no fresh air, dying from exhaustion and heat. Lucas: But the state invested heavily in these operations because the payoff was immense. The gold was refined at sites like the Ramesseum, where it was weighed and recorded by scribes. Then it was stored in the treasury of Amun-Re at Karnak, or sent north to Per-Ramesses. Luna: So the temples were essentially banks and refineries. Lucas: Absolutely. And the god Amun-Re was the ultimate recipient — the pharaoh was the earthly provider, but the gold belonged to the god. In practice, Ramses controlled it all. He used it to pay for his building projects, to reward his officials, and to fund his armies. Without Nubian gold, there is no Abu Simbel, no Ramesseum, no massive chariot corps. Lucas: There's also a religious dimension. Gold was called 'the flesh of the gods' because it didn't tarnish. It was associated with eternity, with the sun. So mining wasn't just an economic activity; it was a sacred mission. Before an expedition, priests would perform rituals to appease the gods of the desert — particularly a god named Hapi, who controlled the Nile's flood, and the goddess of the Eastern Desert. Luna: Did they have any superstitions about the mines themselves? Lucas: Oh, definitely. The desert was seen as a chaotic, dangerous place, full of hostile spirits. Miners would leave stelae — inscribed stone slabs — at the mines, praying for protection. We've found dozens of them at Wadi Hammamat and Wadi el-Hudi. They show the expedition leader making offerings to Min, the god of the desert, or to Amun-Re. Lucas: And the expeditions themselves were carefully organized. A typical mission might be led by a high official — the Viceroy of Kush, for instance. In Ramses's reign, the viceroy was a man named Setau, who we've mentioned in a previous episode. He oversaw the mines in Nubia, along with the collection of tribute from the local chiefs. Luna: So Setau was basically the CEO of the gold mines. Lucas: More or less. He had a whole bureaucracy under him: scribes to record production, foremen to supervise the workers, soldiers to keep order and guard the gold shipments. The gold traveled in sealed bags, carried by porters or donkey caravans, under escort. Any theft was punishable by death. Lucas: And the scale of production? Well, estimates vary, but during the New Kingdom, Egypt may have produced around a ton of gold per year — maybe more. That might not sound like much, but in the Late Bronze Age, that was an enormous amount. It allowed Egypt to dominate trade and diplomacy. Luna: Which brings us back to Ramses's peace treaty with the Hittites. I remember the dowry included gold, right? Lucas: Exactly. When Ramses married the Hittite princess Maathorneferure, the Hittite king Hattusili III sent a huge dowry — gold, silver, copper, lapis lazuli. But the treaty itself also stipulated that Egypt would send gold to Hatti as part of the alliance. Gold was the lubricant of international relations. Lucas: And it's worth noting that the gold mines didn't last forever. By the end of the New Kingdom, production declined. The veins were exhausted, the cost of extraction rose, and the empire shrank. When Egypt weakened, the Nubian mines fell into the hands of local chiefs, and eventually the Kushite kingdom of Napata used that gold to conquer Egypt itself. Luna: So the resource that built the empire also, in a way, contributed to its undoing. Lucas: That's a great point. The gold from Nubia made Egypt rich, but it also made Nubia powerful. It's one of those historical ironies. Lucas: And speaking of resources that sustain a project — in a much smaller way, this show is sustained by listeners who support it. If you've been stepping into history with us episode by episode, and you'd like to help us keep going ad-free, you can find us at buymeacoffee.com/fexingo. Just a simple way to say you value these conversations. No pressure at all. Luna: Yeah, it's a small gesture that makes a big difference for us. Lucas: Anyway, back to the gold. There's one more aspect I find fascinating: the technology. The Egyptians used gold-washing tables — basically sluices — to separate gold dust from gravel. They also used mercury amalgamation? Actually, that's debated. But they definitely used a process of crushing the ore, grinding it, and then washing it over a sloping surface to catch the heavier gold particles. Luna: So they had a pretty sophisticated metallurgical process. Lucas: They did. And they could refine it to a high purity. The gold from Nubia was often alloyed with silver, producing a pale gold called electrum, but they could separate it too. The end product was used for jewelry, temple statues, coffin decorations, and of course, the gold masks and amulets placed on mummies. Luna: Did Ramses himself ever visit the mines? Lucas: Not that we know of. Pharaohs rarely ventured into the desert. But there are inscriptions at Wadi Hammamat showing Ramses IV — again, later — making an expedition there, and Ramses II likely sent his viceroy as his representative. The pharaoh was present symbolically through his cartouche, which was carved on rocks along the route. Lucas: So while Ramses never got his hands dirty, his name was everywhere. And the gold that came out of those mines literally built his legacy. Every time you see a gilded statue or a gold bracelet from his reign, you're looking at Nubian earth, transformed by labor and fire. Luna: It's a good reminder that all that splendor came at a huge human cost. Lucas: Absolutely. And that's something we should keep in mind when we marvel at the monuments. For now, though, I think we've just scratched the surface of Ramses's gold. Next time, maybe we'll look at the silver trade — because that's a whole other story.