How were the golden bowls made?

The golden bowls of the Bronze Age were probably made using an ancient technique. In this process the hammering up of a single piece of gold takes place using a hammer with a rounded striking surface against a hard underlay. The goldsmith starts from the middle and works outward in a close spiral around the plate. The hammering stretches the gold plate upward and in the end the object becomes bowl-shaped. Once the plate has been hammered thin it must be heated to prevent cracking. The beautiful decorations of the bowls – spirals, lines and circles – were made by stamping them on the inner surfaces of the vessels.