a signet ring: the personal ring worn on the hand, used to stamp a seal and so to act with the owner's authority.
TranslatabilityApproximateCertaintySettled
In the ancient world a ring on the hand was not only jewelry. It carried a carved seal, and pressing that seal into wet clay or wax left the owner's unique mark. To hand someone your ring was to hand them your authority: whatever they sealed with it counted as your own command. That is why the king's signet matters so much in these stories.
When Pharaoh takes his ring off and puts it on Joseph, and when the Persian king does the same first for Haman and then for Mordecai, the ring is the visible transfer of power. A decree sealed with the royal ring could not be undone, because it was treated as the king's own word.
Not every worn ring is described as a working seal. In a few places rings appear simply among the bracelets, earrings, and other gold ornaments people wore or gave away. The same word covers both, because the object is the same kind of thing: a ring for the hand. Where the text shows it being used to seal, the authority is the point; elsewhere it is counted as a piece of fine gold.
Nuances
1aa seal ring used to stamp documents and to confer or exercise the owner's authority.
Gen 41:42Est 3:10Est 3:12Est 8:2Est 8:8 (2×)Est 8:10
1ba ring worn on the hand as a personal ornament, listed among gold jewelry.
Exo 35:22Num 31:50Isa 3:21
2
a fixed metal ring on a piece of furniture: a holder through which carrying-poles pass, or a fitting that joins parts together.
TranslatabilityDirectCertaintySettled
When God gives the plans for the tabernacle and its furnishings, the same word for a ring takes on a very different job. These rings are not worn. They are cast from gold or bronze and fastened onto the ark, the table, the incense altar, and the bronze altar, set at the corners or sides so that poles can slide through them and the object can be carried without anyone touching it directly.
The word also covers rings used as connectors in the structure itself: rings that link the frames and bars of the tabernacle walls, and the rings and cords that hold the high priest's breastpiece in place against the ephod so it does not come loose.
So here a ring is a piece of hardware, a small but essential fitting in a portable sanctuary built to be assembled, taken apart, and moved. The crowd of these references in the building chapters reflects how carefully every loop and holder was specified.
Nuances
2aa ring fastened to a sacred object through which the carrying-poles are passed.
Names the seal itself, the engraved device that leaves an impression, used to authenticate and to mark something as binding and personal.Gen 38:181Ki 21:8Jer 22:24
Carries the cut, engraved work of a craftsman, so it stands for a fixed, set design pressed into clay or wax.Exo 28:11Exo 28:36Job 38:14
Used for the love and devotion of being held close, set like a seal over the heart and on the arm.Sng 8:6
It can be the signet ring a ruler wears and hands over, so that giving the ring transfers the power to act in his name, and a document stamped with it cannot be revoked.Gen 41:42Est 3:10Est 8:2Est 8:8Est 8:10
It is cast in gold or bronze and fixed to a piece of furniture as the socket the carrying poles slide through, so the ark and the altars can be lifted and moved.Exo 25:12Exo 25:14Exo 25:15Exo 27:4Exo 30:4Exo 37:3
It also serves as a fastener that holds two finished pieces together without damaging either: a cord runs between the rings of the priest's chest piece and the rings of his vest, and paired corner frames meet at a single ring.Exo 26:24Exo 28:23Exo 28:28Exo 39:21
Both
Both name a small piece of gold jewelry worn on the body, and one offering list sets them side by side among the gold articles people brought and gave away.Exo 35:22
Each is a loop of metal rather than a solid ornament, and each works by threading: poles are brought into the one, while the other is threaded through a jaw.Ezk 29:4Exo 25:14
This one goes through flesh rather than around a finger or a pole: it is set in the nose or driven through the jaws of a creature so that whoever holds it can steer it.2Ki 19:28Isa 37:29Ezk 29:4Ezk 38:4
It belongs to the vocabulary of capture. A proud ruler is hauled off in these like a caged animal, so English versions usually say "hooks" and never "ring" here.Ezk 19:4Ezk 19:9
Nobody chooses to wear it. In every one of these passages the one who fits it is the captor, or God himself announcing that he will lead a boaster home the way he came.2Ki 19:28Ezk 38:4
Worn on the hand and used to seal: the king's signet whose impression carries his own authority, so handing it over transfers the power to act in his name.Gen 41:42Est 3:10Est 8:2Est 8:8
Serves as a fixed fitting rather than an ornament: gold rings cast and fastened to the ark, the table, and the altar to hold the carrying-poles or bind the pieces together.Exo 25:12Exo 25:14Exo 27:4Exo 28:23
Both
Both are gold rings brought freely as donated treasure, listed side by side among the offerings the people give for the sanctuary.Exo 35:22
Both appear together in the catalogue of women's finery that judgment strips away, counted among the ornaments of the daughters of Zion.Isa 3:21
Pierces the face as personal ornament: a ring driven through the nose or hung from the ear, worn against the skin rather than on the hand.Gen 24:47Exo 32:2Ezk 16:12Pro 11:22
Functions as portable wealth: a gold token given at betrothal or in comfort, and gold earrings gathered as the spoil of war.Gen 24:22Job 42:11Jdg 8:24Jdg 8:26
Only this word names the signet ring that carries a ruler's own authority. When Pharaoh or a Persian king takes it off his hand and gives it away, the man who wears it can seal orders that bind an empire.Gen 41:42Est 3:10Est 3:12Est 8:2Est 8:8
Most of its uses are not jewelry at all. It names the fixed metal loops built into the tabernacle and its furniture, the sockets the carrying poles slide through and the fasteners that hold boards and curtains together.Exo 25:12Exo 25:15Exo 27:4Exo 36:29Exo 37:3Exo 38:5
Both
Both are gold ornaments worn on the body, and both show up in the same kind of inventory of a person's finery.Exo 35:22Isa 3:21Gen 24:22Ezk 23:42
Both are valuable enough to be weighed out as bullion and handed over. The soldiers returning from battle bring rings and armbands side by side out of the plunder as an offering.Num 31:50
This is the band worn on the wrists and arms. It is what Abraham's servant puts on Rebekah's hands, and what God puts on the arms of the woman he adorns in Ezekiel's picture of Jerusalem.Gen 24:22Gen 24:30Gen 24:47Ezk 16:11
Its underlying idea is something clamped tightly around a thing, so it can also name a lid fastened down over the mouth of a jar, with nothing worn and no ornament in view. A vessel without one counts as open and therefore unclean.Num 19:15
tabba'at in the other biblical languages
δακτύλιοςGreek“ring”the Greek word for a signet ring in the New Testament, the ring put on the returning son's hand as a mark of restored standing.
Reaches far beyond finger rings: most often it names the gold loops fixed to the tabernacle furniture so poles can be threaded through to carry them.Exo 25:12Exo 27:4
When it does mean a signet, it carries the weight of royal authority: a king hands it over to seal binding decrees in his name.Gen 41:42Est 3:10Est 8:2
Both
Both can name a signet ring worn on the hand that marks the wearer's standing and authority, so the New Testament word is the natural counterpart for the Old Testament signet sense.Luk 15:22Gen 41:42
Names only a finger ring, and in its single appearance it is the signet a father puts on his restored son's hand, a token that gives back standing and authority in the household.Luk 15:22
What scholars say about tabba'at
The standard lexica treat טַבַּעַת as a single noun "ring" with two well-attested applications: the signet ring worn on the hand (Egyptian and Persian court settings: Gen 41:42; Esther 3-8) and, far more frequently, the cast rings affixed to the tabernacle furniture as housings for the carrying-poles and as structural connectors (the Exodus building accounts). BDB and HALOT note the likely loan from Egyptian ḏbꜥ.t (the signet), consistent with the word's first appearance in the Joseph narrative. The worn-but-not-explicitly-sealing occurrences (Exod 35:22;Num 31:50;Isa 3:21) are grouped with the personal-ornament use. The split is functional rather than etymological: one Hebrew object-word covers a wearable seal and a piece of sanctuary hardware.
Sources
BDB, s.v. טַבַּעַתlexicon
HALOT, s.v. טַבַּעַתlexicon
Cornelis Houtman, Exodus, Historical Commentary on the Old Testament (1993-2000)commentary