Featured Ethic Necklace

Hindu/Tibetan?

 

Very ethical, kard.

It is Chinese, not that far from the Tibetan cultural area, so you're close. Perfect for nomads.
The bead caps are gorgeous.
Parts of older jewellery were recycled, which often happens in ethnic jewellery. The wire-wrapped bar links even show some Middle Eastern influence.

 

Kard, check your inbox.

 

I see agates (the oblongs), sponge coral, turquoise, and...?

 

... and bone inlaid with specks of coral and turquoise, tar turquoise (fragments of turquoise pressed in tar or dark resin), white glass, green and blue fake turquoise.
Some of the findings could be a lower grade silver, .800 or less, but I'm not sure, I can see verdigris. The horse pendant is probably a base metal.
Ethnic necklaces like this one are often a mix of fine and base materials, whatever was around at the time. The better grade necklaces had real, precious coral, often Mediterranean, which must have cost the earth in that part of Asia. Sponge coral was introduced in the 1950s as a cheap alternative.

In general this necklace would have been made for its symbolic value, not for valuable materials. It could even have been made for the scarce tourist trade, for a bit of cash.
The horse is important for the survival of nomads, blue and red stands for the balance between male and female, heaven and earth. Red and blue also have special protective significance in many cultures.

 

The chain looks like 70s costume, but some of the round connectors look like Chinese silver. It probably is a real mishmosh of anything and everything; if it looked good, they used it. I've found lots of granny quilts made the same way here. They were made from whatever was in the rag bag without regard to fabric content.

 

Yes, it looks like those are the only silver parts, probably .800.

The chain with the wire-wrapped bar links is a centuries old Middle Eastern style. But no doubt that Middle Eastern style ended up in 70s western costume jewellery through the Hippie trail.

 

Or earlier - Western costume jewelers have been swiping things from other countries for eons.

 

Yes, they have. There was also 19th century Orientalism. And painters like Rembrandt already painted 'Orientals'. There were quite a few Armenians and Persians in The Netherlands at the time, many of them stayed.

 

Women like "something new", so importing designs from other parts of the world makes life easier on local jewelers. Exotic items from faraway lands have always been girlbait. The Asian markets do the same thing, and always have.

 

One of the many reasons why I am fascinated by ancient trade routes, like the Silk Road and the Spice Route.
Both are now being revived in the Chinese initiative for the Asian-European Belt and Road project, for obvious reasons. Since Trump they took the activities up a notch.

 

Sounds like a good idea to me! It's always interesting to me too, how stuff found its way from one end of the world to another. They found a Chinese bronze bowl in the Viking settlement in Newfoundland. Mediterranean coral went the other way to Nepal. Lapis went from Asia to Egypt.

 

Have you heard of the Amber Road? An ancient European trade route from the North Sea and the Baltic to the Mediterranean. Apparently there is evidence of its existence from the 16th century BC. It also brought amber to Egypt, and in the eastern Mediterranean it connected to the Silk Road.

 

I hadn't, but it doesn't surprise me. Amber is still prized in Turkey, especially cherry amber. It had to get there somehow.

 

In Turkey, and in most of Western Asia. Chinese are now buying Baltic Amber like mad.
One of my Yemeni necklaces with ca 1900 German pressed amber:

Similar chunky pressed amber beads were strung on Central European Art Nouveau necklaces.