Featured Are these old beads ivory?

Hi everyone,

I recently picked up this necklace very cheaply having realised there was a stamp on the clasp but without knowing much else.

The stamp is 15K and having looked it up it seems this was used a lot in the nineteenth century, and went completely out of use by 1931.

My question is therefore about the beads themselves, what do we think they are? Are these old ivory beads, or something else? I know of Schreger lines but as I haven't knowingly had ivory before I am not sure if they are present. Also, some beads have whorl like patterns on them, so I don't know what this is. I note a lot have dark crack like lines in them too but not all do.

TYIA for any help you can give.

 

They look like tagua nut beads, also known as 'vegetable ivory'. 15k gold clasp is great.

 

they look like something else from here...

nuts , sound about right..

 

?

 

Glad you added that, you had me confused for a moment.

 

Ooh....tagua vegetable ivory would make a lot of sense. I was thinking I wasn't sure there were Schreger lines present but equally couldn't figure out what else they could be made from, as I had ruled out other materials like bone etc. in my mind!

Thank you so much for mystery solving for me!!

 

You were right, and now you have another material to add to the list of ivory-like possibilities.

 

They sure want to be ivory, but...nope. I'd figure tagua nut too.