Chinese Jewellery
A personal ornament, such as a necklace, ring, orbracelet, made from jewels, precious metals or other substance is known as jewelry in American English.The word jewel gave rise to the word jewelry around the 13th century, anglicized from the Old French "jouel". Research of this word dates back to the Latin word"jocale", which meansplaything. Jewelry is one of the oldest forms of body ornamentation. According to the Archeologists the latestfindings of the 100,000 year-old Nassariusshells that were made into beads are thought to be the oldest known jewelry.
In recent times jewelry has been used almostexclusively for decoration. However, in earlier times jewelry was made for morerealistic uses, such as for storing wealth and pinning clothes together. Initially,the first pieces of jewelry were made from natural materials, such as bone,shell, wood, animal teeth and carved stone. Jewelry was mostly created forpeople of high esteem in the society to show their status and mostly, thepeople were buried with that jewelry.
Jewelry has been created to decorate almost everypart of the body, ranging from hairpins to toe rings and many more types.Almost every material known is used to make Jewelry.While high-quality and artistic pieces are made with gemstones and preciousmetals, less-costly costume jewelry is made from less-valuable materials and ismass-produced.
Jewelry in AsiaIn Asia, Jewelry making wasstarted in China5,000 years ago and in the Indus Valleyregion later on. Asian jewelry was very attractive and used most often inceremonies.The jewelry designs were mostlymade with a religious touch.
Origin of Chinese Jewelry The Chinese was the earliest culture to beginmaking jewelry in around 5,000 years ago. Chinese jewelry designs containedBuddhist symbols and were very religion-orientated.The Chinese designs were very gorgeous andtheir jewelry is a fact which remains to this day.
Silver and Jade in China:
During Neolithic times, the main sources of nephritejade in Chinafor useful and ceremonial jade items were the now depleted deposits in theNingshao area in the Yangtze River Delta and in an area of the Liaoningprovince in Inner Mongolia. Jade was considered the"imperial gem". Jade was used to make many useful and ceremonialobjects, ranging from indoor ornamental items to jade burial suits. From aboutthe earliest Chinese
dynasties until present, the jade deposits in most usewere from the region of Khotan in the Western Chinese provinceof Xinjiang. There, white andgreenish nephrite jade is found in small quarries and as pebbles and bouldersin the rivers flowing from the Kuen-Lun mountain range northward into theTakla-Makan desert area. River jade collection was concentrated in the Yarkand,the White JadeRiver, White Jade and BlackJade Rivers.From the Kingdom of Khotan, on the southern leg of the Silk Road, yearlytribute payments consisting of the most precious white jade were made to theChinese Imperial court and there transformed into objects of art by skilled artisans as jade was considered morevaluable than gold or silver.
Jadeitite, with its bright emerald-green, pink,lavender, orange and brown colors was imported from Burmato China onlyafter about 1800. The vivid green variety became known as Feicui or KingfisherJade. It quickly replaced nephrite as the imperial variety of jade.
Silver was the frequently used metal in Chinesejewelry as compared to gold. They bedecked it with blue which is their favoritecolor. The early Chinese jewelry often had Blue kingfisher feathers tied onto them.Later, the kingfisher feathers in the jewelrywere replaced with blue gems and glass which got incorporated into designs. Thefavorite stone of Chinese was jade.Theypreferred jade over any other stone. The finds from some parts of Chinashows that jade was fashioned using diamonds. Since jade was assigned withhuman-like qualities by the Chinese, such as its durability, hardness andbeauty, they revered jade very much. Though jade acquired complex designs withtime, yet, the first pieces of jade were very simple. There were evidences ofuse of compound milling machines found from remains, that Jade rings frombetween the 4th and 7th centuries BC have been worked with a compound millingmachine.This gives us the informationthat Chinese worked with compound milling machines even hundreds of yearsbefore the first mention of such equipment in the west.
Pearls in China:
There are various combinations ofpearl necklaces which come in and out of fashion with regularity.Out of them, both fake and real freshwater orcultured pearls are made into necklaces and pearl ear rings by the Chinese.China has alsobecome a market for pearl jewelry for most countries in the world, since tradeopened up in the nineties. The price of pearls has dropped by about afifth in the past 10 years and the Chinese are making waves in the pearl worldwith their cheaper prices in making pearl jewelry. Most freshwater culturedpearls sold today come from China.Chinais famous for its akoya pearls.
Ear Rings:
Chinese males and females wore jewelry frequentlyto exhibit their dignity and wealth. However, in later years, it was used toemphasize beauty. Men wore ornamental hat buttons which marked rank and gold orsilver rings while Women wore highly exhaustive gold and silver head dressesand many other ornaments. The strips of gold worn by Chinese women on theirforeheads were comparable to those worn by women in the IndusValley. Such band worn on theforehead, served a purpose like an early form of tiara and it was oftenbedecked with precious gems.The earringwas the most common piece of jewelry worn by Chinese.The ear rings were worn by both men andwomen. Another common piece of jewelry worn by the Chinese was the Amuletsoften with a Chinese symbol or dragon. In fact, dragons, Chinese symbols andalso phoenixes were frequently depicted on jewelry designs. The Chinese oftenplaced their jewelry in their graves. Most Chinese graves found by archaeologistscontain decorative jewelry.
HairAdornments:
Hair adornments such as pins, bronze pivotscrowned by disks with miniature flowers, the most ancient type of headadornments, are common to both Chinaand Central Asia.
Jewelryfindings from CentralAsia:
In the ancient world, headdresses determined thesocial status of the wearer. This aspect is made clear by gold votive plateswith depictions of donors from the Treasure of Oxus. Beginning with theHellenistic era, the headdress served solely as a socio-ideological sign couldhave been used as an adornment for a headdress. Chinese jewelry has acorrelation to the crown from the IVth burial consisting of two combinedelements - the lower part -a fillet with rosetts, the top part a tree withbirds.
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