Ancient treasures

So I’ve decided to start searching the world’s museums, looking for some ancient artifacts that have been dug out of the sand / mud /jungle.

Archeology is a fascinating subject don’t you think? The uncovering of the lost, the rediscovery of man through the abandoned, forgotten and buried. One thing we can be sure is that earrings were as popular then as they are now.

Here’s a classy little number from the British Museum, that great storehouse of the antiquities from around the world stolen liberated borrowed by the British on their colonial conquests. It’s hard to argue that some of these items should be returned to their rightful owners but as anyone who has ever been there will tell you, it is a magical place – a monument to the ingenuity, variety and excess of men and woman over thousands of years.

So, for your delectation we have some pretty ancient specimens. There are from ‘ancient’ Greece which is about 420-400 BC. Over two and a half thousand years old, and we call it ancient? Says alot about our perception of time given that evidence suggests this city was inhabited from around 3000 BC.

These were found buried in a grave in Eretria, a location mentioned by Homer as being one of the cities that sent ships to the Trojan War.

Sailing through time

Like alot of ancient ornaments there are much more to these than meets the eye.

The boats are decorated, front and back, with tightly packed filigree designs. In each of them is a siren – a mythical monster combining the body of a bird with a female head. These have a die-formed front and a flat back sheet. Sirens were known in Greek mythology for their irresistible song that lured sailors to death on the craggy rocks where they perched. Four cockleshell pendants, with die-formed fronts and backs, are suspended by chains from each earring. Cockleshells are used frequently in jewellery, and were associated with the goddess Aphrodite. The boats are attached to a large, two-tiered rosette, with traces of enamelling, probably originally green and blue, in the inner petals.

D. Williams, J. Ogden, Greek Gold: Jewellery of the Classical World, 1994

These boats are therefore a fair approximation of the type of craft used by these ancient pioneers. In an era when the other side of the world is a plane-ride away, we’ve lost the sense of wonder and mystery that existed but it’s clear from these gems that our long-forgotten ancestors were brave and bold people, and not afraid to show off their skills in some gloriously produced earrings.

And god created ears

Earrings have a long history; we’ve already seen how Tutankhamen was a fan, and looked at some of the oldest earrings in the world. Here’s an ad-hoc investigation of some other ancient ear artifacts.

First up, the head of a female figurine, with holes for multiple piercings, Iran, 3500-2900 B.C. That’s around 5,000 years ago! Interestingly as long as some religious nut-jobs think the earth has been in existence, which would mean god didn’t so much rest on the seventh day as pop down a piercing parlour and get some holes stuck in his ears. Must say, exciting as it is to see such early evidence for the world’s greatest fashion accessory, this woman has a face like a pot – her ears look like handles and her eyes like piss-holes in the snow;  still, fashions do change – once this was considered beautiful.

You look like a jug

(Image from the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archeology and Anthropology)

In fact, she bears a startling resemblance to a science-fiction monster.

Steel sexy after all these years

You gotta wonder what they used to pierce ears with in those days. I wonder how thin the thinnest needle was, and how much they knew about keeping the wound clean. Maybe not much, if this report is anything to go by:

‘According to ethnographer Z. Shirokova, “in some kishlaks, or rural settlements, of Zeravshan, the traditions dictated using dog’s hair instead of a cotton or silk thread, to facilitate the healing process” (Traditional and Modern Women’s Clothes of mountain regions of Tajikistan, Dushanbe, 1976, p. 119).’ From Treasures from the Tajik Museum of Ethnography.

Now, I’m no doctor, but I’m pretty sure there is no medicinal benefit to sticking dog hair in your ear – unless it is some truly potent anti-hangover cure.

Famous Earring Wearers 1. Tutankhamen

As well as having a name that is impossible to spell, Tutankhamen (Tut to his friends, Tut Tut to his mum) is also famous for having peirced ears. How do we know? He was an early practitioner of ear stretching, known as gauging. That’s right, the Pharoes were Pharears (sorry, unforgivable and not even funny).

Don't trust men in masks

So look closely and you can see a big ol’hole in his ear. Would love to know what appendages graced that royal ear… So, congrats to the Eargyptian (again, sorry, sorry) for being the first Famous Earring Wearer!!! (Your prize is in the post).

Modern blog, ancient earring

Ultimately this will be a collection and review of shiny sparky things and the people who make them – not just earrings, but bracelets and necklaces and rings too…

But mainly earrings, cos that’s what I love!!!

So to start with I thought I’d look at some really old stuff, try and learn about the history and origin of earrings.

Here’s the first thing I found – a beautiful ancient earring found in a Jerusalem carpark!

That’s a 1,500 year old gold, pearl and emerald earring (Image from National Geographic – shame they can’t accurately subtract 4-500 from 2,100!!!)

Amazing that it wasn’t melted down and turned into something else as so much jewelery seems to be! We can only imagine who wore them, but something as magic as this must have been owned by someone pretty special.

“It must have belonged to someone of the elite in Jerusalem,”  said an Israeli archeologist. “Such a precious item, it couldn’t be one of just ordinary people.”

Beautiful – sometimes we think of the past as a different place but of course they don’t do things that differently. Fashion is fashion, and what goes around comes around…

(Image from Lady of the Lake)