Historical research: earrings worn by the Biblical Rebecca

The history of jewelry has interested me since I started to make jewelry art.

Recently, re-reading a Torah translation in Russian, I read that when Abraham sent his servant back to his native land to find a wife for his son Isaac, he sent him with some valuable gifts for the future bride. And when the servant met Rebecca (who became Isaac’s wife), he gave her gold bracelets weighing 10 shekels, and gold earrings weighing one-half a shekel. The weight of one shekel in those times was 14 grams. So each earring contained 7 grams of gold.

Jewelry - the most conservative art form in the world

Recently I received a wonderful gift: an album called “7000 Years of Jewelry,” edited by Hugh Tait.

“The aim of this book is to bring together jewelry from all the major phases of man’s history” – said Tait in the preface of his book. And he really does that.

Tait’s collection is a chronicle of Jewelry Art through history, from the most ancient known civilizations in Mesopotamia (today’s Iraq) and Egypt, up until today. The book entries are written by the curators of archeological exhibits that are on display in British museums, with a lot of photos from every period of jewelry-making.

I’ll need a lot more time to study this book (and it’s a lovely project for me to look forward to), but I’ve already gotten a first impression that is definitely clear: with more than a few of the pieces, it’s difficult to tell whether they were made today, or thousands of years ago…