Rare Naga Carnelian. The three old barrel-shaped Carnelian beads were handcut in Gujerat west India in the early 1900s, from gemstone material mined in Gujerat, specifically for trade in Nagaland in the far north-east of India, a whole sub-continent across, where this gemstone quality fine Carnelian was most highly prized and used as currency.
Nagaland is a rugged area of valleys and deep forests, mountainous, right up in the far east corner of India, on the border of Burma. It was always verging on the inaccessible and is even now difficult to visit. Culturally rich, it has a peculiarly strong jewellery tradition, often to do with beads that are rare, either through scarcity or being difficult to create.
The old small red glass beads in the above strand were created in India, imported into the Naga regions in the early 1900s, and used in multi-strand thick ropey necklaces worn by women, signs of wealth and standing. Most of the little old red beads in the above were created with a white centre, very labour-intensive but the result is a marvelous luminosity in the red.