Granulated Silver work, handcut shell necklace. Old Bali craftsmanship from the 1980s, the centre-piece and two fineals simply rippling with a myriad tiny Silver granules. Granulation is the art of decorating a metal surface with small spheres of metal, and is best produced using high carat Gold and high grade Silver.
Granulation is an ancient technique of jewellery ornamentation, and very difficult to master. First created some five thousand years ago in Ancient Mesopotamia, Etruscan Gold ornament of one thousand years before the Roman Empire was particularly noted for it. Romans made not that much use of the technique, and then it disappeared, until the European excavations in the 1800s in the lands of ancient civilizations, sensationally unearthing antique marvels, brought the technique to the attention of a great European jewellery house; it required years of patient experimentation to discover processes enabling the duplication of thee ancient art. It is still difficult, and most time-consuming, to get right.
The above Granulated Silver work, patiently created in Bali in the 1980s, was facilitated by the practice of the Balinese artisans to use very high grade Silver in their detailed work; where Sterling Silver contains 925 parts Silver in 1000 parts, the Bali craftsfolk preferred, and still prefer, to work in 950 Silver purity.