The Ornamental Dagger of Yemen

Antique Yemen Inscribed Ornate Silver Dagger in Sheath Still Usable

Yemen Inscribed Ornate Silver Dagger in Sheath

This dagger or jambiya is one of the old daggers forged and decorated by the superb Yemenite Jewish silversmiths that emigrated to Israel in the early 1900s and took their artistic knowledge and ability with them. 

The sheath is decorated profusely with granulation and inlay, and is partially wrapped in a soft black leather. The dagger is still sharp and is in usable condition. The loops attached to leather wrapping serve to attach the dagger to the clothing of the wearer of the dagger. 

Such daggers are worn by Moslem men. This particular one is inscribed with the name 'Daoud' or David written in Arabic. He was probably the owner and wearer of this fine piece. The antique daggers are worn as a status symbol because of the financial value. Yemen still has metalsmiths that create imitations of these magnificent pieces, but the material and the silversmith's techniques are inferior. Many of recent manufacture are made as simply decorative items and are not meant to be used. 

The old jambiyas are to be worn on an elaborately woven belt woven originally by men but the art is now being taught to younger women. As explained by Marta Colburn, a frequent traveler to Yemen:

Men in Yemen do not commonly wear jewelry, except for silver rings. The one exception is the decorative dagger called a jambia, which is a common item of dress for most highland Yemeni men. The jambia has great symbolic value establishing one's place in social hierarchies and tribal membership, though it is rarely used as a weapon. The j-shaped version of this dagger, asib, is worn by tribesmen, while judges, legal scholars and religious elites wear a more gently-curved version called a thuma or tuza .... This version worn by elites often displays very intricate and exquisite silver craftsmanship on the sheath.

The belt is an important decorative and functional element of the jambia. Leather is covered with velvet and other fabric embellished with geometric or religious designs in metallic gold or silver thread. The designs may be embroidered or, as in the case of my belt, tablet-woven brocade. Traditionally various silver crafted items would be sewn to the belt for decorative and functional purposes (powder horn, money pouch and amulets). -- Marta Colburn

This dagger was collected from an antiques dealer in Yemen. 

Your inquiry is invited. 

Measurements:

Sheathed Dagger - 2.5 in x 14 in (6.3 cm x 35.5 cm)

For purchasing information see CraftsofthePast .

Jingle Bells on Yemenite Women's Belts

Antique Yemen Large Silver Belt with Dozens of Large Bell Dangles

This antique belt from Yemen is made for a woman to add to her dowry, not typically shown as part of her wedding garment. However, the older Yemenite Jewish immigrant to Israel is shown in the illustration above wearing some of the customary wedding finery along with the married woman's fancy silver belt with carnelian jewels embedded in the buckle.

The belt from my collection that I am listing for sale has around a hundred tinkling bell dangles similar to those sported in the above illustration of the Yemenite woman's costume. The belt that is offered here for sale has much the same intricate design of links as you can see that each identical column of silver diamond shapes is linked securely to the next for the whole length of the belt, which is 29.5 in or 75 cm of links, not including the elaborate buckle parts. The links are still in perfect working order, as are the buckle and fastener. The bells show the wear and tear of the last 75 years, but there is no lack of bells, which are distributed generously along the length of the belt.

Now comes the mystery of the buckle on this traditional belt created for the Yemenite Jewish woman by a Yemenite Jewish silversmith, probably in the shops at Sana'a, the capital, where the Jewish housewives had a lively social community and wore costuming suitable to their status. 

For some reason this exquisitely designed and fabricated belt buckle with the same pattern that we see in many of the incredibly beautiful inlaid filigree and rosette designs of the Bawsani bracelets has acquired what I call a 'cultural accretion.' On top of one side of the beautiful Bawsani filigree and rosette buckle, we see a specially designed a cut out of glass pieces set in a plain plaque soldered over the original design. 

Why it should happen is a mystery, but there it is. I suppose that is what makes this belt truly ethnic jewelry; the variety of aesthetic standards is shown, because cultural objects are handmade to fit the taste of the owner, not uniformly manufactured for the masses to buy or not to buy. The belt remains very appealing in spite of the 'upscaling' that we can see. The modification is quite old and probably was worn for at least a generation or two before coming into my collection. 

This is one of the most mysterious pieces in my collection, because the final form cannot be explained by 'tradition.' Some writers attribute the addition of gemstones of any kind to their supposed healing or protective properties. This could explain the cultural addition to the original inlaid filigree buckle. The mysterious addition only adds to its authenticity.

Purchase Here.  

Measurements: 
Belt length from left hand end to screw fastener on right hand end - 32.5 in (82.5 cm)
Belt band width at buckle fastener, not including bell dangles - 2 in (5 cm)
Belt width including dangles - 3.75 in (9.5 cm)
Belt buckle length when closed - 3 in (7.5 cm)

Bridal Dowry Bracelet of the Yemenite Jews

Antique Yemen Silver Bracelet Bawsani Filigree Domes Rosette Clasp

More information on availability at DESIGNER'S WEBSITE

This is a beautifully designed antique Yemen silver bracelet with twelve small domes worked in Bawsani style filigree that decorates the middle band around the bracelet. The bands at the top and bottom of the bracelet are inlaid with beaded wire; all the decoration on the age-darkened silver of the base band glows with the nobility of old silver. 

The fastener is the traditional screw fastener of the Middle East. On the opposite side of the bracelet from the fastener is the matching hinge. One of the above photos shows the hinge side of the bracelet. The bracelet is in its original condition except for the aging and the smoothing of its features from being worn against skin or clothing. 
Even the rosette fastener cover is in its original condition with no chips or missing pieces. Such bracelets are becoming ever more rare. 

This beautiful piece of silver was created for a fortunate Yemeni woman before the 1940s when the Jewish silversmiths emigrated to Israel. Odds are that it was not made much before 1930, because traditionally, the older generation's jewelry was melted down to create the bridal dowry for the next generation. In the late 1940s, tradition was broken because the makers of such jewelry were gone. The jewelry became more and more valuable because there was no longer a way to have new pieces made. 

There is a very similar bracelet shown on page 139 of A World of Bracelets by Anne van Cutsem. It is attributed to the goldsmiths of Sana'a, Yemen, which was the location of the Bawsani community of gold and silver craftsmen. 

If you are interested in purchasing this item on our Lay-Away plan (see my policies page), just contact me by clicking on the Contact Seller button on this page. 

Measurements:
Inside diameter - 1.99 inches (5.1 cm) Width of band - 1 inch (2.5 cm)
The bracelet will fit around a 6.25 inch (15.1 cm) wrist

The Exceptional Silver Crafts among Yemenite Jewish Silversmiths

antique Yemen silver filigree prayer amulet, prayer book inside

This piece is the example par excellence of the exception in design, in symbols and in the shape and intent of the silver crafts in Southern Arabia among the Jewish community who influenced the other cultures in that area with their ornamental design.  

While East Asia jewelry artisans were creating ornamental art in fantastic jade carvings, and Central Asia was creating amulets of great size with layers of gold over silver, the craftsmen of the Southwest region of Asia were creating intricate wire decoration that came to be called Bawsani style filigree. both open work and inlaid filigree.  

This is an amulet of importance, still containing the prayers inside.  Here is the fuller story from my website.

This magnificent old Yemen silver filigree necklace still contains the tiny booklet of prayers and blessings that it was meant to contain. The top panel slides and allows the book to be removed if the owner wishes to do so. I have never touched the sheaf of bound papers on which the blessings are written. I have only looked at them for the purpose of describing this precious cultural artifact from a vanished culture. 

The sliding top panel results in a slightly asymmetric sett to the loops to which the Bawsani bead chain is attached. The maker of the panel needed part of the link to make a lip at the right-hand side in order to easily grasp the panel and slide it open. The asymmetric sett does not prevent hanging the amulet straight while wearing it. 

Back to my mention of a vanished culture in the previous paragraph. This piece is the result of the excellent skill of the Yemen Jewish silversmiths. This piece in particular is a prime example of that style of silversmithing. But by 1948, all the Yemen Jewish silversmiths had emigrated to Israel, a new state at that time. Once they were gone, the Yemeni people continued to value the thousands of beautiful pieces of jewelry that remained in the nation of Yemen. Our family began our collection of these outstanding cultural treasures in 1976 and continued to collect them until a few years ago. 

This prayer amulet necklace is one of the finest pieces of jewelry in our collection of antique prayer amulets and Bawsani beads from Yemen. Now to explain just a bit about the name Bawsani. It refers to the House of Baws, or Beit Baws, a community of silversmiths near Sana'a, the capital of Yemen. They developed a very high level of skill in creating intricate filigree, both open work and filigree. This amulet necklace includes three of the styles in which the House of Baws created silver filigree. 

First the inlay on the prayer amulet. You will not find better work in this genre in the world at any time. Just look at the detail. While I am describing the precious amulet, I have to point out the carnelian gemstone in the center. It is the highly prized Yemen agate that is commonly used in ring settings. At first I thought it was glass, but I have determined that it is the blood red carnelian that the Yemenis prize so highly. The gem, whether glass or stone is a perfectly formed cabochon, highly polished and deep blood red. The inlay surrounding it enhances its beauty. The tiny floral design is typical of some of the finest filigree inlay produced for wedding jewelry in Yemen of that time. 

Secondly consider the Bawsani bead pendants that dangle from the bottom and sides of this prayer amulet. The top row of the pendants consists of round open wire filigree beads that match the twelve beads that form the side chains. From those, the silversmith hung tiny Bawsani beads with their peculiar elliptical shapes in open wire work. These hang also from the sides of the prayer amulet. They have become very rare to find on beaded jewelry that remains in Yemen. 

Third are the classic Bawsani style filigree beads; in this piece they are the twelve round open wire filigree beads that form chains to which the prayer amulet is attached. They are highly valued among collectors. To them, the Yemeni designer of this necklace attached small plain surfaced beads which is a common practice. 

The end pieces on this necklace are beauties themselves. They were probably made by a different silversmith. At each end of the terminals there are very small pentagonal beads that are called berry beads, because they are made with openwork granulation. Globules of silver are fused together while still soft to form this delicate and also very highly prized beads. The chain is a typical Yemen chain and has the obligatory male fertility symbols attached to a bridal dowry necklace. 

This necklace with its prayer amulet including prayers and the abundance of Bawsani filigree is complete, original and in very good condition. 

Your inquiries are invited. We can arrange a lay-away plan if you prefer, a plan whereby you choose the schedule and amount you will pay in installments, and I will ship the necklace when the last payment is received. 

Measurements: 
Necklace = 25 in (50 cm) long.
Amulet = 3.5 in x 5 in (9 cm x 13 cm) including attachements

Cultural Influence on Turkmenia from Western Asia

We have seen how Mongolian late Neolithic culture and its successors in the Far East influenced the Mongolians who came down from the Altai mountains and established a Greater Turkmenia than the lands we now know as the 'stans of Central Asia, primarily are discussing the Turkmen who live in Turkmenistan and Afghanistan.

For today's topic let's consider the cultural influence from the West.  In fact, this culture was already there when the Turkmen began to move onto the desert oases in late antiquity, some time after 400 A.D.  There they found the remnants of the Greco-Persian kingdom of Bactria in Afghanistan and in Turkmenistan the Turkmen might have found a few people left from the ruins of the Indo-Iranian Margiana settlement that was closely related to the Bactrians.  Once the Turkoman herders settled in watered areas, they would have begun to find the ritual objects of the early Greek, Persian and Indian cultures.  In Bactria, there was still an Indo-Iranian-Buddhist culture that had reigned as the Kushans, or at least they would have found the huge amounts of cultural remains of it.  The monumental statues of Buddha in Bamiyan come to mind here.  But there was much, much more.  So much more that both archeologists and 'prospectors' are still finding the relics of that culture constantly.

But let's see what I mean when I say that the Bactria-Margiana culture that came from at least as far West as Anatolia (now Turkey, another home of the Turkmen).  But the Turks did not conquer as far West as Turkey until after 1200 A.D.   So when the first Mongol Turks came out of the Altai mountains in the Northern Steppes of Central Asia, they found the successor societies to Bactria and Margiana still steeped in much of the culture of the former residents.

Let us compare a cultural symbol of modern Afghan Turkomans, descended through the Kazakhs of Afghanistan.  It is inscribed on the back of a pendant made in the early part of the twentieth century, around 1930 or 40, I estimate.  Here is the photo and the link to the page that shows the front panel of the pendant:

More about this pendant HERE.

You will see that the figure is a circle of rhomboid shapes with a very faint circle in the middle.  The rhombus circle is so arranged that the eight shapes allow a straight line horizontally and vertically, making the + sign.  Then their arrangement allows one to make a diametrical X along the lines of the rhomboid shapes.  This suggests the symbols on the Bactrian stamp seals on which I find what I believe are meditation images that the Indo-Iranian, especially the Hindi culture, adopted as early as the Late Bronze Age, around 1,500 B. C. and evn earlier.  In the Hindi cultures, they are now called mandalas.   I have a collection of many of them.

Here is an example with just a slight difference in appearance, but a very important difference when understanding that the Mongol Turks never became much like Bactrians.  I believe they only assumed a few acculturations such as making certain images in wood, clay and metal.

Here is the photo and the link to more information on the Bactrian stamp seal

More information available HERE.

You will note that while the Turkoman inscribed design in the first photo above invites the line of sight to travel between the rhomboid shapes, the Bactrian casts the metal stamp seal so the eye follows the same distribution of lines -- horizontal, vertical and diametric -- but the eye begins at the point of the rhombuses and travels to the opposite rhombus tip, no matter whether the line is horizontal, vertical or diametric.  

We see the same distribution of eight shapes, shapes that are hauntingly similar, though the early molds for casting copper and bronze were not nearly as exact at making points as a stylus engraver can be in inscribing the silver pendant.  

I hope this proposition has been at least a bit entertaining, though not scientific.  I invite you to my online shop for the story behind many, many things in my rich collection that I am now selling.  You will find a warm welcome and a ready correspondent at CraftsofthePast.artfire.com

Ancient Mongolian Sacred Amulets in Twentieth Century Turkmenia

after Dieter and Reinhold Schletzer, Old Silver Jewellery of the Turkoman

From a  Bull in the China Cultures to a Ram in the Bushes of Turkmenia 

The people of Turkmenia who are of Mongolian descent still respect some of the same sacred images that the Mongolians crafted into jade figures in pre-historic times.  The Turkic speaking people from the Altai mountain region had come down to the plains of Turkmenistan and most of its neighboring countries beginning around 500 A.D.  They were numerous in the region by 900 A.D.

From the time that they came down from the mountains, they continued to maintain their tradition of crafting sacred amulets in wood, weaving them into their garments and tent furnishings and wearing them on their persons in the form of silver jewelry.  By the late 1800s, their metal smiths were crafting fine jewelry in gilded silver decorated with the ancient tribal symbols, especially the ram's head or ox head, depending on the interpreter of the various pieces of jewelry.

If you mentally rotate the above image into a rectangle instead of the diamond shape in which it is  designed to be worn, you will see an abstract image of the horns and eyes of a male mountain sheep, known by herders as a ram.  The Turkmen were hunters of the mountain sheep while still in the Altai mountains, and followers of domesticated sheep bred from the mountain sheep when the tribes descended from their mountain home to the desert oases of Turkmenistan and surrounding areas.

On a different Turkoman ornament, you see more obvious imitation of the ram's horn, but without the eyes:

  

after Schletzer, Old Silver Jewellery of the Turkoman

And here is another, more decorative representation that is commonly used on the Teke tribe gilded jewelry of the early 1900s.   Here the cut-outs from the metal represent the eyes and even the nose and mouth are suggested in the cut-out pattern at the bottom of this motif: 

after Schletzer, Old Silver Jewellery of the Turkoman

Can you find a similar image repeated on this antique silver Turkoman woman's pendant?  

Read more information on this piece HERE.

 I contend that the Far Eastern Chinese culture such as the Liangzhu farming community that existed at the end of the pre-historic and pre-literate Neolithic period naturally chose the ox as the totem and for a mountain  people such as the Turkmen had been,  the same image would represent a mountain sheep ram's head.  It is the image of the curved horns that the Turkmen have carried into the decoration of their clothing, their tent and now house furnishings, their outdoor furnaces, their garments and their personal jewelry or the ritual ornaments worn by the shaman of their tribe.

These photos of items from my jade collection will show some of the common characteristics of this totem shared over time and distance by the long-lived Mongol cultures.  Here is a jade reproduction in more representational art than was used in ancient times when making the extremely hard jade stone into life-like images was a much more difficult art than it is with the coming of the industrial age when the image below was made in  red jade that was used by the ancient culture now named Liangzhu.

Read more about this piece HERE.

Below is the photo of a jade ox head crafted in antiquity in green jade and based on the late Neolithic Hongshan settlers along the Yellow River in what is now called Inner Mongolia: 

Read more about this piece HERE.

The hole for hanging the jade pendant that represents the horns and eyes of the ox actually is hand drilled in the shape of an ox's nostrils and is called the Hongshan ox nose style of hole in the jade ornaments of that time.  

I have one or two more blog entries for the comparison between the ancient Mongol cultures of the East and the Turkoman tribes of Central and West Asia.  Then I will return for a while to discuss the ornamentation of the more southern styles of jewelry in Western Asia.  

Thank you for visiting my blog.  You are always welcome to see the Turkoman and Eastern jade jewelry at my Artfire shop, my Turkoman and Yemeni jewelry at my Etsy shop,  and my Turkoman textiles at my second Etsy shop. 

By the Twentieth Century, the Dragon Was in Hot Water

Even the most revered of sacred images can become the subject of satire, or simply a domestic decoration of sorts.  I am not sure exactly what statement this carved jade amulet from about 1900 in China was meant to pronounce.  It portrays the usual symmetrical dragons, one on each side not of a pearl or the phoenix bird, as was usually the case, but the two dragons are clinging on and sitting in what we call the hotpot, a vessel served to each table at a Mongolian barbecue.  The hotpot is full of near boiling water or oil or both and would make even a supernatural dragon quite uncomfortable, I should think.

Nevertheless, this is not an uncommon amulet to find in antique collections in China.  Here is the image I am discussing.

Old Hand Carved Kunlun Jade Pendant with Agate and Bronze Beads

This is a piece carved in the twentieth century in China. It was bought from Shanghai. This is the modern ironic temperament toward the sacred dragon symbol that had predominated in China for about five thousand years. In the early twentieth century, a pair of dragons are carved in the medieval style with elaborate coils and clear facial features and in the ancient iconic pose with faces turned back looking in opposite directions. The ironic or maybe satiric element in this carving is that the dragons are being boiled in a hot pot. 

Anyone who has been to a Mongolian barbecue grill knows that the hot pot is brought to the table with raw fresh meat or fish and skewers. The hot pot is steamy if not boiling hot and the diner skewers his/her meat or fish and dips it into the hot pot to cook to her/his satisfaction. Here the jade carver puts dragons, a symbol adopted by royal and noble families, into the hot pot to stew a bit. I will let the reader decide the meaning of this carving. 

The jade from which this satiric message is carved is Kunlun jade, a part of the imperial jade family, meaning that this jade, along with Hetian jade and Xiu jade, was highly valued by the royal dynasties of China. The Kunlun mountains, the source of the jade, divides the extreme Northwest desert part of China from the Tibetan plateau and Central China. 

As the descent is made by a traversable route, the traveler soon comes upon the source of one of the great long rivers of our planet; the Yellow River. The sites of some of our earliest human cultures have been discovered along this great river that stretches from Western China through Mongolia and empties into the Pacific, a length of 5,000 km -- about 3,000 miles.

Some of the world's most beautiful old agate beads are strung with the pendant. The ovoid beads on each side of the pendant are hand cut and hand drilled old dragon vein agates. The small round beads are also hand made beads. The smoky quartz and banded agate tubular beads are not old. The spacer beads are from Tibet and made of bronze finished metal with no lead or nickel content. The fastener and bail for the pendant are of the same material. 

Both sides of the pendant are shown in the photographs above. 

Measurements: 18.5 inches long
Pendant: 6.5 cm (2.5 in) x 6.5 cm (2.5 in)

For more information on this piece for sale, see CraftsofthePast.Artfire.com