As I mentioned in a post-reply yesterday, I was recently asked to clean-up and restring a very nice strand of 17th C. Venetian beads. I've cleand and scanned. Next is sorting and sequencing.

I thought I'd post some photos.

As we can see, the strand is composed primarily of "gooseberry" beads, that are clear with sunken white lines. Some are still somewhat dirty inside, and they appear darker and almost violet. Added to these are various striped a speo star beads, and a few dark blue beads with red or white-red-white stripes. Practically all of these beads are over 300 years old. They represent a class of trade beads we do not see often (since most trade beads are from much later times).

There are occassionally posts here asking how to identify gooseberry beads, and tell old ones from new ones. This is a good specimen group, because there are a variety of shapes and conditions of preservation.

Here's the whole strand. Details to come.

Jamey