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| Home > History of Jewellery > Jewellery in Ancient India > Jewellery for Head & Neck
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| | Jewellery for Head & Neck
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Earrings
1. The earring consists of a six-petalled blossom with a circular centre of applied wire enclosed by granules of regular size. The inner petals, cut from sheet gold, are plain; die outer petals, of stamped sheet gold, are filled with granules of differing sizes. Twisted wires are attached to the back and appear as loops from the front, adorned with granulated rosettes. Beneath the blossom is a turquoise vase mounted with granulated sheet gold; linking the vase and rosette is a stylized dolphin of sheet gold.
2. This earring, also has a vase pendant, like the preceding one, made of a pearl with finely granulated gold mounts, and with a pedestal foot. The dolphins are more naturalistic, worked in the round and chased. A trefoil of sheet gold, with applied wire and granulated borders, replaces the blossom. Chains to the top of the earring attach three seed pearls.
3. This earring has a blossom with five heart-shaped petals, filled with granulation, their points meeting at a small central disc. The pendant beneath has a compressed spherical bead, a ring of granules, and a turquoise bead set in gold and with a granulated terminal. The twisted wire loops set with granulated rosettes, are also seen here.
4. These earrings have two vertical rows of granules. It has a blossom and applied twisted wires.
5. A one more gold ear-ornament was found in the south India, in the Nilgiri Hills and was used in the end of 1st millennium BC. These stylized blossoms are made from granules and pellets of gold, with tiny sheets of gold bent into high relief, mounted on a sheet of gold cut into the form of petals.
Hairpin
1. This is a Hairpin finial in the form of a goddess Gold. The goddess depicted here is semi-nude and entirely western classical in style. Her left hand, held up close to her shoulder, holds a small stick; her right hand, on her hip, holds a bunch of leaves.
Pendants
1. This pendant made from sheet gold, is an original use of `the curl and crescent in the local style, with the back plate `scalloped at the edges, in a leaf-like pattern. These beautifully worked and conceived gold jewels are amongst a group from the same source, of which some pieces have close affinities with finds elsewhere in south India and may well be of local manufacture.
2.  The heart-shaped leaf of the pipal tree (Ficus religiosa) occurs very frequently in Indian art; Pipal leaves as ornaments at the end of chains are often shown on stone and metal images of gods and goddesses. The minute size of this pendant suggests it was made as part of the detachable jewellery of a bronze or wooden image; alternatively it may have been a pendant from a larger piece of jewellery, such as a head ornament.
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