Sterling Silver Jewelry: Pearl Jewelry Buyers Guide

Pearls embody both classic elegance and fun; here are some pointers and tips you should consider before buying Pearl jewelry. Fair skins, blonde and redheads, are well matched to silvery-white and rosy hued Pearls. Tanned and dark skin tones are suited to creamy and golden colored Pearls.

Personal Appearance: Customize your Pearl Necklace to your proportions. If you have a long neck accentuate your feline grace with a single or multi-strand pearl choker or pearl collier, this is also the classic length of a bride’s Pearl wedding strand. If your neck is shorter, dare to shine and think about a longer strand such as a matinee or opera for a twist of 1950s Hollywood glamour. For a true statement of flapper-girl power, stand out and impress admirers with a touch of drama by steeping yourself in an elaborate Pearl rope necklace.

Clothes: The Pearl Choker and Pearl Collier are perfect for the off-the-shoulder grace of wedding gowns. They are also complemented by the plunging décolletages of evening gowns and "V" neck sweaters. Pearl Colliers and matinees are the essential elements to both the younger and older woman’s wardrobe. They are suited to everyday sports and business wear providing a classic, timeless elegance to every kind of outfit and every style of neckline. The longer lengths of the Pearl Opera and Rope Strands are the perfect accompaniment to low or high necks, and look great with suits and blouses with "Constructed" necks.

Start you Pearl wardrobe with a basic set, ‘Parure’, of matching necklace, ring, earrings or bracelet. Your local jeweler can update and lengthen your Pearl Necklace later so choose the length that most suites all occasions first.

The Collier or Collar Pearl Strand
Length: 12 to13 inches.
The Pearl Collier is made up of more than one strand of uniform Pearls that fit cozily around the base of the neck. This is the long-established ‘Coming-of-Age’ gift from the mother-in-law to the daughter. One of the oldest lengths of Pearl Necklace it suites every age, adding class and finesse to everything from sweaters to suits.

The Choker Pearl Strand
Length: 14 to16 inches.
The Pearl Choker is made up of one strand with large uniform sized Pearls that sit cozily around the neck sitting on the collarbone. The choker is an essential element in the wardrobe of the elegant woman with class and style, it is also a length suitable for children as its not too tight allowing for room to grow. The Pearl choker is particularly fashionable at the moment, uniting Victorian retro with today’s catwalk chic.

The Princess Pearl Strand
Length: 17 to19 inches.
The Pearl Princess Necklace is a perfect length if you ever consider attaching a pendant to your Pearl necklace. One of the most popular lengths the princess is well suited to crew and high necklines, but can equally add a frame to a plunging neckline.


The Matinee Pearl Strand
Length: 20 to 24 inches.
The Pearl Matinee Necklace, an unrestricting length that rests well on any neckline, is a little longer than a collier and slightly shorter than the Opera. Offering both elegant sophistication and casual styling the matinee looks great with sports or office clothes, with a sweater or the classic white blouse.

The Opera Pearl Strand
Length: 28 to 36 inches.
The Pearl Opera Strand falls to the breastbone and possesses a grace encapsulated in a single strand of Pearls, usually no less than 7 mm in diameter. A perfect accoutrement to low or high neck-lined blouses or adding a stunning offset to a suit, this jewelry is economy in business class transforming from a free-hanging single pearl strand to a multi pearl strand choker.

The Sautoir or Rope Pearl Strand
Length: 40 inches and over.
The Lariat Pearl Strand
Length: At least 48 inches.
The Pearl Rope, queen of versatility, was the preferred length of Pearl Necklace by the French haute-couture designer Coco Chanel. It is the essence of the emancipated women capturing the freedom of the 20s flapper girl and the 60s flower child. It is the complete jewel, an authentic ‘must have’, comprising of several twisted parallel or graduated strands generally embellished with clasps placed along the length, which transform it into bracelets and necklace of various combinations.

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Sterling Silver Jewelry: The Origins Of Topaz

The 300 B.C. translation of the Old Testament featured a gemstone called ‘Topazion,’ which appeared in Exodus and the breastplate of Aaron, this gem was in fact peridot. The later 1611 A.D. ‘King James Version’ of the Old Testament, translated ‘Topazion’ as ‘Topaz.’ However, at the time of the 1611 translation, ‘Topaz’ was used to denote any yellow colored gemstone, irrespective of the different chemical properties. Although these texts give us proof of Topaz’s ancient etymology, they don’t give us the answer to where and when the Topaz that we know today was first discovered.

The Renaissance, beginning in the late 14th century, spelt a revival in classical Greece, Rome and the preceding cultures of ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia. These archaic cultures based many of their fundamental idea systems around the precursor of modern science: Alchemy. By today’s standards, alchemy is regarded as a mystic, esoteric, and slightly immoral art. The tainted public image of alchemy is due in part to later religious propaganda, and elitist secret societies formed around alchemy such as the Rosicruianism (pictured right) and the Free Masons.

In spite of this, we owe the discovery of many substances and processes that are the mainstay of modern physical, chemical, biological knowledge to alchemists. Where would we be without Isaac Newton, Saint Thomas Aquinas, Boyle, Bacon and Thomas Browne: all devoted alchemists. Alchemists were the high priests of the ‘Modern Age’ transforming the artistic, scientific, religious and political landscape of Europe. They provided the framework for a grand new design of understanding, based on rational materialism: Modern science. In 1669, Rasmus Bartholin discovered the double refraction of light rays in calcite, prompting Thomas Young to propose the theory that different light sources travel in waves at different frequencies. With the advent of these more exacting processes, mineralogy became more defined, and the true nature of a mineral was understood more by its chemical composition and crystalline form than its external characteristics.

Later, at the beginning of the 17th Century, the German mineralogist and director of mines at Freiberg in Saxony, Johann Friedrich Henckel published a book of his teachings. Writing on the chemical properties of minerals in his book ‘Pyritologie.’ Henckel was the first to recognize Topaz, as the mineral that we know today. Henckel sourced his Topaz from the deposits of Schneckenstein, in the Voigtland of Saxony in East Germany. This was the most important source of Topaz up until the 1730 discovery of deposits in the Brazilian state of Minas Gerias. Henckels Topaz was further identified and assayed by Andreas Marggraf who in 1776 wrote the book ‘Findings on the Topaz of Saxony.’ Marggraf was the director of Physics at the Berlin Academy, where he had become famous for numerous discoveries including formic acid, he had also learnt assaying alongside Henckel in Freiberg.

The following excerpt, taken from ‘Findings on the Topaz of Saxony,’ gives an overview of Henckel and Marggraf’s Topaz: “This gem is found in the “Vogtland’, on the ‘Schneckenberg’ near the hills of the ‘Tonneberg’ two miles from ‘Auerbach’: We see quite a lot of it in the deep fissures of a very hard rock, and it is found mixed with a type of yellow schist and quartz. The interior structure/texture is compact but with thin leaf-like layers, which this gem has in common with diamond. It has a prismatic structure at four unequal angles, it is hard with a bright sparkle.”

There can be little question that this description corresponds to the Topaz of today, which is found in association with granite rocks, within pegmatite veins and in association with schist rocks. Topaz’s crystals form in the rhombic system of crystallization, and are prismatic in shape. Topaz possesses a perfect basal cleavage, and is ‘foliated’ (leaf like layers) which makes it brittle if cut in the wrong direction. In spite of this Topaz is one of the hardest minerals known to man, second only to corundum and diamond. Most Topaz is transparent to translucent with a vitreous glass-like luster, exhibiting strong brilliance.

Towards the end of the 1700’s numerous mineral substances were
analyzed by Scheele, Kiaproth, Vauquelin, Kirwan, Berzelius, Rose
and other chemists, and many new mineral-species and chemical elements discovered. In 1819, the principles of differentiation between isomorphic and dimorphic crystal structures were expressed by E. Mitscherlich, who dispelled the many difficulties encountered in defining different mineral species. Later in 1820, classing a mineral’s characteristics became even more precise with Frederich Mohs scale of 1-10 hardness, starting with Talc: 1, and ending with Diamond: 10. All these different systems of mineral classification gave birth to the exactitude of modern mineralogy, by which we determine a gems identity.

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Written for SilverShake, an online retailer of amethyst silver jewelry and sterling silver jewelry at wholesale prices. Purchase today and get silver jewelry worth up to $60...Free!

Sterling Silver Jewelry: Silver & The Seven Days

Seven days of creation, seventh heaven, seven seas, seven continents, seven wonders, seven pillars of wisdom, seven heavenly virtues, lucky seven, the magnificent seven, seven up, seven eleven, …it seems as if the number seven surrounds us.

Over 7000 years ago, after the discoveries of Silver and the first ‘Seven Metals Of Antiquity’, there existed a culture of visionaries who lived in the Mesopotamian city of Babylon, they were known as the Chaldaean oracles. The Chaldaeans were fundamentally alchemists believing ‘As it is above, so it is below’.

According to the Chaldaeans everything was inextricably linked. They believed the interpretation of events on earth, of men's characters and dispositions, were made possible by observing the movements of the planets. We have come to know their prophecies as astrology. While observing the motions of the stars above, the Chaldaeans realized the existence of order in the procession of the planets in the sky, they translated this order into numbers We have come to know their mathematical prophecies as astronomy.

Expressing the movements in numbered measurements the Chaldaeans developed the 12-month ‘Solar’ calendar, conceptualized the twelve signs of the zodiac, this in turn led to the establishment of the two 12 hour divisions of night and day. They went on to establish the monthly period, derived from the 28-day Lunar cycle with each period possessing it’s own full Moon. One theory is that the Chaldaeans based this time period on the female reproductive cycle. This may also explain why the Moon has always had a female identity being governed over by female deities of fertility.

Being alchemists the Chaldaeans based the existence of time on Earth upon the movements of the stars and the seven visible planets above. The seven visible planets were the Moon, Mercury, Venus, Sun, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn: Uranus, Neptune and Pluto weren’t discovered until the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries A.D. respectively.The Chaldeans already associated each of the seven planets with the names of the Babylonian gods: Moon = Nanna, Jupiter = Marduk, Venus = Ishtar, Saturn = Ninib, Mercury = Nebo, Mars = Nergal, Sun = Shamash, they then connected each planet and its god to a designated time period. These systems were later adopted and developed by the Greeks, and subsequently the Romans, who after replacing the original Babylonian deities with their own assigned each of the seven visible planetary bodies with a day.

At this later time Mediterranean cultures, deemed pagan under their Roman satraps, calculated the sequence of the days of the week based on the planets in outermost order to the Earth starting with the furthest Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Sun, Venus, Mercury and finally the closest the Moon. This procession of planets was then numbered from 1 to 7 and run repeatedly through a 24-hour period, the name of each day came from the planet assigned to the first hour of each 24 hour period:

1=Saturn, 2=Jupiter, 3=Mars, 4=Sun, 5=Venus, 6=Mercury, 7=Moon 8=Saturn, 9=Jupiter, 10=Mars, 11=Sun, 12=Venus, 13=Mercury, 14=Moon 15=Saturn, 16=Jupiter, 17=Mars, 18=Sun, 19=Venus, 20=Mercury, 21=Moon 22=Saturn, 23=Jupiter, 24=Mars....1=Sun, 2=Venus, 3=Mercury, 4=Moon 5=Saturn, 6=Jupiter, 7=Mars, 8=Sun, 9=Venus, 10=Mercury, 11=Moon 12=Saturn, 13=Jupiter, 14=Mars, 15=Sun, 16=Venus, 17=Mercury, 18=Moon 19=Saturn, 20=Jupiter, 21=Mars, 22=Sun, 23=Venus, 24=Mercury....1=Moon, 2=Saturn, 3=Jupiter, 4=Mars, 5=Sun, 6=Venus, 7=Mercury, 8=Moon 9=Saturn, 10=Jupiter, 11=Mars, 12=Sun, 13=Venus, 14=Mercury, 15=Moon 16=Saturn, 17=Jupiter, 18=Mars, 19=Sun, 20=Venus, 21=Mercury, 22=Moon 23=Saturn, 24=Jupiter....1=Mars, 2=Sun, 3=Venus, 4=Mercury, 5=Moon 6=Saturn, 7=Jupiter, 8=Mars, 9=Sun, 10=Venus, 11=Mercury, 12=Moon 13=Saturn, 14=Jupiter, 15=Mars, 16=Sun, 17=Venus, 18=Mercury, 19=Moon 20=Saturn, 21=Jupiter, 22=Mars, 23=Sun, 24=Venus.....1=Mercury, 2=Moon 3=Saturn, 4=Jupiter, 5=Mars, 6=Sun, 7=Venus, 8=Mercury, 9=Moon 10=Saturn, 11=Jupiter, 12=Mars, 13=Sun, 14=Venus, 15=Mercury, 16=Moon 17=Saturn, 18=Jupiter, 19=Mars, 20=Sun, 21=Venus, 22=Mercury, 23=Moon 24=Saturn....1=Jupiter, 2=Mars, 3=Sun, 4=Venus, 5=Mercury, 6=Moon 7=Saturn, 8=Jupiter, 9=Mars, 10=Sun, 11=Venus, 12=Mercury, 13=Moon 14=Saturn, 15=Jupiter, 16=Mars, 17=Sun, 18=Venus, 19=Mercury, 20=Moon 21=Saturn, 22=Jupiter, 23=Mars, 24=Sun....1=Venus, 2=Mercury, 3=Moon 4=Saturn, 5=Jupiter, 6=Mars, 7=Sun, 8=Venus, 9=Mercury, 10=Moon 11=Saturn, 12=Jupiter, 13=Mars, 14=Sun, 15=Venus, 16=Mercury, 17=Moon 18=Saturn, 19=Jupiter, 20=Mars, 21=Sun, 22=Venus, 23=Mercury, 24=Moon.

If you look at the planet assigned to the first hour of each day, you notice that the planets come in this order: Saturn, Sun, Moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter and Venus. At the time of Christ, when most of the Mediterranean area was under Roman rule, Saturday with its designated planet Saturn, was the day of rest making Sunday the first day of the week.

However, this pantheon of planets and their names bares little resemblance to the English language’s 7 days of the week. The Romans, who had unofficially adopted this ‘Pagan’ order of days, termed the first day of the week ‘Dies Solis’ which translated into ‘Sun’s Day,’ which became Sunday. They also termed the second day ‘Dies Lunae’ or ‘Moon’s Day,’ which transformed into Monday. And finally, the seventh day ‘Dies Saturni’ meaning ‘Saturn’s Day,’ now Saturday. Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday were all derived later in northern Europe, from the Teutonic and Nordic tribes and their gods Tiw, Odin, Thor and Freyja, who spawned the Anglo Saxon language.

During these ancient periods, civilizations from Mesopotamia, Egypt, Anatolia, Greece venerated the seven visible planets and their respective deities to such an extent that all were allocated seven metals. For the Egyptians gold was the metal of the sun and its god Amun, silver was appropriated to the Moon and the ‘Mother Heaven’ Isis. The Greeks appointed copper, used in ornamentation and jewelry, to the planet and goddess of beauty Venus. The Greeks used iron for the fabrication of instruments of warfare, and thus associated it with the planet and god of war Mars. Accordingly lead was associated with Saturn, tin with Jupiter and Mercury of course speaks for itself.

This article was written by David-John Turner for the Silvershake website, an online retailer of silver jewelry at wholesale prices. Purchase today and get gemstone silver jewelry worth up to $60...Free!
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