Jewellery is personal adornments worn since ancient times by people of all cultures, as ornaments, as badges of social or official rank, and as emblems of religious or other belief. In its widest sense the term jewellery encompasses objects made of many kinds of organic and inorganic materials such as hair, feathers, leather, scales, bones, shells, wood, ceramics, metals, and minerals. More commonly the term refers to mounted precious or semiprecious stones and to objects made of valuable or attractive metals such as gold, silver, platinum, copper, and brass.
Jewellery has been worn on the head as crowns, diadems, tiaras, aigrettes, hairpins, hat ornaments, earrings, nose rings, ear-plugs, and lip rings; on the neck as collars, necklaces, and pendants; on the breast as pectorals, brooches, clasps, and buttons; on the limbs as rings, bracelets, armlets, and anklets; and at the waist as belts and girdles, with pendants such as chatelaines, scent cases, and rosaries. Much present knowledge of jewellery is derived from the preservation of personal objects in tombs. Information about the jewellery of cultures that did not bury valuables with the dead comes from portraits in surviving painting and sculpture. Research Jewellery
Abbreviations
Costume
Research Jewellery