I have been meaning to weigh in on this matter, but have not had time to give it justice. I have been collecting and selling ancient vessel beads for many years. That of course does not make me an expert, and even if it did, as Will has aptly pointed out experts can make mistake as well. In fact sometimes they cannot see past their own desires, like many new collectors, we want something to be good, so sometimes we miss the flaws that might be obvious to others.

I have dealt with Bead castle many times over the years. He often riles other sellers for some reason, but he seems to have a great and uncanny talent for accumulating very high quality ancient beads, many looking so good that you want to think they must be new. I have also seen ancient beads mis-identified in his store before.

Now the strand in question has at least one bead that is Venetian in period, early 1920's most likely. And it is certainly possible that some others could be replicas, but I would not be too quick to judge the whole strand by the pictures shown. In many cases I have seen or heard of "Like-new" beads coming straight out of archaeological sites, either they were well protected by the situation or the content of the soil, etc.

I will try to follow up this weekend with some examples of vessel beads from my collection, along with some very helpful information on vessel beads from Maude Spaer's book about glass beads in the Israeli Museum.

Remember, don't judge all beads by the company they might keep on a trader's strand.

More to come.