These beads look like type A (ancient beads) to me.
its a Carnelian that is artificially Etched or Decorated.
that's all to it.
if you take these to the Himalayas it will be considered to be part of Chung dzi family. in the western world it will be called Etched Carnelian, in China or Burma or Thailand something else etc.
its like calling a Apple, pomme,mela,Apfel, or whatever..
no need to go in a deep sense.
Hi
Please call me "Shinji" (not Shin Ji) haha.
Bonpo has pointed everything already.
Your beads in the picture can not be called "Chung dzi" in international beads market like ebay.
"Chung dzi" and "Etched Carnelian" are suposed to be made in different process.
If you are interested in it,it's better to ask about it to Jamey.
Shinji
Hi, Shinji,
sorry to mistaken your name, I thought it was an elegance to separate the 2 pinyin characters.
As I've told to Jamey, tomorrow I will send a lot of 50 of these beads (most Type B) to this good Italian seller. I've advised him to be much careful and prudent and I've said to him to contact Jamey (they are friend - Jamey really know all the beads sellers in the world). This seller has insisted to pay and to get also the lot has won on ebay and he already says me he is sure they are genuine. Tomorrow I will also send few beads to Jamey for to study. If these 2 experts will say these are fakes I will send back all the beads to the seller, otherwise, if genuine, I will gift a pair of these (Type A & B) to you and other pair to Joyce to do the peace; then let me know your opinions too. The problem will be if the experts won't agree...
With all these small etched carnelian you see in the main photo there were also a very dark brown bead (to see the photo in attached) which I really seems to me a dzi due the strong contrast of color. If so I asked me if could be others dzi mixed in this selected lot of not transparent beads. I know etched carnelian are made with natron and dzi with boiled sugar, but I can not recognize it.
Andrea