I've heard them called "Dutch chevrons" made by the a-speo process. I could be wrong. They are valued in the Africa trade at more than an equivalent sized Russian blue, but may b e from about the same period.
Scott
Considered "chevron family" beads.
If you are interested in chevrons and their relatives, I recommend "Chevron and Nueva Cadiz Beads" by John and Ruth Picard. It may be ordered from their web site picardbeads.com.
Page 29 pictures beads like yours. Normally they have three layers - blue-white-blue, then white stripes on the outer layer.
...you made my day! :)
I looked at the little striped bead with a loupe and I don't see other layers. Is it safe to say that this is still in the chevron family and that they do have different layers as chevrons do?
Luann, I do love the fact that this strand exhibited a lot of variety of color in the "Russian Blue" beads. I also love the different little beads added on the ends. I intend to keep the strand in it's order and use them as the body of a necklace with a focal bead. It also had a little red bead that appeared to have lost it's what I'm guessing was
white decoration.
I took a lot of photos to get a good photo.
I think I may have seen what I thought was a faded white ring or border at the top of the stripes which is actually the white layer as it is in this bead auction.
