The problem with wearing these monsters is the old glue. Inlays sometimes pop out.

This bead had a rather large chip out of it so I had it repaired by a shop that does restorations on antique items.

The repair matches the white trailing and black background quite well, but the base material (likely an epoxy resin) has turned green-ish on the end, in the 3-4 years since the repair was done.

So it is now obvious that the bead has been repaired & I'm not sure it was worth the money spent on it.

In 200 years folks will be fascinated!

I agree!

When repairs are done by a museum, they want the repair to be evident but not too distracting. Mainly, they want the viewer to know that the object has been damaged (sometimes severely), but is still lovely (or whatever).

The other requirement is that any repair be reversible -- partly in case newer, better repair techniques come along, but mainly so that the original object is not permanently altered by the repair . . .

I bought a strand of beads like this when I was living for a time in KL in the early 90s. This one seems to be MOSTLY repair!

In UV light, the glue light up in a different (green-yellow) color.
Repair was done in Indonesia before collecting in the 80's and never noticed till last year when I examined the bead. Not nice to inform the owner, but when convinced she donate the bead to me for the reference collection. (Boulevard of broken Beads)

I've been away for most of the summer and am only just catching up. Thanks, Linda, for opening up this topic. We live in a culture where it has become more and more difficult to get things repaired: if an appliance is broken, throw it out; if a fender is dented, replace it with an identical new one. But I've always loved repaired things; the more obvious the repair the better. Perhaps it comes from having grown up in post-WW2 Europe, when everything was scarce or rationed and people had to repair stuff and were proud of "making ends meet". You never forget wearing darned socks to school!

Now, in a small way, I collect things that have interesting repairs. Here are a few of the bead:

1. A carnelian talhakimt from northern Niger, repaired with brass and resin;

2. A neolithic quartz (53 mm) bead from the Dahklet area of Northern Mauritania, repaired with leather.

And more to follow...

Welcome back, Will - would you kindly check your private messages & see if you can help?

3. I've shown this here before, but it's one of my favourite possessions and I have to show it again: a beautiful piece of Neolithic jade from Ban Chiang in what is now Thailand, originally part of a jade bangle (2000 BCE) that broke, then drilled as a bead which also broke, and then repaired (200CE approximately) with a gold plate and rivets.

4. An amber bead (36mm) from Maroc, repaired with staples and a wound white metal silver ring.

A couple of other repaired things that I like:

1. I found this just a couple of months ago: a fifteenth century ceramic jar with twin handles from the Sankampaeng kilns near Chiang Mai in Thailand; not very interesting in itself but repaired with the neck of an older Khmer culture bronze vase (C13 or 14 probably from Lopburi); the functional jar suddenly becomes quite elegant:

2. A wooden milk container that I bought from Judy a few years ago; it comes from Southern Sudan or Northern Uganda, from Arua or Hima pastoralist tribespeople. The wood has been hollowed out to leave very thin walls that are vulnerable; cracks have been repaired with resin embedded with little squares of white metal, possibly aluminium. Again I think the repaired item is even more beautiful than the unrepaired container would have been.

All the best,

Will

this is a bead from Tibet that apparently broke in half and was restored by capping it and turning it into a pendant. It measures 46mm x 30 mm. It was originally a huge bead!

This is my favorite repaired bead, I have posted it before its 60mm x 40mm

One and one half inch in height, and one inch width. Or, 38mm x 25mm.

I am thinking of having the wire replaced. But I want the wire to look old and worn.

It will! Just do it, wear it and wait!
LD

A delightful bit of work, stained ivory and an old seven layer

Old repairs on these beads.