I doubt it to be old. Light coloured wood(elm,pine?)dyed to mimic rosewood. Nice carving, though, and LARGE: 57 x 40 x 9 mm. The oblong hole is 6,5 mm.

This one is not made of wood, but of a pink/orange coral. And it is also LARGE: 34 x 31 mm.! The hole is 4,5 mm.

This one is still larger: 41,5 mm. The hole 10 mm. It is supposed to be made of quartz (it scratches glass) and ancient (it surely looks like it, specially the insides of its hole). Could it be one of these beads used at the top of court officials' hats? But...so heavy (95 grams)?

One end (or sometimes both ends) is glued on. This allows the center to be hollow. I suspect some duplication machine work involved with these as there are several designs but each is very uniform. Nice beads! Usually available at a pretty reasonable price.

OH! So that's how it was done. I wondered about that. Glued together, that makes sense to me. I haven't find the glue line yet. I will keep looking.

Thank You Russ.

Thomas Mercer
Dog Bone Crazy

Any large round chinese bead from about a century ago of whatever material glass, stone, etc, with a large hole, tends to be called a Mandarin hat button.
I met someone called Primrose Orgel who had researched and written a paper about them, working from examples that belong to the British Museum. (memo to self -look her up!)
The colour of the bead denotes the rank, and would have been mounted on a miniature vertical pedestal of possibly silver wire filigree, which in turn would have been sewn onto the hat material.
I do not recall anything about glue...
Stefany

Just consulted google which informs me that Primrose Orgel died in 1997, and also found a section of the Pitt-Rivers museum website that shows 4 mandarin hat buttons on their little pedestals, if you scroll down a bit.
Stefany

Thank you Stefany;

Mandarin hat button. That is what I meant to ask but counld not remember the kind of hat it was I asking about. Mandarin hat buttons have been discussed on the forum before a long time ago. That is why I asked. Gee, I think a Mandarin hat button would be fun to have in my collection.

Take Care.
Sincerely
Thomas Mercer
Dog Bone Crazy

you may find a Mandarin Hat button there!

The bead in question might easily be from a Mandarin hat. (Some years ago, I composed a necklace made primarily of Mandarin hat beads for a client.)

The mounting is typically a metal shank that the bead is placed on. It's held by a decorative element that fits into the shank (or vice versa), and provides the metal ornament on the top. I think the shank, via its base is sewn onto the hat. I've seen a few intact hats, but not many.

Regarding the Pitt Rivers site..., Mandarin "button" indeed....

Jamey

I think the term is used as in "Knob" or "Handle" rather than "Fastener"!
Perhaps if you are a court mandarin, you grab it to take off the hat?
Stefany

Hi Stef,

You may be correct.

However, I notice many times that people seem practically reticent to use the word "bead" (for a bead) when they can think of something else instead. I suppose they do this because they think that "beads" are "frivilous" or "unimportant."

Jamey