Here is a stand of Hebrons that range from 16 to 24mm in diameter and 10 to 14mm in length. The largest Vaseline bead is 18mm in diameter.

I am just going to post in sequence some various Ghana mix strands I picked up. For whatever the reason I just can't seem to get enough of these things. 2 of them were only $12 each. You'll be able to spot them by the modern powder glass and Chinese beads mixed in. I am also including some close ups of individual beads that caused me to pick these strands. Any ideas on the Akoso-like bead on this page?

Here is a feather bead that was also on that strand.

....and red squiggles isn't too shabby, either!
Nice snags!

Another $12 strand with a feather bead.

This one was a bit more expensive and is pretty much all Venetian beads. I'm including a close up of one of the Tabulars.

They are small (17 and 20mm in lenght), but this strand also had some "elbows" on it.

Hi George!

Congrats on the new camera, these photos are looking really nice!

I know a few people who absolutely love to go through the Ghana mixes. And it always pays off for them. They always find a few strands that contain one really nice bead in good condition that actually is worth the price of the strand.

Akoso-like bead - it appears to be a new powderglass bead.

This is what I thought was an unusual strand of powder glass beads. The dealer said they were from "the '70s" but Joyce thought they might be newer. The largest bead is about 30 x 22mm.

2 strands, both of recent manufacture. The lower "mix" strand was only $6! I bought a couple of those but I ended up giving some away as gifts. At that price you can't go wrong!

Strand 1 is Chinese made nuggets that are about 18 to 22mm long by 12mm wide. Strand 2 which is stylishly strung on monofilament was sold to me as "African Tourquise" although I beleive it is heat treated Magnasite (sp?). Those beads are 30 x 11mm.

Here's a helpful link for turquoise from the Rings and Things website. I've admired this stuff called "African Turquoise" for awhile...wondering just how "turquoisy" it actually is. R and T describes it as a type of jasper found in Africa.

Joyce:
Thanks for the link! However the "African Tourquise" doesn't actually resemble the beads I have. However what they list as "Yellow Tourquise" does, and guess what? They think it might be magnesite! Interesting!

I think your picture shows the sort of "hard yellow turquoise" that we think to be a serpentine. We describe it as "hard" because it is harder than the dyed yellow magnesite coming out of Hubei Province as "yellow turquoise."

The dealer told me that these were modern made Pumtek beads made from fossilized palm wood. However one of the beads broke and I kind of doubt that story. The large central bead is 37mm in diameter

Hello George,

These beads do look like the new Pumtek.
I don't think that all of the fossilized wood they dig out is palmwood, because palmwood has such a distinctive grain that it is easy to recognise.

Hendrik

Here's a picture where the stone is grinded into shape.

A broken old Pumtek bead with the typical palmwood grain and some beads from early nineteen hundreds?.

Hendrik

And some more unfinished beads ready for the final finishing with the well known designs.

Hendrik

Hi George,

These are new pumtek beads, and not imitations.

The material they are made from is opalized palm wood. However, the original trees had some gaps or splits in the wood, and there are places where the opal substitute/deposition is "plain" because it has just filled this gap—and does not preserve the grain of the wood. Consequently, it's not unusual for pumtek beads to be made from this material, and to result in beads that do not have a palm-wood grain, or only partially have it.

Lucky you, to get such a large central bead. They are all nice. Can you show the red bead closer?

Jamey

Here's a strand of beads that Russ Nobbs acquired a few years ago, that he kindly allowed me to shoot. You can see that the beads are about half plain and half patterned. The patterned parts are over the conventional fossil-palm-wood areas; whereas the plain areas wouldn't take the treatments, and remain translucent and (usually) white—plain common opal.

Thanks Russ!

Jamey

Here's another example of partially patterned beads. I can't see the grain in the patterned parts of the half-plain/half-patterned beads in either of our photos. If the grain isn't visible, how can the type of wood be reliably identified as palmwood?

The grain is clearly visible on other Pumtek beads.

Just wondering...
Hendrik

Hello Hendrik,

When pumtek beads first appeared in the US marketplace in about 1983, I did two things.. First, I discussed them with David Ebbinghouse, who had just written about Tibetan zi beads—because I knew he'd be interested in this phenomenon (similar-looking beads from another region); and I showed them to my friend Si Frazier, a highly respected mineralogist and gemologist. David was the first one to announce that the material was opalized fossil palm wood (as determined by the Smithsonian). However, even he was not certain of this because he's not a mineralogist, and only knew opal as the the colorful gem most people would think of—that pumtek beads are assuredly NOT made from. I was mislead by the appearance of the material, and for a while thought it was something like vegetable ivory. However, once I realized that pumtek beads were much too hard to be that stuff, I understood it was a mineral with an organic origin. So, fossil palm wood made good sense.

Nevertheless, when I showed these beads to Si, and said they were thought to be opalized palm wood, his first reaction was that the material had a grain suggesting wood, but not necessarily palm wood. So, over the past 25 years, I have maintained that, even if the majority of pumtek beads were composed from fossil palm wood, this doesn't mean they ALL are.

The material comes from the region of western Burma (not far from India)—where there is definitely a LOT of fossil palm wood available for exploitation. (I know this because Mark Kenoyer, who grew up in this region—in Nagaland—collected specimens as a young boy, and has so-assured me, and gave me a piece he collected.) But if palm trees have been fossilized and converted to opal, I suppose any trees and other plants in the area might also be so-transformed. So, even if the vast majority of pumtek beads are opalized palm wood, this doesn't mean there are no exceptions.

Then, we also should not expect every specimen to reveal the same degree of grain. From some parts of the tree, the pores may have been larger and more visible than in other parts of the wood. (For instance the inner wood versus the outer wood.) Or perhaps younger trees had smaller pores/grain. Perhaps some of the wood rotted and lost it's precise structure prior to opalization. There are any number of reasons why some beads will show the classic grain of fossil/opalized palm wood, and others might not.

Jamey

Jamey:
Here's a close up of the red bead. On looking at it closer I can see the grain lines in one end. I'm also enclosing a better overall shot of the strand. BTW I am curious about the blue Powder Glass strand that I posted above. If you, Art, or anybody else who is knowledgeable about such things could give me an idea of their vintage I would appreciate it.
Thanks!

Thanks for the close-up. I have to guess this is a normal pumtek bead that has been stained red with some pigment or dye.

I'm assuming the powderglass beads you mean for the medium-blue bicones, with patterns that imitate old beads (that might be called "bodom" by some people). I think these were made in the late '90s (at the earliest, or even rather more recently). I am reasonably sure they were not made in the '70s, because I would have seen them sometime between then and now. Plus, they are quite a departure from beads made that long ago.

Jamey

For many years now I've been accumulating blue 6 layer chevrons and this year I finally had enough! They are mostly from Luigi Catalan (I hope I came close to spelling his name correctly) newly ground from old cane. However some of them are from various dealers including the 47 x 30mm central bead that I got from Abdul this year. The white dogons were purchased from Christine.

He keeps a small tray of these and some strands available. I imagine they just get lost amongst all of his more spectacular work.