While people across cultures adorned themselves with jewelry for beauty and status, ancient jewelry was also deeply symbolic. These motifs referenced the gods, the natural world, and the myths that shaped life in antiquity. Once decoded, ancient jewelry gives voice to the past.

Beads are the earliest form of human adornment. These tiny, beautiful objects have been worn, treasured, and traded since the beginning of human history, traveling across continents and millennia. Crafted in almost infinite variations of shape and size, beads were incredibly important in the ancient world.