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Beads can be found in all colors, shapes and sizes. All over the world beads
were manufactured from the earliest human history. They were made of simple
materials like teeth, bits of bone, seeds, shells, precious and semi-precious
stones and metals among innumerable other substances. They have had religious
significance, been believed to cure sickness and bestow wisdom on the wearer.
Before there was money, beads were used as currency because of the ease with which
they can be carried and their unique beauty and worth. It is told that the first
settlers to North America avoided starvation by bartering a strand of blue beads,
and historians say that you can trace the ancient trade routes by the beads that
the travelers left behind. Even the names that were used for beads indicate their
importance and worth, for example the Egyptian word for luck is sha and the word
for a bead is sha-sha. And all levels of society from royalty to commoners owned
beads - because so many different materials of different worth were used to fashion
them, even the poorest families could own a strand of beads. Each culture and region
developed their own specific style of beads and even today beads from different areas
of the world are easily identified.
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