Sumerian Bicone Bead Earrings

$65.00 at The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Met-inspired art jewelry makes a unique gift. These timeless lapis earrings evoke a striking strands of beads (ca. 2600–2500 BCE) found at the ancient Mesopotamian site of Ur. Though the original beads were Sumerian-made, the exotic materials from which they were constructed indicate long-distance trade connections: lapis lazuli was mined in Afghanistan, while the gold could have traveled from Iran, Anatolia, or Egypt. Later texts indicate that these materials were thought to have possessed amuletic…