Tibetan jewelry comes from a high, hard country, and much of what Tibetans set into silver was chosen for what it stands for, not only for how it looks. In a land where Buddhism has shaped daily life for more than a thousand years, a necklace is rarely only an ornament. It carries a thought with it. Read a Tibetan necklace closely and you are reading the religion that made it.
The Buddhism Behind the Jewelry
Tibetan Buddhism, also called Lamaism, is a branch of Buddhism; lama means "teacher." In the seventh century, during the Tibetan empire, King Songtsen Gampo took up the faith under the influence of his two wives — Princess Bhrikuti of Nepal and Princess Wencheng of Tang China. The kings who followed promoted Buddhism and used it to steady the throne, which sharpened a quarrel with ministers of the older Bon religion and led to a coup. When King Langdarma took power he began a great persecution, and the spread of Buddhism in Tibet came to a stop.
From the tenth century on, with the backing of a new landholding class, the faith revived in the form of Lamaism. By then it had changed. It was the result of Buddhism's long struggle with the native Tibetan Bon religion, and of the long influence each had on the other — which is what "Tibetan Buddhism" names.
The teaching held that the world and human life are suffering, and that only devoted practice, cutting off every stray thought, could reach the bliss of nirvana at death. Chanting sutras and reciting the Buddha's name was a search for his protection. The faith took root in people's minds and guided their daily behaviour. So the classic image of a Tibetan became a person with one hand turning a prayer wheel and the other turning a string of beads. That consciousness could not leave Tibetan jewelry alone. It shaped both what the jewelry is made of and the forms it takes.
What the Jewelry Is Made Of
The materials of Tibetan jewelry are many, but the most characteristic are Tibetan silver, turquoise, coral and agate. People here do not value them for their colour alone. Each carries a religious meaning as well.
Turquoise. Nearly every Tibetan owns a piece of turquoise, and it has held an important place in Tibetan jewelry since ancient times. It was set into the crown of the first Tibetan king. It was laid on the altar as an offering, given by the king to high lamas, and sent to neighbouring countries as tribute. In the jewelry worn by the Lhasa nobility in the last century, gold and turquoise were still the main materials.
Tibetans both revere turquoise and love it. The reverence comes from an old legend: the king's subjects were forbidden to throw any turquoise into a river, or the soul would leave the body and the person would die. The love comes from its sea-blue colour. Under the teaching that the world is a sea of suffering, Tibetan believers long for the sea — they even call high mountain lakes "little seas." They see turquoise as the spirit of the sea and a sign of divine power. In Tibetan ornament, it is a holy material.
Coral. Out of the same longing for the sea, coral, which grows on the seabed, is treated as a gift from the gods. In Tibetan Buddhist thinking, the most precious things lie in the deep. Coral is held to be part of the dragon's body, with the power to turn away evil and to cure illness. It is an important ingredient in traditional Tibetan medicine. That divine quality makes it a material Tibetans revere and love.
Dzi. Tibetan dzi comes from the freezing Himalayan range above 4,000 metres, and the material is agate: fine and dense, very hard, with regular patterns. Different forms of pattern are called different "eyes." A dzi is said to be a gem that fell from the sky. Tibetans believe that wearing one wins the protection of the gods. It is one of the Seven Treasures of Tibetan Buddhism, a sacred object, a lucky treasure given by heaven — as important as life itself. Dzi are strung into necklaces of every kind, worn on the body, and passed down through the generations.
The Pieces Buddhism Is Worn As
A defining feature of Tibetan jewelry is that there are many kinds of it and many places to wear it. One might say it hangs from head to foot. Among the many pieces, some types are plainly shaped by the faith.
The ghau. A ghau is worn at the chest or the waist as an amulet — to avert disaster, to seek blessing, to drive off evil — and is usually made of silver and white copper. A man's ghau is shaped like a shrine, with the eight auspicious signs worked in relief on it. A woman's is round or oval, and carries landscapes and trailing-lotus patterns. Inside the amulet sit images of the Buddha, mantras, relics, and vajra knots. The strap of a man's ghau is made with care: sewn from brocade or red velvet, set with silver chain and silver flowers, studded with turquoise and agate, and slung on a diagonal between the left armpit and the left hip. A woman wears hers on a necklace or a silk cord, hung at the chest.
The prayer wheel. The mantras are printed and placed inside, and one turn of the wheel counts as one reading of them; it turns away disaster and wins the Buddha's protection. Turning the wheel is reckoned among the best ways to gather merit, so the wheels are found everywhere. The hand-held one is carried on the body, made of gold, silver or copper. Its body is a cylinder with an axle through it so that it can spin, and mantras are placed inside the barrel. The work is usually fine: besides the six-syllable mantra, sutra text and bird-and-animal figures are engraved on the barrel, and some are set with coral and gems. That adds a value beside the religious one, and makes the wheel a distinctive kind of Tibetan ornament.
The mala. A mala joins 108 beads, worn at the neck or wound round the wrist. The materials differ — bodhi seed, sandalwood, ivory, amber, turquoise. Tibetans carry them to count their recitations. The beautiful, faintly scented beads set off the wearer's calm and devotion, and the mala has become the religious ornament that most marks a Tibetan.
The Forms the Faith Leaves Behind
Among Tibetan ornaments you often see turquoise or red agate set in a circle that turns back on itself. The form comes from the dharma wheel. The wheel is a symbol of Tibetan Buddhism. On the roof-centres of major buildings such as the Jokhang and the Potala, a golden dharma wheel throws out light. In Buddhism the wheel means the destruction of all evil in the world, and a wheel that turns without pause means the dharma endures. The wheel is also an offering set before the Buddha; it appears from the great halls of monasteries down to ordinary homes.
The circling pattern carries the same meaning as circumambulation. Believers turn the prayer wheel by hand, and they also walk in circles around sacred mountains, sacred lakes, holy cities, monasteries and stupas — always in the same direction, over and over. That devotion worked its way into the shape of jewelry, so the circling pattern appears again and again.
Buddhist culture shaped the decorative patterns of Tibetan ornament just as strongly. The six-syllable mantra, the wheel flanked by two deer, the garuda, the eight auspicious symbols, the swastika, and many Buddhist words and signs are all used in it. The number nine, which Tibetan Buddhism holds high, has become the most auspicious number in jewelry design.
Another classic decoration is the tangcao motif, the scrolling-vine pattern, which reached its height in Tang-dynasty metalwork; its wide use in Tibetan ornament is tied to the Tang entry of Buddhism into Tibet. Then there are the eight symbols: the conch, the wheel, the parasol, the white canopy, the lotus, the vase, the fish and the endless knot — eight ritual objects of Buddhism, each with its own meaning. The pattern of the eight is a single expression of Buddhist thought, and it is used widely in Tibetan ornament.
Under the long wash of Buddhist history, Tibetan ornament carries that colour in both its meaning and its form. It is what makes the jewelry distinct, and it is where its mystery comes from.
Where to Go From Here
If you want to see how these stones and symbols come together on a finished piece, the whole range sits in our Tibetan jewelry collection.