Interesting Chinese silver culture and silver jewels

Over 2,000 years ago, Chinese people began making and using unique silver jewelry. Here are just a few of the items they made:

Silver bracelets

Bracelet styles and silver jewels in ancient China varied a lot. They were crafted with gold, silver, agate, or jade. Some bracelets were engraved with beautiful designs like two dragons playing with a ball. Some bracelets were hollow inside, and have a Chinese character engraved on their surface: longevity, which meant to live a long healthy life.

Silver earrings

Earrings first appeared in China about 1,000 years ago. In ancient China, women usually wore earrings with a long pendants sporting round slices, little balls, or a few cones connected together.

Today, sterling silver jewelry and silver earrings are popular not only with Chinese women, but with some ethnic groups. In Hainan Island of southern China, the earrings the local women wear are more than 18 cm in diameter and fall down to their shoulders. Some women wear more than ten earrings connected together at one time.

Silver ornaments adorned onto the hats

In ancient times, when a child was born, the parents would prepare a new hat adorned with glistening silver flowers to wish the baby a happy life. When an aged women celebrated her birthday, her daughters would prepare her a new hat embellished with some silver pieces like chrysanthemums, birds, and butterflies to pray for a long life for her.

Silver buttons

In ancient China, buttons on a piece of clothing were usually made of cloth or silk. Sometimes people wore silver buttons to pray for safety, happiness, wealth, or children, as they believed silver had a magic powers.

Different designs on silver buttons have different meanings: fish symbolize wealth, peaches indicate longevity, and lotus flowers stand for rectitude.

Silverware

Silverware was mainly used by nobles and royal families. All of the silverware was characterized by their various shapes and superb techniques, including silver bowls, basins, pots, plates, and incense burners.

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