AN ALGERIAN BERBER RED CORAL AND POLYCHROME ENAMELS SILVER NECKLACE (AZRAR)
Great Kabylia, Beni Yenni Berber tribe, Tell Atlas, Northern Algeria, North Africa, mid-20th century

With nine scalloped silver plaques with silver chain links, the terminals with a hook-and-loop clasp, eight plaques of oval shape, the central and larger panel designed as a crescent moon, all worked with granulation, silver wire filigree, champlevé ochre yellow, green, and cobalt blue enamels, and with protruding flower head roundels with rounded knobs, richly caparisoned with a variety of auspicious pendants alternating five-pointed stars, rhomboid drops, and globular spheres, each pendant enamelled, decorated with applied silver wire around the edges, and set with red coral beads, the overall design a tour-de-force of North African silver jewellery and a remarkable specimen of Beni Yenni Berber adornments, the necklace accompanied by a custom-made blue morocco leather presentation box.

The necklace 34cm x 31cm

527gr.

With a territory stretching over 2000km, the Maghreb stands out as a remarkable haven for the most varied ethnographic material, and jewellery is perhaps one of its most distinctive and beloved art forms. Bedouins, Tuaregs, Berbers, settled Muslims and Jews, and several other ethnic groups have been living side-by-side in these regions for centuries, yielding to the creation of personal adornments that boast their original cultural heritage but also showcase mutual influences and pragmatic adaptations to fit into the lifestyles of their owners. Specifically, this impressive necklace is a testament to the Berber Kabyle people (from the Arabic word qabila, tribe), who make a living from pressing olives for oil and drying figs (René van der Star, Ethnic Jewellery from Africa, Asia and Pacific Islands, 2008, p. 15).

Kabyle creations, like the majority of Berber jewellery, are mostly made of silver, probably due to its wide availability thanks to the presence of large silver mines in the Atlas mountain range (ibidem, p. 13). Kabyle silversmiths appear to be Muslims, but according to scholars they have only been exercising this profession for the last 200 years (ibidem, p. 17). They must have learnt the trade and took it over from itinerant craftsmen, most probably Jews, who ventured inland from the coast in their peregrinations to find a place where to settle. Kabyle women are central to the running and sustainance of their community, and therefore, most Kabyle jewellery is made for women. And yet, traditionally, the silversmith profession was only carried out by men, generation after generation, from father to son. Only when there was no male heir available, the women of the household were allowed to step in and help. This tradition ensured that all the manufacturing secrets were kept private and remained the prerogative of the silversmith's family (p. 17).

Kabyle silver jewels - specifically Beni Yenni - are almost always uplifted by vibrant colours in the forms of coral beads and enamels, in the shades of ochre yellow, cobalt blue and green. This palette is repeated in Algerian ceramics. And to celebrate the circularity of art, Algerian pottery vessels (tabuqalt) may have been the primary source of inspiration for the globular pendants with tall cylindrical necks characterising this and other azrar necklaces (Wassyla Tamzali, Abzim: Parures et bijoux des femmes d'Algérie, 1984, p. 164).

For further reference and similar published specimens: Saad al-Jadir, Arab & Islamic Silver, 1981, p. 44; and Wolf-Dieter Seiwert, Jewellery from the Orient: Treasures from the Bir Collection, 2009, cat. no. 95.