Millefiori Antique Trade Bead, Tabular Bead with Partial Face Murrine, 21x23mm

SKU: AFE-1516
Sale price $25.00

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Only 1 in stock

Description

  • Tabular bead with lampworked trailed design overall in blue-grey and brick red with several small cane slices on both sides. 21x23mm
  • On one side there's a white and black murrine which would have been more clearly recognized as a face if it were not chipped.
  • On the other, sadly most of the murrine have been chipped off
  • It can be easy to imagine faces in some murrine and lampworked beads, but this is a rare, but well known bead type, documented at the Picard Bead Museum, so we know it really was a face cane. Each slice of the cane and the way it was applied made each face unique. 
  • Made in Venice, Italy for the African Trade, early 1800s
  • Only one available although I'm also posting on with a full face at AFR-1511