In November 2024 I was fortunate to join a contingent from the Jewellery Valuers Association to attend the inaugural Royal Treasures Colloquium hosted at the newly opened Royal Treasure Museum at the Ajuda National Palace in Lisbon, Portugal. The rich schedule of talks and cultural tours provided a unique insight into where Portugal and its former empire fits into the history of state and royal jewels. We were also fortunate to enjoy a wonderful soirée at the Royal Palace with music and a banquet! Gemmologist Rui Galopim de Carvalho was a excellent host and MC, and responsible for overseeing the study and recording of every gemstone in the collection.
Just before the conference I had been doing some research on Indian amber, its possible sources in the 18th to early 20th centuries, and the sacred and cultural uses of amber beads. This stemmed from my own cultural experience as a Parsi Zoroastrian (Indians of Persian origin from Gujarat). In fact in June 2025 I will be pleased to present my research on Indian amber beads in a paper for the Society for Jewellery Historians and Bead Study Trust conference. These highlights review how important it is not to study jewels – even royal ones – in isolation and without a thorough historical and cultural understanding of their contexts.
Two views from India
Dr. Usha Balakrishnan, Ornaments of Empire: The Nizams of Hyderabad’s Legacy in Jewels
It was refreshing in a conference all about royal jewels and their study that at least one foot stepped out of Western Europe and the USA. Usha Balakrishnan has blazed a trail in bringing the histories and cultures of jewellery from India to an international community of jewellery professionals and historians. Dr Balakrishnan wasn’t able to be with us in person (I have so many questions!) but her presentation on the significance of the royal treasuries to the Nizams of Hyderabad before and during the period of the British Raj in the 19th century illuminated the backdrop to the famous Golconda diamond mines in a way I had not heard before, for it was the nizams or rulers of the state of Hyderabad where the majority of these mines were situated.
Royal treasures as portable wealth
I returned with three main themes that I am now pursuing as part of my own wider research into lesser-known gem and jewellery cultures. The first was about the importance of royal treasuries as portable wealth. During most of human history taking on the mantle of rulership was risky and you and your family needed a quick ‘get-out’ if things became difficult, which inevitably they did for the Nizams as the British grip on the South Asian peninsula tightened.
Gifts differing and cultural exchange
The second theme was about the nature of cross-cultural influences. We hear much about Indian jewels and the inspiration they provided European and American jewellers, not least Cartier, but what is less known is the European and British influences on Indian royal and high jewellery. As an example, a traditional stone setting called kundan required high carat pure gold to set the gem into the setting like a closed bezel setting. Kundan settings were then enamelled in between creating a seamless pattern between stones and enamels. British jewellers were based in Calcutta and Bombay (Mumbai) and introduced claw settings for gemstones and many pieces of jewellery display both.
The third theme encourages us to get to know the language and cultures of jewellery outside our own especially when appraising a piece, old or new. Dr Balakrishnan introduced to me a new language to us relating to settings, names of stones and finished pieces such as the sarpech, a bejewelled ornament for the headgear of princes that also acted as insignia. An extension to this is understanding the different way diamonds and coloured stones were fashioned with weight retention being a more important factor than brilliance or even symmetry. And finally when it comes to understanding jewellery cultures it’s always important to know the different ways in which men and women wore jewels regardless of their social status. Usually the women of the Nizam’s court kept their feet bare except for the adornment of ankle, foot and toe jewels, but when western dress was worn (with shoes) there was no room for traditional Nizami jewellery except for several-stranded collars constructed from Basra pearls or uncut diamonds and finished with emeralds called chintak.
Luisa Penalva, Curator, Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga, Lisbon
The tour of the jewellery and liturgical objects of the Museum of Ancient Art (MNAA) pushed my curiosity about gems from India in a different direction. Here, the theme was about the inter-play between Indian and Portuguese jewellery making and metalwork. Portugal ruled over the provinces of Goa (predominantly Catholic Christian), Daman and Diu—two tiny provinces surrounded by the north-western state of Gujarat.
India and Portugal entwined
The Indo-Portuguese war of 1961 finally saw Portugal relinquish its claim to these regions. Indeed jewellery and precious metalwork formed a major part of the negotiations. Luisa’s deep knowledge of the collection and of the traditions behind them was a privilege to hear not least her research in India. In many ways the Indian history of the Portuguese Empire is a thoroughly marginalised topic and sometimes histories told by museums feel like they are constantly told from just one point of view especially when it comes to jewellery. The museums were full of Indian craftsmanship and materials such as tortoiseshell (actually turtleshell) and elephant’s ivory, as well as gem-set ornaments and a lot of silverware and silver-gilt (gold-plated silver). Indo-Portuguese was a commonly used term to describe hybrid Indian and Portuguese objects usually with a Catholic Christian liturgical purpose.
Two objects really left an impression on me, the first was an amber and silver filigree rosary from Goa dating apparently from the 17th-18th centuries. The rosary and the Indo-Portuguese religious objects are a reminder of the cultural and religious diversity of the Indian sub-continent. The silver filigree work was very familiar to me from other pieces of Indian silver jewellery I have seen. However it was the amber that piqued my interest. The amber beads were roughly fashioned and gave me the impression they may have been reused given some of the unusual shapes some of which seemed like irregular concave cylinders with rounded ends. I am researching Indian amber at the moment and in particular starting to map different sources and availability of amber during the late 19th and early 20th centuries for a piece of research I’m doing on the significance of amber beads in Parsi Zoroastrian customs.
Beads and empire
Luisa and I discussed amber, beads and empire over lunch and I shared with her some of what I had found out, for example, that there are sources of amber in Gujarat but whether these were exploited for gemstones and beads I did not yet know. The Museum will be closed by the end of the year for a full refurbishment and it was exciting to hear that scientific analysis of the materials in the jewellery collection would be conducted during the closure which might help to answer the question of amber sources and availability in India.
Reconquering gold
The second object that caught my interest was a stunning medieval processional cross dating to 1214. The golden cross decorated with filigree, a little granulation and repoussé patterns, set with garnets and sapphires, was commissioned by King Sancho I for the Monastery of Santa Cruz (Holy Cross) de Coimbra. The cross’s patterns and arms terminating in palmate trees of life, which might also pass for fleur-de-lis, reminded me of medieval Islamic/Arab goldwork that itself was a continuation of Byzantine and European early medieval goldwork.
This object certainly has a story to tell that is currently missing from its label, and that is of the large period in the early Middle Ages that much of Spain and Portugal formed part of the Islamic Caliphate of Al-Andalus. European Catholic pilgrims and Crusaders made their way to the Holy Land from the late 11th to early 13th centuries through Lisbon. The period of the Reconquista (9th-13th century) denotes the struggles between Muslim and Christian warriors for control of the peninsula but also the co-existence of those in settled society which can be seen in the design and making of objects. This cross might demonstrate how hybrid the jewellery traditions of Al-Andalus were, with possibly exquisite Islamic workmanship creating a glorious Christian symbol.