About Pearls

As one of the oldest known gems, pearls are surrounded by legends going back to the mists of time. And in all the legends, pearls are the most fortuitous of jewels, bestowing love, happiness and good fortune on their possessors.
 

In ancient Greece, the word for pearl implied ‘perfect purity’ and in ancient Rome a word for pearls suggested sweetness and pleasure. In earlier times still, legends and paintings of India depicted pearls as magic charms. In some old stories, wise men sought enlightenment with a  ‘Talisman pearl’ held as a charm in the palm of one hand. There are also paintings of warriors setting out to battle with shields edged in pearls to protect them from harm. In another Indian painting, a beautiful princess is pictured making a necklace of pearls plucked from the joints of bamboo, a plant reputed to grow only where the gods tread.
 

Pearls are also known as jewels of love in India, as they were in Persia where Alexander the Great received gifts of fabulous pearls from his bride Roxanne. The pearls which Alexander and his men sent back to Greece, created a pearl craze in Europe.
 

There has been a long superstitious belief that pearls need to be worn next to the skin at regular intervals or else they will ‘sicken’ and lose their lustre. While regarding this notion with some amusement, the experts today will nevertheless advise you to wear them often, and recommend also that you store them in a place that is neither to dry nor too humid. Auguste Victoria, the wife of Kaiser William II, is known to have made a special journey to the coast once a year to lower her pearls, wrapped in a leather purse, into the sea. By returning the pearls to their natural element for 15 or 20 minutes, she sincerely believed that they would retain their beauty.
 

Men once conjectured that pearls were created when dew floated over the sea at dawn, enticing the oysters to rise to the surface and catch the drops in their shells in the morning light. The true beginnings of the pearl were only discovered in the 1700’s. The people of China ascribed powerful medicinal properties to crushed pearls as early as 2000 BC. Arabians and Persians believed dissolved pearls could cure insanity.
 

Perhaps the most famous legend is the one in which Cleopatra was said to have dissolved two precious pearls in wine to seduce Mark Antony. That pearls were a precious possession in Egypt as was shown by the discovery of jewellery in the tombs of the Pharaohs. But whether Cleopatra could have dissolved two pearls in wine is debatable because modern science have demonstrated that unless thoroughly pulverised, it would take a pearl at least 5 days to dissolve in even a strong acid solution. But it is a charming legend and one which illustrates both how prized pearls were, and the belief in their magic.
 

As for legends concerning the colours of pearls, there is one which says that lovely greenish pearls are symbolic for happiness. That legend may or may not have something to do with pearls of peacock greenish which are so fashionable today.
 

Colour depends largely on the locality in which the pearls are found. pearls from the Persian Gulf are usually light pink or cream coloured. Silvery white pearls originate in Australian waters. Only oysters in the South China Seas can produce truly black pearls. Very occasionally, a natural pearl is found that might be green, blue, red, yellow, brown, or even violet.
 

The pearl is the birthstone for June, and is popularly considered a symbol of purity. This explains why it is so popular with brides.
 

Because a pearl so closely resembles a tear, it has often been called the symbol of grief and is, paradoxically, the jewel most frequently worn at funerals.
 

One of the largest pearls in the world is called The Pearl of Asia. It was given by the Shah Jehan of India to his favourite wife - the same one for whom he subsequently built the Taj Mahal at Agra. The pearl is the size of a large pear - nearly 8cm long and 5cm across.
 

The Palatinate pearl is unique in the world. A fluke of nature caused it to be part white and part black. No one has ever been able to establish the waters from whence it was taken, for it was first recorded as being part of the treasure of the House of Bavaria, which ruled the Palatinate. It is known that the pearl was seen in several castles, passing from generation to generation, before it reached Munich in the second half of the 18th century and became the property of the Palatine count, Charles Theodore, when he became Duke of Bavaria. Today the pearl can be seen in the Residenz in Munich. It has been beautifully mounted between two diamond snakes and set above a sparkling design of floral scolls composed of large diamonds.
 

At least three countries - France, India and the Philippines - have adopted the pearl as their national gem.
 

To the average Hindu , a white pearl symbolises idealism, a pink pearl beauty, and the black pearl philosophy.