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These frequently show up in the silver shops in Tunis. They are probably also being used in south-eastern Tunisia. Here are more details....
This is a interesting bracelet! Having the Tripoli hallmark. It is a pity the hallmark is difficult to see. Do you have an other picture of the hallmark?
Do you know why the studs are called garlic?
I have several pairs of this type of bracelet. Some from Siwa oasis (name edibidge), some of Northern Egypt and Lybia.
The hallmarks are different, some from the Turkish time some from the italian colonial time and hallmarks from Egypt those can be dated. Many have also the Mekkawy stamp (the silversmith that made them) and others stamps that I have not indentified (yet?).
Hi Harald....all my information on this bracelet comes from Alberini's book "Libyan Jewellery". She doesn't explain why they are called this. The suar in her photos has doves on it, but mine has a fish motif. I have noted the same style in an Egyptian model. The maker's stamp on this is very worn and I could not get a decent picture of it. Here, however, is a photo of the Tripoli stamp on the knob...
i guess that the name "swar butuma" or garlic studded bracelet is due to the form of studs.
Don't expect the very exact form of a garlic, it all about imagination and it is a common habit in third world countrie to name things approximately
in north africa we have:
Lentils bracelets
Peas braceles
Tortoise bracelet
wrought laudry bracelets.....!!
All this have to do with simple oral communication of countrymen, sometimes it bears a great sense of humour such as when french chatelaines necklaces were introducedto north africa they were named by local population " the bearded necklace" in reference to the numerous dangling chains hanging from the chatelain's pendant
garlic is ment with the multibranches star form in the top of the bracelet
Thanks Edith for the good picture of the stamp! I do recognize it now I have this stamp on 2 different bracelets, it is not a very refined stamp, like the ones from Egypt, so I could not place it at first.