THE NAMES OF THE BEADS 
Apparently a number of the names for “natural” beads have been applied to “artificial” 
beads, or at least were used for these simultaneously. For that reason the following 
makes a short reference to the natural beads. 
REAL PEARLS 
Size and shape gave real pearls different names: “piece, count or net pearls” were 
round and for that reason the rarest; they were traded by the piece or count and their 
value was determined by jeweler’s weights, according to grain and carat (Altmütter 
1841, p. 69). “Inter-net pearls” differed from “net-pearls” in their “less perfectly round 
shape” (Altmütter 1841, p. 69). “Seed or lot pearls”, about the size of millet seeds, 
were used for embroideries. Pearls with irregulär shapes were called “craw, baroque 
orlump pearlsLike seed pearls, they were mostly sold by weight (ounce or lot, a unit 
of half an ounce). “Parangon pearls” were exceptionally large, monstres were big 
pearls with unusual shapes. “Edge or drum pearls" were flat and round; “cylinders or 
barreis”approached cylindrical form. “Coques” was the name given to irregulär pearl- 
like formations that were mounted in gold and used for jewelry (Altmütter 1841, pp. 69, 
70). 
The “count pearls” were also described by Pierer in 1851 as “especially big, regulär 
and round pearls;” he called the olives and cylinders “card pearls” (siel); the irregulär, 
sharp-edged, big pearls he called “chunk or lump pearls, "the smallerones he referred 
to as “seedpearls orpear!dust."Pierer calls the finest artificial pearls “margrites (dust 
pearls),”which were used for embroidery, tassles and tufts (Pierer 8/1851, p. 797). 
Kulmer lists the usual terms; the “piece, count or net pearls, the internet pearls, seed or 
lot pearls; craw, baroque or lump pearls; parangon pearls, monstres, drums or 
barreis.” In addition there are the drops or pear-shaped drop pearls. What Altmütter 
calles “coques”are “loques”for Kulmer (Kulmer 1872, pp. 321,322). 
Bücher goes by shape to distinguish “craw or baroque pearls” as pearls showing 
“irregulär formation,” and by size for “parangon, count, lot, seed pearls, pearls dust” 
(Bücher 1883, p. 296). 
Some of these terms were also used for glass beads, for example the names, seed 
beads; baroque beads, a term used in some places for all glass beads with irregulär 
shapes; craw beads (Parkert 1925, p. 160); cylinders; dust beads and others. 
FALSE PEARLS 
In addition to the pair of opposites, “real pearls - false pearls,” there was also one of 
“natural and artificial pearls.” When the real pearls are placed opposite false (fake, 
artificial) pearls in the wider sense the contrast applies to all beads of widely differing 
materials (glass, ceramics, amber, horn, etc.); in the narrow sense they refer to the so- 
called pearls that attempt to imitate genuine pearls. In the original German-Ianguage 
usage, the meaning is not so clear, however, since the word for “pearl” and “bead” is 
the same (“Perle”). Among the glass bead imitations of pearls, we find glass beads to 
which fish scale essence is applied, either inside or outside. These can either be 
hollow glass beads or solid glass beads. 
“False pearls are larger orsmaller, very thin-walled glass balls, which have a little opening on two 
sides opposite each other and are filled with certain materials or at least coated on the inside to 
give them the appearance of genuine pearls. Their shape is sometimes spherical, sometimes 
oval like olives, sometimes pear-shaped, sometimes almond shaped, and sometimes even circu 
lar and flat.” (Loysel 1818, p. 306).