Silver and gold vermeil with lapis
These stylish earrings feature a coin with a calligraphic impression of the poetry of Rumi, a Persian poet widely admired in the rest of the world. Coins are often worn as decorative elements forming parts of headdresses, hats and clothes. The textured coin and the bezel are finished in gold vermeil.
Afghanistan was the source of lapis lazuli for the ancient Egyptian and Mesopotamian civilisations, as well as the later Greeks and Romans. The best lapis lazuli is found in Badakhshan province in north-eastern Afghanistan and has been used for millennia in jewellery. The word lazuli is derived ultimately from the Persian lazhward, the name of a place where it was mined and which came to be associated with the stone and, eventually, with its colour.
Poetry translation
Rumi: I have a cave (from Persian)
You are my cave. You are my friend. Enslave me and defend me.
O only Noah that I know, O opener now open,
O heart restored before the secret door where you befriend me!
You are the light, the banquet night, the victim’s victory.
You are the hoopoe bird of Sinai, set to swoop and rend me.
You are the stream. You are the sea. You are the lenient tyrant.
You are the poison and the sugar. Friend, do not torment me.
You are the chamber of the sun, the stations of the stars,
You are the prairie green with hope. Show me the way and send me.
You are my dawn, my Ramadan, the alms that I begged for and won.
You are the jar. You are the water. Slake me with water. Mend me.
Please note that depending on the design, size and finish of a piece, only fragments of the words may be visible.
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