In traditional Scottish highland dress a knife called a sgian dubh, (prounounced skeen doo), is worn in a sock. Pictured above, a sgian dubh handle has been cleverly repurposed into a beautiful brooch.

In Gaelic sgian means knife or dagger, and dubh means black. In this context, black is thought to mean hidden, or secret. This conclusion stems from the antecedent of the sgian dubh – the sgian achlais, (pronounced ochles), a larger dagger concealed in a jacket sleeve dating to the 17th and 18th centuries. Upon visiting someone’s home, visitors were expected to reveal their weapons.

Sgian dubh brooches resulted from the Scottish Romantic period in the nineteenth century, a revival movement inspired by the historical novels of Sir Walter Scott and King George IV’s visit to Scotland in 1822. The King’s image in traditional highland garb and a historically-themed pageant helped cement Scottish national identity, uniting all Scots through a distinctive, national dress.

Queen Victoria, too, ever the tastemaker of her day, greatly contributed to Scottish romanticism, with ornamental sgian dubhs and other Scottish daggers peaking during her period of rule.

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The rapid industrialization of the nineteenth-century contributed to an ever expanding world, a bigger world now open for study. Increased interest in science, particularly natural history, brought pieces of this world into people’s homes and on their person.

Ferns and terrariums became common in parlors, as were aquariums, taxidermy, and shell collections. This penchant for collecting naturalia goes back to the curiosity cabinets of the Renaissance, but it was the Romantic movement at the end of the eighteenth century that paved the way for everyone to become a bit of a naturalist in the Victorian period. Natural specimens were not only found in personal parlors, but for public viewing in the many natural history museums opening.

It was only natural people began wearable collections. Our exhibition certainly attests to the profusion of insect jewelry in this period, encouraged by the rise of entymology in the middle of the nineteenth-century.

Darwin, too, and his theory of evolution certainly encouraged interest in the natural world, altering man’s relationship with flora and fauna. One wonders what Darwin thought of the bejeweled critters worn in his own time, and now, clearly survivors of the fittest, on display in our exhibition. Also on view are Fabergé animals and fine art, including drawings by Alexandre Iacovleff. Stay tuned the next few weeks for more background information on these exhibition highlights.

We invite you now to become a naturalist – come into our parlor for a look at these bejeweled specimens of natural selection.

Remnants of the golden dream, these buckles of California gold commemorate the state officially joining the Union in 1850. The design includes imagery from the California coat of arms. On the left, the goddess Minerva sits with a grizzly bear at her feet, referencing how California, too, came fully formed, having no territorial probation.

In an 1854 history of the state, one author notes how “the plain traveller [sic] from the east will notice the profusion of rich jewelry worn here by every class, and by both sexes.” Naturally, the adventurers headed west to seek their fortunes included jewelers. Through the jewelry companies they formed they aspired to deflect attention from the jewelry centers of the east and provide the entire Pacific coast with jewelry from San Francisco.

It was not uncommon for the forty-niners to send relics of their labor to loved ones left behind. Those with the tools and time fashioned nuggets into rings, crosses, and other pieces of adornment. Others sent small amounts of gold for family members to have made into wearable relics by their local jeweler.

An assortment of jewelry also catered to tourists encouraged to take away natural specimens as souvenirs. California jewelers met the demand with a variety of trinkets including combs, brooches, and rings, which became quite popular in the early 1850s. Much of these mementos proudly displayed clusters of nuggets and incorporated gold quartz into the design. These buckles are a bit unusual in their apparent break from tradition. Collectors are sure to be struck by their historic and aesthetic value, ready to exclaim, ‘eureka!’