Kiffa Beads - Uses

Uses

Diamond-shaped beads were traditionally worn on bracelets, sewn onto strips of leather and arranged in traditional sets composed of a specific ratio of blue to red to polychromatic specimens. Their patterns are believed to protect and to increase the fertility of their wearers and it has been proposed that some might imitate cowrie shells. Triangular-shaped and spherical beads were worn as hair ornaments and traditional assemblages could be composed of two complementary sets of three triangulars each, one blue, one red and one polychromatic, worn at temple height. Many of the small spherical or oblate-shaped beads were hair ornaments or worn in necklaces in various combinations with other glass and stone beads and were made by decorating a red, blue or white preformed glass bead "core". Glass slurry decorations were applied to moulded 19th century beads possibly of Czech origin. Smaller, cigar shaped or cylindrical beads are often also found to have been constructed from two or even three of the moulded beads. These are fragile and tend to break apart easily.