A Valuable Commodity

The introduction of glass trade beads in Native North America made way for new horizons in bead-making.

- PAULA A. BAXTER

From the Atlantic seaboard to the Aleutian Islands, European glass trade beads were a potent cross-cultural currency. European explorers, missionaries, fur trappers, traders and colonists brought strings of these beads with them as they lay claim to the bounty of the North American continent. When bartering with the many Native peoples of the New World, beads were a more than successful substitute for coinage and paper notes. Glass beads also proved to be advantageous for gift-giving purposes as well.

Glass beads have a long history. The glass-making process began 3,500 years ago in ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia. Under the Romans, improvements such as glass blowing pipes spread an active bead trade to the most remote regions of the Empire well up to 400 CE. Glass bead adornment disappeared during the more austere Christian era in Europe until it was revived by the Venetian Republic. In the late 15th century, glass makers on Murano Island restored Roman techniques and created cylindrical hollow glass canes. The first results, called Millefiori beads, eventually became prime candidates for trade to Africa and North America in the 16th century. By the start of the 1800s, Millefiori beads had multilayered wound mosaic stripes or flowers from glass canes molded and cut onto a solid colored core.