Necklace

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This jet necklace was found in a cist burial at Mount Stuart on Bute in the Inner Hebrides. The wealthy woman was also buried with a pot containing an offering of food or drink, a small object of bronze, a pin and an awl, sometime between 2050 and 1700 BC.

The necklace was made of at least 100 spindle-shaped beads (some now fragmentary), four trapezoidal spacer plates, two triangular end-plates, and a triangular toggle. Many of the beads are very worn, but the toggle is not. It was probably a replacement.

The only significant source of good quality jet occurs around Whitby in Yorkshire, although jet-related substances such as cannel coal and lignite are known from several places in Scotland. Jet was used in the Bronze Age for high status objects.

Record details

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• Online ID: 000-100-035-705-C
• Image Rights Holder: National Museums Scotland
• Project: National Museums Scotland
  Project description   View all records in project
• Ref: National Museums Scotland  X.EQ 101
• Date: Between 2050 and 1700 BC
  
• Material: Jet plates and beads
  
• Dimensions:
• What:
• Subject:
• Who:
• Where: Scotland, Bute, Isle of Bute, Mountstuart
  
• Event:
• Description: Necklace of seven plates and ninety nine beads of jet, from a Bronze Age burial at Mountstuart, Isle of Bute
  
• References:
  • Clarke, D.V., Cowie, T.G., & Foxon, Andrew (eds). Symbols of power at the time of Stonehenge. Edinburgh: National Museums of Antiquities of Scotland, 1985, pp 213, 289. 
• Translations:
• Related Records:
  • Pot