JEWELRY

As Türkiye has always been a crossroad for different cultures and religions, its jewelry techniques have inevitably been influenced by the European and Middle Eastern traditions. Whereas jewelry created in Europe was highly symmetrical, the Türkiye jewelry traditions have prioritized the preservation of the original shape and the natural color. Now a highly sophisticated and revered art form, gold jewelry production is thought to have blossomed in the period that spans the country’s Byzantine and Ottoman past times. Today, Türkiye is cited among the top five countries globally in artistic gold jewelry production. It’s crucial, however, to remember and acknowledge that the earliest examples of jewelry in present-day Anatolia region were crafted from copper, the most used metal of all times. During the Bronze Age in Anatolia, the tradition was to wreak and cast this metal. Original Turkish techniques like “savaklama”, “küftgani”, “ajir kesme”, and” kazima” were developed to produce copper accessories, while some of these are still in use today.