A digital archive showcasing the extensive collection of jewellery and adornment images shared on the former Ethnic Jewels Ning site over the years. These images have significantly enriched discussions on cultural adornment and its global dispersion.
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The museum doesn't mention a geographical origin. Striking similarity with some hats from the Tarsus Museum makes identification possible: from southern Anatolia (Urfa, Antep, Hatay, Adana provinces).
It's very beautiful and elaborate. I love the filigree dangles. Do you know what the circles with filigree inside them symbolize?
I don't have specific information about a possible symbolic significance of the dangles.
But, if I were to give one, and regarding the geographic provenance of the tepelik (which is made in a region where Kurdish culture is strongly present since Antiquity), I would say it could be a sun symbol. In Kurdish culture, the sun is an ancestral religious symbol (see: Yezidis) and stands for the source of life. In the countryside, many Kurdish homes have/had a sun amulet hanging from the wall (even if the inhabitants are Muslims since centuries). I add a picture of one (some are rhombic, some are circular).
Of course, after all, this is (about the dangles) a kind of 'wild guess' (even if the sun symbolism of the Kurds is real). Best greetings, JM.