History
In pre-Colonial America, jewelry served an important function in American Indian tribes: The American Indians valued jewelry for its spiritual symbolism and beauty. The American Indians traded jewelry in exchange for goods, religious or medical services, or livestock. They also viewed jewelry as a sign of wealth.

Different jewelry styles developed among the American Indian tribes, but they used the same materials to make their jewelry. Common materials for making jewelry included beads, shells, copper, silver, ivory, amber, turquoise and stones. After colonization, American Indians began using new materials like glass beads and adopted more advanced metalworking techniques.

Navajo Jewelry
In 1864, the United States captured and detained 8,000 Navajo Indians in an attempt to turn them into farmers rather than nomads. During that time, Atsidi Sani observed the Americans’ silver-making techniques. He brought the techniques back to the tribes and became the first American Indian silversmith.

By the late 1800s, many Navajo Indians had learned to work with silver. Navajo Indians would inlay their turquoise jewelry into sterling silver, combining the new techniques with their old styles of jewelry.

Types
One type of Native American jewelry is metalwork. Native Americans made metalwork jewelry by hammering and etching metal into simple earrings and pendants. After the Indians learned silversmithing, the variety among the types of metal jewelry increased.

Beadwork is another type of Native American jewelry. Indians would grind turquoise, coral and shells into beads for necklaces. They also carved wood and bone beads.

Famous Designs
Popular Navajo Americans designs include stamp work and squash-bottom necklaces. In stamp work, the artist uses metal stamps to decorate metal with raised or indented designs. Navajo Indians are known for their concho belts, which are a type of stamp work. They make the belts by hammering silver coins into a flat shape and attaching them to strips of leather. They modeled these belts after the hair ornaments of the nearby Plains tribes.

Navajo Indians specialize in making squash-bottom necklaces, a style of necklace that they invented. The Navajos drew inspiration from the ornaments on Spanish bridles to create the crescent-shaped squash-bottom design. The pendant necklaces eventually became a symbol of crop fertility.

Hallmarks
You can purchase Navajo Indian jewelry from a variety of independent artists. These artists mark and authenticate their jewelry with a signature hallmark–such as their initials or a small symbol–which they carve into the back of the jewelry. The hallmark helps identify the artist who created the jewelry and its metal content.