Pearls are a major component in really fancy Byzantine clothing. The wealthier you were, the more bling– more pearls, more gold, more brocades.  An outer tunic to wear to be seen might begin with a silk brocade, then be embellished with gold thread, embroidery to add dimension and details to the already incredible brocade and then finally pearls would be sewn onto the clothing to make it really pop!

Add jewelry of gold with enameling and colorful stones and more pearls, and WOW!

Also, a civil servant might be paid in fabric, by the pound.  So while the homes of the wealthy were hardly fancier than the smaller homes of the less wealthy, the real difference was found in the clothing worn.

What you wore really did tell everyone who you were, and dictated how you were treated.

And I just purchased a hundred strands of tiny pearls. D grade, white, and roughly 3mm.  It was a good sale and as cheap as they could be had.  D grade is fairly poor quality, but still better than plastic!

So, I need to get on the ball and turn that brocade into a tunic so I can start embellishing as soon as it arrives.  I have some nice metallic gold thread to use too.  My goal is one tunic that is heavy as all get out, blinged out to the max, to be worn only in cool places where it will not get dirty, LOL!

Bit by bit the stuff comes together, now must make time to do the work– that will take a LONG time.

Have GOT to do pictures.

Meanwhile, this has nothing at all to do with pearls…