Victorian Jewelry: How to Recognise the Three Periods
Sixty four years is too long to be a style. Victoria came to the throne when jewelry was still made one piece at a time by hand, and died when it was being stamped out by machine in Birmingham by the thousand. The period divides into three, and the divisions are visible.
Calling a piece Victorian narrows it to sixty four years, which is not dating, it is a gesture. The era divides into three periods that a dealer will name without thinking, and each one looks different enough that you can usually place a piece into one of them from a photograph.
| Period | Years | The mood | What it looks like |
|---|---|---|---|
| Romantic | 1837 to 1860 | Young queen, courtship, sentiment | Small, delicate, symbolic. Snakes, hearts, hands, flowers, hair |
| Grand | 1860 to 1885 | Widowhood, empire, industry | Large, heavy, dark. Jet, black enamel, archaeological revival |
| Aesthetic | 1885 to 1901 | Lighter again, mass production | Small diamonds, stars and crescents, novelty, silver |
Romantic, 1837 to 1860
Victoria married Albert in 1840 and the country followed her taste for the next twenty years. Jewelry from this period is small, sentimental and dense with meaning.
The signatures. Serpents, because Albert gave Victoria an emerald-set snake ring and a snake meant eternity rather than menace. Hands, clasped or holding a flower. Hearts, anchors and crosses together, standing for faith, hope and charity. Forget-me-nots, ivy for fidelity, and the language of flowers generally, which was a genuine code that buyers understood.
The techniques. Cannetille, in which fine gold wire is coiled into rosettes and beehives, gets substantial-looking jewelry out of very little gold and belongs almost entirely to 1820 to 1840. Repoussé work in thin sheet gold does the same job. Both were responses to gold being expensive before the Australian and Californian discoveries of 1848 and 1851 changed the price.
Hair. Hairwork is the single most misunderstood Victorian practice. Hair under glass in a brooch or ring is not necessarily mourning. It was given by the living as a token of affection at least as often as taken from the dead, and it appears in engagement and friendship pieces throughout the period.
Grand, 1860 to 1885
Albert died in December 1861 and Victoria wore black for the rest of her life. The court followed, and an entire industry grew around formal mourning. At the same time, industrial manufacture arrived, gold became cheaper, and archaeology was producing spectacular finds that designers copied immediately.
Mourning. Whitby jet, a fossilised wood mined in Yorkshire, is warm to the touch and remarkably light. It sustained a town. Where jet was unavailable or too expensive, black enamel over gold, black onyx, vulcanite and French jet, which is black glass and noticeably heavier and colder, filled the gap. Formal mourning pieces frequently carry the name, date of death and age of the deceased on the reverse, which makes them the most precisely datable jewelry in existence.
Archaeological revival. The excavations at Pompeii and in Etruria produced goldwork techniques nobody had been able to reproduce, and Castellani in Rome reconstructed granulation, the fusing of minute gold spheres to a surface without visible solder. Etruscan revival pieces are among the finest goldsmithing of the century.
Scale. Everything got bigger. Wide gold bangles, large lockets, heavy chains, brooches the size of a palm. The gold is often thin sheet over a hollow core, which is how the size was affordable and why so many are dented.
Aesthetic, 1885 to 1901
The mood lifts. Pieces get smaller and lighter, silver becomes acceptable for daytime wear, and mass production makes ownership normal rather than exceptional.
The signatures. Stars and crescents, scattered small diamonds, novelty brooches of insects, birds, horseshoes and sporting subjects. Bar brooches. Small pearls. Where the Grand period made a statement, the Aesthetic period made a great many small ones.
Diamonds arrive. The Kimberley discoveries of 1867 onward transformed supply. Diamonds that had been the preserve of the very rich became available to the professional classes, and the old mine cut is the cut you will meet in almost all of them.
Machine work. Die-stamped components, repeated identical elements and machine-made chain dominate. Birmingham was making jewelry at industrial scale for a global market. This is why so much late Victorian jewelry survives: an enormous amount was made.
Dating a Victorian piece more precisely
Three checks narrow it fast, in this order.
- The catch. A C-catch with the pin extending past the frame is pre-1890 practice. A roll-over safety catch means 1910 or later, which would make the piece post-Victorian or repaired.
- The gold standard. British 15ct and 12ct existed only from 1854 to 1932, so those marks alone place a piece after 1854. A hallmark with a date letter settles the year outright: see reading hallmarks.
- The stones. An open culet is expected. A modern brilliant in a Victorian mount means the stone was replaced.
What Victorian jewelry is worth
Enormously variable, and less driven by age than sellers hope. The market currently rewards, roughly in order: fine mourning and hairwork with legible inscriptions, Etruscan revival goldwork, anything with good original old cut diamonds, and novelty pieces with charm. It rewards hollow gold bangles and thin stamped lockets much less, because they were made in vast numbers and are frequently damaged.
Condition matters more here than in most periods. Thin sheet gold dents and splits, jet chips, enamel flakes, and hair under glass lifts and discolours if water has ever got in. Restoration is expensive and rarely returns its cost. See what is my antique jewelry worth.
Frequently asked questions
What years count as Victorian jewelry?
1837 to 1901, the reign of Queen Victoria. Within that, dealers divide the era into Romantic from 1837 to 1860, Grand from 1860 to 1885 and Aesthetic from 1885 to 1901.
How can I tell if my jewelry is Victorian?
Look at the construction rather than the style. A C-catch with an overhanging pin, a closed back to the setting, hand file marks, an open culet on the stones and the absence of platinum or white gold all point to the nineteenth century. A British hallmark with a date letter settles it exactly.
What is Victorian mourning jewelry?
Jewelry made to commemorate a death, typically in jet, black enamel, onyx or vulcanite, often carrying the name, age and date of death of the deceased and sometimes a lock of hair. It became a mass industry after Prince Albert died in 1861.
Is Victorian hair jewelry always about death?
No. Hair was exchanged between living people as a token of affection and appears in courtship, friendship and family pieces at least as often as in mourning ones. Whether a piece is mourning usually turns on the inscription, not the hair.
Was Victorian jewelry made of real gold?
Often, but frequently at low fineness and in very thin sheet over a hollow core, which keeps the weight and cost down. British 9ct, 12ct and 15ct are all common. A great deal of Victorian jewelry is also rolled gold or gilt base metal, which was sold honestly as such at the time.