Sunday, January 3, 2010

Bangles

Bangles one of the jewelry unique to Indians. Its known as Chudi in Hindi and Gazulu in Telugu. They were known to Indian women since ancient times and formed part of traditional jewelry. The bangles along with the Bindi (dot worn on fore head of vermilion) are the indications of the married status of Indian women especially Hindu women.

Shapes, Sizes and Numbers:

Bangles are usually circular in shape and are not flexible where as the flexible type are known as bracelets.

These days we have bangles which are square triangular and other shapes too. There are also danglers attached to the bangles.

The sizes are 2.4, 2.6 and 2.8 inches diameter.

Usually Bangles are worn as pair or six or twelve. One thicker bangle may also be worn. The Women of Lambadas (Gypsies) of Andhra Pradesh, Ahirs from Rajasthan and Rabari from Gujarath wear huge bangles made of ivory along with silver ones almost from their upper arms till their wrists.

Materials:

Bangles are made of precious metals like gold, silver, platinum (these days), studded with gems, pearls, corals beads etc. Ancient times, bangles were made of shell materials, gold, silver, bronze, copper, Pancha loha (mixture of five metals), iron, terracotta, wood, ivory camel and other bones and other materials. Even in modern times this continues. Now bangles made of glass, rubber and plastic and other inexpensive metals have also been in fashion. bangles made of lac and silk thread, are also popular. Bangles are being adorned by multi coloured stones, kundans, beads, cowrie shells and danglers etc. Meenakari bangles are the metal (gold silver or ordinary) ones on which there is inlay of enamel paint. Gold plated bangles are a huge hit as they look like gold and come at a very less price. but they need gold plating form time to time and should not come into contact with water or cannot be worn daily.

While the poor wear the plastic and rubber ones which are cheaper, the rich wear the gold and bangles made of precious metals and gems. But the rich and poor women alike love the glass bangles.

It is believed that the manufacturing of glass bangles were started by the Moghuls. Ferozabad near Delhi was where these glass bangles were born which first used to manufacture chandeliers and lamps.

The popularity of glass bangles was due to the myriad colours that could be manufactured. Reds, greens, blues purples and as many shades of the colours that one can imagine of can be produced. The tinkling sounds made by these glass bangles and the colours that can match the colour of the dress perhaps made it so popular, that even the rich women wear it with their gold bangles. More over our tradition also makes it a compulsion that a woman must wear glass bangles no matter how rich she is. This is especially so on the occasions of marriages, and other festivities when women are gifted and supposed to wear glass bangles.
These are from my collection. You can see the bangles made of lac, glass and studded with stones. The red and green ones with gold designs are more popular.
These are the bangle stands. They are made of wood. You can see rainbow colours from my collection. I love wearing them to match my dress.
Here are stone studded bangles.




These are stone studded ones on metal.

This is the Meenakari bangle. I have a black and white sari and dresses to go with it.

These are the ones made with silk thread. These can be custom made to match your dress. The set you can see consists of bangles, ear rings and necklace.

These are the bangles worn by our Lambada women-the gypsies of Andhra Pradesh. See the danglers attached with ghungroo which make a pleasant sound. These are made of silver.

Marriages and Festivities:

Bangles form an important part of jewelery for girls and women at every stage in their life. When girls come of age, there is a ceremony where they are presented with glass bangles and other costly ones like gold by those who can afford to along with other pieces of jewelry. All the close relatives especially the maternal uncles and aunts, do gift her so that she can have a sizable amount of gold and silver by the time she gets married.

Marriage is an occasion where women wear bangles and are gifted by the relatives and friends alike with bangles.Women from Punjab wear white made of ivory and red bangles studded with stones known as Chooda. Women from Bengal wear bangles made of conch shell and plastic, a combination of white and red colours. In Andhra Pradesh the Muslim women wear a set (dozen) bangles of gold colour made of glass known as Sonabai Chudiyan and Hindu women wear green and red glass bangles. The green is for prosperity and red for happy married life.

In Andhra there is ceremony for women expecting a child and during this, all the women (relatives , friends and neighbors) who attend the ceremony not only present bangles but put them on the hands of the expecting mother. Thi is supposed to be very good for the to be born child.

Girls and women alike buy and wear bangles on all festivals like Teez, Karva Chauth in North India and Dassera, Deepavali, Taddi of South India.

Bangle Sellers

In olden days, the bangle sellers were so famous. they used to carry glass bangles in wooden boxes or in a cloth bundle. The women would eagerly await his arrival. Once they made their choice he would deftly put them on their hands which is bit of a difficult task to wear glass bangles by ourselves. One could buy them when they visited temples or during the carnivals held on special occasional. Even today near all the temples in South India shops sell bangles. It is considered as auspicious to offer, sari, blouse, bangles, turmeric, vermilion and flowers to the Goddess in the temple.Then there are vendors selling on push carts which are in vogues even to this day.

It is no wonder that entire areas in old parts of many cities are famous for their shop selling bangles like the Ferozabad-famous for its manufacturing of glass bangles and is known as Suhag Nagari. Chandini Chowk of Delhi, Chowk of Lucknow, Maniharan in Jaipur and our own Lad Bazaar from Hyderabad is famous for the bangles. Jaipur and Hyderabad are very well known for their bangles made of Lac and Hyderabad is also famous for its golden coloured glass bangles known as Sonabai ki chudi.


This is a stall in an exihibition selling bangles.

Bangles -glass or metal or plastic are sold by the dozen (12 numbers) or half dozen (6 numbers).The costlier and thicker ones may be sold on or two or four in number.

The bangles are so popular a jewelry in India that many songs have been written on them and the beauty of the women adorning them including the songs in movies, titles of the movies, sentimental scenes involving them and so on.... Is it any wonder our poetess Sarojini Naidu, The Nightingale of India wrote a poem titled the Bangle sellers? here is it for you......

The Bangle sellers

Bangle sellers are we who bear
Our shining loads to the temple fair...
Who will buy these delicate, bright
Rainbow-tinted circles of light?
Lustrous tokens of radiant lives,
For happy daughters and happy wives.

Some are meet for a maiden's wrist,
Silver and blue as the mountain mist,
Some are flushed like the buds that dream
On the tranquil brow of a woodland stream,
Some are aglow wth the bloom that cleaves
To the limpid glory of new born leaves

Some are like fields of sunlit corn,
Meet for a bride on her bridal morn,
Some, like the flame of her marriage fire,
Or, rich with the hue of her heart's desire,
Tinkling, luminous, tender, and clear,
Like her bridal laughter and bridal tear.

Some are purple and gold flecked grey
For she who has journeyed through life midway,
Whose hands have cherished, whose love has blest,
And cradled fair sons on her faithful breast,
And serves her household in fruitful pride,
And worships the gods at her husband's side.

So what do you think?



Friday, January 1, 2010

Happy New Year

Wish you all A very Happy, Healthy, Wealthy and Successful New Year Friends.

Thursday, December 31, 2009

Rangoli-1


The Basics of Rangoli

I have received many requests for posting Rangoli designs as the auspicious month of Dhanurmasam has started from December 16th. Here let me first give an introduction.
Rangoli as is known as in Hindi or known as Muggu or Rangavalli in Telugu is the art of drawing beautiful designs on the walls or on the floor.  It is known as Alpana in Bengali, Kolam in Tamil. These designs have religious and ritualistic significance besides being decorative and adding beauty to the interiors and exteriors.
In India, where the houses were previously constructed with mud, the walls were coated with clay or mud or cow dung or a mixture of cow dung and mud. On this various designs were drawn using red soil or a paste made of rice flour or white lime powder.
In South India, in villages and towns the front yards are not paved even to this day. So in order to avoid the dust coming into the house, the yards are daily cleaned early in the morning and water is sprinkled. Mostly, cow dung mixed in water is sprinkled. Or a thick paste of cow dung and water is made an applied. This coat lasts for a  fortnight.This is an art. I learnt from one of the tribal women as a little girl. I got to practice it on their walls and yard.
After that designs are drawn using a white coarse powder made of crushed lime stone, rice flour or mixture of both. This helps in keeping the insects and bugs from entering into the house. Any way these designs are drawn everyday and are an indication that all is well in that house.If someone in the house passes away these designs are not drawn for the entire mourning period of ten days. On special occasions elaborate designs are drawn and are decorated with colours, flowers, coloured stones, rice husk or saw dust  coated with colours. But now we so many new forms like drawing in water, designs like paintings and so on.
As the Sun enters the Zodiac sign of Sagittarius, it is known as Dhanurmasam and during this period, Lord Vishnu is worshiped. It is believed that he comes down to earth and as a part of worshiping him, we get get up very early before sun rise and decorate our front yards with beautiful designs. It is believed that the Lord visits those whose houses are beautifully decorated. Actually while drawing these designs Lords name is chanted.This starts around 14th to 16th of December and culminates with the celebration of Sankranthi festival in January 14th to 16th.
During this whole one month, Cow dung is made into small pyramid shapes and decorated with turmeric, vermilion, yellow Pumpkin flowers or Marigold . One big one(considered as (Mother Gowri-the Goddess who is worshiped for happy married life by the women) with several small ones are made and placed in the center of these decorations. Little girls and young maidens in the neighbor hood are invited and they pray to the Goddess go round it singing beautiful songs, asking for a good husband and happy and prosperous  married life. These songs contain lot of folklore. The next day these are removed and patted on to the walls to form the cow dung cakes and sun dried. These are used as fuel and cooking a sweet rice pudding (on Ratha Saptami -a festival which comes after Sankranti) and offered to Sun God. Cow dung cakes are still used as fuel in many villages in India Its environmental friendly.
During this holy month women and young ladies compete with each other to draw the best of designs in front of their houses. These days competitions are also being held across our state and also many magazines and news papers carry designs daily contributed by the readers. Some special designs are drawn during this period. This I will discuss as I post the designs. I will be posting designs from now on.

Rangoli:

The designs contain natural subjects like flowers, fruits, vegetables, birds animals and so on apart from the geometric shapes like, dots, lines, circles, squares and triangle etc  . The most popular figures are lotus, peacocks, swans, ducks, rabbits, stars, sun, moon, butterflies, deers, elephants, horses, conch shells, feet of Goddess Lakshmi, fishes and many more. Rangoli is basically of two types;
  • Free hand drawings using lines etc
  • Designs drawn using dots.
 This is the powder with which the designs are drawn.
 
This is how the powder is held between thumb and forefinger, and line is drawn.The thinner and neater the line, the skilled the artist is.

 
 
Some people hold the powder like this and draw two/three lines simultaneously. Its very difficult. I could not master it.

Here are some frequently designs drawn directly or by using lines. 
This is the most simplest design we draw quite frequently. 

 This is the simple form. I think this is known as Star of David in West.  Variants of this are as follows....
 
     
     
     
     
     
       
     
     
      


    Hope  you liked them will post some more next time.