This pendant was not on display for sale in the shop I visited but was offered to me after getting to know the owner. I never asked if they had any NA pieces for sale just that I had been tracing my family heritage. The next time I went in this was presented to me for sale.
Sleeping Beauty, coral and what I think is the hind claw of a female wolf. If I’m correct the cluster shot bead and leaf is a registered design .
They are one of the few NA jewlery makers represented in the British Museum in London
Their bio reads : “Ben Eustace, a native American of Zuni birth, is a self-taught jeweller who in the 1970s registered his leaf design for copyright purposes and thus created a style that his family now use. Ben and his wife Felicia (Cochiti) worked for the trader CG Wallace making jewellery in the 1940s, by the 1950s, the Eustaces had moved to Albuquerque and worked at the Covered Wagon doing repairs but also making jewellery themselves. Their children recollect working making shot - beads of silver - to add characteristic detailing to the leaf design. It is, ostensibly, Felicia Eustace who started to make jewellery, having been taught as a young bride in the 1940s by her sisters-in-law when she lived in Zuni, often with Ben away. Felicia Eustace’s style was cluster work, although in the 1980s she took up pottery and started to make Cochiti storytellers. In 1998, the Eustaces lived in Cochiti with their son, Nelson Eustace and made and sold jewellery from their sitting room in their house in Cochiti on the main plaza, although they also took their work to Santa Fe. Their home was open for selling and stocked Felicia Eustace’s pottery, as well as other family member’s work.”
the hallmark on your pendant does not match known examples in Hougarts 5th edition for Ben
the font on the word “sterling” does not match the example for Bernadette
Pretty pendant. BE and Sterling were also hallmarks used by his daughter Bernadette, per Hougart, but in all caps–so it’s hard to say for sure who made this. Agree with @Steve.
It’s not a cluster pendant, in that the expression “cluster work” used by the British Museum doesn’t refer to the silver shot but to Zuni-style multistone, bezel set jewelry, unlike in this piece.
Sleeping Beauty and coral is correct. However as others have pointed out, not Ben Eustace. Likely Navajo made (although without provenance its impossible to confirm), good 70s or 80s production work, meaning a number of these were made in a batch of similar items. Hallmark is from a standard set of lettering stamps, and could be anyone with these initials.
Items like this one are seldom made by well known, or collectible artists, This is more ‘bread and butter’ stuff made by or for a trading company for quick sale to wholesalers. At one time there were scores of Gallup workshops turning out items like this.
The ‘salad work’ as I call it is all handmade, but none of it is in any way proprietary or registered. The only item of real note is the black bear claw. Lots of these were used in production jewelry in the 70s and 80s, but in many jurisdictions are now restricted items.
And I would add that the pendant doesn’t really look like what I see online by the Eustace’s. Many of their turquoise stones appear to be worked (carved), and to me the silver style is quite different.
Wow so much help, I’m so grateful to @StevesTrail@Ziacat@mmrogers@chicfarmer@Steve you have all gone out of your way to identify this piece.
I’m learning how little I know about this subject. European glass I’m mostly ok with identifying. I think by the time I’m 100 years old I might catch up a bit with jewellery
Thank you once again I need to read much more so my rookie stripe isn’t so obvious.
I need to read much more so my rookie stripe isn’t so obvious.