Ancient Glass Beads have long been a very special part of the Rita Okrent Collection. Our ancient beads have origins in the Middle East, Persia, West Africa and Indonesia and date from the Roman and Islamic periods. Rita acquired much of her collection of ancient glass beads in 1993, while traveling in Syria, from a Syrian collector. The collector identified the beads as Phoenician Roman glass and ancient Islamic glass beads found in (now) Syria, Jordan and Lebanon, specifically in the area of Horan, the ancient city of Palmyra, Ataman, and Hara (near Latakia). This was an old collection when Rita purchased it in the 1990's, acquired in the early to mid 1900's. Rita also sourced ancient glass beads in the 1980's in Egypt and Jatim beads in the early 1980's.
