Stone Jewelry. In prehistory humans used stones and animal bones to make beads and pendants, but it was not until the fourth millennium B.C.E.—when unusual sorts of stone were imported into Mesopotamia and the technological ability to work metal had developed—that more-elaborate forms of jewelry were possible. The little surviving Mesopotamian jewelry of the Late Uruk period (circa 3300 - circa 2900 B.C.E.) largely consists of beads, sometimes made of exotic stones such as lapis lazuli imported from northern Afghanistan. This tradition continued into the third millennium B.C.E., when, as trade routes expanded, carnelian was imported from the Indus Valley. The Royal Graves at Ur (circa 2600 - circa 2500 B.C.E.) contained beads and pendants in which colored stones are often combined with gold. Sometimes the forms of the gold beads, such as a popular biconical shape...