Learn About Pearls

What Are the Key Dates in Pearl History?

The timeline below lists dated events in pearl history, from the oldest pearl ornaments reported so far, about 8,500 years old, to the first cultured pearls and the sales and laws of recent years.1 Each is dated as precisely as its sources allow, and disputed dates are marked.

Every event#

The events run from the oldest to the most recent, each with its sources.

  1. About 8,500 years ago: The oldest known pearl ornaments. In 2019, archaeologists reported pearls used as adornments in Baja California Sur, Mexico, radiocarbon dated to 8,500 years old, the oldest reported so far.1
  2. 13th century (disputed): Chinese farmers grow blister pearls on small Buddha figures. By the 13th century, small lead figures of Buddha were being fixed inside freshwater mussels (Cristaria plicata), which coated them in nacre. An FAO report from 1984 dates the practice to more than 2,000 years ago.2 3 4
  3. 1498: Columbus meets people wearing pearls on his third voyage. On his third (1498) and fourth (1502) voyages, Christopher Columbus met people adorned with natural pearls. The pearl sources he found, in present-day Venezuela and Panama, raised demand in Europe.5 6
  4. 1649: Charles I wears a pearl-drop earring to his execution. The V&A showed the pearl-drop earring that Charles I of England wore at his execution in 1649 in its 2013 Pearls exhibition.7
  5. 1863: Princess Alexandra receives the Dagmar necklace. The pearl necklace known as the Dagmar necklace was a gift to Princess Alexandra when she married the Prince of Wales, the future King Edward VII, in 1863.7
  6. 1893: Kokichi Mikimoto grows his first cultured pearls. Kokichi Mikimoto successfully cultured pearls in Japan. They were hemispherical (half) pearls.8 9
  7. 1907: The technique for whole, round cultured pearls is developed. CIBJO dates the technique for spherical, whole cultured pearls to 1907. A 2007 Gems & Gemology review credits Tatsuhei Mise and Tokichi Nishikawa with the basic method still used for bead-cultured pearls, a bead inserted into the gonad with a piece of mantle tissue.9 10
  8. 1917: Pierre Cartier trades a double strand of natural pearls for a mansion. Pierre Cartier traded a double strand of natural pearls for a mansion at 653 Fifth Avenue in New York City.8
  9. 1917: A Japanese company starts culturing pearls in the Philippines. Shortly after Mikimoto began mass-producing Akoya cultured pearls with the Mise-Nishikawa method, the Mitsubishi company of Japan set up a Pinctada maxima pearl farm in the Philippines. Others followed, and several survived until the Second World War.10
  10. 1921-05: Round Japanese cultured pearls surprise the London trade. A London evening paper reported that spherical Japanese pearls with mother-of-pearl beads at their centers had reached the London market and deceived experienced dealers in Hatton Garden.11
  11. 1925: Gem testing laboratories open to separate natural from cultured pearls. The London Chamber of Commerce opened a gem testing laboratory in 1925, followed by the Laboratoire Français de Gemmologie in 1929 and GIA in 1931. All three first focused on telling natural pearls from cultured ones.12
  12. 1928-09: Japan's pearl producers begin inspecting their own pearls. The Dainippon (Japan) Pearl Association required its members to submit all their cultured pearls for inspection, and pearls with too little nacre, poor luster or color, or a very deformed shape were banned from sale.1
  13. 1930s: The Gulf's natural pearl trade contracts. From 1850 to 1930 the Persian Gulf supplied perhaps 70–80% of the world's natural pearls. From the 1930s the natural pearl market contracted, because of the Great Depression, the discovery of oil in the Gulf and the arrival of cultured pearls.9 13
  14. 1952-03: Japan begins government inspection of pearl exports. Under the Pearl Cultivation Law, pearls could be exported only after a government inspection, at offices in Tokyo and Kobe, had graded them. The inspections ran for 46 years, until the law was abolished at the end of 1998.1
  15. 1954: South Sea pearl culturing begins at Kuri Bay, Western Australia. Pearls Pty., a venture of Tokuichi Kuribayashi and Alan Gerdau, began culturing pearls in Pinctada maxima at what is now Kuri Bay. A larger bead method let the farm harvest after only 18 months.10
  16. 1954: Joe DiMaggio gives Marilyn Monroe a cultured pearl necklace. The necklace of cultured pearls that Joe DiMaggio gave Marilyn Monroe in 1954 was among the jewels in the V&A's 2013 Pearls exhibition.7
  17. 1961: French Polynesia runs its first black pearl culturing trial. The government's Fisheries Service ran a trial on Bora Bora with two Japanese firms. It produced good black pearls but had no commercial follow-up; small farms later formed the GIE Poe Rava Nui cooperative, in 1979.10
  18. 1966: Japan's cultured pearl production peaks. Official Japanese production reached an all-time high of 39,522 kan, or 148.2 tonnes, though some estimates put it far higher, at about 65,000 kan. Sales and production then fell sharply at the end of the decade.10
  19. 1969: Richard Burton gives La Peregrina to Elizabeth Taylor. La Peregrina, a drop-shaped natural pearl found in the Gulf of Panama in the 1500s and long owned by European royalty, passed from Richard Burton to Elizabeth Taylor.14
  20. 2011: La Peregrina sells at auction for $11.8 million. Christie's New York auctioned the Cartier necklace containing La Peregrina for $11.8 million.14
  21. 2017-07-18: French Polynesia's pearl law ends the mandatory nacre check. Loi du pays 2017-16 ended the government's mandatory quality control, which had required at least 0.8 mm of nacre since 2005, and made a nacre evaluation voluntary. It defines the Tahitian cultured pearl as naturally colored and untreated.15 16
  22. 2018-11-14: Marie Antoinette's natural pearl pendant sets an auction record. At Sotheby's in Geneva, Marie Antoinette's 18th-century natural pearl and diamond pendant sold for CHF 36,427,000, a new auction record for a natural pearl.17

More about pearl history#

The history overview tells the story around these dates, who invented cultured pearls covers the people behind culturing, and famous pearls covers well-known pieces.

References#

  1. CIBJO Pearl Commission (2025). CIBJO Guides Describing and Classifying Natural and Cultured Pearls, the Producing Molluscs & Responsible Pearling. Source · Archived copy
  2. Shigeru Akamatsu, Li Tajima Zansheng, Thomas M. Moses and Kenneth Scarratt (2001). The Current Status of Chinese Freshwater Cultured Pearls. Source · DOI 10.5741/GEMS.37.2.96 · Archived copy
  3. FAO/UNDP Regional Seafarming Development and Demonstration Project (RAS/90/002) (1991). Pearl Oyster Farming and Pearl Culture (Training Manual 8). Source · Archived copy
  4. R. Pagcatipunan (1984). Technical Assistance on Oyster and Pearl Culture in Bangladesh. Source · Archived copy
  5. Gemological Institute of America (GIA), Gem Encyclopedia. Pearl History and Lore. Source · Archived copy
  6. CIBJO, The World Jewellery Confederation, Pearl Commission (2026). The CIBJO Pearl Book (Pearl Blue Book) 2026. Source · Archived copy
  7. Victoria and Albert Museum, with Qatar Museums Authority (2013). Pearls (exhibition press release). Source · Archived copy
  8. Gemological Institute of America (GIA), Gem Encyclopedia. Pearl. Source · Archived copy
  9. CIBJO, The World Jewellery Confederation (2021). CIBJO Retailers' Reference Guide: Pearls. Source · Archived copy
  10. Russell Shor (2007). From Single Source to Global Free Market: The Transformation of the Cultured Pearl Industry. Source · DOI 10.5741/GEMS.43.3.200 · Archived copy
  11. H. Lyster Jameson (1921). The Japanese Artificially Induced Pearl. Source · DOI 10.1038/107396a0 · Archived copy
  12. Chunhui Zhou and W. Henry Towbin (2024). Applications of X-Ray Radiography and X-Ray Computed Microtomography in Gemology. Source · DOI 10.5741/GEMS.60.4.582 · Archived copy
  13. GIA staff (2025). Converge 2025 Speaker Presentations. Source · Archived copy
  14. Gemological Institute of America (GIA), Birthstones. June Birthstones. Source · Archived copy
  15. Assemblée de la Polynésie française (Journal officiel de la Polynésie française) (2017). Loi du pays n° 2017-16 du 18 juillet 2017 réglementant les activités professionnelles liées à la production et la commercialisation des produits perliers et nacriers en Polynésie française. Source · Archived copy
  16. Chambre territoriale des comptes de la Polynésie française (2021). Rapport d'observations définitives : Politique publique en matière des ressources marines (perliculture), exercices 2015 et suivants. Source · Archived copy
  17. Sotheby's (2018). Marie Antoinette's Pearls Break Auction Records in Geneva. Source · Archived copy
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Unique Pearl, a pearl jeweler
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  1. : First published. First published
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Learn About Pearls editors. (2026). What Are the Key Dates in Pearl History? Learn About Pearls. https://learnaboutpearls.com/history/timeline/
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“What Are the Key Dates in Pearl History?” Learn About Pearls, Unique Pearl, November 4, 2026, learnaboutpearls.com/history/timeline/.
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Learn About Pearls editors. “What Are the Key Dates in Pearl History?” Learn About Pearls. Unique Pearl. Last modified November 4, 2026. https://learnaboutpearls.com/history/timeline/.
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@misc{lap-history-timeline, title = {What Are the Key Dates in Pearl History?}, author = {{Learn About Pearls editors}}, year = {2026}, howpublished = {\url{https://learnaboutpearls.com/history/timeline/}}, note = {Learn About Pearls, published by Unique Pearl}}

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  • History: From ancient pearl fisheries to the first cultured pearls and today's industry, with a dated timeline.
  • Famous pearls: Famous pearls and their stories, from ancient Rome to the present day.
  • The cultured pearl revolution: How cultured pearls began in China and Japan, and how pearl farming spread around the world.