For collectors, beadworkers, and enthusiasts, this is an abridged edition of Abrams' enormously popular History of Beads. It shows how beads have played an important role throughout the world for 40,000 years -- as talismans, status symbols, amulets, and for adornment and barter. Included is the remarkable full-color, eight-page foldout time line of bead history, which places over 2,000 important bead types in cultural and historic context.