{"product_id":"shed-skin-african-opal-snake-zodiac-necklace","title":"The Shed Skin — Swiss Blue Topaz Snake Zodiac Necklace","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eThe oldest maker in Chinese myth is drawn from the waist down as a snake.\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNüwa is not a minor figure. She is the one who makes people out of yellow mud, and the one who patches the sky back together with melted stone after it cracks. On Han dynasty tomb tiles she is painted with a human head, human arms, and a serpent's body below.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNobody drew that as horror. It was drawn as competence.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhich is worth remembering, because the snake in the twelve signs has spent a long time being handed other people's baggage — mostly imported, mostly not Chinese. In the cycle itself the snake is not treacherous. It is the animal that gets out of its own skin on a schedule and keeps going.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eThe oldest maker in Chinese myth is drawn from the waist down as a snake.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eSi, the sixth earthly branch, is the double hour from nine until eleven in the morning. Late enough that the day has a shape. Early enough to change it.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003chr\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe snake here is gold and coiled along a silver branch, and I left the branch pale on purpose so the two metals read as two different materials rather than one decorated one.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe opal sits above in a rayed gold mount. Opal has had a strange run in Europe — in 1829 Walter Scott published a novel in which a woman wearing one dies, and the market for opals across the continent is said to have collapsed on the strength of a plot device. It took decades to recover. A stone's reputation is not the same thing as a stone.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe metal is solid 925 sterling silver with gold plating on the snake, the grass and the mount. Plating is a surface finish and it wears with time; the silver beneath it does not.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePosted to you tracked. 5–10 days to the UK.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe coil is the difficulty — it has to sit over and under the branch convincingly, which means the two are finished as one piece and cannot be corrected separately.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ch2\u003eMaterials\u003c\/h2\u003e\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eNatural African opal — 4 mm round\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eWhite cubic zirconia accent stones — laboratory-made, not mined\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e925 sterling silver with gold plating on the snake, grass and mount\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003ePendant 25.49 mm across, on a box chain\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eFree UK delivery · 5–10 days\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eCarried for centuries as the sign of leaving a version of yourself behind. Some people feel something when they put a sign on. Some don't. Either way it is an old idea and it is accurately made.\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Asi8","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49044068827306,"sku":"ASI8-OPA-021","price":189.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0719\/3313\/2970\/files\/21-1.jpg?v=1786612306","url":"https:\/\/asieight.com\/products\/shed-skin-african-opal-snake-zodiac-necklace","provider":"Asi8","version":"1.0","type":"link"}