The Production and Exchange of Glass and Stone Beads in Southeast Asia from 500 BCE to the early second millennium CE: An assessment of the work of Peter Francis in light of recent research

Abstract

Stone and glass beads are important artifacts in Southeast Asia as they are amongst the earliest objects from South Asia found in the region, and frequently seen as symbols of Indian influence and increasing sociopolitical complexity. Peter Francis Jr.'s writings regarding the production and exchange of beads in Southeast Asia have been influential to archaeologists who have viewed beads as prestige objects that were traded widely and produced at important urban centers in Southeast Asia. However, the field of beads studies in Southeast Asia has greatly expanded in the past 15 years and benefitted from new excavations and scientific techniques. In this article, I review Peter Francis' hypotheses regarding the production and exchange of beads in Southeast Asia from 500 BCE to the early second millennium CE. I then synthesize recent work by scholars that has transformed our understanding of the manufacture and trade of beads. I argue that this work has largely disproven Francis' model of bead production and interaction between South and Southeast Asia. Instead, there appear to have been multiple phases of bead production and exchange between the two regions, which reflect complex interaction networks between South and Southeast Asia and within Southeast Asia