Katerina Perez
by KATERINA PEREZ
@katerina_perez
Club Talks: Arsen Yarman on Armenian Goldsmiths and the Jewels History Forgot
A researcher and independent historian of Ottoman Armenian heritage, Yarman has spent years tracing these forgotten makers through archives, family collections and scattered historical records. The resulting two-volume work is both the culmination of that detective work and an attempt to restore the Armenian masters who helped shape Ottoman jewellery culture to their rightful place in history.
For this edition of Club Talks, I spoke with him about the thrill of unearthing lost names and missing jewels, the challenge of piecing together fragmented archives, and why the legacy of these remarkable craftsmen deserves to be far better known.
Katerina: You sifted through archives scattered across multiple countries, from Yerevan to Venice to Istanbul. What was the biggest obstacle in accessing or verifying information?
Arsen: The greatest difficulty was not simply accessing documents but connecting scattered fragments into a reliable historical narrative. Records relating to Armenian jewellers in the Ottoman Empire are dispersed across a vast geography and preserved in many languages, from Ottoman Turkish to Armenian and European sources.
One recurring challenge was names. The same individual often appeared under different spellings depending on the language, the scribe or whether Eastern or Western Armenian forms were used. To help address this, I included alternative spellings throughout the book, as well as a guide to Armenian names for future researchers.
Katerina: A book this richly illustrated requires trust from collectors, museums and private families who may never have shared their heirlooms before. How did you persuade people to open their archives and jewellery boxes?
Arsen: Reaching such a rich visual archive required not only research, but also the building of trust. Collectors, institutions and families were willing to open their doors when they understood that this project was not commercial in purpose, but an effort to preserve cultural heritage.
I explained that these objects were more than beautiful possessions. They were witnesses to history, labour and identity. Once people understood that, many chose to share photographs, drawings, family records and jewels that had never previously been made public.
That trust allowed important discoveries to emerge. Through private collections and family estates, I was able to document works by masters whose names had faded from view, including jewellers such as Mıgırdiç Melkonyan and Levon Mazlumyan.
For me, the visual richness of the book is not simply illustration. It is the return of a shared memory.
There are also diplomatic jewels described in documents but still physically missing, such as a diamond engraved with the tughra of Abdülhamid II believed to have been created for Queen Victoria. In historical research, a document may prove that an object existed, while the object itself remains silent.
In that sense, the book is also a call to search again for lost treasures.
Katerina: You uncovered seals, decrees, workshop records and forgotten documents. Was there one discovery that changed how you understood the scale of Armenian goldsmiths’ influence?
Arsen: It is difficult to choose only one because every document in the book mattered to me. Sometimes a photograph captures the spirit of an era, a drawing reveals the intelligence of design and a single archive record can reshape what we think we know.
One discovery that moved me deeply was the 1898 Permanent Statute of Unity and Solidarity of the Armenian Jewellers’ Guild. It set out rules for apprenticeship, workshop order and guild administration, but it also revealed a culture of mutual care, with provisions for illness, marriage, old age and death.
Reading it, I felt I was hearing the voices of craftsmen who had worked at the bench more than a century earlier. It showed that Armenian jewellers were not only skilled makers, but part of a disciplined and closely connected professional community.
For me, that document remains one of the most valuable discoveries in the book because it preserves not only how they worked, but how they lived.
Katerina: What role did Armenian jewellers play in connecting East and West
Arsen: For centuries, Armenian merchants and craftsmen operated across trade routes linking India, Persia, the Ottoman Empire and Europe. They were not only makers, but intermediaries who moved precious stones, techniques and taste across borders. In many ways, they helped jewellery ideas travel.
Katerina: After years of research, what part of the process gave you the greatest personal satisfaction?
Arsen: One of the greatest satisfactions was seeing jewels that had long existed only as records, faded photographs or archival notes reappear in the hands of their present owners. To hear the family stories behind them, and to understand how they had been preserved across generations, was deeply moving.
Another moment that affected me profoundly came while researching the swordsmith known in his works as Acemoglu. I identified him as the Armenian Chief Swordsmith Sarkis Acemoğlu, who served the Ottoman palace, and later learned that he had been buried in an Armenian cemetery in Istanbul.
I searched the cemetery for days, reading inscriptions stone by stone, until I finally found his fallen gravestone, leaning into the earth and almost forgotten. It is difficult to describe that feeling. It was as if a master who had been silent for centuries had begun to speak again.
Katerina: For today’s collectors or curators, are there subtle clues that might suggest an unsigned 18th or 19th century jewel could have been made by an Armenian master?
Arsen: We should be careful about assigning objects too confidently because many Armenian jewellers worked across different empires and adapted closely to local tastes. There is no single fixed style that can simply be labelled “Armenian”.
What I would call the Armenian hand is often seen instead in refinement, technical discipline and an ability to unite different visual languages with great sensitivity. These masters worked in the Ottoman world, Persia, Russia, Europe and beyond, often blending influences rather than repeating one formula.
