It started with an elephant hair bangle

I remember having an elephant hair bangle as a child. I was fascinated by it, particularly the knots. They slid along the strands, making the bangle bigger or smaller, and I was forever moving them backwards and forwards.

I don't think I thought very much about where it came from then. I just knew there was something rather special about it.

And, of course, there was a story that went with it.

The Story Behind the Four Knots


The four knots were said to represent the elements — earth, wind, fire and water — while the strands running between them represented how everything in nature is connected.

The elephant itself was part of the meaning too — strength, resilience, protection and good fortune were all associated with the bangle.

A Tradition Passed Down

What I didn't realise as a child was just how old the tradition was. Elephant tail hair has been used to make bangles and other adornments by communities across Africa for generations. How far back it goes we really don't know. Its beginnings are part of an oral tradition that existed long before anyone wrote it down.

The original bangles were made using the long, coarse hairs from an elephant's tail. Several hairs formed each strand and the knots held the strands together. Best of all, those knots could slide — the very thing that had fascinated me so much as a child.

A Bangle That Told a Story

There was another story about how the bangle was worn. If a hunter wore a bangle made from the tail hair of an elephant he had hunted, he wore it on his right wrist. If you had been given your bangle as a gift, you wore it on your left.

Why Silver?

Years later, when I was already making jewellery, I discovered that Elephant Knot bangles were also being made in silver.

I loved the idea immediately.

It was the bangle I remembered — the strands, those sliding knots and all the story that went with them — but there was no need to use elephant hair.

For me, knowing where materials come from matters. I have no objection to elephant hair that has been obtained legally and responsibly, but if I don't know where it has come from, I would rather not use it.

Silver gave me an alternative that I felt comfortable with. And making ours in recycled sterling silver just seemed right.

The Knots Still Slide

We have played with the design over the years, making different numbers of strands, lighter and heavier versions, and both two- and four-knot bangles. But there is one thing I wouldn't want to change.

The knots still slide. Pull them apart and the bangle opens. Slide them back and it closes around your wrist.

I still find that rather wonderful.

A Gift That Wishes You Good Things

The Elephant Knot has long been associated with wishes of good health, prosperity and good fortune. When you give one to somebody, you are not simply giving them a piece of jewellery. There is a little more behind it. You are wishing good things for them.

I love that.

Ours may now be made from recycled silver rather than elephant hair, but that part of the story doesn't need to change.

And perhaps one day, many years from now, someone will pick up one of our bangles, slide those knots backwards and forwards, and ask about the story behind it.

The Elephant Knot Collection

Our Elephant Knot bangles are handmade in Zimbabwe from recycled sterling silver, in a range of designs from lighter three-strand bangles to heavier four-knot styles.

Shop the Elephant Knot Collection

Sources & Further Reading

Science Museum Group — Amuletic bracelet of elephant hair with sliding knots for adjustment of size, Africa, 1880–1930. The museum record documents an African elephant-hair bracelet specifically using sliding knots.

Peabody Museum of Archaeology & Ethnology, Harvard University — African elephant-tail-hair bracelets in its ethnographic collections, including multistrand examples with wrapped knots from the Congo and Sudan.

Francis Galton, Narrative of an Explorer in Tropical South Africa (1853) — an early written account describing Bushmen wearing numerous elephant-hair necklaces, evidence that elephant-hair adornment was already an established practice when Europeans recorded it.