Suffragette City

...actually, nothing to do with cities in this one.  Women's right to vote, yes...

 So isn't this interesting?  And arguably quite pretty?  I found it on ebay (yes...), but it's an example of suffragette jewelry.  Made in the UK during the Victorian era, this type of accessory was beauty with brains.  Bracelets, necklaces, earrings, and brooches exist, but the colors of the gems are always the same, and - in true Victorian spirit - they spell out a message. Pearls, peridot, and amethyst; white, green, and purple...this stands, in the words one Mrs Pethick-Lawrence, for, "[p]urple as everyone knows is the royal colour. It stands for the royal blood that flows in the veins of every suffragette, the instinct of freedom and dignity...white stands for purity in private and public life...green is the colour of hope and the emblem of spring."  Perhaps a bit antiquated in sentiment, but the substance at the root still seems solid enough to me.

Incidentally, it's purple and not violet.  A common misconception has recently arisen that the colors are green, white, and violet, for "Give Women the Vote"...a nice notion, but unfortunately one that came about a hundred years too late.