Nazar Boncugu - Evil Eye
Throughout the whole history, in almost every culture and religion, the eye figure has been considered as a powerful talisman to defy the evil forces. In Turkey, also, you'll meet plenty of eyes looking at you. It is very common in the Turkish culture to give a gift of a " Blue Glass Nazar Boncugu" or " Evil Eye Bead " as it is more widely known. Sometimes people hang a small evil eye amulet from the rear view mirror of their car, keep several small evil eye beads or charms on hand to give to guests, hang an evil eye near their door in the home or office. Glass evil eyes are worn, in the form of jewelry; evil eye bracelets, evil eye necklaces, evil eye anklets, gold or silver evil eye charms and pendants, blue evil eye talismans, evil eye earrings - rings and plenty of evil eye ethnic jewelry sets. The only aim is to protect themselves from the potential "evil eyes".
Nazar Boncugu is usually made out of blue glass with a stylised eye design and can be of any size, large ones for the home or office, smaller ones to hang in a car or a tiny one to pin on a child’s dress with a safety pin. According to the Turkish tradition, when someone praises something or someone they run the risk of attracting the ‘evil eye’ to whatever is being praised, by arousing envy in others. Thus it is believed that the "nazar boncugu" (evil eye) deflects this. Few Turks have blue eyes, so it was probably mistrust of foreigners which gave rise to the traditional blue colour of the charms.