“Mesopotamian cylinder seals provided a forgery-proof method for sealing documents and proving their authenticity. In use for over three thousand years, these small cylinders had images and writing etched into their surfaces. When they were rolled across a damp clay tablet, a raised impression of the depressed design, which became a “trademark” for the owner, was formed. . . . Many such stones had a hollow perforation running through them so that they could be worn on a string around the neck or wrist. . . .
The widely traveled Greek historian Herodotus wrote that the Babylonians each wore a cylinder seal on a cord around their wrists like a bracelet. Prized as ornaments, status symbols, and unique personal signatures, cylinder seals were even used to mark a damp clay seal on the house door when the occupants were away. . . .”

—Phil Meggs & Alston Purvis, Meggs’ History of Graphic Design, 2006.