Byzantine Gold Filigree Finial

Composed of a slender hoop and sub-circular bezel engraved with a highly stylised figure of a dove. 2.02 grams, 18.51 mm overall, 14.84 mm internal diameter (approximate size British H, USA 3 3/4, Europe 6.18, Japan 6)



Private collection formed since the 1940s. UK art market. Property of an Essex gentleman.

Formed in the half-round as a youthful female bust, a cross in the middle of the high hair arrangement (propoloma). 193 grams, 97 mm



Ex Law Professor in Alexandria, prior to 1930. Ex collection M. Bouvier, Switzerland (1901-1980).

The image of the Roman Empress during the late Roman Empire, was connected to Christianity by the figure of the Empress Helena. Constantine had several cities renamed Helenopolis in honour of his mother, Helena, and she gained the political verification of power with the status nobilissima femina in 318 and the rank of Augusta in 324. Alongside her social and political image, Helena also had a significant reputation as a good Christian who was a patron and took care of poor people. Owing to this powerful religious image that was created, all other Christian women during the Eastern Roman Empire were encouraged spiritually by the fact that Helena was the mother of the first Christian emperor, and the image of the Roman empress was connected to the Christian image of the Mother of God, and represented on weights, bronze appliques and, in this case, maybe as an upper mount of a tripod.

Rectangular leather case with turned and seamed end (vertical seam absent); reverse with tooled panels of foliage and tendrils in rectangular frames, obverse with large tooled rosette in a tondo on a hatched field with geometric frame. 130 grams, 45 cm



Acquired from the London trade. Ex central London gallery.