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Details
LOT 0110
Greek Turquoise Bead Necklace with Gold Beads
HELLENISTIC, CIRCA 2ND-1ST CENTURY B.C.
21 7/8 in. (72 grams, 55.5 cm).
Composed of twenty-nine oval turquoise beads and four bicone sheet-gold beads with granulation, decorated with spirals and vertical lines, with beaded wire collars and equator, with later openwork clasp.
Provenance
Acquired on European art market, 1990s.
Private collection of Mr K.A., France.
with Kallos Gallery, London, UK.
This lot has been checked against the Interpol Database of stolen works of art and is accompanied by a search certificate number no.13011-246750.
Literature
See for similar gold beads in Williams, D., Ogden, J., Greek gold, the jewellery of the Classical World, London-New York, 1994, p.100-101.
Footnotes
The use of turquoise and carnelian cloisonné inlay would be more expected in the Ptolemaic or earlier periods than from the Roman period. However, the love of coloured stones increased during the Roman period. In about A.D. 200, Clement said that 'the stones which silly women wear fastened to chains and set in necklaces' included emerald, amethyst, peridot, jasper and ceraunites. Clement's list of stones is closely paralleled by a tariff list of c. A.D. 200, and a list of jewellery from Spain. Both of these sources also include sapphire (hyacinthus) and callaina, which was probably turquoise.
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LOT 0110
Greek Turquoise Bead Necklace with Gold Beads
Estimate £2,500 - 3,500€2,900 - 4,060 (for guidance only)$3,380 - 4,730 (for guidance only)
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The intaglio can depict Capaneus, a legendary, strong, skilled, but arrogant warrior. He was one of the Seven Against Thebes, who boasted that not even Zeus could stop him from scaling the city walls. However, as he climbed them, Zeus struck him down with a bolt of lightning, illustrating divine punishment for his hubris. Evadne, his wife, then threw herself onto the funerary pyre in her grief. The story of strength but excessive pride was reflected in Dante's Inferno, where Capaneus is in the seventh circle as a condemned blasphemer.