Glass head pendant



Accession Number
AB15

This image may be used under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0) license. For uses not covered under the Creative Commons license, or to license images for commercial uses, please contact the institution directly.

Description

A translucent dark blue, opaque yellow and turquoise glass head pendant. There is a small rod hole in the blue base at the bottom, and an overlay in yellow forming the face with a pointed chin. An applied twisted headband is formed in blue, yellow, and turquoise across the forehead, above which is an applied large suspension ring in blue, projecting forward forming a large curl of hair in blue above the ears, extending onto back over the top of the base. The eyes are sunken blue rings, and the facial features include a long, rounded nose, chubby cheeks, mouth with parted lips, and projecting chin. It was a gift from the University of Wales Aberystwyth. These pendants were used as protective amulets to ward off evil. Similar pendants are frequently represented on Cypriot votive statues and figurines, particularly "temple boys." A very similar head was part of the Hilton Price collection and was found at Amarna (Hilton-Price 1908, 62, number 4547). An almost identical head was found in the Fayum and is now in the National Museum of Ireland (1901:729). Another, as part of an earring, is in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (74.51.4029). The latter two dated to the Ptolemaic Period.

Bibliography

Price, Frederick George Hilton 1908. A catalogue of the Egyptian antiquities in the possession of F. G. Hilton Price. London: Quaritch.


Last modified: 10 Oct 2023

Back | Feedback about this object