A ROMAN AMETHYST CAMEO OF MEDUSA CIRCA 2ND CENTURY A.D.

拍品描述

A ROMAN AMETHYST CAMEO OF MEDUSA, CIRCA 2ND CENTURY A.D. Of oval form, the translucent pale violet stone carved in relief with the frontal head of Medusa, her features rendered in the classicising idiom of the so-called Medusa Rondanini type. The face is broad and symmetrical, with a smooth, rounded forehead, almond eyes set beneath softly modelled brows, a straight nose, and a small closed mouth with full lower lip. The hair is parted at the centre and drawn back in undulating waves, framing the face in two heavy masses. Above the temples, the small wings characteristic of the type emerge from the hair, and at either side of the neck the knotted serpents coil beneath the jaw. The reverse is left plain and lightly convex, and the surface retains a soft polish across the field surrounding the relief. The subject is the Gorgon Medusa in her later, humanised form, far removed from the grimacing archaic mask of the sixth and fifth centuries B.C. By the Hellenistic period her image had been reconceived as that of a beautiful young woman whose terror lay not in monstrous distortion but in the fixity of her gaze and the snakes coiled at her throat. The frontal presentation, the winged hair, and the knotted serpents identify the figure unambiguously. As an apotropaic device the Medusa head, or gorgoneion, was among the most enduring protective images of the ancient world, worn on rings and pendants to deflect the evil eye and to invoke the protection associated with the aegis of Athena and the breastplate of imperial cuirasses. Amethyst was a stone of particular significance in the Roman gem-cutter's repertoire. Imported in quantity from Egypt and the eastern provinces, its violet hue was prized both for its rarity at fine quality and for the belief, encoded in the Greek name itself, that it protected the wearer from drunkenness and from harm. Its use for a gorgoneion is therefore doubly protective, the apotropaic image of Medusa carried in a stone already regarded as a guardian against misfortune. The carving here exploits the translucency of the material so that light passes through the field and gathers in the relief, lending the face a luminous, almost internal glow that no opaque stone could produce. The Medusa Rondanini type, named after the celebrated marble in Munich, was disseminated widely through small-scale arts in the Antonine period, when intaglios and cameos in semi-precious stones served both as personal seals and as jewellery for the senatorial and equestrian classes. The frontal head, with its calm and slightly melancholic expression, became one of the most frequently repeated subjects in Roman glyptic. The relatively shallow, fluid cutting of the present cameo, the soft modelling of the cheeks, and the schematic treatment of the serpents accord with workshop production of the second century. This cameo exemplifies the Roman taste for combining a protective image with a protective material, and stands within the wider Antonine tradition of gem-carving in which the Medusa head was reduced from monster to icon while retaining the full force of its apotropaic function. The choice of amethyst, rather than the more common sard or carnelian, places the piece within the higher register of personal ornament available to a Roman wearer of means. Height: 2cm

图片