A ROMAN BANDED AGATE INTAGLIO DEPICTING A PAIR OF HENS ON A GOLD RING, CIRCA 1ST-2ND CENTURY A.D.

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A ROMAN BANDED AGATE INTAGLIO DEPICTING A PAIR OF HENS ON A GOLD RING, CIRCA 1ST-2ND CENTURY A.D. Of substantial form, the plain gold hoop of rounded exterior and flat interior expanding smoothly at the shoulders to carry a broad oval bezel, within which is set an oval banded agate intaglio. The stone displays pronounced horizontal striations in tones of blue-grey, ochre and cream, the natural banding running vertically across the field. The bezel setting is flush, the collet formed as a raised lip encircling the stone. The gold has acquired a soft matte lustre from wear, with minor abrasions across the hoop consistent with ancient use. The intaglio is engraved with two hens confronting a central stalk, their bodies rendered in profile with the heads raised and combs visible above. Ears of grain fan outward to either side, the wheat rendered with fine incised lines to indicate the awns. The engraver has exploited the vertical banding of the agate so that a broad ochre stripe passes down the centre of the composition between the two birds, giving the scene an inherent axial structure that the design follows rather than opposes. The motif of paired birds flanking ears of wheat belongs to a familiar Roman repertoire of prosperity and domestic abundance. Hens and grain together signal the productive household, fertility, and agricultural plenty, themes closely associated with Ceres and with the ideal of the well-ordered estate. Such devices were carried on personal seal-stones and served both as functional signets, impressed into wax to close correspondence and secure property, and as talismans of the values their owners wished to advertise. Banded agate was among the most favoured materials for Roman intaglios, prized both for its hardness, which held a sharp engraved line, and for the visual interest of its natural stratification. The best engravers, working under magnifying globes of water or glass, incorporated the stone's banding into the composition itself, as here. The gold setting is of the massive, plain type characteristic of the earlier imperial period, when signet rings were worn as instruments of legal identity by men of equestrian and senatorial rank, and the weight of the metal signalled the standing of the wearer. This ring exemplifies the confident integration of glyptic and goldsmith's work in the early imperial period, where a signet was at once a working seal, a piece of personal jewellery, and a compressed statement of the values its owner claimed. The engraver's use of the ochre band as the central axis of the composition marks this as the work of a hand attentive to the stone as much as to the subject. Dimensions: Length of stone: 1.9 cm; Internal diameter: 2.4 cm

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