Gold Ring Set with a Roman Calcified Onyx Cameo Portrait Bust of a Young Woman.
Roman cameo, 2nd century A.D.
High carat gold ring mount, modern.
Measurements
• Bezel Measures: 3.1 x 2.4cm
• Ring Size: Q 1/2 UK / 8.25 US / 58 EU.
• Weight: 16 grams.
A high carat gold ring set with an oval Roman cameo, carved from calcified onyx in two layers. The bust of a young woman faces right, her features refined and idealised. She wears a draped garment, the folds crisply carved in the white layer, set against a darker background. Her hair is arranged in the characteristic melon coiffure—segmented ridges drawn back into a braided chignon at the nape. Minor loss to the left edge has been sympathetically restored.
The cameo, dating to the 2nd century A.D., is mounted in a modern gold ring designed in a sympathetic classical style. Such portraits were both personal adornments and markers of social status in the Roman world, often representing members of the imperial household or fashionable ideals of feminine beauty.
Provenance
• Frank Sternberg, Zürich, Auktion XIII: Antike Münzen, Griechen – Römer – Byzantiner, Geschnittene Steine und Schmuck der Antike, Islamische Münzen, 17–18 November 1983, lot 363. https://archive.org/details/sternberg-sale-13-1983-11-17/page/182/mode/2up?q=frank+sternberg&view=theater
• Lot 235, Antiquities, Christie’s, London, Live Auction 8543, 20 October 1999. https://www.christies.com/en/lot/lot-1580739
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