Head Ornament

Description This luxurious piece of jewelry may have been a hair ornament, or one of two pendants that hung from a noblewoman's crown or headdress. The small bust of a woman with a turreted crown is identified by the Greek inscription "KOCMIA" as a personification of Adornment. The semiprecious stones were added to the piece in the 1910s as replacements for the lost original ones.

Exhibitions

• Early Christian and Byzantine Art. Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore. 1947.
• Jewelry - Ancient to Modern. The Walters Art Gallery, Baltimore. 1979-1980.

Provenance Unknown dealer, Smyrna; Friedrich Ludwig von Gans, Frankfurt a. Main, ca. 1912-1920, by purchase; Kurt W. Bachstitz, Hague, 1920, by purchase; Henry Walters, Baltimore [date of acquisition unknown], by purchase; Walters Art Museum, 1931, by bequest.

Credit Acquired by Henry Walters