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Repoussé plaque with a woman-bee hybrid
Greek, East Greek
Orientalizing Period
660–620 B.C.
Place of Manufacture: Greece, Rhodes, Kameiros
Medium/Technique
Electrum, repoussé
Dimensions
Height: 3.2 cm (1 1/4 in.); width: 2 cm (13/16 in.)
Credit Line
Henry Lillie Pierce Fund
Accession Number99.396
CollectionsJewelry, Ancient Greece and Rome
ClassificationsJewelry / Adornment
DescriptionOn this plaque, a winged hybrid creature that fuses a woman’s head and torso with a bee’s bottom is depicted. The goddess has heavy striated hair, typical of the Daedalic style. Her wings curve in dramatically and are decorated with curving lines. She holds her arms out perpendicular to her waist, her hands clenched into fists. Her waist is marked by a sort of belt with vertical striations, while her bee bottom is horizontally striped. On either side of the figure, just beneath her arms, are two large rosettes. The entire composition is bordered by a braided pattern, and further decorated on top by a row of 12 darts. A single cylinder is preserved at the center of the top of the plaque, perhaps once strung so that the plaque could be hung from a string. A portion of the lower border and the composition adjacent to it are now missing.
ProvenanceBy date unknown: W. H. Forman Collection; inherited from him by Mrs. Burt and then, about 1889, by A. H. Browne; by 1899: with Sotheby, Wilkinson & Hodge, 13 Wellington Strand, London, W.C. (sale of the Forman collection, June 19-22, lot 397, partial; said to have come from Kameiros, Rhodes); 1899: with Edward Perry Warren; 1899: purchased by MFA from Edward Perry Warren for $ 32,500.00 (this is the total price for MFA 99.338-99.542)