Pendant Design with Judith Holding the Head of Holofernes, from Des Pendants de Cleffs pour les Femmes

Pendant Design with Judith Holding the Head of Holofernes, from Des Pendants de Cleffs pour les Femmes

Johann Theodor de Bry

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Ornamental pendant design with Judith holding the head of Holofernes in her left hand and a sword in her right, in an oval at center. The surrounding blackwork contains a crouching satyr supporting the oval below and a dog and a bunny holding up a house at top. From a series of five plates.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Pendant Design with Judith Holding the Head of Holofernes, from Des Pendants de Cleffs pour les FemmesPendant Design with Judith Holding the Head of Holofernes, from Des Pendants de Cleffs pour les FemmesPendant Design with Judith Holding the Head of Holofernes, from Des Pendants de Cleffs pour les FemmesPendant Design with Judith Holding the Head of Holofernes, from Des Pendants de Cleffs pour les FemmesPendant Design with Judith Holding the Head of Holofernes, from Des Pendants de Cleffs pour les Femmes

The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.