Gold, garnet, and agate necklace and earrings

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The necklace and earrings form a matching set; all are decorated with a large cabochon garnet. The chain loops on the earrings are unusual and must have been made to pass round the back of the ear lobe so that the garnet and gold decoration covered the front of the ear itself. Such fine Late Hellenistic parures are rare in comparison to the material from the rich burials of the early part of the Hellenistic period.

Greek and Roman Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Museum's collection of Greek and Roman art comprises more than thirty thousand works ranging in date from the Neolithic period (ca. 4500 B.C.) to the time of the Roman emperor Constantine's conversion to Christianity in A.D. 312. It includes the art of many cultures and is among the most comprehensive in North America. The geographic regions represented are Greece and Italy, but not as delimited by modern political frontiers: Greek colonies were established around the Mediterranean basin and on the shores of the Black Sea, and Cyprus became increasingly Hellenized. For Roman art, the geographical limits coincide with the expansion of the Roman Empire. The department also exhibits the art of prehistoric Greece (Helladic, Cycladic, and Minoan) and pre-Roman art of Italic peoples, notably the Etruscans.

Metropolitan Museum of Art