A PAIR OF ATTIC GOLD EARRINGS
A PAIR OF ATTIC GOLD EARRINGS
A PAIR OF ATTIC GOLD EARRINGS
A PAIR OF ATTIC GOLD EARRINGS
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PROPERTY FROM A SWISS FAMILY COLLECTION
A PAIR OF ATTIC GOLD EARRINGS

LATE GEOMETRIC PERIOD, CIRCA 750-725 B.C.

Details
A PAIR OF ATTIC GOLD EARRINGS
LATE GEOMETRIC PERIOD, CIRCA 750-725 B.C.
Larger: 1 7⁄8 in. (4.7 cm.) long
Provenance
Ernst Kofler-Truniger (1903-1990) and Marthe Kofler-Truniger (1918-1999), Luzern, acquired by 1955 (Inv. no. K 719A).
Private Collection, Luzern, acquired from the above circa 1974; thence by continuous descent to the current owner.
Literature
K. Schefold, Meisterwerke griechischer Kunst, Basel and Stuttgart, 1960, pp. 308-309, no. 554.
R.A. Higgins, "The Elgin Jewellery," The British Museum Quarterly, vol. 23, no. 4, June 1961, p. 103.
R.A. Higgins, Greek and Roman Jewellery, London, 1961, p. 99.
Sammlung E. und M. Kofler-Truniger, Luzern, Zurich, 1964, p. 41, no. 392, pl. 31.
R. A. Higgins, "Early Greek Jewellery," The Annual of the British School at Athens, vol. 64, 1969, pp. 143, 148-149, pl. 41c-d.
D.L. Carroll, "A Group of Asymmetrical Spiral-Form Earrings," American Journal of Archaeology, vol. 74, no. 1, 1970, p. 38, pl. 10, fig. 6.
J.N. Coldstream, Geometric Greece, New York, 1977, pp. 126, 139, n. 51.
R.A. Higgins, Greek and Roman Jewellery, second edition, London, 1980, p. 98, pl. 14d.
B. Deppert-Lippitz, Griechischer Goldschmuck, Mainz am Rhein, 1985, p. 74.
S. Langdon, ed., From Pasture to Polis: Art in the Age of Homer, Columbia, 1993, p. 71.
Exhibited
Basel, Kunsthalle, Meisterwerke griechischer Kunst, 19 June-13 September 1960.
Zurich, Kunsthaus, Sammlung E. und M. Kofler-Truniger, Luzern, 7 June-2 August 1964.

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Hannah Fox Solomon
Hannah Fox Solomon Head of Department, Specialist

Lot Essay

Only a small number of related gold earrings dating to the Geometric period are known. All are thought to have been made in Attica, and due to the similarity of the granulation style seen on several contemporary plaques and earrings found at Eleusis, the production center has been assigned to an “Eleusis school” (see Higgins, op. cit., 1969, p. 148). This pair is each composed of a stout rod, octagonal in section, coiled into a spiral and joined at one end to a large disk and at the other in a biconical element with a rectangular extension. The disk was once centered by an inlay, perhaps of either rock crystal, glass or amber, and the inlay collar is encircled by bands of granulation. Framing the inlay is a broad band of double arcades in granulation, with further bands of granulation at the rim. The reverse has a web pattern at the join of the rod, while each end of the rod has granulated triangles and bands. The biconical element has two opposing triangular cloisons, once inlaid, on the obverse, framed by a granulated meander pattern, with other granulated geometric ornament on the reverse. Both sides of the rectangular extension were also once inlaid.

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