Published Catalogue Text: Ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern Bronzes at the Harvard Art Museums
This small, openwork cage pendant consists of seven ribs forming a circular cage that ends in a rounded terminal. A cylindrical stem rising from the top of the cage ends in a circular loop for suspension.
This small pendant is typical of cage pendants that occur in many sizes and varieties and were produced widely in Macedonia, Thrace, and the southern Balkans during the eighth to early seventh centuries BCE (1). Similar objects are also abundant in Iron Age bronze assemblages from western and northwestern Iran (2). Such cage pendants served as elements for necklaces, earrings, pectorals, and belts in Iron Age Macedonia, and they may have been decorations for horse harnesses as well. The fact that this pendant was part of the David N. Robinson bequest, however, may be evidence that this piece comes from Greece.
There is a strong possibility that these cage pendants represented fruit, especially the pomegranate, a symbol of the Underworld. The Homeric Hymn to Demeter states that Persephone had to return to the Underworld for six months each year because she had eaten a few pomegranate seeds (3). Late Geometric ceramic model pomegranates are known from Attica (4). However, the small size and rounded nature of the tip of this pendant make its identification as a pomegranate uncertain.
NOTES:
1. See J. Bouzek, Graeco-Macedonian Bronzes (Prague, 1974) 60-71, figs. 18-21; and I. Kilian-Dirlmeier, Anhänger in Griechenland von der mykenischen bis zur spätgeometrischen Zeit, Prähistorische Bronzefunde 11.2 (Munich, 1979) 79-85, 94-96, and 100-101; nos. 506-26, 552-56, 564-66, 568-69, and 571-72; pls. 26-29. Also see H. Philipp, Bronzeschmuck aus Olympia, Olympische Forschungen 13 (Berlin, 1981) 357, no. 1274, pl. 24; and D. M. Robinson, Metal and Minor Miscellaneous Finds: An Original Contribution to Greek Life, Excavations at Olynthus 10 (Baltimore, 1941) 118-19, nos. 405-406, pl. 24 (Type II, “Birdcage Pendants”).
2. P. R. S. Moorey, Catalogue of the Ancient Persian Bronzes in the Ashmolean Museum (Oxford, 1971) 235, nos. 433-34, pl. 66; see ibid., 137-37, nos. 153-58, pls. 28-29, for larger openwork bronze bells.
3. Homeric Hymn to Demeter, ll. 371-74, 404-15, and 441-47.
4. S. Langdon, ed., From Pasture to Polis: Art in the Age of Homer, exh. cat., Museum of Art and Archaeology, University of Missouri-Columbia; University Art Museum, University of California, Berkeley; Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Harvard University Art Museums (Columbia, MO, 1993) 93-95, no. 22, with parallels.
David G. Mitten
