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Antique Gold and Enamel Renaissance Heart Pendant

Antique Gold and Enamel Renaissance Heart Pendant

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Antique Gold and Enamel Renaissance Heart Pendant

About the Item

Renaissance Heart Pendant Spain or Italy, c. 1600 Gold, enamel, glass Weight 17.2 grams; dimensions 45 × 31.4 × 13.8 mm Double-sided heart-shaped pendant in gold and enamel openwork. A blue enameled frame surrounds an oval capsule with convex glass and translucent red and opaque white cartouche with wings. The bulbous outer border consists of opaque blue strapwork alternating with opaque white enameled daisy-like flowers and red globules. Baluster-shaped base with red and blue enamel for the gold pendant loop. Although today we typically associate the heart with romantic love, in the Middle Ages and Renaissance the heart moved effortlessly between religious and secular meanings. The shape could as easily represent the heart of the beloved or the bleeding heart of Jesus (see no. 23). A surviving testament tells us that John of Baret (d. 1580) left his “best heart brooch” to St. Edmund. Does this gift represent the conversion of an object from secular to sacred use? Or was John’s heart brooch already a devotional object? A document of 1380 records that Charles V, king of France, owned “a gold heart enameled in clear red, inside which is a Crucifixion and Our Lady.” Moreover, many medieval gemstones, especially rubies, were shaped like hearts—and we have seen how fluid the meaning of precious stones can be.³ The heart symbolizes love and “sincerity of devotion,” but those qualities can represent human or divine love, romantic or religious devotion. This heart jewel was surely created as a testimony to love but, so long as we do not know what the transparent oculus at its center revealed, we can never be sure of its specific meaning. A very similarly constructed enameled heart in the Thyssen-Bornemisza collection in Madrid is marked with the sacred monogram (IHS) on the reverse and carries a clear jewel on the obverse. Above a crown is suspended, and a pearl hangs below. Yvonne Hackenbroch calls the Spanish jewel a reliquary. Another magnificent enameled and gemmed object, the Scottish Darnley jewel, carries multiple inscriptions that speak to many things—virtue, desire, and ambition—and has many secrets to reveal. On the front the jewel proclaims, “Who hopes still constantly with patience shall obtain victory in their claim.” When one lifts the central jewel (cobalt glass), a skull and crossbones is revealed, inscribed “death shall dissolve,” making the object not a victory trophy but a memento mori (see no. 35). The heart further opens like a locket to reveal an enameled gold surface covered with a baffling multitude of inscriptions and emblems concerning topics as varied as time, pleasure, and victory. The Darnley jewel was commissioned by Lady Margaret Doublas, Countess of Lennox (1515–78), in honor of her husband who died in battle (1571), and it carries their monogram and family heraldry which included the device of the heart. One detail of the Darnley jewel comparable to this heart is the inclusion on both of “wings” on either side of the central jewel, perhaps signifying precious, even “heavenly” contents within. Ultimately, with so many options among which to choose, we cannot be sure what the heart jewel in this collection meant to its original owner, but surely its wonderful openwork structure covered with enamel flowers, strapwork, and “gems” captures the gaze. What did it hold? Whether a bit of cloth or a lock of hair that once belonged to a lover, or alternately a tiny bit of bone or sacred substance, the contents were presented to the eye of the owner as something precious indeed. O! Mankinde, Have in thy minde My Passion smert, And thou shalt finde Me full kinde– Lo! here my hert. Comparisons and Literature: Such hearts, given as tokens of love, became popular in Renaissance jewelry. Occasionally combined with a sacred image, these tokens symbolize divine love. The Darnley (or Lennox) Jewel in the Collection of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II (Piacenti-Aschengreen and Boardman 2008, no. 280) is a prominent example. A heart pendant of the same period with a cameo of Mary, Queen of Scots, is in the National Museums of Scotland, Edinburgh (exh. cat., The Art of Jewellery in Scotland 1991, no. 2). A heart jewel with the initials of Dorothea Maria, wife of Count Palatine Otto Heinrich (1556-1604) of the Wittelsbach family, was found in the Lauinger Crypt (Stolleis/Himmelheber 1977, no. 66). For heart-shaped devotional jewels with sacred images, cf. two pendants belonging to the Madonna of Trapani in the Museo Regionale Pepoli, Trapani (di Natale 1989, p. 66, nos. 7 and 8; di Natale/Abate 1995, I,24 and I,25). The style of this pendant resembles Spanish work; see Kugel/ Distelberger/Bimbinet-Privat 2000, no. 32.

Metal:
Gold,Enamel
Weight:
17.2 g
Dimensions:
Width: 1.24 in (31.4 mm)Depth: 0.55 in (13.8 mm)Length: 1.78 in (45 mm)
Style:
Renaissance
Period:
17th Century
Date of Manufacture:
c. 1600
Condition:
Wear consistent with age and use.
Seller Location:
Chicago, IL
Reference Number:
Seller: J 350451stDibs: LU2334213060582

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