The fluttering effects of this earring’s suspended figure was undoubtedly meant to evoke the god Eros’s flight. This example depicts the god holding a torch, to enflame the wearer or viewer with burning desire. Such earrings were popular during the early Hellenistic period, where they seem to have carried an erotic charge.
Provenance
- Lewis Einstein (1877–1967), Washington, DC; gifted by Einstein to Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, Washington, DC, 1961.
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