Pair of Earrings (1st century): Artwork and History

Pair of Earrings (1st century) is in the Art Institute of Chicago collection. The museum lists its creator attribution as Roman; probably Egypt.

The work and its context

The Art Institute of Chicago describes the work:

For both men and women in the Roman world, jewelry functioned as a visible sign of wealth, social standing, and gender. Artists of the time created some works in accord with earlier Hellenistic and Etruscan preferences for the extravagant and conspicuous use of gold. Over time, imperial expansion increased Romans’ access to a variety of valuable materials, leading to a distinctly Roman taste for jewelry incorporating color—typically in the form of gemstones or glass, as seen in these earrings.

Object facts

• Title: Pair of Earrings
• Date: 1st century
• Artist attribution: Roman; probably Egypt
• Place of origin: Roman Empire
• Medium: Gold and glass
• Dimensions: Gold balls: Diam.: 2 cm (13/16 in.); H.: 4.5 cm (1 5/16 in.)
• Type: Costume and Accessories
• Department: Arts of Greece, Rome, and Byzantium
• Reference number: 1892.24a-b

Collection credit

Gift of Charles L. Hutchinson

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The description above is credited to the Art Institute of Chicago and reused under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0; HTML formatting has been converted to plain text. Other catalogue metadata and the public-domain image are provided under CC0 1.0.