CIRCA 1ST CENTURY B.C.

Details

A ROMAN GARNET RINGSTONE WITH A HERM HEAD OF HYPNOS
CIRCA 1ST CENTURY B.C.
9/16 in. (1.5 cm.) long

Provenance

said to be from Taranto.
‌Giorgio Sangiorgi (1886-1965), Rome, acquired and brought to Switzerland, late 1930s; thence by continuous descent to the current owner.

Literature

J. Boardman and C. Wagner, Masterpieces in Miniature: Engraved Gems from Prehistory to the Present, London, 2018, p. 152, no. 139.

Special notice

This lot has been imported from outside of the UK for sale and placed under the Temporary Admission regime. Import VAT is payable at 5% on the hammer price. VAT at 20% will be added to the buyer’s premium but will not be shown separately on our invoice.

Conditions of sale

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Lot Essay

The herm head of Hypnos, the personification of sleep, is here represented facing to the right, with long beard and ringlets falling onto his shoulders, wearing a herring-bone hatched diadem with a wreath of leaves behind, dotted butterfly wings emerging from the diadem behind his ear with ribbons trailing out behind. This is a particularly detailed example of the type. For others cf. "Hypnos/Somnus" in LIMC, Vol. V, p. 598, nos 63-64, with the above example being very similar to one in Munich (A 1742) and J. Boardman, Engraved Gems, The Ionides Collection, London, 1968, p. 104, no. 87.

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