Elephant-head necklace

The bravura coloristic style of Hellenistic Greek jewelry is ideally represented by this lavish necklace with elephant-head finials. The necklace itself makes a rich play of contrasting emeralds, garnets, and rock crystals, while the elephant heads are meticulously modeled in repoussé and heavy wire to suggest the character of their rugged skin and the lively curves of their trunks. Such necklaces were probably worn with the finials on the wearer’s chest to display these fine sculptural attachments. The remnants of wreaths that once crowned the elephants’ heads suggest that the animals were associated with the cult of the god Dionysos, scenes of whose ceremonial procession from India to the Mediterranean often included animals like panthers and elephants. The realism of the elephant heads is also typical of Hellenistic style. This necklace is one of over one-hundred pieces of rare ancient Greek, Etruscan, and Roman gold jewelry in the Dallas Museum of Art collections.