These imposing serpentine armbands represent two tritons, male and female, each holding a small winged Eros. The hoops behind the tritons' heads were used to attach the armbands to the sleeves of a garment, for otherwise, their weight (each over 6 1/2 ounces) would have caused them to slip down the arms.
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Title:Pair of gold armbands
Period:Hellenistic
Date:ca. 200 BCE
Culture:Greek
Medium:Gold
Dimensions:Overall: 10 7/16in., 0.4lb. (26.5cm, 0.2kg) Other (height-triton armband): 9 13/16in. (25cm) Other (height-tritoness armband): 10 7/16in. (26.5cm)
Classification:Gold and Silver
Credit Line:Rogers Fund, 1956
Accession Number:56.11.5, .6
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Picón, Carlos A. 2009. "Glass and Gold of the Hellenistic and Early Roman World." Philippe de Montebello and the Metropolitan Museum of Art: 1977-2008, James R. Houghton, ed. pp. 20–21, fig. 27, New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Lapatin, Kenneth. 2015. Luxus: The Sumptuous Arts of Greece and Rome. no. 39, pp. 74, 232, pl. 39, Los Angeles, CA: J. Paul Getty Museum.
Picón, Carlos A. and Seán Hemingway. 2016. Pergamon and the Hellenistic Kingdoms of the Ancient World no. 166, p. 231, New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Holcomb, Melanie. 2018. Jewelry : The Body Transformed pp. 106–7, pl. 84, New Haven: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Metropolitan Museum of Art. 2020. ART = Discovering Infinite Connections in Art History. p. 199, New York: Phaidon Press.
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The Museum's collection of Greek and Roman art comprises more than 30,000 works ranging in date from the Neolithic period to the time of the Roman emperor Constantine's conversion to Christianity in A.D. 312.
