Curator C. Griffith Mann discusses how three rings featured in the exhibition Treasures and Talismans: Rings from the Griffin Collection forge connections between the past and present.
In addition to spending fortunes on sumptuous villas, lavish entertainment, fashionable clothes, and entourages of slaves and hangers-on, men and women in high Roman society furnished themselves with a range of expensive personal items.
While this skill is traditionally associated with femininity and the education of young girls, it was in fact practiced by both men and women, children and adults, paid professionals and talented amateurs.
The primary functions of the institution of marriage centered on the family and society, and love rarely entered into the equation. Yet the subjects of love, beauty, and attraction mesmerized Renaissance men and women.
