Bead with floral pattern
Culture: Mycenaean
Period: Late Helladic III
Date: ca. 1400-1300 B.C.
Medium: Blue glass
Dimensions:
approx.: 3/4 × 1/2 in. (1.9 × 1.3 cm)
Credit Line: San Antonio Museum of Art, gift of Paul and Peggy Pace
Object number: 2020.1.3
Provenance: with Galerie Günter Puhze, Freiburg, by 1987; sold by Galerie Günter Puhze to Robert Willson (1912-2000) and Margaret Pace Willson (1919-2006), San Antonio, 1990; by inheritance to Margaret Pace Willson’s son, Paul Pace, San Antonio, 2006; by gift to the San Antonio Museum of Art, 2020
Label Text
Mycenaean craftsmen cast glass in open stone molds to create flat beads with designs in relief, like this group, in three shapes all decorated with four- or five-petalled rosettes. Like the other objects displayed nearby, these beads reflect the extensive networks of trade and exchange around the eastern Mediterranean during the Late Bronze Age. The blue glass was produced in Egypt and shipped in ingots, then cast into beads in workshops closely associated with Mycenaean palaces, particularly at Mycenae and Knossos. Such beads were not themselves exported, however, and most surviving examples have been found in Mycenaean tombs. (J. Powers, 2020)
On view
In Collection(s)
The San Antonio Museum of Art is in the process of digitizing its permanent collection. This electronic record was created from historic documentation that does not necessarily reflect SAMA's complete or current knowledge about the object. Review and updating of such records is ongoing.
This resource has been made possible in part by the National Endowment for the Humanities: Exploring the Human Endeavor.
