TimeLine Auctions Limited
Lot 149
3rd-4th century AD. A gold ring with round section hoop, the bezel with a collar supporting a projecting cup with line to the rim; set with an extremely rare chrome chalcedony engraved with the bust of Serapis with bushy beard and modius crown to the top of the head. See Lüle, Çigdem, Non-destructive Gemmological Tests for the Identification of Ancient Gems, in Gems of Heaven, British Museum Research Publication 177 2012 pp.1-3 for information on chrome chalcedony and its use in ancient times. 7.53 grams, 23.78mm overall, 19.88mm internal diameter (approximate ring size British U, USA 10 Europe 22.33 Japan 22) (1"). Very fine condition. A large wearable size. Stone of an extremely rare material. UK art market, acquired prior to 2000. The extremely rare green variety of chalcedony coloured by chromium was only known to the ancients and the Romans, until circa 3rd century AD, when it disappears from history. It is only known from small worked pieces such as beads and intaglios. The source has been recently re-discovered as being from northern Turkey (Anatolia"). Serapis was a hybrid deity combining Egyptian and Greek elements and first appears in the Ptolemaic period. Although there is an account by the Roman historian Tacitus propounding that Serapis originally came from Asia Minor, the land of Egypt itself probably provided the elements for the god. He seems to have originated from the cult of Osarapis, the deified dead bull god that fused the both Osiris and Apis into one. The nature of Osarapis, involving the concepts of life after death and agricultural fecundity, seems to have attracted the early Ptolemies as being the quintessence of the myriad deities of Egypt, and as the aspects most easily fused with Greek gods. The Hellenistic elements in Serapis predominate in his nature and iconography and he has characteristics from Zeus, Dionysus, Aeculapius and Hades, which reflect his role as a sovereign with healing and the underworld; the Ptolemies essentially created a deity that would unite the native Egyptian population, as well as the Greek, and which reflected the multicultural and diverse nature of Alexandria and the Ptolemaic court.
