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Object Timeline
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Square (Egypt)
This is a Square. It is dated 5th–7th century and we acquired it in 1902. Its medium is wool and its technique is plain weave with discontinuous wefts (slit tapestry). It is a part of the Textiles department.
Woven portrait busts were a popular way to decorate clothing and soft furnishings in late Roman (third-fourth century C.E.) and Byzantine (fourth-seventh century C.E.) Egypt. Records show that woven busts sometimes portrayed real people. For example, the Emperor Gratian (d. 383 C.E.) is known to have sent the Consul Ausonius a tunic featuring a woven portrait of Constantius. While this bust of a woman may represent a real person, the fragment contains no identifying attributes. The carefully-shaded jewels on the surrounding frame resemble the cabochon rubies and roughly faceted emeralds used in fine jewelry, suggesting that she was a woman of status. A depiction of the Empress Theodora in the Basilica San Vitale uses similar shading to depict the Empress’s jewels.
This object was featured in our Object of the Week series in a post titled Mystery Woman.
This object was
donated by
John Pierpont Morgan.
It is credited Gift of John Pierpont Morgan.
- Hanging, Binary Traces: Kay
- cotton.
- Museum purchase from General Acquisitions Endowment Fund.
- 2007-33-1
- Poster, Blowing in the Mind/Mister Tambourine Man
- lithograph on wove paper.
- Gift of Sara and Marc Benda.
- 2009-12-25
- Book, Things I Have Learned in My Life So Far
- digitally color printed and die-cut cardboard cover with 15 digitally color....
- Gift of Stefan Sagmeister.
- 2011-34-6
Our curators have highlighted 9 objects that are related to this one. Here are three of them, selected at random:
- Poster, Help a Greek Child to Survive
- lithograph on white wove paper.
- Gift of Mrs. E. McKnight Kauffer.
- 1963-39-111-a
- Poster, Elvis
- offset lithograph on paper.
- Gift of Milton Glaser.
- 1979-42-2
- Souvenir Ribbon Portrait, Portrait of Pope Innocent X (1650) by Diego...
- silk.
- Gift of Lisa Taylor.
- 1978-175-1
Its dimensions are
H x W: 15.3 x 14.6 cm (6 x 5 3/4 in.)
Cite this object as
Square (Egypt); wool; H x W: 15.3 x 14.6 cm (6 x 5 3/4 in.); Gift of John Pierpont Morgan; 1902-1-72
This object was previously on display as a part of the exhibition Maira Kalman Selects.
