Ornamental Brooch
c. 100–300 CE
- Medium
- bronze and champlevé enamel
- Classification
- Jewelry
- Dimensions
- Overall: 5.1 x 4.8 x 1.6 cm (2 x 1 7/8 x 5/8 in.)
- Culture
- Gallo-Roman or Romano-British, Migration period
- Museum
- Cleveland Museum of Art, Medieval Art
- Credit line
- Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund
- Rights
- Public domain (CC0), as the museum states it.
- Who can see it
- Little Ones profiles and older: it shows gentle subjects for the very young. How works are placed
View at the Cleveland Museum of Art
About this work
These brooches functioned as garment clasps (much like the generally larger fibulae) and are distinctive for their decorative enamels. The art of enameling was highly popular among the conquered peoples who lived on the outskirts of the Roman empire, chiefly the Celts and the Gauls. Though the enameling technique was practiced by the Romans themselves on small objects, the brightly colored decoration readily appealed to "barbarian" taste. By the AD 200s, enameled brooches like these were being made in abundance by the native peoples of Britain and Gaul (modern France and Belgium).
