Image © Trustees of The British Museum
Persian jewellers were masters of modelling in gold and this graphic armlet is a jewel of enormous character as well as technical prowess. The mythical griffin was a fabled creature that incorporated multiple animal and human features into its form; the detail of every part of the beast is breathtaking here. The armlet also demonstrates the beauty of symmetry in jewellery.
This piece forms part of the Oxus Treasure, widely considered to be the most important collection of gold and silver to have survived from the Achaemenid Empire. The status of its first owner is emphatically communicated by the fantastical nature of the subject but the griffin may also be designed to enhance its wearer’s power, as a talisman of esoteric knowledge or magical protection.