Belt clasp

Belt clasp

Unknown artist

Details

Medium
Bronze
Dimensions
4 3/16 × 4 1/8 × 13/16 in. (10.7 × 10.5 × 2.1 cm)
Holding institution
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
License
CC0-1.0
Credit
Rogers Fund, 1921

Art Genome Taxonomy

9 tags

Subject Matter

  • Animals Both · 98%

    The Metropolitan Museum of Art lists Birds and Deer as subjects, and the openwork design visibly includes multiple animal forms, including two prominent deer-like quadrupeds and bird-like forms.

Visual Qualities

  • Patinated and Oxidized Visual · 94%

    The surface shows mottled green oxidation and brown-gold areas characteristic of an aged bronze surface.

  • Highly Ornamented Visual · 96%

    The rectangular frame, braided borders, corner bosses, animal figures, and scrolling ornament create a densely decorated surface.

  • Patterns Visual · 93%

    Repeated braided bands, spirals, incised marks, and recurring rounded forms organize both the frame and the interior openwork.

  • Curvilinear Forms Visual · 96%

    Looping scrolls, spiral coils, rounded animal bodies, and flowing openwork contours dominate the composition.

Medium and Techniques

  • Relief Visual · 87%

    The animal and ornamental elements are modeled as raised bronze forms surrounding and separating open spaces, producing a relief-like openwork surface.

Time Periods

  • Ancient Art Metadata · 99%

    The catalog dates the belt clasp to approximately the 1st–2nd century CE, supporting its classification as ancient art.

Geographic Regions

  • The work is cataloged in the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Ancient West Asian Art department. This supports a broad Middle Eastern geographic association, but does not establish a more specific place of manufacture.

Materials

  • Bronze Metadata · 99%

    The catalog identifies the medium as bronze.

Source & rights

Unknown artist. Belt clasp. The Metropolitan Museum of Art.