Cleveland Museum of Art

Locket

Date

1700s

Medium

gold and enamel

Culture

Northwestern India, Rajasthan, Rajput Kingdom of Jaipur

Department

Indian and Southeast Asian Art

Institution

Cleveland Museum of Art

This locket may have once been an amulet containing prayers and talismans or a container for perfume or other cosmetic items. At the center, a young woman stands between two groupings of large red flowers. The connections between women and nature have ancient precedents in India, often communicating auspicious fertility. Luxury enamels like this were the hallmark of 18th-century Jaipur goldsmiths and jewelry makers. This locket was given to the museum by the Twentieth Century Club, a women’s community group founded in the early 1900s with satellites across the United States. Green glass, now mostly lost, once filled the lozenge shapes in the woman’s gown.

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