Cleveland Museum of Art

Pair of Earrings with Vishnu Riding Garuda

Date: 1600s or 1700s
Medium: Gold set with precious and semiprecious stones
Department: Indian and Southeast Asian Art
Institution: Cleveland Museum of Art

These earrings were made to hang on large bronze sculptures of deities worshipped in Nepalese temples. Nepalese craftsmen excelled at the detailed encrustation of jewels to depict complex figural imagery. They shaped gold wires into a framework, then inserted polished stones into the spaces, held in place with an adhesive. Four-armed Vishnu is made of sapphires; his mount the man-eagle appears to be made of carnelian and spinel with wings of turquoise. The father of Jeptha Homer Wade II (1857–1926), who owned these earrings, gave the land for the museum and Wade Oval.

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