American
Reliquary Pendant with Relics, early 20th century
Silver and glass with fabric fragments and paper notes, 2.7 cm (1 1/16 in.)
This tiny, silver pendant is an oval shape with an attached open circle of silver to allow it to be worn on a chain. One side is solid molded silver decorated with a heart bisected by a crown of thorns. There is a cross emerging from a flame in the center of the cleft in the heart. The heart and cross are surrounded by silver raised rays that radiate to the periphery where there is a decorative serpentine border of alternating spheres and tree forms. On the reverse side, enclosed in transparent glass and a border of silver beadwork, there are two mementos arranged on a red fabric and needlework background. The first, sitting on a green background is a yellow porous object. Underneath, inscribed in ink on slip of paper ger... (illegible). Next the second object is a square piece of dirty looking fabric with another slip of paper below, with de Perboyp (?) printed on it. There is a tiny brown leather satchel designed to protect the pendant. It has an attached leather strip to be used as a tie closure. It is outlined in gold and decorated with four tiny gold flowers.
Little Salon
Commentary
Given to Isabella Stewart Gardner by her good friend and accomplished poet Gretchen Osgood Warren for Christmas in 1923, this silver pendant holds two tiny, yet to be identified relics perhaps mementos of their friendship. Twenty years earlier John Singer Sargent painted Gretchen and her daughter Rachel in the Gothic Room of the Museum. The portrait, a reminder of Isabella’s patronage of contemporary artists, is now in the collection of the Museum of Fine Arts Boston.