carved from a piece of layered sardonyx, the instrument comprising of a tortoiseshell sound box with a pair of horn armatures, picked out in a rich brown strata of the stone, the background in pure white.

Mounted in a gold brooch dating to the late 18th Century.

Length: 4 cm
Cameo: 1.3 cm x 1 cm

£8,750

The lyre is an attribute of the God Apollo and associated with the Muse Terpischore. It was the symbol of poets and musicians and was a rebus of harmony.

On the reverse there is evidence of a hole which ran through the centre of stone. This was the means by which the gem was originally conceived to have been mounted in ancient Rome, threaded with a section of gold wire which could then be suspended or secured.