A Carthaginian Glass "Eye" Bead Necklace, ca. 6th - 2nd century BCE

This superb necklace features sixty glass eye beads of yellow and blue, turquoise and blue, and white and blue, interspersed with translucent light and dark blue glass beads. Three ancient gold beads at the center of the necklace.

Condition: Beads show minor signs of wear commensurate with age, they are intact and in very good condition overall. Restrung with a modern 18K gold S-hook-and-loop closure. 

Dimensions: length: 21 1/2 in (54.6 cm)

Provenance:  The Hauge Collection of Ancient & Iranian Art, assembled between 1962 and 1966. Foreign service brothers, Victor and Osborne Hauge, together with their wives Takako and Gratia, assembled their collection of Persian, Japanese, Chinese, and Southeast Asian works of fine and folk art while stationed overseas with the US government after WWII. In consultation with academics and dealers, the Hauges assembled over two decades of what former Freer Gallery of Art director Harold Stern described in 1957 as "without doubt one of the finest private collections in the world". Victor and Takako published Folk Traditions in Japanese Art to coincide with a traveling exhibition held from 1978 at the Cleveland Museum of Art; Japan House Gallery, New York; and Asian Art Museum, San Francisco. Much of their collection was donated to the Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery at the Smithsonian Institute culminating in an exhibition and published catalogue in 2000. The balance of the collection, including this necklace, was inherited by descent in 2016.