Pendant, white nephrite jade, inset gold, rhodolite garnet and turquoise, Mughal empire

A pendant fashioned in white nephrite jade, with the front being convex and polished. The concave back has been roughly worked and given a partial polish. The front face is decorated with a symmetric, floral design of inlaid gold wire and inset with five turquoise cabochons and twenty-four rhodolite garnet cabochons in reflective and coloured closed settings. The reflective and coloured surfaces have subsequently deteriorated and faded. At the top is a small protrusion that has a hole drilled parallel to the plane of the pendant. Some gold wire is absent.

This pendant was formerly in The India Museum in London and it was then transferred to the South Kensington Museum (later renamed The Victoria & Albert Museum) in 1879.

This pendant has been fashioned from white nephrite jade and then inset with rhodolite garnet and turquoise in gold. It was originally owned by Colonel Charles Seton Guthrie, a renowned collector of Mughal and other hardstones. He sold itwith other objects from his collection to the Indian Museum in Leadenhall Street, London, in 1868. They were all transferred to the South Kensington Museum, later renamed the Victoria and Albert Museum, in 1879.

03135(IS)