The surprising history of the locket<\/h1>\n
By Rachel Church<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>
What is a locket?<\/h2>\n
A locket is a jewel linked with memory. It can be a private sentimental item or an object associated with public success.<\/p>\n
Most importantly, it is a container – a jewel made to hold a precious item, perhaps a portrait, a lock of hair, an item of sentimental importance or a relic.<\/p>\n
Lockets can be used in most forms of jewellery. They hang from a necklace or are set in the clasp of a bracelet or the bezel of a ring. They can be brooches, pins and even buttons.<\/p>\n
Modern lockets are generally worn by and marketed to women. However, historically, they were worn by women, men and children. They were made from precious metals and gemstones for the rich. Mass produced lockets made from cheaper materials were available for a wider group of wearers. Whether richly set with gems or very humble, they were often intensely sentimental and personal jewels.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>
Holy relics: the locket in medieval Europe<\/h2>\n
The early history of the locket is linked to that of reliquary jewels. These small pendants were made to contain holy tokens such as fragments of bone or hair from a martyred saint.<\/p>\n
Faithful Christians believed that these relics could heal the sick and perform miracles.<\/p>\n
Wearing a relic close to the body was a sign of faith and served as an amulet to protect the wearer against both physical and spiritual evils.<\/p>\n<\/div>
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<\/a><\/span><\/div><\/div><\/div>Silver and enamel locket pendant
\nLombardy, 1400-1500
\n\u00a9 Schmuckmuseum Pforzheim<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>
<\/a><\/span><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/a><\/span><\/div><\/div><\/div>Enamel silver-gilt locket, France, 1300-1400
\n\u00a9 Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>
This enamelled \u2018Agnus Dei\u2019 pendant once held a disc of wax which had been blessed and stamped with an image of a lamb and cross. These were made from the candle used by the Pope during Easter celebrations. They were a powerful amulet, especially for pregnant women.<\/p>\n
Reliquary jewels were also used as diplomatic gifts and status symbols. In 1238, the French king Louis IX bought the Crown of Thorns from Baldwin II, the Emperor of Constantinople. He used individual thorns as diplomatic gifts, one of which was set into an amethyst and enamelled locket now in the British Museum.<\/p>\n
A holy relic was a treasure beyond price and needed an appropriate container. Reliquary jewels were often made of gold, enamelled and set with pearls and gemstones. They were worn at the highest levels of society – the 1380 inventory of Louis d\u2019Anjou lists \u2018petits reliquaries d\u2019or a porter sur soy\u2019 (little gold reliquaries to wear upon your person).<\/p>\n<\/div>
<\/a><\/span><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/a><\/span><\/div><\/div><\/div>Reliquary pendant with Virgin and Child, Greece, c. 1550
\n\u00a9 Walters Art Museum<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>
A beautiful pendant, set with an amethyst cameo of the Virgin and Child was given to the monastery of St John on the Greek island of Chalke by a cleric named Arsenius. The back of the jewel has a cross shaped locket which probably held a fragment of the True Cross or a relic closely associated with Christ. The inscription reads \u2018Thou hast redeemed us by Thy precious blood, nailed to the cross\u2019.<\/p>\n<\/div>
<\/a><\/span><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/span><\/div><\/div><\/div>Gold and pearl locket brooch, Germany ca. 1340-60
\n\u00a9 Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>
The great English writer Geoffrey Chaucer told his readers that to win a fair lady\u2019s love, you should send her \u2018letters, tokens, brooches and rings\u2019. Jewellery was a well understood way to earn a place in someone\u2019s heart. A medieval German brooch in the shape of the letter E (probably the initial of the wearer or the donor) is set with the figure of a man, piercing his own heart with arrows. The inscription on the back can be translated as \u2018Fair lady, may I always remain close to your heart\u2019. The hinged lid lifts up to reveal a hollow space which may once have held perfume or a sentimental token.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>
Rewards and renown: the Renaissance and 17th century locket<\/h2>\n
Renaissance lockets were often portrait jewels (known as bo\u00eetes a portrait in French). These jewels made prestigious court or diplomatic gifts. They were offered as a sign of favour and treasured as family heirlooms.<\/p>\n<\/div>
<\/a><\/span><\/div><\/div><\/div>Medallion with a knight of the Order of the Golden Fleece, ca. 1600-20
\n\u00a9 Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>
The outer case of the locket was designed to be seen. It could be enamelled with a monogram, an ornamental design or set with a cameo, gemstones or a medal. The locket often held painted miniatures by the finest artists of the day such as Nicholas Hilliard, Isaac Oliver or Jean Petitot.<\/p>\n<\/div>
<\/a><\/span><\/div><\/div><\/div>Designs for pendants,Ornements d’orf\u00e8vrerie, Louis Roupert, Metz, ca. 1668
\n\u00a9 Biblioth\u00e8que de l’Institut National d’Histoire de l’Art<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>
<\/a><\/span><\/div><\/div><\/div>Locket with monogram of Henrietta Amalia von Anhalt-Dessau, The Netherlands, ca. 1690
\n\u00a9 Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>
Receiving a jewel set with the portrait of a ruler was a great honour. Portrait jewels could be official gifts, for a visiting ambassador or the prince of another realm. The first recorded instance of a miniature being used in diplomacy between two states was in 1526, when Marguerite, duchesse d\u2019Alen\u00e7on sent pictures of her two sons, set in finely worked gold lockets, to the British king Henry VIII. The children were hostages at the court of Emperor Charles V and Marguerite hoped to gain Henry\u2019s support in reclaiming them.<\/p>\n<\/div>
<\/a><\/span><\/div><\/div><\/div>Pendant with portrait of Mary Stuart, wife of William II of Orange, ca. 1645
\n\u00a9 Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>
Portrait jewels might also be granted to recognise an individual service. In 1611, the British king James I gave a locket set with his painted miniature in a jewelled case to Thomas Lyte as a reward for painting the king\u2019s family tree. He also gave a fine diamond chain hung with his portrait to the Duchess of Lennox as a thank you for making \u2018broths and caudles\u2019 for an invalid. Wearing a jewel with the ruler\u2019s image was a wonderful way to show your closeness to the court and the favour you enjoyed.<\/p>\n<\/div>
<\/a><\/span><\/div><\/div><\/div>Double portrait locket, The Netherlands, c. 1645
\n\u00a9 Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>
Lockets could also hold more intimate images, like this double locket which holds the portraits of an unnamed man and woman, probably a husband and wife. This is a smaller and more personal version of a double wall portrait.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>
Love in life and death: the locket in the 18th century<\/h2>\n
The word locket<\/em> began to appear in the English language in the mid 17th century – other European languages used a variation on medaillon<\/em>. Contemporary paintings often show the locket worn as a pendant from a chain or ribbon around the neck or hanging from a belt.<\/p>\n<\/div> Designs for lockets or pendants from the Nouveau Livre de Serrureries, Paris 1709 Women, men and children continued to wear lockets. Crime reports from the early eighteenth century report small children wearing gold or silver lockets on coral necklaces. Coral was a protective amulet and the locket may have held the picture of a parent, a lock of hair or a religious image.<\/p>\n<\/div> Baby with locket, 1813 Lockets continued to be court gifts, set with portraits or medals of the ruler.<\/p>\n<\/div> In Mozart\u2019s opera \u2018Cos\u00ec fan tutte\u2019, Guglielmo gives his heart, in the form of a locket, to Dorabella to replace the portrait of her former lover, Ferrando. The symbolism of the locket is clearly shown as Guglielmo sings \u2018This heart I give you, lovely idol mine\/ but yours I want also. Come give it to me\u2019. By giving Dorabella a locket, Guglielmo is laying claim to her affections.<\/p>\n The locket\u2019s outer case was often enamelled with a romantic scene, or with a personal monogram while the precious image or relic was hidden inside.<\/p>\n<\/div> Locket with enamelled romantic scene, ca. 1800 Giving someone a locket was an intimate act, especially if it contained a lock of hair or a miniature picture. In Marivaux\u2019s play Les Fausses Confidences of 1737, when asked for a picture by her lover Dorante, Araminte exclaims \u2018Give you my portrait? But that would be the same as saying I love you!\u2019<\/p>\n The woman seated in this painting by Nicolas Lavreince holds up a locket at arm\u2019s length, perhaps to comfort herself for her lover\u2019s absence.<\/p>\n<\/div> Detail of La Consolation de l\u2019Absence, Nicolas Lavreince, ca. 1785 Part of the charm of a locket was that it could be there when the lover was absent, a token to be cherished and kissed. The hero of The Lover\u2019s Luck, a 1696 play by Thomas Dilke, owned \u2018a Locket of your Ladyship\u2019s Hair, which he always wore next to his heart […] kissed a thousand times […] not without a frequent Current of Tears\u2019. Mourning jewels often included hair. A little heart shaped locket from 1706 is set with hair on one side and on the other, an engraved skull and date of death.<\/p>\n<\/div> Mourning locket with hair, America, 1706 Political lockets might hide the wearer\u2019s sympathies by concealing a portrait of a ruler or a politician inside a neutral case, like those worn by supporters of the exiled Stuart monarchy in Britain. In Revolutionary France, Madame de Genlis showed her move, from being a member of the court inner circle to an ardent Revolutionary, by wearing a locket, set with the word Liberty in diamonds and enclosing a piece of the destroyed Bastille prison.<\/p>\n<\/div> Many jewels were made to commemorate Admiral Horatio Nelson, the British hero of the Napoleonic Wars. Wearing a jewel set with his portrait or a lock of his hair was a sign of national pride and a way to associate yourself with a significant historical moment.<\/p>\n Locket with portrait and hair of Admiral Horatio Nelson, 1805 Lockets were at the peak of their popularity in the 19th century. By 1871, the Queen magazine declared that \u2018Lockets \u2026 are considered indispensable with morning costumes.\u2019<\/p>\n<\/div> Young woman wearing a locket, ca. 1805 They were very widely worn by both sexes and at all ages, from the small child to the old age pensioner. Women usually wore lockets around their neck on a chain or ribbon, pinned to the bodice as a brooch or perhaps set into the clasp of a bracelet or a ring. They might also hang from the waist on a watch-chain or a chatelaine. Men\u2019s lockets were typically private jewels, worn with a chain or ribbon under the shirt or perhaps fixed to a watch-chain and tucked into a waistcoat pocket.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/a><\/span><\/div><\/div><\/div>
\n\u00a9 Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/a><\/span><\/div><\/div><\/div>
\n\u00a9 National Gallery of Art, Washington<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>The sentimental locket – \u2018Il core vi dono – this heart I give you\u2019<\/h3><\/span>
<\/a><\/span><\/div><\/div><\/div>
\n\u00a9 Mus\u00e9e de la Vie romantique, Paris<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/a><\/span><\/div><\/div><\/div>
\n\u00a9 Musee Cognacq-Jay, Paris<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/a><\/span><\/div><\/div><\/div>
\n\u00a9 Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>Political lockets<\/h3><\/span>
<\/a><\/span><\/div><\/div><\/div>
\n\u00a9 Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>Love, fashion and novelty: the locket in the 19th century<\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/span><\/div><\/div><\/div>
\n\u00a9 Collection Tansey, Museum Celle<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>