This cross attests to the conservative nature of the cross pendant. Its techniques situate its origins in an Austro-Hungarian workshop of perhaps the late eighteenth century. This example has no figurative or explicit iconography. It makes its case for the glory of the Cross (or other relic that it may have contained) through intricate workmanship and applied gems. The face of the cross comprises an elaborate network of gilded silver filigree scrolls and globules that center on an openwork rosette of radiating spikes with a paste gem at its midpoint. It is lavishly and further adorned with globules and multicolor paste gems set in star-form mounts. Beads of some sort, now missing, would have dangled from the three loops. The surface might be said to virtually twinkle with ornament.



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