JH10-JH17: Earrings from the Jordan hoard
JH10 Leech-shaped earring, made of a single sheet of silver folded over, with margins of silver granules; rectangular silver strip soldered to the bottom, with groups of silver granules soldered below. Kraay and Moorey 1969, no.127 (Ashmolean 1967.755)
JH11 Leech-shaped earring, as above; hoop missing; alternating triangles of silver granules along the two faces. Kraay and Moorey 1969, no.128 (Ashmolean 1967.756)
JH12 Earring with cluster-pendant of silver balls. Kraay and Moorey 1969, no.131 (Ashmolean 1967.759)
JH13 Flat crescentic earring, decorated with margins, triangles and small piles of silver granules. Kraay and Moorey 1969, no.137 (Ashmolean 1967.763)
JH14 Triple-platform earring: three rectangular silver sheets set horizontally, separated by pyramids of granules set along the edges. Kraay and Moorey 1969, no.138 (Ashmolean 1967.766)
JH15 Triple-platform earring, as above. Kraay and Moorey 1969, no.140 (Ashmolean 1967.768)
JH16 Earring with pear-shaped “vase”-pendant: two sheets of silver crudely fitted together at the waist, with extensive granular decoration. Kraay and Moorey 1969, no.141 (Ashmolean 1967.769)
JH17 Earring in the form of an eight-pointed star. Kraay and Moorey 1969, no.143 (Ashmolean 1967.770).
Commentary
Leech-shaped earrings (JH10-11) have a long history in the Near East; they seem to have been particularly associated with Syria, and one of the Syrian delegates on the Persepolis Apadana reliefs (Delegation VI) seems to be wearing an earring of this type (G. Walser, Die Völkerschaften auf den Reliefs von Persepolis (1966), Tafel 46; perhaps also a member of the Lydian Delegation XII, Tafel 61). A very close parallel is found in the Deve Hüyük assemblage (Moorey 1980: p.83, no. 304, with p.81 Fig.13: British Museum). The Ashmolean has a spectacular pair of gold earrings of similar shape and design from a 'Scythian' burial at Nymphaion in the Crimea, c. 400 BC (M. Vickers, Scythian and Thracian Antiquities in Oxford, 2002, 18-19, Plate 3). The same basic shape and design was also used for necklace-pendants: compare a silver necklace-pendant from the Achaemenid burial at Hacınebi, very close to Deve Hüyük (Stein 2014, 269 no.HN2276). The exceptionally fine granulation of the two earrings in the Jordan hoard is a distinctive feature of Syrian metalwork; for an analogy from the Persian heartland, see D. Stronach, Pasargadae (1978), p.209 Fig.89 (gold pin, with the head decorated with margins and triangles of gold granules).
The earring with a cluster-pendant of silver balls (JH12), widespread in the Achaemenid Levant (perhaps of Iranian origin), also has two precise analogies from the Deve Hüyük assemblage (Moorey 1980: pp.82-3, nos. 301-2, with p.81 Fig.13: Ashmolean).
Flat crescentic earrings such as JH13 are distinctively Achaemenid (no Greek or earlier Near Eastern analogies); there is a very close parallel at Deve Hüyük (Moorey 1980: pp.82, no. 300, with p.81 Fig.13: Ashmolean), and several more elaborate examples from Pasargadae (D. Stronach, Pasargadae (1978), p.201 Fig.85).
I know of no close parallels for the marvellous triple-platform earrings (JH14-15).
Earrings with vase-shaped pendants (JH16) appear throughout the Levant, Cyprus, and Anatolia in the Achaemenid period; the closest analogies for this example come from Kamid el-Loz in Lebanon.
The eight-pointed star (JH17) finds close parallels in royal Achaemenid art (the “star of Shamash”), e.g. above the head of Ahuramazda and on the crown of Darius on the Bisitun relief: see M. Cool Root, ‘Defining the divine in Achaemenid Persian kingship’, in L. Mitchell and C. Melville, Every Inch a King (2013), 37-44.