Advanced Search 
Memorial pendant
about 1800
Object Place: United States
Medium/Technique
Gold with horn/ivory or bone/shell
Dimensions
Height x width: 3 5/16 x 2 7/16 in. (8.4 x 6.2 cm)
Credit Line
Gift of Miss Margaret Roys
Accession Number49.511
NOT ON VIEW
ClassificationsJewelry / Adornment – Pendants
DescriptionOval locket set in gold with flat suspension ring. Obv: painted ivory, architectural background, woman kneels at raised pedestal with urn on top, both mounted with gold and pearls (loose). Blue oval on stand inscribed: AM / Obt. Sep 9 / 1800 / AEt. 25. Convex glass has painting of willow branches above urn. Rev: pearl and gold wire held curls of hair in pearl frame within blue enamel. (from card)
InscriptionsA M / Obt Sep 9 / 1800 / AEt 25" (from card)
ProvenanceCollection of Miss Margaret Roys by 1949; to MFA June 6, 1949, gift.
"Locket in memory of Abigail May, d. Sept. 9 1800." (from object file)
"from a letter: This locket is part of a bequest which came to my mother and her two sisters from the estate of their two great aunts, the Misses Mary Davenport and Charlotte Augusta May, the last two of the family of Colonel John and his wife Abigail May of Boston and sisters of the Abigail May whose death is commemorated on the locket...
...the portrait of my great-great-grandmother May (the mother of Abigail of the locket) painted by Gilbert Stuart...was at the museum..returned to its owner, the Children's Aid Society, and now hangs in their building in Mount Vernon Street...Guerrier portrait of her husband owned by the American Antiquarian Society...
Margaret Roys" (from object file)
"Locket in memory of Abigail May, d. Sept. 9 1800." (from object file)
"from a letter: This locket is part of a bequest which came to my mother and her two sisters from the estate of their two great aunts, the Misses Mary Davenport and Charlotte Augusta May, the last two of the family of Colonel John and his wife Abigail May of Boston and sisters of the Abigail May whose death is commemorated on the locket...
...the portrait of my great-great-grandmother May (the mother of Abigail of the locket) painted by Gilbert Stuart...was at the museum..returned to its owner, the Children's Aid Society, and now hangs in their building in Mount Vernon Street...Guerrier portrait of her husband owned by the American Antiquarian Society...
Margaret Roys" (from object file)