Folia Historica 28. (Budapest, 2013)

II. KÖZLEMÉNYEK - Ewa Letkiewicz: The Hungarian King's Daughter Kinga's 13th Century Jewel in Polish Collections

Ewa Letkiewicz

THE HUNGARIAN KING'S DAUGHTER KINGA'S 13th CENTURY JEWEL IN POLISH COLLECTIONS

The Poor Clare's sisters from Stary S^cz keep in their treasury an extremely mysterious jewel. It is a massive, largish-sized pendant, decorated by a gem with an unidentified head showed from profile, (photo 1) According to the oral tradition, the jewel was the property of the convent founder, Kinga (1234-1298), the Duchess of Kraków and San- domierz, who was later a saint. Her name is linked by tradition and hypotheses with some other precious mementoes kept in the nunnery, (photo 2)

The jewel with gem, despite its ancient specification certificate, did not enjoy too much of researchers' interest. In the hitherto short mentions in the subject literature, the authors generally agreed as to the fact that the metal part of the pendant might have belonged to St. Kinga, because it was from the second half or the end of the 13th century. However, the dating of the gem set in the pendant was very divergent. The gem was referred to as 'Egyptian or Greek one, from the 6th century before Christ',1 'late ancient',1 2 'Byzantine' or 'much older'3 than the metal pendant.

The jewel of the dimensions: 9,8 cm height; 7,1 cm width; 3,6 cm thickness, was made of silver, gilded tin. It consists of two parts in the form of irregular ovals , connected on the left by a hinge, on the right - by a clasp, which most probably originally had locked with a bolt that had not kept until our times.4 The joined parts form a kind of box, empty inside.

The irregular oval form was imposed by the shape of gem cut in the two-colored, blue-gray and milk-white jeweler's stone (agate?), placed in the frontal part of the jewel.

1 Karta biala. Ed.: Wladyslawa Chodaczek, on commission of Relics of the Past Restorer and Diocesan Curia in Tarnów, 1953-1955.

2 Michal Walicki: Wyposazenie artystyczne dworu i kosciofa. In: Sztuka polska przedromanska i romariska do schytku XIII wieku. Ed.: Michat Walicki. Catalogue and Bibliography of the Relics was compiled by Maria Pietrusinska. Warsaw, 1971. 299. Katalog 757.

3 Katalog Zabytków Sztuki w Polsce. Vol. 1. Woj. Krakowskie., Ed.: Jerzy Szablowski. föl. 10., Powiat Nowosqdecki. Prepared: Anna Misiqg-Bochehska, Miasto Nowy Sqcz. Prepared: Tade- usz Dobrowolski. Warsaw, 1951. 41. photo 49.

4 In identically structured and locked boxes the bolt of the clasp is attached to the permanently secured short chain, like e.g. in the reliquary of the thorn from Christ's thorn crown. Tait, Hugh: 7000 Years of Jewellery. London, 2001. 209. photo 509.

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