Auction 89 - Rare and Important Items
Silver and Enamel Ring – Portrait of Theodor Herzl – "Realization of the Balfour Declaration"
Opening: $1,000
Estimate: $2,000 - $3,000
Sold for: $2,000
Including buyer's premium
Ring bearing a portrait of Theodor (Binyamin Ze'ev) Herzl and the Hebrew inscription: "5th of Iyar 5680 / "Realization of the Balfour Declaration." [The former Austro-Hungarian Empire (probably Czechoslovakia), ca. 1920].
Silver (marked; hallmarks faded); enamel.
At the center of the ring is an oval-shaped medallion bearing a profile portrait of Theodor Herzl, facing left, framed with pale-blue-and-white enamel inscribed with the (Hebrew) words "Realization of the Balfour Declaration." The ring also bears the date "5th of Iyar 5680" [April 23, 1920], on either side of the medallion. The inscription is in reference to the resolution of the San Remo Conference (April 1920) granting the United Kingdom a mandate over Palestine on the basis of the Balfour Declaration, wherein Great Britain's leadership declared that "His Majesty's Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people…"
The Balfour Declaration – one of the most significant milestones in the annals of the Zionist movement and the re-establishment of Jewish self-determination in the Promised Land – found expression in all aspects of 20th-century Jewish culture, and perhaps most conspicuously in the plastic arts. From the masters of the Bezalel School and the preeminent art schools of Europe down to anonymous folk artists from the multifarious far reaches of the Jewish Diaspora, Jewish and Zionist artists began producing paintings, prints, vessels, sculptures, pieces of jewelry, functional objects for daily use, and sacred or ritual articles – all in the spirit of the Zionist ethos and infused with emotional uplift, in anticipation that the prophetic dream of the Return to Zion might be realized someday soon. The present ring is of a piece with an entire line of jewelry, ritual objects, and functional and decorative objects, all bearing the image of Theodor Herzl, visionary father of the Jewish State, and commemorates an important landmark on the road to the realization of that very dream.
Diameter: approx. 20 mm. Good condition. Minor warping. Minor scratches.
Silver (marked; hallmarks faded); enamel.
At the center of the ring is an oval-shaped medallion bearing a profile portrait of Theodor Herzl, facing left, framed with pale-blue-and-white enamel inscribed with the (Hebrew) words "Realization of the Balfour Declaration." The ring also bears the date "5th of Iyar 5680" [April 23, 1920], on either side of the medallion. The inscription is in reference to the resolution of the San Remo Conference (April 1920) granting the United Kingdom a mandate over Palestine on the basis of the Balfour Declaration, wherein Great Britain's leadership declared that "His Majesty's Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people…"
The Balfour Declaration – one of the most significant milestones in the annals of the Zionist movement and the re-establishment of Jewish self-determination in the Promised Land – found expression in all aspects of 20th-century Jewish culture, and perhaps most conspicuously in the plastic arts. From the masters of the Bezalel School and the preeminent art schools of Europe down to anonymous folk artists from the multifarious far reaches of the Jewish Diaspora, Jewish and Zionist artists began producing paintings, prints, vessels, sculptures, pieces of jewelry, functional objects for daily use, and sacred or ritual articles – all in the spirit of the Zionist ethos and infused with emotional uplift, in anticipation that the prophetic dream of the Return to Zion might be realized someday soon. The present ring is of a piece with an entire line of jewelry, ritual objects, and functional and decorative objects, all bearing the image of Theodor Herzl, visionary father of the Jewish State, and commemorates an important landmark on the road to the realization of that very dream.
Diameter: approx. 20 mm. Good condition. Minor warping. Minor scratches.
Zionism, the Land of Israel
Zionism, the Land of Israel