Pin with Decorative Comb Finial

One end of this object, which is perhaps a pin, is a flat, openwork vegetal design with what may be two stylized dolphins, pointed downward with their noses touching. Thin, sharp, pointed tines topped the decorative element; all but two of the tines are broken (1). The blunt tip and untapered shaft argue against an identification of the object as a pin and suggest instead that it was a decorative element of unknown function. NOTES: 1. Compare a silver example in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, inv. no. 47.100.27; see A. Oliver, “Two Hoards of Republican Silver,” The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 13.5 (1965) 177-85, esp. 183, figs. 9-10. For an Egyptian example of a pin-comb combination from Sakkara in the Teti Pyramid cemeteries, see W. Hayes, The Scepter of Egypt 2: The Hyksos Period and the New Kingdom (1675-1080 B.C.) (New York, 1960) 402, fig. 253. Compare also a scraper published in N. Rauch, Instruments de chirurgie gréco-romains (Lausanne, 1961) 21, no. 75. David Smart