Palm Beach Jewelry , Art & Antique Show , 2013 T K Asian

I'm Michael Teller of TKA Asian Antiquities. This shelf here we have a pair of gold bracelets with lion head terminals on them. Actually a very famous design thought to be a Greek creation. Through recent research we actually know that the Achaemenid Empire heavily influenced this and that most of these actually what they call rope design whether it's twisted or not were made for the Scythians by the Greeks. This is a particularly early example here done around the 4th century BC and these were found also in the northern part of Afghanistan. They happen to have been so popular this was actually one of Fabergé's designs and he copied it almost to the T. A lot of his work was influenced by the ancient cultures and he derived he interpreted them differently in different media but in this particular instance Fabergé's depiction is almost identical and the work is spectacular here. Melting tiny tiny pieces of gold soldering to other pieces of gold it was incredibly difficult to maintain the shapes. These are just superb examples here. This was probably found made for some secular or religious ruler in the Bactrian area and then probably was captured when a city was destroyed and brought down into the Steppe area and then ultimately found its way into China. Whether it was tribute or put into the ground as an example of this warrior's accomplishments we don't know but these are one of the few things that survived after the Steppe tribes would ransack or destroy a culture or city. Everything was flattened. They were nomadic cultures. Everything was melted but they would keep something like this because it was representative of the power that they had just conquered. So certain personal adornments that had great religious significance and certain things like a crown like this are generally the emblems that they would keep intact. All of the gold collection presented at this show is probably the only collection worldwide not just for commercial ventures or collectors but even major museums that has been thoroughly documented scientifically. Each piece has been subjected to multi-disciplines by the top experts in the world, scientific experts in the world and using the latest technology that most people are not even aware of that exists. That gold is the only metal that can actually be dated. It's a system called uranium, thorium and helium and all of our pieces have been not only subjected to analysis but for construction, for impurity patterns, for tool markings for x-ray fluorescence and electromicrobe but they've all been subjected to the uranium, thorium, helium test the dating mechanism for gold and this does not exist except perhaps a single piece and even the major museums around the world. You have every piece depicted here which took a period of many years to do. It's very difficult. There's only one tube in the world capable of doing that. Every piece is done here though is done with that particular method. We have to actually measure the number of atoms of helium per milligram of gold and then we have to figure out the ratio of it parts per billion to the radioactive isotopes in the material. That's the basic science, a little more complex than that but it is so time-consuming and with only one machine in the world capable of measuring those low helium concentrations that is why you have the only dated collection of ancient gold available in the world today.