Figure 33 Mirror with Peleus, Thetis, and Galene, Etruscan, Late Classical, ca. 350 B.C. Bronze, Diam.: 16.2 cm (63⁄8 in.). New York, The Metropolitan Figure 34 Necklace, Italic or Etruscan, 550–475 B.C. Amber and gold, L Museum of Art, Rogers Fund, 1909, 09.221.16. © The Metropolitan Museum of (approx.): 39.5 cm (159⁄16 in.). Los Angeles, J. Paul Getty Museum, 77.AO.77.5. Art / Art Resource, NY. Gift of Gordon McLendon. As early as the eighth century B.C., the bulla was imitated If amber was fiery and glowing, its most prized in amber for pendants on necklaces, but it is important to characteristics, then this alone might have ensured it a note that documented finds of amber bullae come almost special protective and sanctifying role.159 Amber could exclusively from elite female burials (figure 34).158 Strings also symbolize constancy. Amber necklaces were gifts for of amber bullae excavated in Latium and the Basilicata brides, mortal and immortal, as the ancient sources tell date to the early seventh century. Bullae of amber were us. special translations of the form: they were sun-shaped and sun-colored, shining like the sun, and instead of Another sympathetic function of amber amulets might containing amuletic substances inside a metal envelope, have been their ability to focus the powers of a particular the material itself was a curative (remedia) that could deity and astrological force. Amber’s magnetic properties enclose inclusions. gave it a special role in attraction (and displacement), and because of its already potent associations with the sun, amber may have been thought able to draw, attract, and fix the sun’s influence.160 Ancient beliefs in the ability of stones to draw down the power of the planets and stars, and especially the rays of the sun, were widespread and are described first in Egyptian texts and later in Hermetic writings on talismans. We might extrapolate from such sources how amber might have worked in this regard. One Hermetic papyrus describes how “the magician draws down to earth the spiritual powers of the star, planets, and fixes them in talismans prepared of the proper substances and engraved with or shaped into the proper symbolic forms.”161 In early modern Europe, amber, gold, and rubies—all solar materials—were believed, like the sun, to have the property of generating the vital spirit of the microcosmos. It is not difficult to see how a shiny amber amulet could have been thought to contain sunlight or to allow light to 50 INTRODUCTION