From a set of eight openwork belt ornaments cast in bronze (BZ.1929.9 - BZ.1929.16). Six of them, like this, comprise a rectangular plaque decorated with a stylized animal, probably a crouching griffin, with a hinged openwork pendant below (missing on one). There is a hole in each corner for a rivet to fasten the plaque to the belt. A seventh rectangular plaque is identical to the main body of the six but lacks the hinge for the pendant (BZ.1929.16)

The belt tab, BZ.1929.12, has an openwork design of a leafy scroll.

M. Ross, Jewelry, Enamels and Art of the Migration Period, Catalogue of the Byzantine and Early Mediaeval Antiquities in the Dumbarton Oaks Collection, Vol. II, (Washington, DC, 1965), no. 168, pl. 84.

Handbook of the Dumbarton Oaks Collection, Harvard University (Washington, DC, 1955), no. 152.

Purchased from Kalebdjian, Paris through Royall Tyler, Paris, 1929.

Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Robert Bliss, Dumbarton Oaks.

Harvard University, The Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, November 1940

Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, Byzantine Collection, Washington, D.C.