{"product_id":"antique-portrait-of-king-solomon-masonic-seal-pendant","title":"Antique Portrait of King Solomon | Masonic Seal Pendant","description":"\u003cp\u003eHere we have a king who has spent over a century staring down from somebody's wall, and every detail of him suggests that wall belonged to men who kept minutes in code and met behind a locked door.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis portrait depicts a bearded man in a striped, Judeo-Egyptian style headdress topped with a small gold diadem set with a red stone. Around his neck hangs a six pointed star in gold, set with red stones and a central green one: the Seal of Solomon. Crown, beard, seal. This is King Solomon, rendered in the \"type head\" tradition that filled academic ateliers and, just as often, fraternal halls, in the decades around 1900.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSolomon is not incidental to Masonic tradition. He is one of its foundational figures, honored as the king behind the building of the Temple, and his seal is worked into ritual symbolism at nearly every level of the craft. Iowa City had the infrastructure to make that connection more than coincidence. Iowa City Lodge No. 4 was chartered in 1844, one of the four founding lodges of the Grand Lodge of Iowa, and the city built a Masonic Temple to match its standing. The same city ran a parallel tradition of university literary societies, the Zetagathians, the Irving Institute, the Hesperians, whose halls leaned on exactly this kind of classical and allegorical figure to dress up a room built around ritual and self improvement.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis piece comes out of an Iowa City estate alongside a companion portrait of a woman crowned in laurel and roses, signed Alethea, Truth, along the bottom edge (see our companion listing in our store). \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003ehttps:\/\/www.etsy.com\/listing\/4557159654\/antique-portrait-of-alethea-truth?ref=shop_home_active_1\u0026amp;frs=1\u0026amp;sts=1\u0026amp;logging_key=b473ef9d8bab38c7c47f25eb0c378fcd4e73620d%3A4557159654\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSame board, same hardware, hung as a pair for longer than either owner is around to explain. We have not found a lodge stamp or maker's mark on the back, so we are calling the fraternal context exactly what it is: the strongest read of where a painting like this lived, not a documented fact we can point to in ink.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe artwork measures 12 1\/4” x 9 1\/4”. There is edge wear and chipping to board corners, craquelure and toning consistent with age, hanging wire and screw eye intact on verso. \u003cbr\u003ePlease see all pics as they are part of the description. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eA man who kept the Temple's secrets is not going to give up his own. But we suspect you already knew that.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Mad Van Antiques","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43472030400589,"sku":null,"price":250.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0116\/3637\/5610\/files\/IMG_0424.jpg?v=1786935954","url":"https:\/\/madvanantiques.com\/products\/antique-portrait-of-king-solomon-masonic-seal-pendant","provider":"Mad Van Antiques","version":"1.0","type":"link"}