Skull (the Memento Mori Death's Head)

The skull is the sharpest, oldest and most honest memento mori symbol. Unlike the weeping willow (see Weeping Willow), which aestheticises pain, or the butterfly (see Butterfly), which consoles it, the skull is a confrontational iconographic gesture: it puts death directly before the eyes. That harshness makes it the dominant mourning and memento mori jewellery of the European aristocracy in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries; from the Victorian mourning dress code onwards (see The Victorian Era (1837–1901)) it is increasingly made taboo, because it breaks too abruptly with bourgeois sentimental mourning etiquette. In the modern market it is enjoying a revival - primarily in fashion and tattoo contexts, secondarily in specialist memorial pieces.

Symbolic meaning

The skull carries several layers of meaning:

• Memento mori - its primary charge: "remember that you will die." An admonitory gesture calling for a conscious life
• Vanitas - the transience of all worldly beauty and possession; the central element in vanitas still lifes (see Baroque (c. 1600–1750))
• Concrete remembrance - in personalised memento mori rings with initials and a date of death, the skull refers to a particular deceased person
• Penitence and religious contrition - in the context of Catholic piety (Trent, the Counter-Reformation), an admonition to prepare the soul for one's own death
• Power over death - paradoxically: whoever looks death in the face fears it less; wearing skull jewellery is a deliberate breaking of a taboo

In Christian iconography the skull is closely bound to the hill of Golgotha - calvaria, "the place of the skull", denotes both the skull and the site of Christ's crucifixion. On many crucifixes and depictions of the Crucifixion a skull lies at the foot of the cross (often interpreted as the skull of Adam) - an iconographic link between the first death (the Fall) and the death of Christ that overcomes it.

History

Antiquity. Skulls and skeletons as vanitas symbols are attested in Greek and Roman funerary and mosaic iconography. A famous example is the memento mori mosaic from Pompeii (first century AD): a skull with a spirit level and a butterfly, beside it a spinning wheel - a complete vanitas composition.

Middle Ages. Skull symbolism is present in monastic piety and in illumination, but is rarely documented in jewellery form.

Late Middle Ages and Renaissance. The Ars Moriendi - the art of dying a good death - becomes a literary genre in its own right. Skull jewellery arises as a religious keepsake; the early pieces are often vernacular and modest.

Tudor and Stuart England (sixteenth to seventeenth centuries, see Tudor Mourning and Stuart Bequest Rings). Memento mori jewellery becomes an aristocratic tradition. Henry VIII, Mary Stuart and their courts wear rings with inlaid enamel skulls; Anne Boleyn bequeaths several memento mori pendants in her will. The Stuart crystal rings - gold rings with a rock crystal cabochon over a painted skull or a small plait of the deceased's hair - are the most important English memento mori jewellery tradition.

Baroque (1600–1750, see Baroque (c. 1600–1750)). The high point of memento mori jewellery across Europe. South German, Dutch, Italian and Spanish workshops make elaborate skull pendants and rings. One speciality: funeral rings, distributed to invited mourners at English aristocratic funerals - usually gold rings with a black enamel skull and, on the inner face, the deceased's name and date of death. Well-known historical pieces: the Charles I memento mori rings (after the execution of 1649) and the William of Orange pieces.

Late Enlightenment (1750–1830). Memento mori jewellery loses importance with the rise of sentimentalism (see Sentimental Jewellery). The direct iconography of the skull is replaced by gentler symbols - weeping willow, urn, mourning figure (see Weeping Willow).

Victorian (see The Victorian Era (1837–1901)). The skull is largely taboo within the Victorian mourning dress code. It contradicts a bourgeois mourning etiquette founded on sentimental consolation. It appears only sporadically, in the jewellery of secret societies (Masonic jewellery) or in subversive memento mori pieces.

Twentieth century. A long interval. The skull appears sporadically in Art Deco pieces (see Art Deco) and in military insignia (the SS death's head, with its problematic charge), but as a symbol in memorial jewellery it has practically vanished.

From 1990. A revival - driven by goth subculture, by tattoo culture and by a fashionable rediscovery of historical memento mori iconography. Designer labels (Alexander McQueen, Damien Hirst) make the skull a fashion icon of the late 1990s and 2000s. In the memorial jewellery context it remains a niche to this day, but is once again usable as a deliberate historical reference.

Formal variants

Full skull. A naturalistic or stylised depiction of the complete human skull. In Baroque pieces often with recognisable cranial sutures, eye sockets, nasal aperture and rows of teeth.

Skull with crossed bones. A skull above two crossed femurs. A later variant (from the eighteenth century) that passed into jewellery from military heraldry.

Skull with hourglass. Skull and hourglass (see Hourglass) in one composition - a doubled memento mori message, very frequent in Baroque rings.

Skeleton composition. A full-figure skeleton - standing, seated or sleeping. In elaborate pendants or in rings with a hinged closure.

Hinged skull ring. A ring whose skull bezel opens to reveal a small relic setting inside (hair, ashes, an inscription). A technically very demanding special form.

Enamel skull on a black ground. A white skull on a black enamel ground - the typical English funeral ring variant (see Black Enamel (Schwarzemail)).

Carved ivory skull. A miniature skull in ivory (see Ivory), in a gold mount as a pendant or ring bezel. A high-quality Baroque variant.

Materials

Memento mori jewellery was made in a range of materials:

• Gold (see Gold in Mourning Jewellery) - high-quality pieces, often with black enamel detail
• Silver (see Silver in Mourning Jewellery) - in vernacular work and widespread in German workshops
• Black enamel on gold (see Black Enamel (Schwarzemail)) - the classic English funeral ring technique
• Niello inlay (see Niello (Black Inlay Technique)) - blackened skull lines in a silver or gold ground
• Ivory (see Ivory) - carved miniature skulls, above all in southern Germany and the Netherlands
• Rock crystal over a painted skull - the Stuart crystal tradition (see Tudor Mourning and Stuart Bequest Rings)
• Pinchbeck and tombac - inexpensive copper-zinc alloys for vernacular pieces

The skull in the modern memorial market

Several fields of application exist in today's market:

Fashion jewellery. Designer labels and fashion jewellery makers offer skull pendants, rings and earrings. These pieces are primarily fashion-driven, but can be read as a deliberate memento mori gesture. Prices: 30–3,000 €.

Historicising memorial pieces. Specialist workshops make memento mori rings after Baroque models - a gold ring with an inlaid black enamel skull, with the deceased's name and date of death on the inner face. A small but loyal niche of the memorial jewellery market. Prices: 600–4,000 €.

Tattoo variant. In tattooing the skull has for decades been one of the most frequent memorial motifs - often combined with initials, a date of death or roses.

Collectors' items. Antique memento mori jewels of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries form a collecting field of their own. Authentic Stuart crystal rings, funeral rings and vanitas pendants achieve prices from 1,000 € up to six figures for historically significant pieces.

The current revival

The rediscovery of the skull as a contemporary symbol is part of several cultural movements:

• Goth and punk subculture from the 1970s onwards, which actively took up memento mori iconography
• Tattoo culture with its repertoire of classic Sailor Jerry motifs (skulls, roses, swords)
• Designer fashion (Alexander McQueen; Damien Hirst's diamond-set skull For the Love of God, 2007)
• Deliberate historical reference within the memorial jewellery field

This revival does not mean that the skull has become a standard mourning symbol - heart and butterfly continue to dominate the modern memorial market. But for mourners with a connection to the historical memento mori tradition, or to modern tattoo and goth aesthetics, the skull is once again a deliberate option - one that does not soften the harshness of death but names it directly.