While the material this cameo is made of is mere Pinchbeck (a copper and zinc alloy resembling gold), a secret unfolded when researching the names on this cameo that was truly astounding — and that secret took an
otherwise $50 cameo to a $1,000 cameo.
Adah Isaacs Menken was a childhood friend of Annie Holcombe. Annie and her sister were considered the
belles of the Confederacy. Volumes have been written about the Holcombe sisters and their activities in
Confederate society.
Though a beauty in her own right, Adah Menken became far more than a Southern belle. With her shockingly cropped hair, theater career, public smoking and multiple marriages and affairs —one of them with Alexandre Dumas pêre — she was notorious.
Flamboyant and fearless, Menken was the highest-earning actress of her time. She was dubbed “America’s first pinup girl” for posing in scandalous photos and on stage — in nothing but her underwear or a flesh-toned body
stocking — which was simply not done in the 1860s.
Inside the cameo, we found a handwritten note from Adah noting that this was a souvenir from when she played Mazeppa at the Old National Theater — her star-making role.
Ms. Menken died in 1868 after a devastating illness; she was only 33 years old.
Three former Sothebyscom associates and three art historians
on staff. We will buy for cash or consign to auction
any of your rare, valuable watches, antiques, coins
or collectibles. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
