Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2017 with funding from Getty Research Institute https://archive.org/details/antiquegemsrings01king_0 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. LONDON : l’RINTED by WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET AND CllAKING CROSS. ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. BY C. W. K I N G, M.A., FELLOV OF TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE “ Those also that cut and grave seals, and are diligent to make great variety, and give themselves to counterfeit imagery, and watch to finish a work.” — Ecclus. xxxviii. 27. VOL. L- TEXT. LONDON: BELL AND DALDY, YORK STREET, COVENT GARDEN. 1872 . PRINTED BY STAMFORD LONDON : WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, STREET AND CHARING CROSS. P K E F A C E. My ‘ Antique Gems,’ though complimented by too flattering reviewers as an “ exhaustive book,” w r as in truth little more than an attempt at giving a general view of the numerous and widely differing branches of an enormously extensive subject. The very favourable reception, however, granted by the literary world to this first attempt, encouraged me, during the following decade, to carry out three of its sections to something more like the fulness that their nature and interest demanded. Thus the section of “ Materials ” grew, after some years of further research and elaboration, into a fresh volume, equalling its parent in size, and which in a second edition again nearly doubled its contents, under the title of ‘ The Natural History, Ancient and Modern, of Precious Stones,’ &c. The chapters treat- ing of the supernatural properties attached by antiquity to the subjects of the glyptic art had previously furnished a field for long and continuous labour in drawing up what, after all, was a “very incomplete account of matters requiring so much research ; but which, nevertheless, filled a large volume, as ‘ The Gnostics and their VI PREFACE . Remains.’ The same subject, of all others the most deeply interest- ing to myself (but, unluckily, not so to the public), has since that publication occupied much of my time, and its continued pursuit has resulted in an accumulation of matter that would, if ever called for, treble the bulk of its predecessor in the same walk. All who have seriously entered into such studies, are well aware that to treat of Gnostic monuments with the completeness that their abundance, variety, and bearing upon the history of religion demand, would require an extension of limits compared with which those of the volume just mentioned would appear no more than of a hasty sketch. And, lastly, whatever the original text contained upon the rise and progress of glyptics in connection with the history of creative art in general, being brought together into a continuous form, and supplemented with an account of public collections of gems, and the more important pieces they possess, constituted by themselves a treatise of considerable extent, under tbe name of ‘ The Handbook of Engraved Gems.’ Nevertheless, after all this cutting and carving from the parent stock, there was still left intact what the actual amateur and collector of the productions of the art would regard with good reason as the most essential portion of the whole. This was all that relates to gems viewed as objects for the cabinet, and valuable in exact propor- tion to their authenticity and fulfilment of the promise they bear upon their face ; for which end information upon dimensions, forms, mechanical execution, subjects, and styles, was particularly demanded from a book professing to offer guidance to the dactyliologist in every walk of his pursuit. Equally desiderated by the same class of readers was the knowledge of the uses which the objects of their pursuit had originally subserved, and of the various fashions devised by ancient taste and ingenuity to enable them best to perform those purposes. With a view to the accomplishment of this remain- ing portion of my self-imposed duty, I have taken every opportunity, during the interval since my first essay in this department, of collecting information upon the last-mentioned points, partly practical, PREFACE. vii from the examination of numerous cabinets, opened to me by the kindness of their possessors, to whom my first book had served for a letter of recommendation ; from the perpetual communication of fresh types on the part of all sorts of collectors seeking information from one whom they seemed to take for granted had set up for an oracle, “ in re gemmaria,” by the committing of himself to print ; from the unremitting collection and study of a large series of casts of all important gems ; and, lastly, from never losing a chance of forming an opinion upon every work that came within my reach, belonging to the immense literature of the subject, a department in which the two last centuries have been so wonderfully prolific. All the large stock of notes and extracts thus brought together, after religiously obeying Horace’s precept — “ Nonum prematur in annum ” — I have incorporated with the chapters of cognate nature, and thus have gradually remodelled and rewritten the whole, often finding the means for expanding mere passing allusions into entire pages, so that the present work might have the better claim to the title of a complete account of antique gems and rings. The epithet, indeed, is somewhat too restrictive ; for our cabinets being fully as much indebted to the artists of the Eevival as to those of antiquity, con- siderable space has been, in justice, allotted to those once famous Italians who took up the smouldering torch from the dead hand of Dea Roma , and speedily fanned its flame to its pristine (but a more fantastic) lustre. The chapter “ On the Portraiture of the Ancients ” was written for the ‘Archaeological Journal,’ but being intimately con- nected in nature with the section it now follows, and the interval since its publication having furnished me with much new and curious matter, I have judged its introduction absolutely indispensable to the complete- ness of the present treatise. The correspondence with distant amateurs, above alluded to, has enabled me to enrich these pages with some important new discoveries of gem-stars, hitherto unpublished. Most remarkable amongst these for novelty and interest of subject are the Telephus consulting the PREFACE. viii Oracle , of the Hon. A. S. Johnson ; the Family of Ptolemy /., of Mr. Muirhead ; and the so-called Demosthenes, by Dexamenos, belonging to Admiral Soteriades ; the last being, in all likelihood, that most precious of monuments, the portrait of the old Chian engraver him- self, and from his own hand. The larger portion of the illustrations in the text have been engraved for the present work, and are taken from gems of the greatest celebrity. Some have been often published, in every variety of manner, but are now reproduced by Mr. Utting with an accuracy and an intelligence of their true spirit, which every one who understands drawing will appreciate, and would seek for in vain in their representations in previous publications. The series of plates consists of all the illustrations from my pre- ceding, and other works of similar nature, carefully arranged accord- ing to their subjects, so as to form a general atlas of the glyptic art. They compose the largest and most comprehensive series ever presented at one view, nearly equalling in numbers that of Gold’s ‘ Museum Florentinum ’ (by far the most extensive hitherto published), and far surpassing that work in completeness, for it is entirely deficient in all that relates to Oriental art of any period. For the benefit of those requiring more minute information in the different branches of the subject, I have appended a list of “books upon the glyptic art and cabinets of gems,” with brief notices of the character of each. Those only are put down which have been actually examined by myself with sufficient accuracy to enable me to form a correct judgment on their merits. Merely to have transcribed from library catalogues (as Millin has done) the titles of such books, without any knowledge of their real value, would have served no other end than by a false parade of one’s own reading to bewilder and mislead the inquirer ; and, besides, to have unprofitably occupied a large portion of my space, so incredibly productive was the dactyliology of preceding times. Trinity College, 1871. C. W. King. TABLE OF CONTENTS. PAGE Preface ......... v Description of Woodcuts in the Text .... x Introduction ........ 1 Tests of Antiquity in Engraved Gems, and the Instruments used by the Ancient Engravers ...... 18 On the Forms of Antique Gems . . . . . .35 Cylinders — Assyrian, Babylonian, Persian .... 38 Babylonian and Assyrian Deities . . . . . .53 Cones and Hemispherical Seals ..... 58 Indian Engraved Gems . . . . . . .88 Modern Oriental Engraving ...... 92 Egyptian Intagli . . . . . . . .97 Etruscan, Greek, and Phoenician Scarabei .... 197 Scarabei of Tharros . . . . . . .124 Phoenician Intagli . . . . . . .130 Kohler’s Classification of Etruscan Scarabei .... 136 Etruscan Art ........ 115 Greek and Koman Glyptic Art ...... 182 The Portraiture of the Ancients ..... 199 General Observations 222 X TABLE OF CONTENTS. PAGE Astrological Subjects ....... 238 Signa Orientia ........ 254 Subjects of the Designs on Gems ..... 258 Cameo Engravings ...... . . 284 Lower Empire and Byzantine Camei ..... 304 Complimentary or Inscription Camei ..... 310 Barbaric Camei ....... 314 Works “en ronde bosse Phalerje ..... 317 Camei of the Revival ....... 322 Rings, their Origin and Use . . . . . . 329 Iron Rings ........ 351 Silver and other Metal Rings ...... 361 Figure Rings ........ 369 Stone Rings ........ 372 Magic Rings ........ 376 Papal and Episcopal Rings ...... 386 Bulls ......... 394 Gimmel Rings ... ..... 397 Die-sinkers and Gem-Engravers ..... 400 Gem-Engravers, Ancient ....... 407 Modern Gem-Engravers ...... 412 English Gem-Engravers ....... 445 Seals in terra-cotta : Tessera ..... 453 Casts in Plaster of Paris and in Sulphur .... 456 Works upon the Glyptic Art and Cabinets of Gems . . 462 Index . . . . . . . . . 471 DESCRIPTION OF THE WOODCUTS IN THE TEXT. Title-page. — Teleplius, King of My si a, consulting his national god, the Indian Bacchus, how he may obtain a cure for the festering wound in his leg, received from the spear of Achilles. The story is very graphically told by the writhing anguish manifested in the attitude of the despairing hero, and by his bandaged limb, whilst the spear placed so conspicuously against the altar, at once indicates the cause of the mischief, and prevents our mistaking the sufferer for the equally lamed Philoctetes, of whom the distinctive attribute is the bow. A bust of a deity placed upon an altar is the regular conventional method for expressing the presence of an Oracular shrine. This very interesting type, no other example of which can I find published, has been lately communicated to me by its possessor, the Hon. A. S. Johnson, Utica, U.S. Golden sard, drawn to twice the actual size. Page v. — Bust of Pallas, covered with an almost transparent robe, represented with wonderful delicacy by the engraver. Her head is covered with a helmet, made to imitate locks of hair, although its rigidity has been carefully expressed, so as to leave no doubt as to its composition : it is surmounted by a lofty crest. This curious as well as beautiful design must have been a copy from some statue of great celebrity at the time, for the Biacas Cabinet possesses a replica of this on a smaller (though still unusually large) scale, which has every appearance of being antique. It has been supposed by some to be taken from the Minerva of Phidias in marble, the principal figure in the western pediment of the Acropolis Sardoine, slightly enlarged in the drawing. (Florence.') Page ix. — Ptolemy Soter, Berenice, and their son, P'niladelphus. The head of the DESCRIPTION OF THE WOODCUTS IN THE TEXT. xii father is laureate d, to mark his deification ; that of his son is diademed, to show that lie was then the reigning prince after his father’s decease. These striking peculiarities of costume render it almost certain that this very remarkable gem was engraved for the actual signet of Ptolemy II. (Vide p. 187.) The gem is a sard, one-third of the dimensions of the drawing, and was brought from Egypt many years ago, and long in the possession of a noble lady. (Muirhead.) Page x. — Nusbirwan the Just. The same portrait that is seen on his medals. Calcedony. (King.) Page xi. — Jupiter Axur, or “the Beardless.” Now explained as Augustus under that form ; an attribution, however, controverted by the diadem, which can only belong to a Greek king. There is consequently much better reason for discovering in this fine gem a copy from the celebrated painting by Apelles of Alexander, in the same character, which decorated the temple of Ephesus. (Orleans.) Page xix. — Bacchanalian concert. A Bacchante and young Faun, reclining on a lion’s skin spread in the shade of a tree, are singing to the accompaniment of Pan’s syrinx. Cameo of the best Boman period. (Beverley.) Page 1.- — Cupid guiding a lion by the sound of his lyre : emblematic of brute force subdued by Culture. The signature is one of the very few whose authenticity is beyond suspicion. The artist’s name is commonly read “ Protarchos but closer examination proves it to be “ Plotarcbos,” the Boeotian form of Pb/tarchos. Cameo. (Florence.) Page 17. — Augustus, in advanced life. The inscription shows it to have served for the seal of the municipality of Valeria in Latium. A valuable example of a public seal thus authenticated : first made known by Visconti in his ‘ Esposizione di Gemme Antiche.’ (From a Cad.) Page 18.' — Antinous, with spear on shoulder, in the character of Achilles : a portrait in the so-called “ Heroic ” style. Sard. (Marlborough, formerly in the Zanetti Cabinet.) Page 35. — Persian noble on horseback : an engraving of uncommon excellence in the Sassanian style, from the correctness of the drawing and the delicate execution of all the details. The name, in Pehlevi letters of the earliest form, seems to read “ Arinani.” Amethyst. (Paris.) Page 38. — The Cylinder of King Urukh : the most important relic of Assyrian art. Described at p. 42. Page 52. — The Cylinder of Sennacherib. Described at p. 44. Amazon-stone. (British Museum.) Page 53. — Ashtarotli and a worshipper. From a cylinder. (Layard.) Ib. — Two figures of Sin, the moon-god. He appears as an old man, leaning on a staff, and walking over the crescent ; thus presenting a singular analogy to the present popular idea of the figure of the “Man in the Moon.” Intagli on cones. (Layard.) Page 58.' — Sapor, the Fire-priest of the Hyra?ans. His lofty tiara is emblazoned with the Tripod, emblem of his office. Described at ’ p. 62. Carnelian, slightly enlarged. (British Museum.) DESCRIPTION OF THE WOODCUTS JN THE TEXT. xiii Page 80. — Varahrau Kerman shah ; as will convincingly appear upon comparison with the portrait taken from the Devonshire amethyst. Ib. —Youthful prince, probably his son and Viceroy of Bactriana — a circumstance accounting for the legend being written in Pali. These seals (carnelian, and rock-crystal), slightly enlarged in the drawing, were found both hidden in the same hole amongst some ruins in the Punjab. (Col. Pearse.) Page 91. — Brahminee Bull. Given here as an example of the coarse style of work characterizing the great majority of the Sassanian hemispherical stamps in calcedony. ( Prqun .) Page 92. — Head of a “malignant and a turbaned Turk,' 1 very cleverly eternized by a Cinque-cento hand in a fine heliotrope, obtained by Col. Leake in the Morea. A memento of Venetian occupation. Page 97.— Tablet engraved on both sides, and bearing the cartouche of Amenophis II.; but probably of Ptolemaic date. Yellow jasper. (British Museum.) Page 106.— Chimaara and Sphinx fronting each other. Etruscan graffito in gold. ( Vescovali.) Page 107. — Ulysses recognised by his old hound, Argus. Archaic Greek scarabeoid of calcedony. (Leake.) lb. — Hercules and the Neimean lion. Etruscan scarabeus, of extraordinary dimensions, in sard. (Hamilton Gems, British Museum.) Page 123. — Hercules beating down Cycerus, son of Mars. Their names are given in the Etruscan spelling and characters. Sard scarabeus. (Blacas.) Ib. — Arimaspian contending with a Gryphon. Calcedony scarabeus. ( Uzielli.) Ib. — Lady seated, arranging her hair in a mirror, which a young girl holds to her. In the field may be discovered the names “Mices” and “Dexamenos.” A specimen of early Greek engraving, to which few rivals can be produced. Calcedony scarabeoid. (Leake.) Page 124. — Lion pulling down a stag. A national Phoenician device, and the intaglio probably of Phoenician workmanship. Sard scarabeus, found at Vulci. (Demidoff.) Page 130. — Massinissa, to keep to the common designation of this head. The metallic rigidity of the beard, however, makes it manifest that we have no portrait at all in this curious gem, but a vizor in the form of a face, like the Sassanian helmets described by Ammian. The gem here engraved is the original; in the numerous copies the beard is naturalized and the features softened into the life required for a portrait. Calcedony. (Barbarini.) Page 135. — Persian encountering two gryphons. Inscribed “ Seal of Gadshiratb, son of Artidati.” Cylinder of the Aebcemenian period. Described at p. 49. (British Museum.) Page 136. — Icarus falling from the skies, in consequence of the dissolution of his wings. In his hands are seen the saw and the drill, inventions of his father, Daidalus, whose own name is put below in disjointed Etruscan letters, A A I A L E. Calcedony scarabeus. (Blacas.) Page 136. Neptune tearing open the rocks to make a passage for the Peneus XIV DESCRIPTION OF THE WOODCUTS IN THE TEXT. personified under the figure of a home, the forepart of which is visible emerging from the chasm. Inscribed with the Pelasgic name of the god, NE0YNO2. Scarabeus in sard, from Vulci. ( Durand 1.) Page 144. — Hermes Psychopompus, carrying a soul to Hades. Etruscan scarabeus. ( Berlin .) Ih. — Cadmus at the Fountain, engaging the Dragon which has slain his com- panions. Etruscan gem. (Berlin.) Ih. — Ganymede represented as an emasculated Etruscan pincerna, presenting a diota to his lord. Scarabeus in sard. ( Beugnot .) Page 145. Etruscan Lucurno, or priest-king, habited in a perfectly Assyrian style, lidding a caduceus. In the field are the Raven, so important in Augury, and the Fawn of Bacchus. Graffito in gold. (Beverley.) Page 181. — Chariot drawn by a Sphinx and a Pegasus, met by a Harpy, who presents a lotus-flower to the driver. As the Harpy is the emblem of Death, and Pegasus became afterwards the regular conveyance of glorified spirits to heaven (as in the Apotheosis of Augustus), this most mystical design may be explained as the arrival of the happy soul in Elysium. Gold graffito. (Fioli.) Page 182. — The Claudian Family. Claudius, with his niece, Agrippina, faces his (adoptive) father Tiberius, who is accompanied by Livia. The Eoman eagle in the centre turns his head towards the reigning emperor — an ingenious method of indicating the date of the work. The arms and cornucopias filling up the composition, elegantly allude to the Ithastian, Germanic, and British conquests of both Cassars. Cameo, double the size of the drawing. ( Vienna.) Page 198. — Gallienus facing his empress, Salonina. Between them is the Homan Eagle, standing upon the nuptial altar entwined with myrtle. The wheat-ears crowning the pair signify the blessings expected from their union. The emperor has here, as may also be remarked upon his coins, almost the profile of the young Nero. Sard. (Praun.) Page 199. — Miltiades, for so Visconti identifies this portrait upon sufficiently valid grounds. Amethyst. (Blacas.) Page 221. — Warrior wearing a helmet shaped into the head of a ram. Pronounced, on the authority of the Eoman Institute, a portrait of Hannibal. Sard. (Dr. Nvtt.) Page 222. — The famous “ Drunken Bacchus,” of which Winckelmann observes : “ This paste represents the intaglio from which it was taken with all the precision of the original, being perfectly well preserved. And I venture to say that this Bacchus equals in beauty of drawing and correctness of workmanship any other figure of antique art. I further remark, that from the large dimensions of the piece, the artist has had room to exhibit with freedom his knowledge and his resources. We behold the expression of all the parts of the body, so as to be actually able to count the muscles which are termed the extensors. And yet the minute details into which the engraver has gone, have not seduced him into losing sight of the character of his subject. For having to represent a god at the age of puberty, with that tender softness and luxurious deportment that are his distinctive marks — all this is here visible, but as it were upon the peaceful surface of a tranquil sea, and where nothing is undulatory, except in an DESCRIPTION OF THE WOODCUTS IN THE TEXT. xv imperceptible manner from the action of a mere breath of air.” Antique paste. ( Berlin .) Page 237. — Cupid reclining on the ground, with one hand extended as if in the act of playing with astragali. Inscribed with the name of Phrygillus, usually supposed to designate the artist, (the same actually is found on a Syracusan medallion,) but much more probably the owner of the gem. Of this pretty intaglio, Winckelmann remarks : “This is one of the most valuable Greek engravings known, not only with respect to its drawing and execution, but also its high antiquity ; for besides the border , which is like that in the earliest Etruscan engravings, the characters of the artist’s name appear more ancient than those upon any other antique in existence. The Shell has hero doubtless the same signification as the one upon a coin of Syracuse, at the side of the head of a goddess, which, on the strength of this same attribute, I take for a head of Venus. To this shell has been given the name of ‘ Paphia,’ and ‘ Cytheriaca.’ ” (‘ Pierres Gravees de Stosch,’ pp. 138, 230 ) Page 238. — Magus performing his devotions before a fire-altar. The other group represents a regal personage contending with two lions. Cylinder of Persian date. ( Layard .) Page 253.— Leo holding in his mouth a bull’s head — a Mithraic emblem of the solar influence over the earth. Below is seen Scorpio, the guardian Sign of Africa. Red jasper. (Duchess of Grafton .) Ib . — Saturn riding in his serpent-car : above are shown his planetary Houses, the Signs Aquarius and Capricorn. Sard. (Dr. Nott.) Ib . — Aquarius pouring forth a stream of water from his urn, typifying the wetness of the season over which he presides. Antique paste. (Gerhard.) Page 254. — Phryxus borne over the waves by Capricornus, instead of his proper conveyance, Aries. Cameo, slightly enlarged in the drawing. (Beverley.) Page 258. — The celebrated Medusa of Solon, which has been more praised by connoisseurs than perhaps any other gem in existence. It was found in a vineyard on the Monte Celio, in the 17th century, mounted in a regular Cinque-cento setting, with a loop behind for the ribbon serving to fasten it on the hat. The engraving may be of the Greek school, although the type differs essentially from all other antique conceptions of the subject, but the inscription is indisputably modern, as the form of the A shows. Calcedonv. (Blacas.) Page 283. — Tiger and Eagle about to seize a Rabbit, which turns towards them with clasped forepaws, as though begging for mercy. “ Alliance of the strong against the weak,” according to Visconti’s way of interpreting these fancies. Sard. (Leake.) Ib .-- Mouse in a car drawn by a pair of Ants. Perhaps allusive to the names of some famous Auriga of the times, and of his horses. Sard. (Leake.) Ib . — Dolphin carrying a trident, as the minister of Neptune. Sard. (Hertz.) Page 281. — Ptolemy Philadelphus and Arsinoe. His helmet is adorned with the Agathodtemon serpent, in compliment to his auspicious rule. His consort, for the same ’-eason. wears the wheat-ear wreath of Ceres. Cameo, drawn to half the actual size. (Vienna.) XVI DES CHIP TION OF THE WOODCUTS IN THE TEXT. Tage 303.— The Laughing Silenus. A mask shown in front face. Cameo. (Dr. Nott.) Page 304. — Augustus; his bust placed upon a winnowing -fan, (vannus mystica,) piled with various fruits, in the character of Bonus Eventus. Cameo. (Beverley.) Page 310. — Polyhymnia, Muse of History, and Terpsichore, of the Chorus, surrounded with masks of various characters, rehearsing in front of a sepulchral column. This composition expresses the original object of Tragedy — the commemoration of departed heroes. Cameo. (From a Cast.) Page 314. — Indo-Scythic (Tartar) king, seated, to whom a vassal presents a torques, in testimony of allegiance. A rare and interesting type, as belonging to the period of the domination of the Sacte in Bactria. The gem, a greenish calcedony, extremely protuberant and hollowed at the back, has a small perforation at each end, to admit a thread for fastening it to the dress. lb. — Siva, holding forth in his four hands symbols of his power as god of Death, viz., the mace, the trident, the dagger, and the roomal, or noose, used by his devotees, the Thugs, in strangling their victims. He also displays conspicuously (not shown in the cut) his most characteristic symbol, that of the god of Change and Propagation. He is enthroned upon his regular velian, or attribute, the couchant Bull. This iype is of the highest value, as being a very early example of a Puranic representation of this deity, for the execution of the engraving is that of the best Sassanian epoch, and consequently cannot be placed later than the end of the fourth century. Deeply cut in a beautiful brownish-yellow calcedony of great lustre, slightly opalescent. Both these gems, lately discovered in the Punjab, have been communicated to me while these sheets were in the press. (Pearse.) Page 316. — Persian hunter casting' a second javelin at a stag, already wounded by his first. Engraving probably of Achsemenian date, well drawn, and curious for giving the costume, which is that of the Kurds of this day. Calcedony scarabeoid. (Leake.) Page 317. — Hercules Bibax, inscribed “ Admon,” formerly supposed the name of its engraver. The “ gladiatorial corpulence ” (to use Cicero’s phrase) which distinguishes a is figure from the Grecian type of the demi-god, demonstrates it to be the performance of a Roman master, but one of the best of his school. Sard. (Blacas, or Marlborough.) Page 322. — Youthful Faun and a Bacchante reclining upon a lion’s skin, spread in the shade of a tree, under the auspices of Cupid. A subject which the Cinque-cento engravers were extremely fond of reproducing, wdth slight variations in detail. The present cameo, however, is an admirably finished spuecimen of early Roman work. (Beverley.) Page 328. — The fatal ring given by Elizabeth to Essex. Now in the possession of Lord John Thynne, to whom it has descended through the female line. Cameo in a tine sardonyx. Page 329. — Vulcan engaged in making the wedding-ring for Cupid and Psyche, who, standing at each side of him, with uplifted hands, are pronouncing the nuptial vow, beneath the myrtle of Venus. Sard. (Dr. Nott.) Page 350. — Charioteer, petasus on head, driving a biga of winged horses. Etruscan graffito in gold. ( Soc . Candelari.) DESCRIPTION OF THE WOODCUTS IN THE TEXT. xvu Pago 351. — Prometheus modelling the body of his Man. At each side stand the horse and the ram, indicating the brute creation from which he had extracted the several qualities, “ particulam undique desectam,” necessary for the mental constitution of his handiwork. Sard. {Beverley.) Page 361. — The Etruscan Venus, Turan, seated on the nuptial altar, and holding forth a dove by the tips of the wings. On her lap is the distaff. Solid gold ring. {British Museum.) Page 368. — Sphinx seated, taking a necklace out of a casket : at her side stands a vase, to show she is at her toilet. A fitting signet for some Lais or Glycera of old. Drawn and executed in the most exquisite style of Greek art. Sardoine. {Hertz.) Page 369. — Isis, with lotus-flower on her brow, and holding a sceptre, her bust clothed in an almost transparent robe with sleeves. The face having nothing of the Egyptian type, it must be inferred that this very elegant work preserves to us the portrait of some princess of the house of Ptolemy, deified under the form of her patron goddess. Black and white onyx. {Muirhead.) Page 372. — Two Persian, or Parthian, hunters : one letting fly an arrow at a lion, the other spearing a boar. Their costume is that of the horseman already noticed. Large calcedony scarabeoid. {Leake.) Page 376. — Nemesis standing with her hand placed on a wheel, set upon the top of a column, and which Cupid, on the other side, is causing to revolve, by means of a rope passing over its circumference. A curious illustration of the poetic similes drawn from the use of the magic trochus (p. 379). Antique paste. {Praun.) Page 385. — The Grecian Thorax, or body armour, an engraving of much interest, from its so distinctly exhibiting the defences for the throat and shoulders. The gem was probably the signet of some noted armourer, like that “ old Helicon ” who made the helmet with neck-piece worn by Alexander at the battle of Issus. {From a cast.) Page 386. — Ring, set with a green jasper Abraxas-gem, found in the coffin of Seffrid, Bishop of Chichester, dec. 1159. A very convincing testimony to the value attached to these talismans in the Middle Ages. Page 393. — Murex-shell, yielding the famous Tyrian purple : its figure shows the aptness of Pliny’s description, “ clavatum aculeis,” “ studded all over with spikes.” This type exemplifies my remark about professional signets, for it could only have been chosen by a dyer of purple for his seal. {From a cast.) Page 394. — Seal of St. Servatius (dec. 389 a.d.), engraved on both sides of a green jasper, of the size of the drawing. From time immemorial it has been preserved in Majstriclit Cathedral, attached to a portable altar of porphyry, attributed to the same saint. It is, however, evidently a Byzantine work, (or an imitation of one,) long posterior to the period of the apostle of the Netherlands. The legend round the Gorgon is intended for the charm, Mol pa peXaiVfj as oejus, of which other examples are known. That round the portrait may be the continuation of the same spell, but so blundered as to be unintelligible. The letters at the side, however, can only stand for O API (oy). Page 396. — Rural Sacrifice : a woman holding a dish of fruits, and a prccfericulum for libation, stands before a blazing altar and utters her vows, “ vota nuncupat.’' Calcedony. {Leake.) I xviii DESCRIPTION OF THE WOODCUTS IN THE TEXT. Page 397.— Privy Signet of Charles le Sage of Prance. Described at p. 398. Page 399. — Standard of the Sassanian monarchy : a very frequent device. Almandiue. {King.) Page 400. — Portrait of a man, with features of a type very far removed from the Greek, but having much analogy to those of the Pontic kings, on their medals. It may possibly be the “ likeness by himself ” of the very Dexamenos whose signature it exhibits. The very exceptional character of both head and style in this admirable intaglio has caused its antiquity to be doubted ; yet it is apparent upon careful comparison that its technical execution is identical with that of the Stork by the same artist, which has always been accepted as indisputably genuine. Identical also are its form , and, yet more remarkably, its material — a scarabeoid of curious agate, having a yellow sard ground clouded with opaque red, a material so unusual in Greek remains, that no forger would have dared to select it for the vehicle of imposture. Discovered a few years ago in some ruins at the foot of Hymettus, and communicated to me by its present possessor, Admiral Soteriades. Page 406. — Sphinx scratching her ear with her hind-paw : an action chosen by the artist out of the Archaic love for the representation of constrained attitudes, of which the present engraving is a wonderfully successful specimen. The signature “Of Thamyrus ” in the field, if not a modem interpolation, can only refer to ' the owner. Sard scarabeus. ( Vienna, as generally quoted, but there is one, to all appearance antique, in the Blacas Cabinet.) Page 407. — The Flying Stork of Dexamenos. Described at p. 408. Page 411. — Jupiter Olympus. Roman cameo in a Gothic setting. In virtue of the Eagle at his feet, the god continued to be revered through the Middle Ages as St. John the Evangelist, and in that character was, as a most precious relic, lent by Charles Y. of France to the Sacristy of the Ste. Chapelle, according to the inscription upon the tablet underneath. Page 412. — Juno. A good example of Johann Pichler’s manner. Carnelian. {Lace.) lb. — Pallas, copied from the head on the coins of Thurium. The old spirit has been truly caught by Rega, whose signature it so honestly displays. Aquamarine. {Formerly Lady Grieve' s.) Page 444. — Dolphin, Trident, and Cornucopia ; united emblems of maritime commerce, naval supremacy, and good fortune — the appropriate signet of some Greek trader of old. Should the bright days of Lord Maryborough ever return, and our Master of the Mint be, for a second time, a man of taste, this elegant and expressive device will recommend itself to him, when seen, as above all others fitted for the reverse of some piece in the English coinage. Calcedony, {Leake.) Page 445. — Bellerophon watering Pegasus at the fountain Hippocrene. The inscrip- tion is a blundered attempt at a supposed artist’s signature, CWCTPATOY. This example serves to exhibit the extreme divergence of the modern from the antique taste in the treatment of subjects for gems. It probably is a work of Natter’s. Sard. (Marlborough .) Page 452. — Sepulchral Urn, of unusually graceful form, adorned with a funereal fillet, infula. {From a cast.) DESCRIPTION OF THE WOODCUTS IN THE TEXT. xix Page 453. — Combat between a Hound and Wild Boar of prodigious size. The inscription commemorates the hero as “Gauranus (dog) of Anicetus.” Gciuranus is a mountain in Campania, and Anicetus sounds like the name of one connected with the sports of the amphitheatre. Both names have a close analogy in their derivation to the Lydia, hound of Dexter, whose death in combat with a similar monster has been elegantly sung by Martial. Bloodstone. (St. Aignan.) Page 455. — Sea-horse careering over the waves. A pretty Greek intaglio. Sard. (Leake.) Page 456. — Greek warrior, busily engaged withhammer and punch (marculus, ccelum) in chasing the toreutic decorations of a suit of body armour, set upon the ground before him. The evident firmness of the metal casing well illustrates the name of 6c opa£ crradla applied to this kind of defence. Probably the signet of an armourer, like the one already quoted. Calcedony. (Leake.) Page 461. — Tritoness advancing to the attack, brandishing a trident: a unique design. Calcedony. (Leake.) Page 462. — Mrecenas, inscribed in the field with the name of Dioscorides, in very minute lettering (not shown in cut). Amethyst. (Paris.) Page 470. — Alexander, a Cinque-cento work, in an unusually large and spirited manner, engraved on the reverse of an antique intaglio of Apollo and Venus. Lapis- lazuli. (Praun.) Page 471. — The Tythia seated, immersed in deep thought, in front of the Delphic Tripod. Antique paste, from a lost original, of most delicate Greek workmanship, first published, with due commendation of its merit, by Winckelmann in his ‘ Monimenti Inediti.’ Now at Berlin, but another from the same mould, and equally antique, is in the possession of Mr. Palgrave. Page 483. — Jupiter descending amidst a shower of thunderbolts upon the dying Semele. An example of all the peculiar features of the Archaic Greek manner. Antique sard. (Berlin.) INTRODUCTION. “ In tlie gems that have been worn by any civilized people, we possess an epitome of that people’s arts, their religion, and their civilization, in a form at once the most portable, the most indestructible, and the most genuine.” The recommendations of the study, to facilitate which is the object of this treatise, cannot be more correctly, more tersely, nor more forcibly summed up than in these words which I have quoted from a recent and most able writer upon the same subject.* I shall therefore seek for no better definition. But briefly to pass these several consi- derations in review, that of art is admirably illustrated by the impres- sion which the acutest of German critics has noted as being the fore- most to force itself upon his mind when for the first time a cabinet of antique gems was opened to his inspection. t “ At the very outset I discovered the most charming subjects in the compositions which sprung to meet the eye from out of these precious miniature represen- tations. What is more, none could deny that copies of great, important, * ‘ Edinburgh Review,’ October, 186G, p. 528. f That of Hemsterhuis, then in the possession of the Princess Galitzin, at whose house Goethe was staying at the time. B ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. antique works, for ever lost to us, have here been preserved like so many jewels, within these narrow limits. Hardly any branch of art wanted its representative here, in scarcely any class of subjects was a deficiency to he observed amongst them. Their vigorous, ivy-crowned Hercules could not conceal his colossal origin ; the stern Medusa’^ Head ; the Bacchus, formerly preserved in the Medicean cabinet ; the graceful Sacrifices ; the Bacchic Festivals ; and besides all these, the most interesting portraits of known and unknown personages, all commanded our admiration during oft-repeated examination I for my part could only appreciate the poetic side of the engravings, the subject itself, the composition, the execution ; and pass judgment upon, and admire these points alone : my friends, on the other hand, were accustomed to bring forward totally different considerations upon the same topic. For in fact the amateur, who after procuring treasures of the kind, shall be ambitious to raise his acquisitions to the rank of a respectable cabinet, must, for his own security in the pursuit, not remain satisfied with the mere ability to appreciate the spirit, and the meaning of these precious works of art, and to derive pleasure from them, he must also call extrinsic proofs to his assistance — a thing that must be excessively difficult for any one who is not himself a practical artist in that department We found ourselves justified on intrinsic grounds of art in pronouncing, if not all, yet by far the largest number of these intagli to be genuine antique monuments of art ; and indeed several were noticed amongst them worthy to be reckoned in the list of the most remarkable works of the kind. Some were conspicuous from the circumstance of being absolutely identical with the casts of other celebrated gems. Several more we remarked where the design corresponded with that of other well-known intagli ; but which, and for that very reason, too, might still be accounted genuine. In extensive collections, repetitions of the same subject frequently occur ; and we should be very much mistaken in pronouncing one of them to be the original, and the rest no better than modern copies. In such a case we ought to keep in mind the noble artistic honesty of the ancients, which thought it could never repeat too often JNTROD UCTION. 3 the treatment of a subject that had once been successfully carried out. The artists of those times considered themselves as original enough when they felt themselves possessed of sufficient power and dexterity to grasp the original thought of another, and to reproduce it again after their own version.” Even a cursory inspection of any large gem cabinet will oblige the man of taste and learning to acquiesce in the justice of these conclusions of Goethe’s. It is evident from the first, and the evidence continually gains new strength from study, that these tiny, yet indestructible, monuments have brought down to us accurate representations of all the celebrated masterpieces of ancient art of which descriptions remain ; nay more, of innumerable others whose very fame has perished with themselves for want of enduring record. I have, on a previous occasion,* collected numerous examples which strikingly manifest how that these, the sole unchangeable vehicles of ancient genius, have preserved to us the reflex of much of the departed glory of sculpture, and all of painting, of the times whence they have descended to our own ; how the tradi- tionary fame of Theodoras, Canachus, Lysippus, Eutychiades, and again of Parrhasius, Athenion, Pamphilus, Apelles, is confirmed by no surviving evidence save what is to be derived from them. Again, if we consider the intrinsic merits of antique gems regarded in the view of art, we have in them the emanations ever fresh and unfaded of the feelings and the taste of those ages when the love of the Beautiful was the all-prevailing and almost sole religion, and flourished unfettered by tradition, prejudice, and conventional rales ; whilst from the universal demand, during those same ages, for engraved gems, whether for signets or for personal ornaments, artists of the highest ability did not disdain the narrow field of the pretty stone as the arena for the exertion of their powers. The unparalleled vigour and perfection of many of these performances are a sufficient proof that they proceeded directly from the master hand, and were not mere slavish copies by a mechanic, after designs created by the genius of another. Besides this moral proof, we have the express testimony of Pliny (xxxv. 45) that such a distin- b 2 * ‘ Handbook, ’ p. 44. 4 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. guished modeller and statuary as Pasiteles also employed himself in the chasing of plate and engraving upon gems.* It has been very justly observed by the author of ‘ Thoughts upon Antique Cameos and Intaglios,’ “ that although the work on gems, whether in relief or sunk, be confined to a very narrow space, and though by reason of its necessary minuteness it make not the direct, immediate, and powerful impression upon the imagination and affections which is felt when we behold figures of life, or above life-size in high or low relief, or when given to the eye on pedestals as statues ; still it remains an unquestionable fact that in all that relates to anatomical truth, expressiveness of attitude and aspect, gracefulness of drapery, and every other detail and accom- paniment of fine workmanship, the Greek, Sicilian, and Eoman glyptic artists were eminently distinguished, and especially in that simplicity of contour, and composition, and masterly ordonnance that have ever made the study of antique gems so serviceable for the settlement of the principles, and the improvement of the practice, of painting and sculpture. Hence the lovers of the fine arts, and especially artists themselves, may discover the importance of the study of the antique in this particular branch of workmanship. ‘ For herein,’ says Mariette, ‘ knowledge is brought under the direction of a noble and lovely simplicity, which suffers nothing to be brought before the eye but what is required for the elevation of our ideas.’ And to the same effect is the remark of Gori : ‘ What is there more pleasant than the contem- plation of the works of the artists of antiquity, and to behold shut up, as it were, within the narrow compass of a small, it may he a very small gem, all the majesty of a vast design and a most elaborate performance? The art of cutting figures upon these minute stones was as much * Pasiteles, one of the latest lights of Hellenic art, was a native of Magna Grsecia, and a contemporary of Varro’s, who highly lauds his talents. “ Plasticen (modelling in clay) matrem cselaturas et statuariaj scalptrmeque dixit, et cum esset in omnibus his summits, nihil unquam fecit antequam finxit.” His best work was an ivory Jupiter, standing in the temple of Metellus. His zeal for studying from nature once nearly cost him his life, for while making a chasing at the docks from a lion in a caravan of wild beasts just arrived from Africa, a panther broke loose from another cage, to the no small peril of this “most painstaking artist.” He also composed a catalogue, in five volumes, of all the chief works of art then in existence, (xxxvi. 4. 12.) INTRODUCTION. admired by the ancients as that other sort of laborious skill which produced full-sized statues out of bronze or marble. It may even be said that gems in their eyes were of greater value by reason of the extreme smallness of the stones, and a hardness that defied the steel tool, and submitted to nothing but the power of the diamond.’ “ In short, it may be safely affirmed that the gem engravers of the Alexandrian and Augustan ages were, in all that concerns excellence of design and composition (that is, in all those parts and principles of their art that admit of comparison), rivals of the most famous workers in marble and in bronze, however large the dimensions of their works, or perfect the finish of their workmanship. These wonderful artists contrived to inclose within the narrowness of a little agate-stone all the complicated details of an event in history or of a fable in mythology, and to make them stand forth in beautiful relief as a cameo, or to sink down as beautifully into depths as an intaglio, with all that truth of design and power of expression which characterize the excellence of the largest works of the most consummate masters. Great indeed must have been his taste and talent, his power and patience, who could make a small-sized onyx or cornelian bear on its surface, or within its substance, all those realities of place, person, or thing, which belong to historical events or fabulous traditions. It is Seneca’s observation (suggested probably by the sight of some production of the gem engraver’s skill), ‘ that to inclose a whole within a small space is the work of a great artist.’ The remark of Sir Joshua Reynolds may also be cited upon this point, as to the importance of making this whole congruous and consistent. ‘ Excellence,’ says he, ‘ in every part and in every province of our art, from the highest style of history down to the resemblance of still life, will depend upon this power of extending the attention at once to the whole, and to its parts, without which the greatest diligence is in vain.’ The gem artists of antiquity, besides their other claims to our admiration, had regard to uniformity of design, to congruity and consistency throughout the entire work ; they took care that all its parts were well fitted and compactly distributed and disposed, and that also in all their fulness and effect.” ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. 6 On the revival of learning antique gems were amongst the first relics of better times to claim the attention of men of taste, both from their intrinsic beauty, and the value of the art enshrined within them, as well as by the vast service they lent towards the furtherance of the studies now so zealously pursued. Hence amongst the other measures taken by Lorenzo dei Medici for fostering the infant arts of design, besides accumulating an immense cabinet of the most important gems, gathered from all quarters whither the extensive mercantile relations of his family reached, he drew to Florence, as Vasari informs us, many “ masters from foreign coun- tries,” to execute new works for him in emulation of the ancient, and at the same time to found a national school of art in his own capital. The large number of magnificent gems, inscribed with lavr . med, still remaining in the Galleria of Florence, notwithstanding the dispersion of a far larger portion over every cabinet of Europe, in consequence of the subsequent vicissitudes of his family, attests to our times, the eagerness with which he sought after these mirrors of ancient feeling, and the importance he attached to their possession. They were in truth, at that period, only just emerging out of barbarism, before many statues or bas-reliefs had been brought to light, the sole means of obtaining satisfactory and perfect examples of what Greece and Eome had achieved in the way of creative art. And in no other department was this prince so successful in raising up a school of artists as in this particular one, for the earliest Italian camei approach so closely to the Eoman, both in spirit and in workmanship, that to distinguish one from the other often baffies the most extended experience, and leaves the real date of the piece a matter of dispute and uncertainty. But, fifteen centuries before the age of the tasteful Florentine, his illustrious pro- totype, Maecenas, had regarded this same walk of art with peculiar favour, and has left enduring evidence of his predilection for it, not only in the numerous gem-portraits of himself (a testimony to his wide patronage of their authors), hut even in the scanty fragments of his writings that have escaped the universal wreck of the lighter Eoman literature. For, to make a general observation, it will be found that. INTRODUCTION. the more extensive the knowledge of the true critic in the other lines of creative art, the more readily will he appreciate this one in particu- lar ; a truth which is singularly illustrated by the reflections of Goethe, already quoted, when this, to him entirely new field of thought, first opened upon his view. For none but smatterers in art ever estimate the value of a work by the rule of its dimensions, as did the Gothic architects, who fancied their work reached nearer to perfection the higher it was carried up into the clouds. The man of true taste looks merely to the mind displayed in a performance, not at the extent of matter which it may have animated. The feeling which induces the pre- tender to taste to disparage the genius embodied within the narrow circle of the gem, is the same in nature with what has prompted all races, both at the dawn and in the decline of their culture, to erect monuments that aim at producing effect by their magnitude alone. Pausanias remarks satirically “ that only Komans and Ehodians pride themselves on their Colossi,” whilst the masterpieces of the other Greeks rarely exceeded the life size. And thus Cellini, piqued by a remark of Michael Angelo’s, made on the sight of a small medallion* from his hand, “ that a man might very well be successful in such trifles, and yet be incompetent to produce anything of merit on a large scale,” in order to demonstrate the injustice of this dictum, immediately set to work at marble and bronze, and w T hen the opportunity presented itself achieved his noble Perseus, which most judges now agree in pronouncing superior to anything left us by his overweening critic. Yet even Michael Angelo did not refuse to admit excellence in the glyptic art, as appears from his astonishment and admiration at the sight of a head of Minerva in topaz, obtained by Cellini from the diggers in the vineyards about Borne in 1524 ; from his supplying Gio. del Castel Bolognese with designs for his two clief-d'ceuvres, the Tityus f and the Pliaethon ; and the value he set upon his own signet, the so celebrated work of his friend Pier Maria da Pescia. We may justly apply to gem, what the best art-critic of our day says of the cognate art, wood-engraving: — * Hercules strangling the lion, the_ figures in lull relief, done for Giaolemo Marotti of Siena. f Now in the Blacas Cabinet. 8 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. “ These (Bewick’s cuts) cannot he too carefully studied : they have a directness in reaching their point, a breadth and largeness in style, exactly analogous to the qualities of Velasquez. So little are perfection and greatness in art dependent on size or material.” (Palgrave, ‘ Handbook of the Fine Art Exhibition, &c., 1862.’ p. 126.) To sum up this part of the subject, nothing can be more just than the conclusion of Goethe when introducing his notice of Hemsterhuis and his gems he says : “ This estimable man had been led indefatigably to pursue both the moral as regards the soul, and the tasteful as regards the senses ; and this, with a sagacious acuteness peculiar to himself. If a person is to be thoroughly imbued with the former, then ought he always to be surrounded by the latter element. Hence for a private individual, who cannot afford the expense of large galleries, but who nevertheless is unable to dispense with his accustomed enjoyment of art, even when on a journey — for such a person a cabinet of engraved gems becomes in the highest degree desirable : he is everywhere accom- panied by the most pleasure-giving of all things, one that is precious and instructive without being cumbersome, and at the same time he enjoys without interruption the most noble of all his possessions.” The relation borne by the glyptic to the other branches of ancient art has been pointed out by Creuzer with much sagacity : his opinion upon the subject, as that of the acutest as well as the most universally experi- enced of all recent German archaeologists will well repay the trouble of perusal. “ A great proficient in the Oriental languages* has lately discovered the etymology of the much disputed word cameo, in the Arabic for flower or blossom. It would perhaps be an admissible view to regard the entire treasure of gems and camei as one vast flower-garden, or as an assemblage of the finest flowers, as varied in form as in colour, which the creative hand of the artist of antiquity has bequeathed to us in precious stone, like a never-fading plantation made for the pleasure and instruction of susceptible minds down to the latest generations. At all events, the comparison of the Engraved Gems of antiquity that have come down to our times, is truly applicable to the ‘ Anthologies ’ of * Yon Hammer. INTRODUCTION. 9 smaller poems which we possess in both the ancient classical languages, more especially in the Greek. The gems engraved by the Grecian glyptic artists bear the same relation to the great productions of ancient art, to the statues, busts, reliefs, and similar works of conspi- cuous magnitude, as do the poems of the Greek Anthology to the grand creations of the Hellenic epos lyric and dramatic poetry. But here one important difference enters into the consideration, that whereas the Greek spirit in poetry soon became too much exhausted to he able to continue its workings in the same form with any success, at that very time the same spirit, still surviving in the plastic arts, was strong enough to produce things that from their form and magnitude can fearlessly take their place by the side of those of the greatest masters belonging to the epoch of Grecian independence. To become acquainted, however, with the wonderful fecundity of the infinitely varied Hellenic genius, it comes to the same thing, whether we contemplate this multi- tude of the smaller productions of its glyptic art, or read the thousands of Greek poems that lie open to us in the Anthology. A well-stocked cabinet of gems will make nearly the same impression upon our minds as does the richness of that collection of poems. The one, equally with the other, surrounds us with a vast panorama painted by the creative fancy of that genial race, as happy in its production of Form as of Poesy ; and offers to us in gems and camei, like its idyls and epigrams, a garland of flowers, which in their infinite variety, with respect to choice, taste, and feeling, can leave no educated mind unsatisfied.” The hearing of our subject upon the art of antiquity having now been sufficiently discussed, it only remains briefly to illustrate its connexion with the other heads indicated at our starting point — the civilization and religion. To the archaeologist, or inquirer into the public and domestic life of the ancient world, engraved gems are invalu- able authorities, supplying, as they do, the most authentic information that could he desired upon the forms and construction of innumerable articles belonging to war, navigation, religious rites, festivals, the games of the circus and arena, or the stage, with its masks, costumes, and other requisites of scenic use. Let any one, though unversed in this special 10 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. - branch of antique art, only cast his eye over a good collection of casts from gems, and he, if a classical scholar, will immediately be surprised and delighted at the light suddenly thrown upon much of his reading by the faithful pictures of ancient life that will there hurst upon his view. There will he behold the various pieces of the Greek and Etruscan panoply carefully made out in their minutest details ; the chief implements of the sailor and of the husbandman perpetually occur ; whilst the elegant forms of Corinthian vases, upon which the glyptic artist so often has lavished his deepest skill, are all that remains to tell of the grand chasings of Thericles, Mentor, and Boethus ; and again, the various exercises, scenes, and games of the palaestra, the theatre, and the hippodrome, will he found abundantly restored to existence in the most instructive ways. To quote but a couple of instances out of the long list my own experience supplies ; • that curious invention, the Injdraulis, and the mode of working it ; the clepsydra, also, of which no accurate notion can he extracted from the long technical descriptions left by Yitruvius, are both of them clearly exhibited upon a small sard, recently secured at the Hertz sale for the British Museum, and on an agate in my own possession. Again, regarding these gem-pictures as exponents of religious ideas, and of mythology in its widest sense, we shall discover how many obscure notices that ancient writers have left on these heads are eked out and rendered intelligible by these most incontrovertible memorials of the creeds and ideas to which they refer. They are our chief and best authorities upon the nature of the worship that flourished in pre- historic times in Chaldaea and Assyria ; or again amongst those interesting and problematical races whose histories have perished, the Phoenicians and their close allies the Etruscans. Of the last-named race, the education in religion is only to be found written in the records of their gems and engravings in metal. In the same way the new creeds that sprung up and flourished so rankly under the Boman Empire, like the Mithraic and the varied forms of Alexandrian Gnosticism, cannot be properly studied unless by the light of gems the genuine fruit of their doctrines ; for the only written documents INTRODUCTION. 11 concerning these same creeds must be received with much distrust as proceeding from ill-informed or hostile composers. As for the mystic worship of Mithras, scarcely any other source exists whence an accurate idea of its nature can be gathered, except from the talismans which it has left to us in such profusion ; so carefully have all the larger objects of adoration raised by its votaries been defaced or utterly destroyed by its overthrowers. With the religion of early antiquity its history is closely united, and here too, gems, from their very commencement, present themselves as a substitute for other records. If the reading of their cuneiform legends can he depended upon, the cylinders thereby declared the signets of Kings Urukh and Tiglath-Pileser I. carry up the foundation of the Babylonian and Ninevite empires to twenty and to twelve centuries before the Christian era, an antiquity hitherto supposed fabulous in the traditions of any nation. The much disputed chronology of Egyptian annals has already been to some extent settled by the evidence of the innumerable scarabei and tablets stamped with the names and titles of their kings ; and much more may he expected as the system of hieroglyphical interpretation advances, and is applied to their examination. It may be hoped this immense store of materials will then do as much for the dynasties of Egypt as coins have done for the history of the Greek, Koman, and Sassanian empires. As it is more than probable that the scarabei were the earliest repre- sentatives of value in the country to which their invention belongs, the same service to history which their intrinsically precious substi- tutes in other regions have rendered, may reasonably he expected from their instrumentality. A truly endless source of enjoyment is pre- sented to the educated mind by another and a very rich department of this science. When we arrive at the period of the full development of the glyptic art, we find a new world opening itself to us in the way of portraiture, which includes not only the most accredited types of gods and heroes, the truest likenesses of philosophers, poets, and warriors, but also a multitude of the brave and beautiful, only nameless now — Carent quia vate sacro.' 12 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. Bucli memorials of the illustrious of old, since necessarily they are but rarely preserved by medals, would otherwise have been entirely wanting, or at best, the deficiency were inadequately supplied by the defaced or dubious statue and bust. And what is more, the intaglio possesses an immeasurable advantage over the medal in the indestructi- bility of its impress, which no time nor wear can affect, and nothing destroy, except the utter communition of the stone itself. Medals, on the contrary, from the high relief of their surface, and the necessary friction to which they are destined by their nature, added to the action of the earth upon the material, frequently disappoint us in the portraits they offer. Besides which, these last were seldom executed with the same degree of care as the costly intaglio, cut on the precious stone, for the signet of the prince himself, or the man of undying fame, whose “ counterfeit presentment ” it carries down to the remotest ages. As this treatise is designed for a guide to the actual collector of gems, equally with the theoretical student of dactylography as a branch of archaeology, it is but fair to give the former some warning of the difficulties and disappointments that he is likely to encounter in the pursuit. And here I shall again preface my own observations by quoting the sentiments upon this head of the “ many sided ” Goethe, so just and pertinent will they approve themselves to every amateur of experience. “ The philosophy of Hemsterhuis, together with its basis and ideas, I could only make my own by translating them into my own language. The Beautiful, and the pleasure derived therefrom, consist, as he expresses himself, when we behold, and conceive comfortably, the greatest possible number of images at one and the same moment. I, on the other hand, am bound to assert that the Beautiful consists when we contemplate the Living in its normal state and in its highest activity and perfection ; by which act we feel ourselves impelled in a lively manner to the reproduction of the same, and also placed simultaneously in a state of the highest activity ourselves. Accurately considered, all that has been said comes to one and the same thing, only as expressed by different persons ; and INTRODUCTION. 13 I refrain from saying more, for the Beautiful is not so much a giver as a promiser. On the other hand, Deformity, which has its origin in its stopping short of its true end, by its nature causes us also to stop short, and to hope for, aim at, and expect nothing at all. “ This being so, I fancied I could interpret his ‘ Letters on Sculpture 5 according to the above rule, consistently with my own sentiments. Nay more, his little treatise ‘ On Desire ’ appeared to me, when considered in this way, perfectly intelligible, for when the eagerly longed-for Beautiful comes into our possession, it does not always make good in particulars what it promised in the whole ; and thus it is plain that the same thing which excited our desire as a whole will sometimes not satisfy us thoroughly in particulars. Such considerations were of so much the greater weight as the princess had observed her friend to long eagerly after works of art, but to grow cold and weary in their possession — a fact which he has himself expressed so charmingly and clearly in that little treatise. In such cases a person has in reality to consider the difference as to whether the subject is worthy of the enthusiasm felt for it. If it he, then must pleasure and admiration ever grow upon it, and perpetually renew themselves ; if it be not completely so, then the thermometer sinks a few degrees, and one gains in knowledge what one loses in prejudice. Hence it certainly is quite true that a person must hig works of art in order to understand them, in order that the desire may he put out of the case, and the true value of the object established. Meanwhile, desire and its gratification must here also alternate with one another with a thrilling vitality ; they must mutually seize upon and release each other, in order that the man, once deceived, may yet not cease to pursue. “ It is highly vexatious to see a thing, although of the most perfect nature, received with doubt, for the doubter sets himself up above the trouble of finding proof, although he demands it from the asserter of the authenticity of the object. But in such cases (speaking of gems), upon what does proof rest except upon a certain intuitive feeling supported by a practised eye that may be able to detect certain 14 ANTIQUE GEMS AND DINGS. indications of origin, as well as resting .upon the established proba- bility of particular historical requirements ; and, in fact, upon many other circumstances, which we, taking them collectively, do by their means, after all, convince only ourselves, without carrying conviction into the minds of others ? But as things are, the love of doubting nowhere finds a more ample field to display itself upon than precisely in the case of engraved gems. Now, one is termed an ancient, now, a modern copy, a replica, an imitation ; sometimes the stone itself excites suspicion, sometimes the inscription, the very thing that ought to have been of special value ; and hence it is more dangerous to indulge in collecting gems than ancient coins, though even with the latter great circumspection will he requisite, when, for instance, the point is to distinguish certain Paduan counterfeits from the genuine originals. The keepers of the French Cabinet of Medals have long observed that private collections, brought up to Paris from the provinces, contain a large proportion of forgeries ; because the owner, in his confined sphere of observation, has not been enabled to practise his eye suffi- ciently, and has proceeded in his operations chiefly after the light of his inclinations and his prejudices. In fine, on considering the matter with exactness, the same thing holds good for all kinds of collections, and every possessor of one will he ready to confess that he has paid many a heavy apprentice fee for experience before his eyes were opened.” It is indeed true that no other branch of archaeology demands the union of so many qualifications in its cultivator to enable him to advance on even tolerably safe ground in making his acquisitions. A sufficient knowledge of mineralogy, not merely as possessed by the moderns, but by the ancients ; a practical acquaintance with the mechanical processes of engraving used at different periods ; an accu- rate discrimination of the various styles of art, for example, how the Cinquecento may he recognized from the antique ; and above all, the constant examination of large numbers of engraved stones. All these are requisites quite indispensable to him that wishes to form a col- lection of gems likely to possess any real value, and fit to stand the INTRODUCTION. 15 scrutiny of the experienced connoisseur. After the enumeration of all these difficulties and drawbacks, the incipient gem collector may well remonstrate in the words of the student of astrology, addressed under similar circumstances to his instructor, Manilius — “ Hard, wilt thou say, and subtile is the task, That these thy precepts from the learner ask ; When late before mine eyes, as clear as day, An easy path to heaven’s own science lay.” To which expostulation, although we cannot reply with that ancient sage — “ ’Tis God thou seek’st, thine aim to scale the skies, And, born Fate’s slave, above Fate’s laws to rise ” — yet we certainly are justified to cheer him on, in the language of the succeeding lines, to persevere in the sure hope of a brilliant reward — “ Toil is the price wherewith such things are bought, Such mighty blessings are not given for nought ; Nor stand aghast the tortuous road to view, And things to things still linked in sequence new ; Let it suffice to have gained an entrance there, The rest is ours with industry and care. Unless by toil thou pierce the mountain rude, Its gold shall ’scape thee, and thy grasp elude ; Thy flattering hopes shall blackest darkness cloud, And swelling earth her envied treasures shroud. To seek the gem we cross the world so wide, To seek the pearl we plunge beneath the tide.” And surely that study will amply compensate the expenditure of much money, time, and application, which places within the reach of the lover of art, however moderate his pecuniary means, the acquisition of genuine monuments both of the most ancient and the most perfect efforts of human ingenuity. Although precluded by his circumstances from possessing the works of masters of celebrity in the other, as now considered, more important walks of art, he has it in his power to obtain the finest productions of persons equally admired by the ancient world for their excellence in this. Nay more, pursued in all its hearings, this study gives the key to the knowledge not 16 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. merely of all antique art, but also of all ancient history, in respect to the origin of nations and of religions. Something upon these two points will be found worked out in the chapter upon Etruscan art. Finally, to consider the matter from the point of view of the mere amateur, a refined taste and a quick eye, although backed by no very extensive experience in the critical minutiae of the science, will afford much security to his judgment concerning the authenticity of glyptic works rrpon which he may have to decide. The indefinable character that separates the antique from its modern imitation, may by attention be speedily caught and ever afterwards appreciated. In fact, nothing in this pursuit has surprised me more than the beauty combined with the genuineness of the components of certain collections formed by persons whose sole guide was an apparently instinctive taste, or sense of the True, though unsupported by any special knowledge of archaeology or art ; a testimony this in itself to the intrinsic merit of the actual productions of the ancient gem engraver, and which holds good more particularly for the correct outlines and delicate finish of the early Greek school. Besides, there remains yet one consolation for the beginner — he who judges merely by the eye, and considers only the artistic merit of the performance, though a Pichler may occasionally be palmed off upon him for a Pyrgoteles, or a Sirletti for a Dioscorides, yet even after his eyes have been opened to the mistake, he still retains what is “ a joy for ever,” if there be any truth in the poet’s dictum, for his purchase still abides “ a thing of beauty,” and that too in the same degree as before, whatever the name or date of its author. How different is the case with the pursuits of the numismatist ! The bit of metal stamped with the name of some unknown Greek or Asiatic village, or with the ludicrous attempt to delineate the visage of some barbarian chief, obscure usurper, or Saxon savage, upon the discovery that it has emanated from a false die (ever to be suspected in all cases of rarity), is at once reduced to a “ thorn in the eye,” to worse than worthlessness, though originally acquired at a price the finest gem would not demand in the present state of the market. And as regards the grand criterion of authenticity INTRODUCTION. 17 in the highest line of the glyptic art, let the man of taste and incipient gem collector derive courage from the dictum of our great law-giver, Winckelmann, who lays down that “ the perception of the Beautiful, which forms the second portion of the knowledge of art (the first being that of the different national styles and their epochs), has principally to do with the Greek engravings. The Egyptians could hardly be expected to succeed in representing the beautiful, for their climate did not produce it. The Etruscans never arrived to the highest point of the Beautiful, in consequence partly of the peculiarity of their style, and partly of the circumstances of their history. But we already discover the Beautiful in the Greek heads upon the early medals, chiefly in those of Syracuse, even previously to the times when the greatest masters of the fine arts flourished, and at a date when their design necessarily resembled that of the Etruscans. The feeling for the Beautiful constitutes therefore the knowledge of the most beautiful style of the Greeks, and this feeling, united with the understanding of design, is sufficient in itself to guide the student to the science of distinguishing the antique from the modern.” c 18 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. THE TESTS OP ANTIQUITY IN ENGRAVED GEMS, AND THE INSTRUMENTS USED P>Y THE ANCIENT ENGRAVERS. To a treatise devoted to the consideration of Intagli and Camei,* works of art whose interest and value depend so much upon their being the genuine productions of the far-remote ages to which they profess to belong, some preliminary observations upon the two points (intimately connected with each other) which form the title of this chapter will prove the most serviceable introduction. No definite rules, indeed, can be laid down here, since nothing but long experience, and the careful examination of large numbers of glyptic works in all their various classes, can supply that almost intuitive perception of true character, impossible to be acquired by any other means. The remarks that follow are the result of much reading, of more thought, and above all, of many years’ study of antique gems in the minute examination of numerous public and private cabinets. The first point that naturally strikes the eye, and, therefore, claims to be first considered here, is magnitude. If we think of the purpose to which intagli were almost exclusively applied at the time of their * “ Intaglio,” literally an incision, very Appropriately designates work sunk into the gem. “ Cameo,” a word of much disputed etymology, hut probably a form of the Arabic camea, a charm, or camaut, the camel’s hump, implies work in relief, whether high or flat. TESTS OF ANTIQUITY— DIMENSIONS. 19 execution — namely, that of signets to be worn set in rings, we shall have good reason, on that very account, to look with suspicion upon all gems engraved in intaglio, the dimensions of which exceed those of an ordinary ring stone ; and it will he found in practice that this rule has hut very few exceptions, and that almost all intagli of larger extent belong to times with other requirements, that is, to periods subsequent to the revival of the art in the sixteenth century. Of course we are not to include in this limitation the huge astrological and Gnostic stones (usually of the cheaper class) that were designed to he worn upon the dress or carried about the person as talismans, hut not to serve for signets. For purposes of ornament to clothes, plate, and jewellery, the ancients preferred the true precious stones, the beauty and value of which lay in their colour alone, and which consequently were introduced in decoration without engraving ; and, more espe- cially, camei, which size and style of work rendered effective when viewed from a distance, whereas intagli conceal all their beauties except from the closest inspection. The finest antique cameo ever offered to me for sale at Kome, was a grand head of Jupiter Dodonaeus in sardonyx, still inclosed within the iron frame that had first served to fix it upon the cuirass of some Koman general. The small size of truly antique intagli (a thing every one must notice in looking over any judiciously formed cabinet), the student will at once perceive how strong a distinction it makes between them and the productions of the modern school. Ever since the revival of the glyptic art its prac- titioners have always preferred surfaces of considerable relative extent, and their best works are to he found done upon stones of larger size than those employed for their less important performances ; a practice exactly the converse of that of the ancient engravers. And in the same sense, groups of several figures, and representations of well-known historical events, as distinguished from mythological, are the almost certain marks of modern origin ; whilst the drawing of the Cinque- cento school betrays all that exaggerated character of which the paint- ings on the majolica of the same age may he quoted as the most familiar example. c 2 20 ANTIQUE GEMS AND BINGS. Again, the antique stones are often of a very irregular form at the back, in fact, retaining their native configuration, the margin alone (the “ water-edge ” as our lapidaries call it) being rounded off for the convenience of setting. This was done to augment the depth of colour in the finished gem, which any diminution of its thickness would have impaired. The hack, though highly polished, will often exhibit traces of deep parallel scratches, occasioned by its having been rubbed down into shape upon a slab of emery ; a certain indication this of an antique stone, for the modern are cut down and polished at once by the same operation, upon a revolving metal plate coated with emery powder and oil, which gives them a perfectly smooth and even surface. I must here call attention to a peculiarity that appears unaccountable, but may frequently be observed on the backs of sards cut fiat by the ancient lapidary. It consists in two roughly-sunk, shallow depressions, a little distance apart, and occupying much of the plane surface. Many sards also retain traces of such indentations, which have been subsequently ground out ; and in the cases where they have been left, the stone was evidently too thin to allow this finishing operation. The only conjecture that occurs to me, accounting for their use, is, that they served for the better fixing of the stone upon a handle during the process of engraving. It is evident they were not intended to brighten the tint of the stone by lessening its thickness, as is done with carbuncles, else the concavity would have been single, regular, and highly polished, as it is in the latter. Antique stones are, as a rule, much thicker than modern ones of the same circumference, hence a thin gem will usually be found, if carefully tested, to belong to the latter class, unless, indeed, the original thick- ness of the antique has been ground away by some ignorant jeweller to adapt it to a modern setting. The ancient rings, hollow and bulky, furnished by their peculiar make a “ box setting ” capable of con- taining a gem of any depth desired. A high degree of polish on the surface of a gem pretending to antiquity, although in itself a highly suspicious circumstance, from the very nature of the case, does not, however, infallibly stamp the intaglio TESTS OF ANTIQUITY— POLISH. •_1 for a work of modern times, for it lias long been the mischievous practice with jewellers to repolisli ancient gems in order to remove the scratches and traces of wear that true antiques generally exhibit, for the sake of restoring its pristine beauty to the material itself. Mariette censures the fastidiousness and bad taste of amateurs who made a point of repolishing every gem with a worn surface that came into their hands ; and a glance at the large collections formed in his day, like the Devonshire and the Marlborough, discovers the irreparable mischief this over-niceness has done to art. It is, in truth, a most ruinous procedure, for besides rendering dubious the authenticity of the piece itself, it destroys the perfect outline of the design by lowering the field, obliterating with outline the artist’s finishing touches, and thus, for the sake of a little outward improvement, sacrificing the soul to the body of the work. On the other hand, an abraded and scratched surface must not be received as an unquestionable criterion of antiquity, for Italian inge- nuity has long ago discovered that a handful of new-made gems crammed down the throat of a turkey, will, in a few days, from the trituration of the gizzard, assume a roughness of surface apparently due to the action of many centuries.* Of the deceptive effect of this contrivance many of the Poniatowsky gems, particularly the portraits, furnish the most astonishing evidence. On this account, if a gem present an unusually ancient-looking aspect superficially, it requires to be examined still more distrustfully, as suggesting good grounds for suspicion in this very ostentation of old age. In a word, though faith may be a cardinal virtue with the theologian, yet distrust should be especially cultivated by the gem collector, beset as he is at every * A more simple and common expedient was to rub the face of the stone with fine emery-paper, or else with a box-wood pencil smeared with diamond powder ; but these methods produce scratches, which, being concentric, betray the motion of the hand that produced them, and can always be detected upon microscopic examination. To the white stratum in a modern cameo, the requisite deadness (mat) is imparted by soaking the stone some hours m aquafortis mixed with iron-filings, and then baking it. This was the method, Pistrucci says, Bonelli employed with the works done to his order by the artist at the outset of his career. 22 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. turn by the most ingenious frauds, devised and carried out by tbe accumulated roguery and practice of now four hundred years. Lastly, though the actual stone may he antique, yet it may have been pressed into the service of the antiquario as the vehicle for another species of deception, and that the most difficult of all to guard against. It has ever been a common practice with the Italian engra- vers to get antique gems of fine material hut low art, and to re-touch, or even entirely re-model the design,* thus producing an intaglio in a good style upon a material whose aspect suffices to lull to sleep all suspicion. This is the commonest fraud of more recent times, and one against which the only safeguard is to examine with a lens the whole interior of the intaglio ; when if some portions of the work bear a fresher and higher polish than the rest, and, above all, if they sink deeper into the stone than is required by the exigencies of the design, a shrewd guess may be hazarded that the deception now described has been here brought into play. .For their own purposes dealers continue to promulgate the belief that a high polish of the interior of an engraving is a certain warrant of its antiquity : hut this doctrine is of the falsest, for all good modern engravers have known how to impart to their intagli a polish equal to (indeed, sometimes overdoing) that of the antique. This finish merely requires the expenditure of some additional time and labour in working over the intaglio, internally, with a leaden point charged with diamond-powder.f Another popular notion is, that the modelling- wax (which amateurs usually carry with them for examining gems) will not adhere so readily to antique as to modern work ; but this, * Antique camei also on fine and large sardonyx-stones, but rudely finished (as are the majority of the genuine Homan), have been the especial subjects of this orthopcedic treatment. The most conspicuous exemplum probans of this statement is the grand ‘ Trajan crowned by a Province,’ as the savant Denon chose to christen it, still one of the chief glories of the cabinet of the Hermitage, but which in truth owes all its actual merit to Pistrucci, who, in the opening of his fame, entirely reworked the clumsy Lower Empire relievo “ on an onyx as big as a man’s head,” put under his care by Dom. Desalief, a Eoman antiquario. j- For which Guay in his chef-d’oeuvre, the bust of Louis XV., substituted a quill cut to point ; this enabling him to reach the finest lines of the work. TESTS OF ANTIQUITY— POLISH. :3 though absolutely correct in itself, in reality depends on nothing else than the relative degree of polish of the stones tested. But as to this particular, the much-insisted on test of internal polish, the truest criterion of antiquity (omitting for the present the question of art) I have ever found to he that slight degree of dulness, like that pro- duced by breathing upon a lustrous surface (and literally in this case the marks of Old Time’s breath), which the lapse of ages has always cast upon the originally high lustre of the interior of the work. This appearance cannot be imitated by any contrivance of the modern forger ; and, once remarked, is so peculiar in itself, as easily to be recognised ever afterwards. So constant is this peculiarity in works of genuine antiquity, that its absence is always to he regarded as very unfavorable to the authenticity of the piece. Besides this, the effect of the real wear and tear of time upon the surface of a gem is rather an equably diffused roughening, like that upon ground glass, than the deep scratches and pittings produced by the violent forcing of the dealers ; personages aptly styled by Pliny “ mangones gemmarum,” and whose reputation for honesty stood precisely at the same zero in his times as in our own. A very satisfying mark of antique origin is obtained where the engraving appears to have been executed chiefly by means of the diamond point ; that is to say, where all the lines are cut into the stone by a succession of little scratches one after the other, while all the deeper parts of the design have been sunk by the action of the drill* a tool with a blunt and rounded point, producing a succession of hemi- spherical hollows of varying diameter. Some intagli even occur that have evidently been scratched into the gem by means of the diamond point alone, especially the works in shallow relief belonging to the Archaic Greek school ; and as a general rule, according to the obser- * Mentioned by Pliny in his provokingly concise notice of the technique of engraving (xxxvii. 76). “Jam tanta differentia est ut alire (gemmae) ferro scalpi non possint, alia} non nisi retuso, omnes autem adamante ; plurimum vero in iis terebrarum proficit fervor.” And Apuleius couples the same tool under its more proper name, “ tornus,” with the “ lima,” in a very curious passage of his ‘ Florida,’ describing the sophist Hippias wearing a gem ring, engraved, set, and made with his own hands. 24 ANTIQUE OEMS AND RINGS. vation of that able engraver Natter, “ the extensive nse of the diamond-point is the grand distinction between the antique and the modern art.” The technical term itself, 7 \u ANTIQUE GEMS AND BINGS. corundum powder and oil, which explains the rudeness of the facetting in Indian cut gems.* The “ terebrarum fervor,” termed hy Pliny the most efficient agent of all in the process, was the rapidly revolving drill, elsewhere called “ ferrum retusum,” and this observation of our grand and almost sole authority in the matter, is convincingly borne out by the appearance of many intagli (forming the majority of those covering the scarabei of the Etruscans), which must have been executed with the drill and emery powder exclusively. In such works the entire design is carried out by the juxtaposition of a series of hemi- spherical hollows of varied extent, touching and overlapping each other, by which inartificial method those wonderful caricatures of man and beast were multiplied by the primitive Etruscan artist. And the failure of that early school in respect to intaglio cutting is the more striking, and must with the greater confidence be imputed to the imperfect mechanical means at their command, when we meet with the very rudest intagli, evidently the first essays of the new art, enriching, as their authors thought, the field of scarabei, which are themselves perfect masterpieces of work in relief, and which frequently have been honoured with the most elaborate and beautiful of gold mountings ; circumstances pointing them out as the original ornaments of a class able to command the highest artistic skill of their age. To wind up this enumeration of the instruments of the ancient engraver, to which any reference can be found in classical writers ; the ostracites , or ostracias, is briefly mentioned by Pliny as a substance testacea dnrior, “ of such hardness, as to be capable of engraving gems with its fragments.” Millin supposes, hut without the slightest grounds in actual practice, that an allusion is here intended to the use of cuttle-fish bone in the polishing of the finished work. But certain points in Pliny’s confused notices of the mineral, incline me to suspect he is transcribing some Greek account of the use of iron pyrites for * 'They also use a kind of rotary grindstone made out of corundum powder and shell-lac, turned hy means of a strap. 1 more than suspect that the “ lima Thynica ” of Maecenas’ lines was of the same nature. Files of carbonado (black diamond) and shcll-lac are a recent Parisian invention, and cut the ruby. ANCIENT ENGRAVING TOOLS. the purpose — a material substituted for emery in Persia, from the earliest times, in the polishing of precious stones, and indispensable, says Ben Mansur, in that of the spinel ; unless indeed we take “ testacea ” in its literal sense, as meaning the pounded slag from the copper furnace, which Heraclius prescribes as the best material for the cutting of rock-crystal.* The “ marculus ” and “ caelum,” hammer and chisel, have been added to the ancient gem engraver’s equipment by the learned K. 0. Muller, t on the strength of a passage of Fronto’s (iv. 3). “ Verba prorsus alii vecte et malleo ut silices moliuntur, alii autem caelo et marculo ut gemmulas exsculpunt.” But it is apparent from the nature of the simile that the philosopher is alluding to the extraction, by means of these two implements, of gems out of the matrix in which they were embedded (as Theophrastus tells us of the sard), and contrasts this delicate process with the rough work of getting building stone out of the quarry by means of the beetle and crowbar.{ Natter, whose opinion derives the greatest weight from his profession, suspected that the ancient engraving tool, what- ever its nature, both excised and polished its work by one and the same operation ; drawing this inference from the existence of so many rude and seemingly unfinished intagli, which, nevertheless, are as thoroughly polished inside as others in the highest state of completion. * This seems to me to be the only possible explanation of his “ fomacis fragmina.” Pliny’s “ Cadmea ” is of two kinds, the native, copper pyrites, “ ipse lapis ex quo fit res cadmea vocatur,” and the artificial. This was something produced in the smelting of the ore, and was divided into many sorts (all used in medicine as caustics), according to their degrees of levity. The heaviest of all the placitis, that adhered to the sides of the furnace, was again subdivided into the ostracitis, completely black, and the onychitis, “ externally almost blue, but internally resembling the spots on the onyx ” — (xxxiv. 22). The copper smelters of Swansea still twist into spirals, as toys, the fine black and blue agate-like slag produced in their work, a substance very aptly to be described by “Onychites.” I strongly suspect these artificial minerals crept into Pliny’s list of gems in another book, purely on account of their employment amongst the apparatus of the gem-cutter. f And upon his authority by the latest writer on our subject (‘Ed. Rev.’ Oct., 1866), who advances a very fanciful theory as to the mode of their application to cameo engraving. + “Silex” is the Roman technical term for building and paving-stone, still retained in “ Selce,” in the modern tongue. 28 ANTIQUE GEMS AND DINGS. This argument, however, is not entirely conclusive : it might have been that some mechanical process was then known for polishing the intaglio with very little trouble, and which the lowest class of artists, who produced these cheap ring-stones for the plebeians, were equally competent with the most skilful to impart to their performances.* In Pliny’s time the wheel, in its present form at least, does not seem to have been known, otherwise he could not have omitted from his list of engraver’s appliances so important an innovation, which once in- troduced drove all the older methods out of the atelier, in consequence of the superior rapidity and facility of its operation. Pietramari, an old Roman antiquario of great experience in this subject, thought he had observed indications of wheel-cut work for the first time about the period of Domitian : it is certain we find abundant traces of its use in the coarser intagli of the Lower Empire. f Especially is this method observable in the lettering of the legends on the Gnostic class, where we see the square form of the characters universally employed, in consequence of the difficulty of cutting curves with an instrument rotating in a vertical plane ; and consequently tending to work forwards in a straight line upon the surface presented to its action. Upon the earlier gems, on the contrary, the letters were scratched in by the diamond point, and therefore whatever their shape, curved or angular, were all executed with equal facility. The rude intagli of the Sassanian period (to he particularly considered in * The denarii of the families Papia and Eoscia exhibit amongst their exceedingly numerous mint marks a great variety of tools belonging to the various arts, 'that some of these represent the tools used in die-sinking, may be inferred from the fact of the hammer and the die being plainly recognisable amongst them. There is, therefore, reason to suppose that others of the number, of singular and inexplicable figure, may be the implements of the gem engraver. f Jannon de Saint-Laurent has discussed, at great length, the subject of ancient engraving tools in his treatise, ‘ Sopra le pietre preziose degli antichi ; e sopra il modo con quale furono lavorate.’ Part IT., published in the ‘Dissert. Acad, di Costona,’ Yol. VI., 1751. The conclusion he arrives at is that the ancient, instruments were identically the same with the modem, and applied in the same way; and that all antique intagli were executed with the wheel ( rotellino ), and finished off with the diamond point ; also that diamond powder was the regular agent in the first part of the operation ! ANCIENT ENGRAVING TOOLS— THE WHEEL. 29 their due place) appear to have been universally cut with the wheel, and the artist must have had but a single implement of the kind at his disposal, as may be inferred from the fact that all the lines composing the design are of the same thickness, and that, generally, very coarse. The wheel was probably introduced into the Roman practice from the East, at the time when the trade in gems had attained to the prodigious extent, of which some notion may be gleaned from Pliny’s incidental remarks ; and the Parthian con- quests of Trajan, and of Severus, in the next century, must have largely widened the relations between the two empires which then divided the world between them. Down to the fall of the Western Empire, and far below, as the crystal plaques, executed under the auspices of the Carlovingian patron of the art, Lothaire, in the ninth century, attest, the wheel continued the sole means for pro- ducing the pitiable monuments of the expiring profession. In the East the mechanical processes have always been main- tained in full vigour, from the custom with the Mahomedans of wearing signets engraved in stones, the finest, the most beautiful, and the hardest that conld he procured. Persian legends often may be seen admirably cut on the spinel and the sapphire, nay, even on the diamond, as in the case of the Russian “ Shah and these long inscriptions, formed into regular, gracefully flowing curves, often combined into the most complicated monograms, inter- spersed with flowers and stars, required as much taste and skill in their execution as did the groups and figures of the European artist. At the time of the Revival the instrument, together with the art of gem engraving, was again introduced into Italy, and through its agency all the innumerable master-pieces of the Cinque- cento sprung into existence.! And so it continued until that able engraver, Flavio Sirletti, at the opening of the last century, followed the suggestions of Baron Stosch, and by reviving the use * The large diamond sold to the Czar by Chosroes, youngest son of Abbas Mirza. f A curious proof of this is Vasari’s putting “ ruote,” literally “wheels,” for intagli as distinguished from camei, when speaking of Val. Vicentino’s labours. 30 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. of tlie diamond point, was enabled to get his own works pass current for those of the greatest masters of antiquity.* But to make a concluding remark upon the antique method : it is my firm conviction, based upon the study of the finest genuine intagli, that the old scalptor, having first sunk his work to the depth required with the drill, and then completed all the details with the diamond point, finally removed all traces of the instru- ments employed by the high polish he imparted to his work, as the concluding operation ; thereby giving it the effect, so character- istic of the truly antique intaglio, that almost melting outline which leaves nothing angular or sharply defined, hut rather makes the whole figure appear modelled by the most delicate touch in some soft and plastic substance. So true is this, that one is frequently inclined to mistake the best antique gem work for modern paste, until the reality of the done is tested by the file, so exact an ap- pearance does it present of having been produced at once, by cast- ing in some fused material, rather than that of a design, slowly eat by assiduous labour into the hardest and most refractory of created bodies. Intagli are occasionally to he met with which the engraver has for some unknown reason left unfinished ; perhaps on account of some accident or blunder during the progress of the work beyond his power to rectify. On such a commenced sketch (which is figured in his plate, No. 35, 36) Baspe makes the following in- structive observations : “ A sketch of Thalia standing, with the mask and curved pastoral staff, which shows the manner in which the ancient masters executed their works ; that is to say, the extremities of the legs are only simple strokes that imitate the bones. On the upper parts of the bosom and the body it is evident that they engraved the nude previously to engraving the drapery, which in this instance the artist has begun to put in afterwards. Everything proclaims an artist, who in his desire after correctness, used to * Pistrucci has left it mitten in his delightful autobiography, that all his master, Mango, taught him when first apprenticed, was how to pound the diamond powder, and to what side to turn the wheel ; adding, that in truth there was very little else to be taught in the art. THE MAGNIFYING-GLASS. 31 work on the same plan as the celebrated Burch, whose panegyric we have already proclaimed elsewhere ” (at No. 5844). “ All the works of Mr. Burch are of classical elegance, as well with regard to proportion, as in the details and execution ; for he does what few engravers have done or can do, he begins* the figures to which he sets his hand, which are academical and anatomical studies and sketches.” The extreme minuteness of detail, conspicuous in many antique works, has induced certain writers on our subject boldly to assert that the engravers must have had some means of assisting their sight, equivalent to our magnifying-glasses. In confirmation of their theory, a story is vaguely told about some engraved gems found in company with a convex glass lens at Pompeiif and they at once jump to the conclusion that the lens had been employed in the engraving of these particular gems, and therefore formed a regular part of the artist’s stock. But the supposed lens was in all proba- bility no more than a paste imitation of peridot (the commonest of all), cast in cabochon, and itself prepared to receive an impression ; such a shape being the favourite one with the ancients for all the transparent coloured gems, whether intended to be worn en- graved or plain. A large pale amethyst of my own, on which the intaglio, a hippocampus, occupies only a small extent of the field, does, when properly applied, act as a magnifying lens of great * That is “ from the beginning,” the skeleton. f In Stabire Street, in the year 1854, and now in the Museum, Naples. It is of a pale green colour, If inch in diameter, having the edges ground for setting. The half of a similar, but somewhat larger disk, was found amongst Roman remains in London, and is described in ‘Journal of Arch. Association,’ XL, p. 453. But I strongly suspect the whole theory is based upon Layard’s discovery at Nineveh of a plane convex crystal lens, 14 inch in diameter by 1 deep, found in company with some glass vases. He and Rawlinson both suggest that it was a true magnifier (its focal length being 44 inches), used either for reading the small cuneiform legends, or in gem engraving. An obvious answer to this hypothesis is that, had the use of crystal lenses for these purposes been known, considering the vast extent to which the glyptic trade then flourished, they would now turn up by hundreds, and not in one solitary example. Orpheus (Onomacritus), that thorough Magian, informs us of the true object of the crystals thus shaped, viz., to kindle the sacred fire, or, as he terms it, the “ fire of Vesta.” 32 ANTIQUE GEMS AND BINGS. power, a remarkable property that one cannot help supposing must have attracted the attention of some amongst the ancient possessors of similarly formed gems. Besides, an antique Greek ring has been seen by me, set with a lenticular crystal, unengraved, which if found loose in suitable company might very well have passed for a magnifier. But Pliny, who notices so particularly the various requisites of the glyptic art, and who certainly possessed more than a theoretical knowledge of all its processes, would never have omitted this most important auxiliary, both to the artist and the amateur, especially when he actually mentions “ that engravers, whenever their sight is fatigued by the excessive strain required by their work, refresh their eyes by looking upon an emerald.” Seneca, indeed states (‘ Nat. Quaes.’ I. 6),* “ that glass globes, filled with water, make small and obscure objects seen through them appear quite legible and distinct but he ascribes the effect to the nature of the water, and gives no hint that in his day the discovery had been applied to any useful purpose. It has however been supposed that the ancient engraver directed the light from a small window or a lamp so as to pass through one such globe, and fall in a concen- trated focus upon his work, in the same manner as is still done by jewellers working upon small objects by lamp-light ; and as the present practice can be traced very far back, there is a possibility of its having been handed down in the traditions of the trade from remote antiquity. But the truth is, that gem engravers do really execute their work with little assistance from the magnifier, the chief use of which is to ascertain the progress made in the sinking the design into the gem, by repeated examination of the impression taken at short intervals in soft wax. For by the very nature of the operation, in which the gem is held, cemented upon a handle, against the edge * Having previously (xxix, 38) noticed the use of a green beetle for the same purpose in a very curious passage, which, however, has escaped the observation of all previous writers upon ancient glyptics: “Scarabei viridis natura contuentium visum exacuit, itaque gemmarum scalptores contuitu eorum acquiescunt.” USE OF THE LENS. 33 of a revolving button smeared with oil and diamond-powder, the actual work doing is concealed from the eye of the operator, who regulates the cutting more by the touch, and the instinct derived from long practice, than from ocular observation ; whilst he keeps a check upon the excising power of the instrument by the repeated application of the lens, both to the stone and to the impression in wax. Again, the dust and oil combined fill up the lines as the work pro- ceeds, so that the inspection of the cutting itself is rendered practi- cally impossible. Even in intagli executed with the diamond point solely, the same inconvenience existed, if we suppose the ancient engravers employed that tool in the same manner as the Italian described by Vettori as fixing the diamond-splinter in the end of an iron pencil a span in length, and rubbing it to and fro over the lines to be traced upon the gem, dropping upon the place occasionally emery-powder and oil. Such being the case, the whole seeming difficulty at once vanishes, for the minutest work, that of the early Greek intagli, is distinctly visible to the naked eye when well practised in the examination of such objects ; whilst the intagli of Roman date, from their bolder and less finished style, offer no difficulty whatever, even to the ordinary observer, who is able to catch every detail of the subject without artificial aid. As for truly antique camei, their style is so vigorous, not to say careless in details, being only intended to produce effect from a distance, that the artist could have experienced no more difficulty, as regards sight, in working them out of the sardonyx with the unassisted eye, than in the carving of small bas-reliefs in any other less resisting material ; and with respect to this literal “ working in the dark ” in the case of intaglio- engraving, Vasari has long ago made the same observation : for he calls it “ Una arte tanto difficile perche intagliando in cavo e proprio un lavorare al buio, dache non serve ad altro la cera che per occhiali a vedere di niano in mano quel che si fa.”* It must also be borne in mind in how much higher a degree of perfection the Greeks * “ So difficult an art, because engraving in intaglio is regularly working in the dark, since the wax serves no farther than to show, through the magnifying glass, from time to time, what is going on.” D 14 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. possessed all their bodily faculties than the moderns, owing to their gymnastic training and simple mode of life ; whilst with us all these faculties are dulled by our over-civilization, and, as regards the sight, by the invention of printing, through which, and the early over- straining thereby entailed upon the optic nerve, it is prevented from ever attaining to its full development.* Nevertheless, some of our best wood-engravers do work without a lens, and there is an almost complete identity between the technique of their practice and that of the Etruscan or early Greek There can be no doubt, however, that the use of a magnifier was known much earlier than is generally supposed, for Ducange communicated to Menage a passage out of an unpublished poem by Protoprodromus, who flourished about a.d. 1150, where speaking of the physicians called in to the Emperor Manuel Comnenus, he has, — “ 'Ipyoincu, [SXcttovglv evOvs, Kparovaiv rbv ocpuypbv tov dewpovGiv teat ra cncvftaXa p,€Ta rod veXlov ,” — which veXtov Lessing (Ant. Briefe. XLY.) explains plausibly enough as a magnifying glass. Ages before, the same word is employed by Aristophanes for a burning-glass, which by its nature is at the same time a magnifier. * As examples of extraordinary powers of vision, Pliny (vii. 21) mentions the whole Iliad written out on parchment, of such a size as to be contained within a walnut, which Cicero had seen. This poem now fills 620 pages, 32mo., of small Greek type, Tauchnitz. As the Italian walnut attains such a magnitude as to admit of being converted into a “ lady’s companion,” this story may be received without dubitation. Callicrates cut ants and other insects out of ivory, so fine, that their limbs could not be discerned by other people (which, by the way, is another convincing proof that there were no lenses then known to assist weak eyes). Myrmecides, famed for his perform- ances in the same line, carved a quadriga that a fly covered with its wings, also a ship hid under those of a bee. And for the converse faculty, Varro recorded the name of a certain Strabo who, standing on Cape Lilybasum, could tell the number of the ships sailing out of Carthage, distant 135 miles. f I possess some etchings, done by a person of my acquaintance without the assist- ance of a magnifier, in which the details of grasses, ferns, &c., growing on bits of ruined architecture, are made out with microscopic delicacy that rivals the perfection of Archaic-Greek glyptics. And, what bears directly upon the question, Dr. Billing states that most industrious engraver, Pistrucci, to the close of his long life, seventy- three years, never to have used spectacles at his work. ( 35 ) ON THE FORMS OF ANTIQUE GEMS. This point is of sufficient importance to onr inquiry to claim a special notice, as in many cases (strange as it may appear to the uninitiated) the form supplies a trustworthy criterion of the date of the work, so invariably did the ancients assign particular modes of cutting to particular species of stones. For it is a rule almost without an exception, that the ancient lapidaries cut every coloured transparent stone, except the sard, into a more or less double-convex figure. It was probably on account of their original, time-honoured employment for hearing the signet-device on the flat base of the scarabaeus, that the sard, and its congener, the banded agate, continued to be cut into planes ; sometimes, though rarely, and in the later Eoman period alone, having the upper one slightly convex. The opaque coloured stones, lapis-lazuli, the red and green jaspers, follow the same rule as the sard. When the original plan of cutting the sardonyx in transverse plane slices was abandoned, which was not before the full inauguration of the Koman school, the stone was fashioned into a very obtuse cone, with a small table at the summit, so as to present its strata horizontally, and to the best advantage for their colours, to the eye, instead of vertically, as the Etruscans and Grecians preferred to view them. The evident cause of the change was the almost exclusive employment of this d 2 3G ANTIQUE OEMS AND RINGS. material for camei, then for the first time becoming the grand field for the exercise of the talents of the most eminent masters in the art. The sardonyx, not engraved, was often worn in the ring as a precious stone, merely for ornament, in this form ; which, too, at the same time, as being the most fashionable of all, was occasionally adopted for the sard and the red jasper, though without the same reason. Pliny has certain singular remarks, somewhat difficult to understand, upon the forms of gems that were most general in his day. First in favour says he was the oblong* * * § meaning, doubt- less, the long ellipse to be noticed in so many of the finest antiques. In the next degree stood the lentile-shaped, or the spherical much flattened on both sides ; a pattern now known as “ cut en ccihochon”\ or by the homely hut expressive term, “ tallow-drop.” Lessing has some very subtle speculations to account for the evident predilection for this pattern, which, as before remarked, the majority of the coloured transparent gems exhibit, j: He ingeniously endeavours to prove that this configuration of the field both facili- tated the engraving and assisted the perspective of the design, by bringing all the depths of the intaglio into the same horizontal plane. But the more probable motive is that the protuberant form of a coloured stone rendered it more ornamental when mounted in gold ; besides the practical advantage that the projecting surface, forming a corresponding depression in the soft material then used for sealing with, so protected from effacement the impression of the signet-intaglio. § Next to the lenticular, Pliny ranks the cycloidal outline, the * There is another form confined to gems of the early Greco-Italian school, the almond, hut having both ends equally pointed. It is well adapted for the designs placed upon it, single erect figures ; the favourite stone for it being the dark agate. t From “ Cabo,” a head. J A plasma or a garnet cut to a plane face, will invariably prove to contain the work of a modern hand, however skilfully disguised. § It must also be remembered that all the Indian gems, except the diamond, known to the ancients, came to them in the shape of beads of different sizes. The double convex form, probably on this account, was regarded by them as the most natural. FORMS OF OEMS. 37 popularity of winch in the Augustan age is attested hy the numerous specimens remaining : and last of all came the circular. “ Angular shapes are disliked,” a fact shown hy their rarity ; for although we do meet with a few square gems, they belong to the talismanic class, and only date from the ages of the Decline. An octangular form is often to he seen in antiques that have been cut down for re-setting in Gothic times, when the octagon, for its importance as a Masonic symbol, had become the most popular of all figures. “ Stones with concave* or projecting surfaces, are considered inferior to those which have them smooth and even.” To understand this, it is neces- sary to have seen in what manner the Eomans employed the harder precious stones like the ruby and sapphire. We find that they never attempted to reduce them to any exact form, hut set them retaining their native figure, to which the lapidary had contrived to give a certain degree of polish. Hence such a stone, if naturally presenting a regular shape, was much more sightly in ornamentation, than when, as more usually, it came in the awkward form of an irregularly rolled pebble. In Low Latin, such a sapphire went by the name of “ lupa,” in allusion, probably, to its untamed nature, as distinguishing it from one shaped hy art, “ arte edomitus.” This native form being generally convex, the name got ultimately transferred to a magnifying lens ; whence the French “ loupe.” The most valuable stones, as rude (except a slight polish) as when first picked up in the gravel of the Cingalese torrent, may he seen embellishing, rather hy their intrinsic preciousness than hy their still veiled beauty, the most important pieces extant of ancient jeweller’s work, such as the Iron Crown, those of the Hispano-Gotliic princes found at Guerrazar, and those of Charlemagne, and of Geisa, first king of Hungary. In fact, native spinels continued to he preferred to the cut for setting in jewellery as late as the middle of the 17th century, as De Laet has remarked at the time. * The meaning of this is far from clear. Can it refer to the hollowing out the hacks of carbuncles, in order to diminish the opacity and dark tinge of the stone ? 38 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. CYLINDERS— ASSYRIAN, BABYLONIAN, PERSIAN. These, the most ancient form of the signet, are, for the most part, perfectly cylindrical stones, from one to three inches in length,* and half as much in diameter. In a few, the form is varied into a barrel shape ; in others, the converse appears, and the sides are slightly concave, like a dice-hos. A large hole passes through their length, to admit a soft woollen cord, by means of which they were tied round the wrist like a bracelet. This accounts for their never having metal mountings when disinterred amongst Assyrian remains, though found in such vast abundance. The very rare examples known, mounted in massy gold swivel-rings, prove by the hieroglyphics engraved upon them, that such were merely adaptations by the Egyptians to their national fashion of the swivel-mounted scarabeus, during the period their country was subject to the Persian rule. A few words in testimony to this, according to modern notions, so strange a fashion of wearing the signet. Whenever signets are mentioned in the Old Testament, it is always as borne upon the The respective magnitudes being regulated by the rank of the owner. CYLINDERS, IIO W CARRIED. 39 band, not upon tlie finger. Thus (Gen. xxxviii. 18) Tamar" demands her lover’s “ seal and twisted cord,” chotam and ^pethil, falsely rendered “ ring and bracelet.” Again, Pharaoh takes the signet “ off his own hand ” and puts it upon that of Joseph. Jeremiah (xxii. 24) has : “ The signet upon my right hand and Ecclesiasticus (xlix. 11), “ Zorobabel, even he was as a signet on the right hand with many other similar allusions, all tending to prove the same thing. Thus the young Amalekite (2 Kings i. 10) brings to David, as the ensigns of royalty, taken off Saul’s corpse, his diadem and bracelet, apparently because the latter contained the royal signet, the mere possession of which invested the holder with supreme power. In the catalogue of the treasury in the Acropolis, engraved on marble about the date of the Peloponnesian War (b. c. 431), and published by Chandler (Part II. No. iv. 2), are enumerated : “ Two glass signets of different colours, set in gold, and having gold chains attached to them,” a description showing them to he mounted as bracelets. Visconti (Op. Var. II. 1) gives a vase-painting, Jove seated on his throne, holding an eagle- tipped sceptre — itself an Assyrian distinction, as Herodotus records (i. 195)— and upon his wrist a large oval gem, a scarabeoid, tied around it by a fine cord— a mode this of carrying a convex stone much more convenient, as well as more natural, than the setting it in a swivel finger-ring, and moreover less exposing it to accidental injury. Pliny (xxxiii. 4) expressly states that the custom of wearing finger-rings was of no very ancient date, even in his days unknown to the East and to Egypt; and yet signets are, as we have seen, mentioned as in universal use in the most venerable of all historical records. Besides, when Herodotus notices, in the passage just quoted, that “ each Baby- lonian has a signet,” had he seen anything peculiar in their mode of wearing that signet, he certainly would have described it, according to his wont in all such cases. His silence shows, therefore, that the fashion still held its ground amongst the Greeks, for whom he was writing. That the Asiatic Greek scarabeoids were intended to be worn thus is plain from their appearance, they being frequently much too large for convenient use as swivel-rings : besides, they never retain 40 ANTIQUE GEMS AND DINGS. any trace of the metal axis so frequently remaining, fixed by its oxidation within the small scarabei. The most noble examples of the class known to me, are a scarabeoid (brought by M. Merlin from Athens) in lapis-lazuli, 1) x 1 inch in size, engraved with a crouching Venus putting on her tunic, in the purest old style ; and mother in sappharine, of about equal size, found in Sicily, a Victory crowning a trophy, in the style of the coins of Agathocles (Brit. Mus.). In this mode, the engraved face of the stone being next the skin, was effectually protected from the dangers of wear and of accident. The very large relative diameter of the hole through the axis of both cylinders and scarabeoids, conclusively demonstrates that they were intented to admit a thick and soft cord such as could be fastened about the wrist,* without inconveniencing the wearer, and which, dyed of a bright hue, became an ornamental appendage. For example, the amethyst lynx of the sorceress Nico (probably something of this form) is strung upon a yarn of purple lambs wool, when dedicated to Venus (Antliol. v. 205). That the Assyrian and Babylonian cylinders were never intended for metal settings, is an inference to be also deduced from the absence of all trace of metal within any one of the thousands brought to this country. The solitary example amongst Hertz’s cylinders of one retaining its bronze axis, may confidently be put down to the same class as the rare exceptions already noticed set as swivel-rings in gold, an adaptation by a foreign race to their national usage. But had such an arrangement been known in Assyria, the cylinders would now turn up with their pivots oxidised and still remaining inside them, when made of baser metal, quite as frequently as do the Egyptian scarabei similarly fitted. Besides, all such stones, whether Egyptian or Etruscan, properly designed to turn upon a metal axis, * It is possible that several strung together were used for a necklace by such as could afford the cost of so many works of the engraver. Such indeed seem to be the components (separated by spherical beads) of the necklaces of the gods and princes in the Assyrian sculptures. Some argument may be drawn from analogy — this is the use the Arab women put all the cylinders to that they can pick up in the ruins. CYLINDERS, HOW APPLIED AS SEALS. 4 L are bored with a very fine hole that barely admits the wire, for the sake of solidity ; whereas cylinders, however small their external dimensions, have all an equally wide internal perforation, which, in the smaller specimens, often reduces their substance to such tenuity that unless the fastening passed through them had been soft and pliant yarn,* they would have been extremely liable to split when applied to their use. Add to this, the heavier cylinders if fastened about the wrist with a wire, would have formed a painful and intoler- able incumbrance to the wearer.j We come now to the mode of using these singular implements. The impression of the signet engraved on the circumference was made by rolling it over a bit of pipeclay J (the 7 rj arjfjLavrpb ? of the Greeks), laid upon the object to be secured, or attached by a ribbon to the document to be authenticated by the seal. This is the true source of Job’s simile, “ The heavens are turned as clay to the seal whereby he poetically likens the concave vault above, studded with the constellations, presenting to his mind so many fanciful shapes, to the surface of the clay spreading itself before the revolving cylinder into a hollow plain, covered with its strange devices of gods, heroes, and monsters. When Layard first attempted to classify these primeval monu- ments of the glyptic art in their national and chronological order, he made those of his First Period to only coincide in date with the earliest sculptures of Nineveh ; but subsequent discoveries, aided by the more perfect understanding of their cuneiform legends, have * Eawlinson (‘Ancient Monarchies,’ I. p. Ill) figures the interior of a primitive Chaldsean tomb at Mugheir (Ur), where the remains of string fastening the cylinder were yet visible around the arm bone of the deceased. These Mortuary cylinders are always blank ; the real, engraved one, being the family seal, as a matter of course passed to the heir ; its semblance sufficed for the purposes of the defunct. f The smallest were sometimes mounted in gold swivel-rings of the Egyptian fashion. In the Waterton Collection is one of lapis-lazuli, set exactly in the style of the “ Eoyal Signets,” in gold, having a very massy shank tapering towards the points, and wrapped round for some distance with the stout wire that also forms the axis of the cylinder. t Still the best material for taking clear impressions from cylinders ; a thing im- possible to effect with our sealing-wax. ANTIQUE GEMS AND DINGS. 42 carried back the antiquity of the instrument by more than a thousand years. The following classification may, therefore, be accepted as based upon tolerably secure data; and cylinders, judged by the form of the character used in their inscriptions, their styles of art, and their materials, may be assigned respectively to five periods. I. The primitive Chaldsean Empire in Lower Mesopotamia, ex- tending from b.c. 2234 to 1675; its metropolis, Ur (Mugheir). II. The Archaic-Babylonian Period, after the seat of government had been fixed at Babylon, about b.c. 1675.* III. The Early Assyrian, beginning some time after the foundation of Nineveh by Tiglath-Pileser I., about b.c. 1110, and ending with the fall of that city in b.c. 625. f IV. The later Babylonian, from the re-establishment of that empire, until its destruction by Cyrus, from b.c. 625 to b.c. 536. Y. The Persian, under the Achaemenian dynasty, down to the Macedonian Conquest ; from b.c 536 to b.c. 330. Of the First Period, the earliest recorded king is Urukh,i who reigned about b. c. 2090, and whose name is read, impressed in sin- gularly bold and simple characters upon the bricks of his capitals, Mugheir, Warka. His signet has been recognised by Sir H. Pmw- linson in the cylinder figured by Sir Ker Porter (II. pi. 79. 6.) The design is a bearded, flat-capped man, seated in a chair, and to whom another in the conical cap of Belus is presenting a young woman : behind her stands a female attendant, with hands raised in adoration. The draperies are wound spirally about the figures ; one grand cha- racteristic of the primitive style in these works. Three lines of neatly-cut letters contain the monarch’s name and titles. Porter has not stated the material, and the present whereabouts of this invaluable monument is unknown. But the British Museum actually * Subverted by the Arabians, b.c. 1500, of whom followed a series of nine kings for 245 years, barbarian conquerors who have left no monuments. f Babylonia remained in the insignificance to which the Arab conquest had reduced it for seven centuries and a half. X The “ pater Orchamus, seventh in descent from the primal Belus ” of Ovid (Met. iv. 212). FIRST CHALDEAN, AR CHAIC-BAB YL ON I AN, EARLY ASSYRIAN. 43 possesses the signet of Urukh’s son, Igli, engraved with the king paying his worship to a seated divinity, and inscribed with several lines, in a large and rudish lettering. It is formed of what seems black serpentine, partially calcined, about three inches long. This same easily-worked material is by far the most frequent one for these primitive seals, although jaspers, black and green, were occasionally employed, and the Museum has lately acquired a magnificent example in lapis-lazuli of the largest size, but unfortunately much defaced by wear. The designs upon this whole class are recognizable by their great simplicity ; a man combating with some beast of chase being a special favourite. In the Archaic-Babylonian Period,* the designs continue much the same in their nature, but gradually admit of some multiplicity of details, and often a procession of several figures of the same height walks round the circumference. The peculiar material, almost the national one, of all Babylonian art, probably owing to local circum- stances, is the loadstone (fibrous haematite), a black, hard, compact, oxide of iron, taking a very fine metallic polish, which it often has preserved unimpaired with wonderful pertinacity. The work, for the most part, has been executed with a tool having an obtusely angular edge, leaving deep parallel incisions, no doubt a fragment of the emery-stone, dtcovy, which down to the age of Theophrastus Armenia exported for the use of the Greek engravers. During the Early Assyrian Period, and the long ages through which Nineveh grew and flourished as the capital of the Eastern world, the glyptic art, keeping pace with its sister, sculpture, attained to the highest point of mechanical perfection it ever reached in any age or country. Its materials are at first the serpentine, black, green, and red, but it speedily makes its own the harder and finer stones, syenite, jasper, agate, calcedony, and has left innumerable and im- * Babylon, in place of Ur, had been made the capital by Naransin about b.c. 1750. The names of many of these kings are compounded 'with Sin = Lunus Deus. The names of fifteen kings of this series have been found on monuments. Berosus gives their complete number at sixty. 44 ANTIQUE GEMS AND BINGS. perishable records as to the true paternity of the most elegant of inventions. The subjects in the beginning are somewhat rudely done,* and correspond with those of the most ancient bas-reliefs found at Nimroud (Nineveh) ; such as the king in his chariot discharging his arrows at the lion, or gigantic wild hull ( arnee ) ; warriors in combat ; the king or the priest adoring the emblem of the Deity (the Mir, or winged orb in the heavens), or else the eagle-headed god, Nisroch ; winged hulls and lions ; all accompanied by the usual Assyrian symbols, the sun, the moon, the seven stars, the sacred tree ( Horn , the Tree of Life) the winged orb, and the wedge. A very large cylinder in brownish calcedony, belonging to a king who reigned in the fifteenth century before our era, is a masterpiece of engraving. But nothing can exceed, in elaborate design and exquisite finish, that of Sennacherib himself, cut in amazonstone,t a material, from its brit- tleness, taxing all the skill of the most practised lapidary to master. It was found with another, in the same stone, hut of finer quality, neither engraved nor bored, and which accompanies it in the show- case at the Museum. On this signet Sennacherib stands with his queen on either side of the Tree of Life, over which hovers the Visible Presence, hearing up on its wings two small busts, the genii (ferouers) of the worshippers. Similar acts of adoration are favourite subjects in this class. A remarkably elegant one of Layard’s presents Astarte standing, hacked by five stars, her crescent overhead, a seated dog, her regular attribute, in front ; her worshipper is a lady, behind whom is a tree with an antelope browsing upon it. As already remarked, these elaborate and highly finished engrav- ings declare the perfection to which the glyptic art had been carried in Assyria, even before its very rudiments were known in Egypt — * Especially in the conical stamps, which make their first appearance in this period ; the figures being entirely made out by coarse drill holes, rudely assisted by straight incisions from the cutting material. f Probably Pliny’s ‘ Tanos,’ a gem “ of an unpleasing green, and turbid internally, coming from Persia, and foisted in amongst the emeralds,” the opaque specimens of which it does in truth closely resemble. A cameo head of Antoninus Pius in oriental amazonstone actually passed in the Praun cabinet for done in emerald. EARLY ASSYRIAN, LATER BABYLONIAN. 45 the country to which some writers have assigned the honour of its invention. For the contemporary Egyptian signets were cut with the graver, either in soft materials, limestone, steaschist, and baked clay ; or, when of the highest class, in metal, like the “ royal signets,” some of which are still in existence.* The fact is singularly attested by Layard’s clay seal bearing the impressions of the signets of Sabaeo II. and Sennacherib ; the first unmistakably produced from an engraving in metal, the second from a well-executed intaglio in stone — not a cylinder, but a conical stamp of the form to be hereafter considered in its due place. Of the Later Babylonian Period,! the cylinders are by far the most numerous of all in European collections, owing to our much more familiar and long-standing intercourse with the region that furnishes them to the Arab diggers in the ruins. Amongst their materials the loadstone still predominates, followed in frequency by the brown calcedony ; but almost every other species of probably the Flight into Egypt. 5. The Baptism in Jordan, inscribed 1C . XC- 6. The Transfiguration. The second row consists of: — 1. The Entrance into Jerusalem. 2. The Flagellation. 3. The Crucifixion. 4. The Entombment. 5. The Resurrection. 6. The Angel appearing to the Magdalene. Chabouillet considers it as anterior to the eighth century, and made in Mesopotamia, the original country of that form for gems. The fact of this specimen being a paste, shows that there existed a regular manufactory of the kind, otherwise the mould for casting them would have been unnecessary. The figures being in relief show this cylinder to have been a mere ornament, probably like the examples last noticed, for stringing upon a necklace. ( 53 ) BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN DEITIES.* The following attempt to distinguish the various deities of Nineveh and Babylon is unfortunately to a great extent merely conjectural, so little having been preserved to us by the extant historians con- cerning the native names or the attributes of these ancient divinities, immortalized in their engraved effigies upon the cylinders and the cones. Belus is figured with bull’s horns, wearing an erect tiara sur- mounted by a globe. He is armed with a trident, or an axe, and stands upon the back of a bull, or wild goat. His dress is a long and full tunic. Sometimes he appears seated on a throne, and holding the bull by the horn. Occasionally his attributes are the thunderbolt and caduceus. This was the idol described by Baruch (vi. 14) : “ He hath a sceptre in his hand, as the judge of the country . . . ; he hath also in his hands a sword and an axe,” &c. Mylitta (Yenus) is seated on a throne with a crown in her hand, * Most of these deities were Primitive Chaldsean, and introduced into Assyria when that country formed part of the First Babylonian Empire. 51 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. and rests her feet upon Capricorn. A star and dove are her usual attributes. Parsondas, the god of war and the chase, is figured as a eunuch wearing a pointed cap, holding a knife or sword, and with one foot raised upon a footstool. Anaitis (Venus) is seen naked, and in front, standing upon the Egyptian hieroglyph for gold, a basin. Later, Anahid is the female Izecl presiding over the same planet. The Dove was employed as a religious symbol in the most remote ages, and amongst the most ancient nations of the world. The fabulous Semiramis, whose epoch is anterior to the very earliest of these monuments, according to one account derived her name from the dove in Assyrian.* According to another tradition she was changed into this bird on her departure from mankind (Diocl. Sic. Ovid). Even in the age of Augustus the dove was held sacred in Palestine. “ Alba Palaestino sacra columba Syro,” says the learned Propertius. Hence the adoption of the form, handed down to our times, as the most holy of symbols. It is curious to observe how the modern disciples of Zoroaster have retained the notion that it is in this very shape the Supreme Being still manifests himself to mortal eyes, as appears from the story in Tavernier (i. p. 490), of the Khan of Kerman, who insisted upon seeing the sacred fire preserved in the famous Parsee temple there. Being disappointed at the sight of only an ordinary flame, having expected to behold some miraculous light, he began * “ Between the Syrian Goddess and Jupiter stands another figure in gold, totally different from all other statues, having no form of its own, hut bearing that of all the other gods. It is called by the Assyrians themselves the image , but they give it no name, nor any account of its origin. Some suppose it to be Bacchus, some Deucalion, some Semiramis ; in fact, there is a golden dove standing upon its head, for which reason they fable it to be the figure of Semiramis ” (De Syr. Dea., 33). Doubtless it was the same attribute, the dove, that caused its attribution to Deucalion, our Greek’s evident equivalent for the Chaldean Noah. The “ Dea Syria,” or great goddess of Edessa, was in Plutarch’s age identified with Venus, with T sis, and with Nature, on the Principle creating all life out of moisture. She was in truth the old Chaldsean Beltis— Mylitta, whose usual title in the cuneiform legends is “ Mother of the great gods." Her numeral is 15, Chaldean Ri, whence probably came the Greek Rhea, with whom some identified the goddess of Hierapolis. BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN DEITIES. 55 to swear and to spit upon it, whereupon it vanished in the bodily- shape of a white dove. It was only induced to return (and in the same shape), by dint of prayer and almsgiving on the part of the priests and congregation. Nebo , the Clialdaean Mercury, has a beard, is clad in a long tunic, which leaves his right knee uncovered, and rests one foot upon a lion. He carries a caduceus. Nergal, bearded and bare-headed, has the legs and tail of a cock ; or is figured as a man with a cock’s head. Bel-Itan and JDagon are bearded figures, terminating in fishes’ tails. Oannes* wears a turreted tiara, has one leg of a man, the other in the form of a fish, and carries the sacred basket in his hand. The Horn, or Sacred Tree, is introduced into many of these groups, and often forms the principal object, with sphinxes, human-headed bulls, or wild-goats, rampant on each side like heraldic supporters. On stones of Persian date, Ormuzd himself, t or more probably the Ferouer, or Angel, of the king, soars in a crescent above the Tree of Life, to whom a figure below offers adoration. Hercules Gigon, a grotesque figure crowned with reeds, standing erect, carries by the tail a couple of struggling lions. The diminutive grotesque figures so frequently introduced have been supposed to represent the Phoenician Pataic gods, which they used to set in the prows of their ships, and which Herodotus (iii. 37), compares to the figures of the Pygmies. The Greeks have left us scanty notices even of the deities worshipped by the last Babylonians, so that the identification of their figures engraved on these cylinders is in great measure conjectural. Herodotus only mentions Mylitta, or Yenus, and Belus, whom he identifies with Jupiter, of whom he saw a large seated statue in the famous Temple, apparently differing in nothing from the commonly received Greek type of the god, inasmuch as he does not * The Greek version of Hoa, “ the god of waters.” His symbol is the wedge, as being the inventor of the cuneiform alphabet, and also the erect serpent. ’ f Copied identically from the type of Asshur in the Assyrian sculptures, whose attribute is similarly the Horn tree. ANTIQUE GEMS AND BINGS. 513 specify any striking peculiarity in the representation, which, according to his custom in such cases, he would otherwise have done. The shrine upon the summit of the temple contained no idol, being- inhabited by the god himself, in person, spiritually. But the account Diodorus gives of the same temple (ii. 9) is won- derfully embellished by the travellers’ tales accumulated during the intervening four centuries, and when the utter ruin of the building had rendered all confutation impossible. He himself owns the im- possibility of attaining to the truth, from the great discrepancy of the descriptions then current. But he places upon the summit three hammer- wrought golden statues, of Belus, Juno, and Pdiea — the first erect and striding, forty feet high, and weighing a thousand talents : Juno, a standing figure, holding a serpent fastened round her head in her right hand, a sceptre set with gems in her left :* Bhea, of equal weight with Belus, seated, two lions stood upon her knees, and at her side were two huge serpents of silver. Before the three was set a common table, supporting two goblets and two craters of incredible weight. But all these treasures had fallen a prey to the covetousness or necessities of the later Persian kings, who, be it remembered, were not image worshippers. Xerxes, relates Herodotus, had set the example by appropriating a statue of solid gold, twelve cubits high. But this was the figure of a monarch, not of a god (for it is termed avSpiw ?, whilst that of Belus is ayaXp.a,') and stood in the sacred enclosure, not within the temple itself, and may well have been that statue of Nebuchadnezzar, the mag- * Her priests offered fishes as the daily sacrifice to the great goddess Atargatis, whom Macrobius considers as synonymous with the Earth, and persons making vows to her, dedicated figures of fish in gold or silver (Athen. viii. 346). The Greeks accounted for this by an ex post facto fiction that she (a tyrannical queen) and her son Ichthys (i. e. Dag), had been drowned by order of their conqueror, Mopsus the Lydian, in the lake near Ascalon. Another tradition, preserved by Manilius (iv. 582), related how Venus (Anaitis) in the war with the giants assumed this shape : — “ For when she plunged beneath Euphrates’ waves, A fish’s form the flying Venus saves, ’Scaping the furious Typhon, giant dread, With serpent legs, with dragon-wings outspread.” BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN DEITIES. 57 nitude of wliich is so unreasonably exaggerated by Jewish tradition to the height of three score cubits. Still later Macrobius (i. 23) describes the supreme deity of the Assyrians, called Adad, “ one,” his head surrounded with rays point- ing downwards, expressive of the force of heaven in the solar rays shot down into the earth. He is attended by a goddess, Atargatis, crowned with rays pointing upwards, symbolizing the upward shoot- ing of the products of the earth, Both statues are supported by figures of lions. Agatliias quotes Berosus, to the effect that the Assyrian gods were identical with the Grecian, differing but in name ; as Sandes for Hercules, and Anaitis for Venus ; and existing monuments show plainly enough that these Oriental idols finding their way through Ionia, or Phoenicia, or Cyprus, served for models to the primitive Grecian image-makers. Identification of subjects will be facilitated by a list of symbols of Chaldsean and Assyrian deities. (Bawlinson.) Asshur, the supreme god : bust of man holding a bow, borne up in the winged circle : his attribute is the Horn tree. Shamas, Sol : a four-rayed star (Maltese Cross). Gula (his wife) : an eight-rayed star in a circle. Sin, Lunus deus : a man holding a staff, standing on a crescent ; or the crescent alone. Nergal, god of war : a lion, or androsphinx. Nin, of hunting : the Babylonian Hercules ; the winged bull. Iva, or Vul, of thunder, holds a rod, whence issue three zig-zag rays. Belus wears the horned cap. Beltis — Mylitta, “ the great mother,” is represented by a woman suckling, as Isis. Bel-Merodach is probably the very frequent figure holding a short sceptre and marching forwards, as Diodorus describes the statue of Belus. The badge of royalty is a torques, on which are strung, like charms, the emblems of Sin, Shamas, Gula, Belus, and Iva. 58 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. CONES AND HEMISPHERICAL SEALS. Stones thus shaped were gradually usurping the place of the Oriental signet under, its most ancient form, the cylinder, even during the times of the Achaemenidae, and entirely superseded the same when their empire with their old religion was restored by the vigorous race of the Sassanidse, in the third century. On this account all are indis- criminately termed Sassanian seals (though belonging to epochs so widely remote), from the appellation of the dynasty to which, in truth, the vast majority of them are to be assigned. The line commences with Artashir or Artaserses, “ the blacksmith,” a lineal descendant of the last Darius, who overthrew the Parthian empire, a.d. 226, and ends with Yezdigerd III. in a.d. 632, when the Arab invasion put a stop to the engraving of figures. Their dynastic appellation comes from Saansaan, the Roman mode (as we see from Ammian) of spelling Sliaansliaan, “ the king of kings,” the title in all ages, and even now, assumed by the Persian monarch. It is not, as historians absurdly repeat, a family name derived from an imaginary ancestor, Sasan. These stamps are found in great numbers in the ground about Bassora and Bagdad, places which, under the second Persian monarchy, CONES AND SEALS , EARLY FORM. 50 held the same rank as Ecbatana and Babylon under the ancient ; and by their abundance, coupled with the almost total absence of every other form of signet-gem, hear witness to the accuracy of Pliny’s remark (xxxiii. 6) : “ The greatest part of the nations, and of mankind, even erf those subject to our rule, have no signet-rings at all.” Their material is far from admitting so many varieties of stones as the later cylinders present. We find a few in red and green jaspers, agate, and sard, hut fully nine-tenths are in calcedony, the smoky, the sapphirine,* and the white. The obvious preference shown to the last sort, more especially for those seals honoured with the royal image and superscription, affords reason for considering this to repre- sent Pliny’s Thehjcardios — “ Colore candido Persas apud quos gignitur magnopere delectat, Mule earn appellant.” The Persian name is clearly their Mallca, “ king and the Greek, “ woman’s heart,” alludes to the usual cordiform shape of the native calcedony. On the examination of a collection of many examples, it will he found that the earliest class, agreeing both as to subjects and style with the Lower Assyrian cylinders as regards their intagli, are shaped like obtuse cones, frequently cut with eight sides, so as to make the signet an octagon ; probably then, as in the middle ages, a form replete with hidden virtues. The obtuse cone is the exact form of the Hindoo Lingarn, that most ancient symbol of the active generative power, Siva or Change — the origin of the obelisk, of the phallus erected on sepulchres, and of its last form, the more decorous stele. Again, the cone was the universally received type of the penetrating solar ray, an analogy sufficient to recommend this form to the worshippers of Mithras. Thus the black conical stone of Emesa, whose higli-priest was the Emperor Elagabalus, is figured on his coins with the legend “ Sacerdos dei Solis.” Such octagonal seals may be assigned, for the most part, to the times of the first Ninevitish and Persian monarchies,! i. e., before the * Which often is so fine in colour as almost to pass for a pale sapphire. Its tint explains the “ cerulean Phrygian iaspis ” of Marcellus Empiricus. f It is now generally agreed that this form of the signet was devised at Nineveh GO ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. Macedonian conquest ; and some, possibly, to those who held fast to the old religion and usages during the four centuries of the Parthian usurpation. They have a small hole drilled through the upper part, to admit a string for hanging them about the neck, the regular mode in those times of carrying the signet. In very fine specimens, probably designed for princely use, a groove passes round the apex of the cone, terminating in the usual holes, which only enter the stone to a slight depth, evidently once holding a thick loop of gold, as a more secure as well as ornamental mode of attachment. Such a loop still remains in a pyramidal stamp of serpentine (No. 972, Paris) discovered on the field of Marathon, and thus throwing a light upon the antiquity of this fashion. When inscriptions do occur on these early stamps of the First Period, it is invariably in a Semitic character, the oldest form of the Punic alphabet, never in the cuneiform, nor even in the latest of the Persian characters, the Pehlevi. The Sassanian proper are oblate spheres, with about one-third of the body ground flat to afford a field for the intaglio, and perforated through the middle with a large hole. This perforation is often so considerable relatively as to reduce the seal to the appearance of a bulky finger-ring, which no doubt inspired the later Romans with the idea of the crystal rings they were so fond of, as well as becoming the prototype of the agate and calcedony rings yet common in the East. In the more care- fully executed specimens the sides are carved into concentric curves ; in some cases thus, perhaps designedly, giving the contour of the shank the appearance of a turban. The seal so adorned in my possession is the best executed piece in this style known to me. Its device is three rosebuds springing from one stem, and the legend, most about the ninth century before our era, and did not become popular at Babylon before that city had become the capital of the AchEemenidan The scarabeoid, or simple ellipse, perforated through the axis, was sometimes adopted. Amongst Major Pearse’s gems (from the Punjab) I observed an immense one in dark agate, bearing an un- mistakably Babylonian Ashtaroth and her worshippers. The same form also continued in use amongst the Sassanians, especially in the case of the onyx, probably suggested by the fact of that material being usually imported in the shape of fakirs’ beads. SASSANIAN SEALS, TITLES. 61 elegantly cut, gives the name ancl titles of Yaranes, “ Yahrahran Shah.” On another (formerly Hertz’s), where the sides are thus embellished with concentric curves, is presented a very interesting figure of the qu'een in full dress, with flowing diadem, hanging scarf, and Chinese sleeves, her robe full of plaits falling over her feet in a thick roll, indicating the richness and weight of its silk brocade. By her side stands the infant prince. The legend gives her name — “Armin- dochti dochti, “ daughter,” having a special meaning of “ princess ” in Persia, exactly as “ infanta ” now in Spanish, to denote the daughter of the kingdom, par excellence. Similarly ShahjMhri properly means the “ king’s hoy,” i. e., the prince.* It may therefore be suspected that the very numerous portraits bearing this latter title do not all necessarily belong to one of the three kings so called, hut to different sons of their respective families. These hemispherical seals continued in use for some time after the Arabian conquest, since they are found with nothing upon them except a Cufic legend giving the owner’s name, after the usual Mohammedan fashion. There is an example in a fine sard, in my possession. But they were speedily superseded by ring-stones of the usual form mounted in silver finger or thumb rings, of which numbers exist, going hack to the first ages of the Caliphate. The engravings upon these stamps are extremely heavy in design and rudely executed — never to be compared to the work seen upon the better class of cylinders. The sole exception known to me is an octagonal cone in the purest sapphirine (once A. Fould’s), the intaglio a Hermes, only recognizable by his caduceus and winged boots, for he bears a lotus in his hand, and is closely draped in a long gown, candys, with a hanging pallium — a singular Oriental rendering of this Hellenic deity. On his head he wears the Persian cidaris, or tiara, at his feet is an eagle. The work is peculiarly neat, but altogether archaic, and * The Saxon “ conunk,” king, had originally the same meaning ; and “ childe ” even now is an archaic synonym for “ knight.” The shah’s image on a gem may always be known by the tiara he wears. All other portraits, constituting the vast majority, though inscribed with regal names, represent either the innumerable princes of the blood, or perhaps government officials. ANTIQUE GEMS AND BINGS, 62 may be assigned to some prince of the semi-Greek nations on the coast of Asia Minor. The apex of the cone has been deeply grooved for the reception of a massy gold shank to support the ring from which it depended. This is the place to remark that we are not left in doubt as to the use of these stamps. They explain it of themselves ; the actual manner of wearing the seal being conspicuously exhibited upon a noble specimen in sard (Brit. Mus.), proclaiming itself by its clearly-cut legend, “ The attestation of Sapor, fire-priest of the Hyrmans.” In this, a large spherical object, which can be nothing else than a stone (its magnitude far exceeding the biggest pearl ever found), is seen suspended by a short cord about the prelate’s neck, and above the long string of pearls that falls down over his bust. A hooked fastening at the ends of the cord seems also to be indicated, allowing of the facile disengagement of the seal whenever its services were required. But our great authority on Sassanian customs, E. Thomas, adduces a passage from the ‘ Shah Narneh ’ allusive to a different fashion, where the hero is directed to bequeath his seal to his child, if a girl, to be worn in her hair, but if a boy, in the bracelet upon his arm. Such directions at once elucidate the destination of those exceptionally large flattened disks (unpierced) in amethyst, sard, and nicolo, on which the more important portraits invariably occur. The great had invented this plan for converting the signet into a personal decoration, whilst the commonalty adhered to the primitive fashion of stringing it on a cord tied round the neck. But royalty maintained also the antique usage. A close inspection of the shah’s image often discovers a similar appendage to that of the above-quoted Fire-priest, and the matter-of- fact Oriental artist could never have omitted so essential a badge of sovereignty as the royal signet from his “ counterfeit presentment ” of the King of kings. The lately-cited writer, in his highly instructive memoir upon the great Devonshire amethyst (‘ Num. Chron.’ for 1866, p. 242), quotes Masaudi to the effect that Nushirwan had in use four different seals, with separate devices and legends ; and that Khosru Parviz employed SASSANIAN SEALS, EXECUTION. G3 no fewer than nine for the various departments of the state : “He had nine seals which he employed in the affairs of the kingdom. The first was a ring of diamond, the head whereof was formed out of a red ruby ! on which was cut the portrait of the king, the legend having the king’s titles. This was put upon letters and diplomas. The second was a gold ring set with a cornelian, upon which were engraved the words ‘ Khorasan khudah,’ ‘ King of Khorasan.’ It served for the state archives.” The first-mentioned arrangement is clearly con- nected with Nushirwan’s division of his empire into four provinces — Assyria, Media, Persia, Bactriana, each presided over by a vizier, who, of course, had an official seal of his own assigned to him. But to resume our notice of the art and execution of these later Persian intagli, it must be confessed that, in general, both are equally barbaric; cut by means (as its traces show) of a single coarse wheel, the figures formed by the repetition of equal lines, occasionally assisted by the application of a blunt-pointed drill. No traces are visible of the use of the diamond-point, nor that high polish so marked a pecu- liarity of the Greek and Boman intaglio-work. To give some idea of their designs, I subjoin a few of those most frequently repeated upon their faces, premising that deities never are figured upon these signets of the iconoclast, idol-hating Persians, to whose race this peculiar pattern of the seal undoubtedly owed its origin. — A priest praying before an altar ; a priest sacrificing at a fire-altar ; a winged genius holding a flower ; a winged human-headed horse ; the human-headed bull ; lion with scorpion’s claws and serpent-tail, a tree behind him ; Capricorn and a star above ; with a vast variety of similar astrological devices, as might be expected where the Magi formed the established church. The national standard — a crescent supported on a tripod, with the legend, “ Afsud direfesh,” “ Long live the royal banner ” — is so frequent, that it may be supposed the usual seal for a military officer. The fantastic animals, Pegasi, sphinxes, busts of lions and tigers, wild goats and antelopes, which form the subjects upon a large majority, at least in the late Sassanian period, exhibit often a truly Chinese taste in their drawing. And there is a wonderful similarity between 64 ANTIQUE OEMS AND RINGS. many of their animals and the same as figured on the Gallic or British coins. Thus a cornelian stamp hearing a horse, a wild hoar in the field below, from its exact identity with a well-known potin coin- type found in Jersey, made me long delude myself with the idea of having discovered the genuine work of some Gallic Pyrgoteles as yet uninfluenced by Roman instruction in his art. The Mithraic bull, always represented as the humped Brahminee,* whose Zend name, signifying Life, makes it the emblem of the Earth, is very frequent, and always in a couchant posture. One, on a fine almandine (a ring- stone in my collection), is interesting from its legend, “ Rast Shali- puhri,” “ The Just Sapor ” — an epithet curiously illustrated by the fact Ammian mentions, that Julian’s troops, breaking from their mine into the town of Maogamalka, surprised the garrison “ as they were chanting, according to their custom, the justice and felicity of this very king.” Another in jacinth has an elephant’s .head inscribed “ Masdaki Rai,” “ Prince Masdak ” — not the famous communist of the name who made a convert of King Cavades to his ruin. But these two examples are quoted here merely on account of their subjects, else they are foreign to our present purpose, the consideration of the stamps alone. The precious stones evidently designed for princely seals necessarily served their purpose as gems set in rings, a part of our subject to be hereafter separately considered. The antelope, t or more properly the wild-sheep of Armenia, appears * In Hindoo mythology the car of Chandra, the moon, is drawn by an antelope with long spiral horns ; hence that animal was the emblem of the moon, as the lion of the sun, and here do we find the true origin of Diana’s stag in Grecian fable. Yishnu in one of his avaatars tabes the name of VaraJia, his Sacti or energy is Varalvi, and her Vehan, vehicle or attribute, is the buffalo. Here is at once the origin of that favourite royal name, Vaharan, borne by four of the line, and the universal adoption of the Hindoo sacred buffalo as a device. f I cannot ascertain the exact species. It has refiexed horns exactly like the chamois, but much longer in proportion to its size. The animal is often figured couchant, -with the royal diadem tied round its neck, the sun and moon in the field distinctly marking it for the attribute (and symbol) of some grand divinity. One would almost suspect that our Richard II. took the idea of his favourite badge, the white hart chained, couchant, from the sight of a gem of the kind. Another Sassanian beast, armorial, has such monstrous and peculiar horns, that it can hardly be other than the THE BAM OF PERSIA. 65 so commonly as a signet device, that the figure must certainly embody some notion of great supposed importance. Could it have been chosen for the emblem of Persia Proper, its favourite habitat ; as in con- temporary art Carthage is known by the horse’s head, Africa by the scorpion, Spain by the rabbit, Gallia by the prancing steed ? In Daniel’s Vision, the ram typifying Darius has horns that were high, and one of them larger than the other. Now in all ancient figures of the common ram, the horns, however big, always curve downwards around the ear, and the epithet “ high ” is the very last one applicable to them. Probably, therefore, this mountain sheep was the animal the prophet had in view, and the Hebrew word will be capable of such interpretation. Ammian speaks of Sapor II. as “ lifting up his horns,” which may not be merely a rhetorical trope ; for the Sassanian kings actually appear graced with such strange appendages upon their medals. But the deep significance of the emblem is again manifested from its being emblazoned on these signets borne up by two pair of wings, like certain royal busts, intimating the divine nature of the object thus supported. On another stamp this beast couchant, engraved with unusual spirit, has the royal diadem tied round his neck, with the inscription “ Bat Parzai,” in which the name of Persia (Phars) is evidently contained. Can this have any reference to the astrological doctrine that Persia was under the influence of the sign Aries, as Manilius lays down : — “ Him Persia worships, clad in robes that flow. Her steps entangling as they fall below.” Ammian (xix. i.) describes how Sapor II. advanced under the very walls of Amida — “ Mounted on his steed, towering above all his attendants, he moved in front of his whole army, wearing, instead of a diadem, the golden figure of a ram’s head set with precious stones.” Such a royal helmet there is reason to believe we behold upon the seal just described. The tilting-helmets that came into fashion about Mouflon of Sardinia, a native of Tartary also ; or the Jaal of Mount Sinai, the Akko of Deuteronomy. The beast with the long heavy reflexed horns may be the great Paseng of Persia, which yields the bezoar. F 66 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. 1450, bore a strong resemblance to this object, and like it were commonly made in the shape of the head and neck of some beast, and rose to a monstrous height above the knight’s shoulders, which supported all the burthen of the head-piece ; and such an elevation appears intended by the term “ celsior ipse,” applied to the Persian conqueror in Ammian’s account. The Persian cavalry at this period, the middle of the fourth century, must have greatly resembled the men-at-arms of a thousand years later; for he goes on: “ All the squadrons were clothed in steel, being so covered with close-fitting plates over every limb, that the rigid joinings of the armour corre- sponded to the joints of their bodies, and vizors formed like the human face were so artfully fitted to their heads, that whilst their bodies were plated over to one impenetrable surface,* the falling missiles can only take effect where through minute openings placed in front of the eyeballs a scanty light is admitted, or where narrow breathing- holes are perforated through the extremities of the nostrils ” (xxv. 1). Again, his contemporary, Heliodorus (ix. 15), describes the Persian helmet as solid, all hammered out of one piece of metal, and exactly imitating the man’s face like a mask (it must be remembered that the ancient mask represented the entire head, hair and all). “ The wearer is entirely covered with this from the crown of his head down to the neck, with the exception of the eye-holes to peep through. The whole of his body, not the breast merely, is covered in this way — they beat out plates of iron and bronze into a square form a hand’s breadth in measure, and fitting one upon the other by the edges of the sides, so that the one above overlaps the one below, and its side lies over the piece adjacent in a continuous order; then linking- together the whole fabric by fastenings underneath the overlapping parts, they construct a scaled tunic fitting to the body without annoy- ance, and adhering closely to every portion thereof, contracting and * The cavalier in the sculpture at the Takt-i-Bostan (admirably engraved in ‘ Porter’s Travels ’) wears a very long mail shirt, the hood of which is drawn over a skull cap, and hangs like a short veil (our “ ugly ”) over his face, similar to the mode of the present Circassians. PERSIAN ARMOUR— FINGER-RINGS. G7 extending itself to suit without impeding every movement. It has sleeves, also, and reaches from the neck down to the knee, opening merely between the thighs sufficiently for convenience in getting on horseback.” An exact description, this, of the tegulated armour of the Normans.* The king’s bust, surrounded by a Pehlevi legend giving his name and lofty titles, frequently dignifies the calcedony stamps from the earliest to the latest ages of the monarchy ; but the royal image, when executed by the best hands of the times, appears on a rarer material and in a different fashion, on the nicolo and the sardonyx, cut in the ancient form of the perforated scarabeoid, to be worn as a bracelet ; or again, on precious stones, the spinel, almandine, guarnaccino, amethyst, fashioned as gems for setting in rings. t That the orna- ment for the finger had been naturalised amongst the later Persians is apparent from a remark in Procopius (Bell. Pers. 18), that no Persian was allowed to wear a ring, brooch, or girdle made of gold, except by the express permission of the king, conferred as a mark of special distinction. This explains the rarity of Sassanian ring stones, and their precious materials when they do occur — being designed as badges of superior merit.| It will be found on examination of this series, that the best executed portraits are those on precious stones, quite the converse of the rule holding good for Greek and Boman art, in which the * This invention must have been of old date, for when Masristius, Mardonius’s master of the horse, was thrown from his horse in the skirmish preceding the battle of Plate*, he was unable to rise from the weight of his armour ; not merely his body, but his arms and legs being covered with plates of gold, bronze, and steel. The Athenians could only despatch him by thrusting the long spike at the butt end of a spear into the sight of his helmet. — Plutarch, ‘ Aristides.’ f Often greatly exceeding the customary Roman dimensions. The British Museum sard of the “Fire-priest” is If x If inch, a perfect oval; the Devonshire amethyst of Yaranes IV., of nearly the same dimensions. The cabochon form, whatever the gem, was then the rule in Persia. t The satrap Nacharagas boasts to the Byzantine general, Martinus. before his own defeat at Archinopolis, “ I hold the victory as firmly, and put it on with as much ease as I do this ornament,” pointing at the same time to the ring he was wearing. — Agathias, II. F 2 G8 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. sard was preferred to all other gems, so long as works of any value were produced. The most interesting ring-stone I have met with, for it must of necessity date from the first monarchy, is a sard presenting the bust of a Persian prince, his head covered with close, short curls, his neck with an elaborate collar of heads, engraved in a very peculiar style. But what gives the portrait its importance, are a ram’s head and two cuneiform letters in the field, precisely as seen on the coins of Salamis in Cyprus, thus indubitably marking the head for a Persian satrap’s of that island, and consequently anterior to the Macedonian conquest. This gem has evidently been reduced to its present shape in modern times ; there can be little doubt its original form was a perforated scarabeoid (my collection). Such, indeed, is the shape of a large fine-coloured sardonyx of three layers (Pulsky Collection), which exhibits the full-length figure of a Parthian or Sassanian king, tiara on head, and attired in all his gorgeous apparel. Its type recalls the very important notice of a similar intaglio in a letter of Pliny’s, when governor of Bithynia, addressed to the emperor Trajan. “Apuleius, an officer stationed at Nicomedia, has written to me that a person named Callinicus having been forcibly detained by the bakers Maximus and Dionysius, to whom he had hired himself, fled for sanctuary to your statue, and being brought before the magistrate, made the following declaration : ‘ that he had been formerly slave to Lahienus Maximus, and taken prisoner by Susagus in Maesia, thence sent as a present by Decehalus to Pacorus, king of Parthia, in whose servitude he had remained many years ; hut at last had made his escape and got to Nicomedia.’ He was brought before me, and persisting in the same story, I judged that he ought to be sent on to you for examina- tion. This I have been somewhat delayed in doing, in consequence of having instituted a search for a gem engraved with the portrait of Pacorus and the ensigns of royalty he is used to wear, which gem the man tells me had been stolen from him. For I was anxious to send it to you if it could possibly he recovered, together with the man himself, as I have actually done with this piece of ore, which PERSIAN SEALS OF OFFICE. H9 lie asserts lie brought away with him from a Parthian mine. It is sealed up with my own signet, the impression on which is a four horse car.” It must be observed here, that Pliny terms the portrait of Pacorus gemma, not annulus, a sufficient evidence that it was nothing but a stone unset, either a scarabeoid or a stamp. The fact of a slave’s possessing such a seal throws light upon the existence of so many others bearing the king’s bust engraved so rudely and in such common materials, that they could only have belonged to the lower officials or perhaps the menials of the royal household. Again, the equally numerous class representing priests ( mobeds ) and fire-altars, may safely be assigned to the Magi, that powerful and numerous caste, whose establishment only fell with the monarchy itself. One point more in this letter must be noticed — the “ piece of ore,” thought of sufficient importance to be forwarded for Trajan’s own inspection. It was probably a specimen from a silver mine, a metal very abundant amongst the Persians. Immense quantities are still yielded by Thibet, then a tributary country. Both the Parthian and Sassanian currency consisted entirely of silver and copper, gold pieces of either race being almost unknown, and therefore rather to be considered pieces de luxe than current coin.* Procopius, with the laughable vanity of a true Byzantine, pretends that the Persian king did not dare to coin gold, that being the exclusive prerogative of the Roman emperor — a somewhat unsatisfactory solution of the difficulty when we consider the supreme contempt Nushirwan the Just justly entertained and expressed for Justinian, his superstition, and his power. Yet the historian afterwards hints at the true reason, adding that “ even were the Persians to coin gold, none of the nations with whom they trade would take it in payment,” the Byzantine solidi being then the universal currency of the world, circulating at once amongst the Anglo-Saxons and the nations of Upper India. But in all * This is indicated by the exceptional weight of the only two known; one of ITormisdas III., the other of Chosroes I. They seem to be intended for ornaments alone, like the contemporary medallions of the Eastern emperors. 70 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. times the Orientals have preferred silver for their circulating medium, all the immensity of gold coin that finds its way into India at the present moment being melted down, either for conversion into personal ornaments, or into ingots lor the purpose of hoarding. The portraits under consideration are some royal ; of the king himself, his numerous queens, the yet more numerous princes of the blood ; and of others, apparently tributary chiefs and high officials. In the finer stones they are often fairly executed, especially taking into account the lateness of their date, when the glyptic art in the Roman empire was fast expiring, or already extinct. Still in most cases do they betray that heavy, coarse touch of the artist, quite cha- racterizing this class of intagli. Although gems of the Sassanian line abound, yet any that can be positively attributed to their immediate predecessors, the Arsacidse, are extremely rare — a strange deficiency, considering the length of their rule, the abundance of their existing coins, and their boasted patronage of Greek artists. The only mode that suggests itself to me for explaining this apparent blank in Oriental glyptics is derived from the analogy of the numismatics of the same dynasty. As their coins never present the figure of any peculiar national deity, but in the beginning continue the Apollo and the Hercules of the Seleucidae, and carry on with a Victory or a Peace to the very end, so it may reasonably be suspected that the gems rudely engraved with Grecian types, so abundantly brought hither from Asia, represent the signets of the Parthian epoch. In antiquity the fashion of the coinage and of the signet was ever one and the same ; for coin was in its nature nothing more than metal impressed with the sovereign’s seal to warrant its currency. By far the most important work that can with certainty be referred to this period is the fine onyx of two strata, li x 1^ in. in size, engraved with a bust, not diademed, but of unmistakably Arsacid physiognomy. On the sloping edge of the stone is engraved in large letters his name and dignity: 0T£A1$ niTTAEHiS IBHPGN KAPXHAHN, “ Ousas, vitiaxa of the Iberian Carchedi (the modern Georgia).” Vitiaxa was the title given to the eighteen sub-kings, SASSANJAN REVIVAL OF ART. 71 or great satraps, of the Parthian monarchy, in virtue of which the Arsacicl sovereign took the style of “ King of kings.” Ousas follows, it will be noticed, the example of his superior in using the Greek language for his superscription. This interesting monument is in the French cabinet ; hut Professor Maskelyne possesses a small amethyst very neatly engraved with the same head, having in the field two words in (apparently) Hebrew characters, not yet deciphered. Of the Achsemenidae, indeed, we cannot expect to find portraits on gems, which even the inventive Greeks had hardly attempted before Alexander’s time. The royal signet remained, down to the last Darius, a cylinder, and depicted the King of kings in his full glory of attire mounted upon the state chariot. A few, however, of the Sassanian portraits are so well drawn and carefully finished, that, despite their inscriptions authenticating their date, we feel at first some difficulty in regarding them as productions of those lower ages which the monarchy embraced, especially when we contrast their style and work with the utter barbarism then reigning at Kome and Byzantium. Yet certain it is that with the re-establish- ment of the ancient religion and sovereignty by Artashir * the Black- smith, in a.d. 226, the arts appear to have simultaneously revived in their dominions ; the coins issued by that patriot-prince and his immediate successors being immeasurably superior as regards both design and minting to those of the later Parthians ; whilst their jewellers were unrivalled in the rest of the world — the famous Cup of Chosroes exciting the admiration of Cellini himself, when shown to him by Francois I. as one of the chief ornaments of his treasury. Thus, by a strange coincidence, Assyria may with exactest truth * In the Pulsky cabinet is a cameo of a Sassanian king sacrificing a bull, in the character of Mithras, attributed to this king, which for delicacy of execution may compete with the best works of the Augustan epoch. And for intaglio engraving, hardly anything can be imagined more full of life and expressive of the historic character of the man, with the most perfect technical finish, than the bust in front-face of Varahran IV., on a large cornelian. He wears a very elaborate turban, with a profusion of jewellery, and the legend round is in the most beautifully cut Fali . — (Pearse Collection.) ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. be styled both the cradle and the grave of the art of gem-engraving — being its birthplace and its last asylum. Their ring-stones are for the most part gems having a highly convex surface, apparently the reason for the so frequent choice of the carbuncle. Even where nicoli or sards are used they are cut en cabochon, or else to a very obtuse cone flattened to a field to receive the engraving— a shape restricted by the Eomans to the sardonyx alone. In now particularising the most interesting examples of the class that have come under my own notice, and many of the legends on which I have been successful in deciphering, my reader’s attention will be directed en passant to several curious points of history illustrated by them. The list must be headed by the magnificent amethyst, reckoned amongst the chiefest ornaments of the Devonshire cabinet, bearing the bust of Varahran Kermanshah, seen in profile wearing the tiara, the work of extraordinary boldness and uncommon finish for any class, and surrounded by a long legend in two lines of large, well-cut Pehlevi characters. This stone (1^ x 1 inch, oval) forms the centre in the comb belonging to the parure of antique gems, so tastefully combined and set by Messrs. Hancock, the duke’s jewellers.* A nicolo (formerly Fould’s) with the bust of a queen, whose breasts are ostentatiously displayed f (as in all these female busts), her hair falling in two immense plaited tresses ; is an intaglio executed with extraordinary minuteness. Around runs a long legend in microscopic * Fully equal to this iu beauty of work and forcible expression is the same portrait, but seen in front (which strongly recalls Holbein’s Henry VIII.), above described. The same collection (Major Pearse’s) also boasts another, only inferior to this in merit, the full-faced bust of a youthful shah, whose features resemble Cavades on his coins. His crown is of unique pattern, a row of tall fieur-de-lys springing out of the diadem, the point of each tipped with a monster pearl. Material, too, is uncommon, a cabochon rock-crystal If inch in diameter. The employment of the Pali, instead of the usual Pehlevi, in the legends, may be explained by supposing them made as official signets for the satrap of the Indian provinces of the shah’s empire. To suppose, as some have done, that they represent Scythian princes, is preposterous ; so immeasurably superior is their art to that displayed in the latter class. f Probably to indicate her having attained to the honours of maternity, ever held in the highest esteem in Persia. REGAL PORTRAITS. 73 letters commencing with MciModochti, “ Queen Mado ” (answering to the Greek Giinanthe, so common a name for the votaresses of Bacchus). A beautiful spinel of my own has a bust, the head covered with huge curls standing up like a cap, and the name Zumitliri — perhaps another example of a Hindoo god’s (Sumitri is an avatar of Vishnu) giving his name to a mortal prince — or this may, indeed, represent some tributary rajah in the shah’s dominions upon the Indus. Another spinel (Pulsky *) presents a head which for beauty of work is the first in the class, and, indeed, competes with the best efforts of the Koman school when most flourishing. The face resembles that of Narses on his medals. The legend, unfortunately imperfect, begins with the title Noivazi,] “ the Merciful,” well adapted to the recorded character of this excellent prince. In the late Mertens collection, No. 52, a two-coloured sard presented a clever bust of a young prince, inscribed “ Piruzi zi Shapuhri,” “ Perozes, son of Sapor.” But I possess a still more interesting portrait, though the workmanship is inferior to the last named — a large carbuncle, on which Sapor II. ’s bust, borne up upon two pair of wings, to symbolize his divine origin, is placed between the sun and moon — recalling the arrogant style assumed by this very prince in his epistle to the Emperor Constantius, which Ammian has preserved (xvii. 5) : — “ Bex regum Sapor, particeps siderum, frater solis et lunte, Constantio Csesari fratri meo salutem plurimam dico.” The legend, very neatly cut, reads distinctly, “ Piruz Shahpuhri ” — a remarkable confirmation of a circumstance also noted by Ammian in his most graphic account of the siege of Amida, con- ducted by Sapor in person — that the Persian host investing that city chanted throughout the night the praises of Sapor, accompanied with the titles of Pyroses and Saansaan ; that is to say, “ Victor and King of kings.” It is no wonder that both gems and medals of the second Sapor should so abound, for the duration of his reign and of his life were commensurate, extending to seventy-two years. In fact, his * Lately bought for the British Museum. t So read by E. Thomas, but it seems to me to be Narsehi Shah, and to agree with the spelling of the same name on De Sacy’s Nakshi-liustam Tablet, No. 2. 74 ANTIQUE GEMS AND DINGS. sovereignty began before bis birth, for his father, Hormisclas II., hying and leaving his queen pregnant of a male child (as the Magi predicted), the diadem was placed uj)on her womb, to crown the unborn prince, before the grand assembly of the satraps and nobles. A nicolo in my collection presents a laureated head much resembling Caracalla or his reputed son Elagabalus. It is within a sunken circle, and a Pehlevi legend, unintelligible to me, surrounds it. It is not likely to be intended for a Eoman, but may be explained as an attempt at novelty in the representing the Great King after the usual imperial type. A head of some king on a nicolo scarabeoid (Praun Collection) has in the field that singular object already mentioned as a favourite device for a signet amongst the Persian commonalty, and explained by Mordtmann as the royal standard. It seems, how- ever, to me rather to represent the awful tripod, or altar of incense, mentioned by Procopius (Bell. Per. i. 23), in explaining the phrase “ To be sent to the tripod,” i. e., to be in disgrace at court. “ When any Persian learns that the king is displeased with him, he does not take sanctuary in any temple or such like place, hut sits down by the great iron tripod which always stands in front of the royal palace, and there awaits the king’s sentence upon him.” Another illustrative type I have seen, giving this dreaded object with the royal diadem suspended over it, and the legend Rastachi, “ the Just ” — a title of all others the best fitted to its significance.* Like the Shah in our days, the Sassanian king prefaced his missives with a long string of titles expressing the qualities he was pleased to arrogate to himself. The curious letter addressed by Chosroes II., more famous as Khosru Parviz, to the rebel general Bahrain, copied * I lately discovered in the Blacas cabinet a head of Perozes (lapis-lazuli) in the character of Serapis, a butterfly pitched upon the modias, a lizard (symbol of the Logos) behind his head. This is an unprecedented example of a Zoroastrian monarch assuming the figure of a Eoman deity, imitating a very common fashion with his rivals of the Lower Empire. Another (Pearse gems) surprised me much as a unique attempt to naturalize that popular Eoman device, a head covered with a chimera- helmet, made up in this case of a wolfs head and a comic mask. The stone, a three-layered onyx, bore a Pehlevi legend upon its white zone. SASSANIAN BEGAL TITLES. by Theophylact Simocatta, is an excellent specimen, and opens thus : — “ Chosroes, king of kings, master of rulers, lord of nations, governing in peace, a saviour of mortals, amongst the gods a man good and ever- lasting, but amongst men a most glorious god, above measure illustrious, victorious, rising together with the sun and giving eyes to the night, renowned for his ancestry, a monarch that hatetli war, munificent, he that hath the Asons (genii) in his pay, the preserver of the kingdom of the Persians,” &c. This grandiloquent list certainly furnishes a complete glossary for all the titles filling up the long legends surrounding the portraits already described. At other times, with affected humility, the sole legend around the head is Apestan ul Jezdani, “ The most humble servant of the gods.” Perhaps, indeed, in such cases the portrait is merely that of a private man ; for the same Bahrain, in his reply to the letter above cited (Theoph. iv. 7), calls himself, among other equally modest epithets, “ The lover of the gods,” a sense identical with the last-quoted and common super- scription.* In one point of the costume there is a diversity difficult to explain between the gems and the medals. On the latter the regal head is invariably bedecked with the tiara, a balloon-shaped turban rising out of a mural crown, from which float proudly the two streaming ends of the broad and fringed diadem. On the gems the heads are for the most part bare, the hair being simply confined by a fillet in the old Greek fashion. In the most important gems, however, like the Devonshire amethyst, the tiara appears, but in a plain form, bordered with pearls, in fact differing little from the ancient cidaris, the national Persian head-gear, which distinguished royalty by having its apex erect, the subjects bending theirs forward like the so-called * With Chosroes I. the legends on the coins always commence with APSD, read by Thomas, afzud, “ long live hence its appearance on a gem shows the head to he that of a successor of that monarch. On the grand Devonshire amethyst, Prince Vahrahran (not yet Shah ) uses the regular style of the coins : “ Vahrahran Kerman malka, bari masdsini bagi Shahapohri malkan malka Iran va Aniran, minochetri men Jesdan. “Vahrahran, of Kerman king, son of the servant-of-Ormuzd, the divine Sapor, king of the kings of Iran and Aniran, heaven-born, from God.” ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. 7(1 Phrygian cap. The omission of the actual Sassanian head-dress from the gem-portraits adds much to the difficulty in identifying them, for the medals show that a certain variation in its fashion was made by every king upon his accession to the throne, and adhered to without alteration throughout his reign ; and this proves a valuable guide in identifying the likenesses 'when the minute, blundered, or effaced legends fail to give any definite sense. It is strange indeed why the engravers should have left the heads on the gems so often destitute of this important badge of sovereignty — especially as they seem to have had so much difficulty in representing the curly and flowing locks, that cherished distinction of the Achsemenian race in every age, and which they usually attempt to render by a succession of drill-holes set close together.* Invariably in these portraits will the eye he caught by the huge pearl pendant from the right ear ; and which the artist, to judge from the care bestowed upon its representation, has evidently con- sidered one of the most essential points in the royal paraphernalia. His solicitude brings to one’s recollection the romantic tale so fully given by the Walter Scott of ancient history, Procopius (Bell. Pers. i. 4), concerning that pearl of unprecedented magnitude obtained at the urgent entreaty of King Perozes, by the daring diver, from the guardianship of the enamoured shark, but with the sacrifice of his own life ; and which the same monarch in the very moment of destruction consoled himself by burying for ever from the eager researches of his treacherous foes, the Ephthalite Huns, in the monster pitfall into which they had lured him and his nobles. The ropes * An invaluable picture of the sbah in full dress is preserved to us by a large nicolo (li x | inch) brought by General Cunningham from the Punjab, and now in the British Museum. The monarch stands upon a prostrate foe (a Roman by his armour and crested helmet), in whose body he has planted the spear on which he composedly leans, looking round, with his drawn sword, point downwards, held in front of him. He wears a battlemented crown, surmounted by a balloon like that of Sapor I. in the rock-sculptures, and is probably the same personage. His costume is a tight vest and ample trousers, from his neck floats out the royal diadem, whilst at his waist are displayed the long broad ends of the kosti, the Parsee girdle, the symbol of the Zoroastrian faith. The style is bold in the extreme, deeply sunk, but very heavy. REGAL ORNAMENTS— PE ff LEVI. \ i of enormous pearls that load the shah’s bust in many of these gem portraits curiously verify Plutarch’s statement that Artaxerxes Mnemon used to go into battle covered with jewellery to the value of over two millions of our money (twelve thousand talents). And in another place, he notices that the scabbard only of Mitliridates’ sword (a descendant from Darius Hystaspis) was worth four hundred talents (eighty thousand pounds) from which particular the aggregate of his other decorations may be deduced, and remove all suspicion of fable from the first-quoted tradition. After examining a large number of these seals, the conclusion has forced itself upon me that the portion of the legend containing the king’s name has in many instances been purposely effaced. This appearance is too frequent to be ascribed to mere accident, for to defacement by such a cause the rest of the lettering (which remains uninjured) was equally exposed. It may be conjectured that on the king’s death, all his officers’ seals, with his head and name, were defaced and thrown away, exactly as the Great Seal is cut in two on the death of our sovereigns, or the Annulus Piscatoris broken up on the Pope’s demise. The character used in these inscriptions is invariably the Pehlevi, the Zoroastrian alphabet, which only appears after the restoration of the ancient line and the national sovereignty, the Parthian kings having exclusively employed the Greek language on their coinage, possibly from the wish to pass themselves off as the legitimate repre- sentatives of the Macedonian line.* Their constant title on their medals is Phil-hellene, though they oddly manifested their love for the Greeks by stripping Alexander’s successors of the greater part of his Asiatic conquests. There are, however, indications not wanting that the Pehlevi was the alphabet of the natives when under the Parthian domination, and was properly the national one — the offspring and successor of the * With, the same view they continued to date by the Seleucidan era, and even in some cases by the Macedonian names of the months. ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. Acliaemenian cuneiform. “ Its earliest characters are met with on certain coins (few in number) of the last Arsacid.se, wherever the Greek language is not used, and had currency in but two localities, the region round about Persepolis, where it forms the original text, and occupies the post of honour in the explanatory inscriptions cut upon the numerous rock-sculptures there ; and secondly at Shahirzor, in the bilingual inscriptions upon the fire-temples of that vicinity. Thus it appears to have been current under the Parthian empire, throughout the provinces of Kurdistan, Khusistan, and Fars (Persia Proper), and to have had a Mesopotamian or Babylonian source, and in this way to have a common origin with the Chaldee (modern Hebrew), from which it only differs in a few forms ” (Thomas : 1 Numismatic Chro- nicle,’ xii. 93). Its derivation from the cuneiform first became ap- parent to me by comparing certain of the letters with the Cypriote Persian, that latest modification of the cuneiform, in which the cha- racters standing for A and S at once assume their subsequent Perse- folitan form by a slight change of position, occasioned by the alteration of the primitive vertical arrangement of the letters in each word to the present horizontal lineation. This alphabet has been termed Parthian, but can claim no special Parthian attribution any more than the Bactrian Pali upon their contemporaneous Indian currencies, or the Greek upon their Asiatic. It is also termed Persepolitan, but ought with greater justice to be denominated Chaldee ,* the designation bestowed upon the radically identical character, the square Hebrew. The only Sassanian king using this character on his coins is Artashir I., of whom a very clearly struck piece is figured in the above-quoted periodical (xv. 180). Of gems inscribed in this early lettering, no examples are known to me ; as indeed was to be expected, for this alphabet was speedily given up by the first king of the Sassanian line, and it has already * The Chaldee language, not Persian, is invariably used for the king’s style on the coinage, doubtless as being the sacred tongue. This fact is a strong proof that the character also is the national Chaldee which had taken the place of the cuneiform. The Jews, according to their own account, adopted the Chaldee mode of writing during the Captivity, so its native origin is placed beyond all question. PEHLEV1 ALP If ABETS. 79 been stated that our seals did not come into general use until after bis establishment on the Persian throne. I have, however, seen an amethyst bearing a regal head quite of the Arsacid physiognomy,* with a regular Chaldee legend in the field, translated, “ as a bear, mighty but whether this may not be an insertion of later times, to make the thing a talisman, remains an open question. The gem was at the time in the possession of a Jew dealer, who, on the strength of the legend, read as pure Hebrew, believing it to be an authentic portrait of one of the Biblical kings of his own “ people,” valued it at a most extravagant price. This, with a rudely engraved small sard of Hertz’s, are the sole examples which have come in my way of intagli that can, with any foundation, be attributed to the times of the Parthian empire — a most singular and inexplicable anomaly, unless my previously advanced theory be accepted. The second form of this alphabet is found holding the inferior place in the inscriptions at Nakshi-Rustam, and is the one exclusively adopted on the coins of Sapor I. and of his successors for above two centuries. This is by far the most common character met with on the gems, for its use coincides with the flourishing ages of the Sas- sanian monarchy. It is seen in its full beauty in the long legend on the Devonshire amethyst, setting forth the name and titles of Yaraliran Kermanshah, as well as on a remarkably large sard en cabochon, with apparently the same portrait which formerly came under my notice in the hands of a London dealer (afterwards stolen and lost).| This alphabet, whose forms, when carefully engraved, are elegant though simple, consists of three long vowels, A, I, U, and eleven con- sonants, B, D, H guttural, K, L or R indifferently, M, N, P or PH, S or SH, T, Z. The short vowels were to be supplied by the reader according to the usual rule in Oriental tongues. Letters whose form permits are commonly united in a nexus of two, even in the earliest inscriptions. But in the later inscriptions, three or more are run * It strongly resembles that of Ousas, prince of Iberia, figured by Visconti (II. PL xvi 10), from the French cabinet, which I have already noticed (p. 70). f The original, perhaps, of No. 673, ‘ Raspe’s Catalogue.’ 80 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. together, and the confusion grows until it ends in the continuous, most undecipherable Cufic.* Both coins and medals attest that this was the sole recognized national alphabet. But that another, and more perfected one, was current simultaneously with it for literary purposes even in the fourth century, we may gather incidentally from Epiphanius (‘ Hteres.’ lxvi.), where he mentions that Manes divided his treatise ‘On the Faith’ into twenty-two books, after the number of the letters in the Syriac alphabet. “For most Persians use, as well as the Persian letters, the Syriac characters ; just as many nations amongst ourselves use the Greek, although each one may have a national alphabet of its own. Others, forsooth, pride themselves upon writing that most recondite dialect of the Syriac, the one current in Palmyra, both the dialect itself and the letters, and these are twenty-two in number.” This notice makes it more than a matter of conjecture that the Semitic, already alluded to as seen on certain Persian seals, was the Palmyrene, which numerous existing inscriptions show was only a modification of the Phoenician. As the foundation of Palmyra goes back to the mythic age of Solomon, her alphabet might well occur on monuments of the remotest antiquity, for it would be coeval with the Babylonian cuneiform. This second alphabet is the parent of the Zend, in which the Parsees still preserve their hereditary Zendavesta, that treasury of the Zoroastrian religion collected into one volume by the care of the first Sassanian king. The characters are virtually the same, but modified in writing into the more commodious fluency of a cursive hand. The third and latest form of the Pehlevi is the parent of the old Syriac, and of its modification, the Cufic. Inasmuch as the latter received its name from its being adopted by the first transcribers of the Koran at Cufa in Mesopotamia — it is the natural inference that it was the established cursive writing of the age, and therefore * The small number of these characters is a conclusive testimony to the high antiquity of their invention. CUFIC — PALI. 81 embraced by tlie Arab conquerors, who up to that time had possessed no literature, perhaps no alphabet of their own. The MS. of the Koran still venerated in Persia as the actual handwriting of Ali, the second successor to the Prophet, and his son-in-law, is written in the precise character seen on the latest Sassanian seals, more distinct in fact, and better defined than the Cufic afterwards became. Ouseley gives a fac-simile of some lines of this venerable, text (Plate 82). So trifling is the difference between the alphabets used on the coinage of the last Sassanian kings and on that of the first caliphs, who continued the old types for many years after the conquest (not striking money in their own name until 72 of the Hejira), that Longperier reads the names of Sarparaz, Paran, and Zerni in the very same legends, which E. Thomas explains as giving the names of Omar, Farkhan, and Hani, in the common Cufic letter. This third alphabet is no other than a corruption of the second, produced by running the letters into each other, a practice the Orientals are so given to for the sake of expedition in writing with a pen, although in engraving on a hard substance nothing is gained by it save confusion. This style first makes its appearance on the coins of Chosroes I., Justinian’s great rival, and degenerates more and more under his successors, until it merges into the Cufic. Gems with legends in this lettering are common enough, but there is a sad falling off in their execution, marking the fast-spreading decadence of the times. The legends around the regal portraits commence with the four letters, variously read as apad or afzud, “ The Most High,” or “ Long live,” a style first introduced upon the monetary legends of Chosroes I. From the discoveries made of late years in the topes or Buddhist relic-shrines in Cabul, it has been ascertained, that concurrently with the usual Sassanian currency, another was issued either within, or for the use of, the Indian provinces of the empire, having its legends in the Bactrian letter ;* but of this no traces have, to my knowledge, * Supposed by E. Tbomas to be only the Punic character modified for the expres- sion of the sounds of the Indian language (the Pracrit), but certainly a very ancient G 82 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. ever yet been observed upon any of the contemporary seals. But the true Pali, still the sacred letter of tlie Buddhists, and genuine parent of the modern Sanscrit, is to be seen on numberless calcedony stamps with ordinary Sassanian types, discovered in the Punjab. In this letter are the legends on the two magnificent royal seals (Pearse) already described. It is only reasonable to suppose that the Satrap of Bactriana, the fourth division of the Persian empire, should have his official seal engraved with a legend in the characters and language of the country. And this curiously illustrates the Byzantine Menander’s statement, that Maniach, prince of Sogdiana, coming as ambassador from the Turks to Justin II., carried credentials written in the Scythian language and characters. For Sogdiana comprised Usbek Tartary and Little Thibet, where the same alphabet still keeps its ground. The series comprehends those rude intagli (of extreme rarity) having some one of the common devices, the Minotaur, &c., cut on the field, and a true Himyaritic legend running round the bevelled edge in one con- tinuous line. Examples are a large calcedony in the British Museum, device, the lion-headed man, or Mithraic priest ; and a male and female figure joining hands, in the field two stars, on a nicolo in my own collection. South Arabia must claim their parentage. To conclude with a few general remarks upon the Pehlevi alphabet and its variations. It was the eminent Orientalist De Sacy, who in his ‘ Antiquites de la Perse,’ was the first to decipher this hitherto inexplicable character, from the careful study of the Kermanshah tablets commemorating Sapor I. and Varanes, which are written in what has been above described as the second form. The trilingual inscriptions at Nakshi-Bustam give the Persepolitan (the so-called Parthian) character for the two versions in the native language ; but the third, the Greek, by supplying the actual meaning, enabled the acute Frenchman to fix the exact value of the several letters. The lettering used in the legends of the coins, owing to its microscopic alphabet, for the Greeks found, it current in Bactriana when they conquered the province, and therefore used it in their bilingual coin legends. PE II LEVI ALPHABETS. 83 size (rendered obligatory upon the engraver of the dies by the necessity of crowding into so confined a circle the pompous style of the sovereign), is very similar in appearance to the modern Pehlevi of the Parsee religious books ; and, like that, the most difficult con- ceivable to make out, so many different letters assuming the same form, from the die-sinker’s inability to express the small distinctive curves and other diacriticals. It w T as this class, however, that De Sacy set himself professedly to illustrate, in which he has been followed with little success by Longperier ; but the sagacious discoverer has recently found a worthy successor in E. Thomas, in his little treatise ‘ On Sassanian Mint-monograms and Gems.’ It is curious, that although De Sacy saw the identity of the alphabet on the seals with that of the Kermanshah tablets and the medals, yet he should have to confess his inability to make out more than a single example ; which failure he attributes to the language used in such cases being not the Zend, of which he was master, but the Pehlevi. This one seal-legend he reads Artashetran-Rami-Minochetir — “ Kami son of Artaxerxes, of divine race.” Sapor’s style (and that of most of his successors) on the coinage is “ Masdisin bagi Shapuhri malkan malka airan va anairan ” — “ The servant of Ormuzd Sapor, king of kings of Iran and not-Iran,” * where it must be remarked the Chaldee title “ malka ” is invariably assumed instead of the Persian “ shah,” though the other is the case with the gem legends. In fact, the latter, however legible, often spell out such strange words as to corroborate De Sacy’s opinion that they are couched in a totally different language. Longperier in his alphabet gives several distinct forms for the same letter, which makes his system hopeless confusion, as v r ell as repugnant to the universal practice of mankind. To what purpose would an alphabet serve, in which many letters had half-a-dozen forms totally distinct, and what is even worse, the same form standing for three or four different letters ? But the well-cut gem legends show that the Pehlevi alphabet admitted no more variation in its forms than * “ Of Persia and what is not Persia,” i. e., all the world besides. G 2 84 ANTIQUE GEMS AND BINGS. the Latin. Apparent irregularities result from the engraver’s want of skill, or time, to make the diacritical curves, and consequently render- ing them by angular strokes, exactly as the Greek letters were treated by the barbarous makers of the Alexandrian Gnostic talismans. But in the finer works of the age, the precious stones on which a superior hand has displayed its skill, the lettering is in the clearest and best defined forms that the tool could produce ; and such must he taken for the normal forms of the characters, not the ill-defined corruptions produced by the carelessness and hasty execution of ordinary workmen. A few amongst our seals present legends in the Greek language, and such are on another account of the highest interest to the archmologist ; inasmuch as design, work, and legend, point them out for the signets of the Persian Christians, those Nestorians “ to whom the jealous pride of Perozes afforded an asylum, when persecuted and expelled from Europe and Asia Minor by his orthodox rival, the Byzantine emperor.” Their sectarian hatred rendered them in after times the most zealous supporters of Nushirwan and Khosru Parviz, in their repeated invasions of the Boman territory. In the French Collection the following specimens of the class are particularised by Chabouillet. No. 1330, The Sacrifice of Abraham ; striped sardonyx. — 1331, The Virgin seated, holding the infant Jesus ; garnet with a Pehlevi legend. — 1332, The Virgin and Saint Elizabeth joining hands ; between the figures a star and crescent; a Pehlevi legend in connected letters ; carnelian. — 1333, The Fish placed in the middle of the Christian monogram ; a carnelian annular seal. And lastly, the most valuable of all, because offering the combination of the ancient Oriental form with the Greek decoration in the same example, the bust of Christ in profile and beardless, the fish below, and the legend XPICTOT : on a truncated cone in white calcedony. Chabouillet considers these monuments to be all anterior to the date of the great persecution by Sapor II., a.d. 340 ; but the connected writing of the legend in No. 1332 attests a much later age. I have discussed so fully this portion of my subject, because it is one as yet almost untouched, and hitherto passed over as entirely SASSANIAN EMPIRE— ITS EXTENT. 85 impracticable by writers on glyptics, although it preserves to us so valuable a series of portraits, authenticated by their legends, of those mighty rulers who make as prominent a figure in the later ages of Roman history, as do their Achaemenian progenitors in the pages of the early Greek. In fact, Kkosru Parviz not merely claimed by hereditary right the whole extent of the ancient empire of Xerxes, but had actually recovered its original limits, was master of all Asia, Egypt, and the north of Africa, and long kept his best general, Sain, closely pressing the siege of Constantinople — “ Sed dea qum nimiis obstat Rhamnusia votis Erubuit vertitque rotam.” At this very time, upon the capture of Jerusalem by the king in person, Mahomet delivered his famous prophecy of their coming fall, in the chapter of the Koran entitled “ The Greeks,” commencing thus : “ The Greeks have been overcome by the Persians in the nearest part of the land, but within a space of nine years after their defeat they shall overcome the others in their turn ” (xxx.). This was uttered in the year 615, and was speedily verified by the almost miraculous successes of the Emperor Heraclius. To close all, in 641 the Sassanian sovereignty was annihilated by Mahomet’s successor, Omar. Again, in the point of view of art, many of these works are far from contemptible ; some few, like those cited above, have great merit ; and all derive additional importance from the fact that they are the only intagli capable of affording historical evidence, that were produced either in the West or the East subsequently to the times of Constantine. An interesting exemplification of the stereotyped character of Oriental art is afforded by a magnificent turquoise (Lace Coll.) en- graved with heads of a modern shah and his queen, the field inlaid with ornaments in gold. But for the fresh look of the material and its decorations, the royal portraits might serve for the best depicted of their predecessors who called Artashir founder of their line. * Succeeded by Sarban. The city was invested by the Persians, who made Chalcedon their head-quarters for more than ten years. ANTIQUE GEMS AND BINGS. 80 INDIAN ENGRAVED GEMS. It is universally acknowledged that the inhabitants of the Indian Peninsula derived the use of coined money from the Greek subjugators of Bactria, and that the earliest Hindoo pieces exhibit evident traces of being imitations, their rudeness increasing as their date descends, of the Greco-Bactrian currency. And this is equally true of those engraved gems, few indeed in number, whose types indisputably declare an Indian origin ; and which are occasionally discovered mixed with the other jewels and coins, in the deposit normally consecrating the Buddhist topes or relic-shrines recently investigated in Cabul, of which Wilson gives such curious details in his ‘ Ariana Antigua .’ It is certainly to he reckoned amongst the other unaccountable inconsistencies of the Hindoo race, that although the earliest perhaps of mankind to attain to mechanical perfection and facility in the carving of the hardest stones, the jade, agate, crystal, granite, &c., into ornamental vases and other figures ; and likewise in the shaping and polishing of all gems, the diamond excepted, with which they supplied the ancient world to an extent of which no conception at all adequate to the reality can now he formed — yet that despite all those HINDOO ART— JADE CARVINGS. 87 inducements held out by their own practical ability, and their abun- dance of materials, they never should have attempted to imitate their Persian neighbours in embodying in precious stones the intaglio forms of those numerous and often graceful deities whose statues on a larger scale they daily reproduced in innumerable multitudes in clay, stone, and bronze. Assuredly it was not the practical diffi- culties of this art that deterred them, seeing that they executed with facility many operations which would baffle the skill of the most expert modern lapidary, such as boring fine holes, with the greatest precision, not merely through the sardonyx, but even through the sapphire and ruby. Now this is a part of the working in hard stones much more difficult, and necessitating greater accuracy of hand and attention, than any processes required for sinking an intaglio, at least in its simplest forms, or in cutting a figure in relief upon the surface of the same material. Their unparalleled dexterity in working one of the hardest substances known, the jade* is wonderfully exemplified by the large tortoise found in the bank of the Jumna near Allahabad (now in the British Museum, Mineralogical Department), and which for fidelity to nature and exquisite finish is worthy of the ancient Greeks. Small figures in “ hard” stones of the Sacred Bull, coucliant , perforated through their length for stringing as heads, are often found in company with the other relics in the tope deposits ; and also miniature Hindoo idols in the same style and materials. t But the most extraordinary production of the kind that ever came under my notice, was a figure of Buddha squatting in his cave, surrounded by numerous attributes, all cut with marvellous * Equally wonderful as a monument of skill and patient industry is tlie statuette of Buddha, about an inch high, carved out of one entire and perfect sapphire. This most precious idol, probably a trophy from the sack of Candy, but converted by its impious captor into a breast-pin, now adorns its family series in the Mineralogical Department, British Museum. f Neronian extravagance was far outdone by the deviser of the reliquary found in a Punjabee tope, which came into the hands of that enterprising explorer, Major Pearse. It was one monstrous emerald, three inches long by two thick, with the ends rounded off, and of good colour. It was bored through half its axis to contain a gold case, the size of the little finger, to hold two minute finger-joints of a Buddhist saint, whose holiness may be estimated by the costliness of the shrine inclosing such tiny relics. 88 ANTIQUE GEMS AND BINGS. skill in an enormous sardonyx of red and white strata ; the mere stone a most valuable specimen, for brightness of its colours and unusual magnitude, being six inches in height and width, and nearly the same in thickness : a true specimen of the long disputed Murrhina, and offering all the characters of “ lac ” and “ purpura ” noted by Pliny in his description of that substance. Sakya, the fifth Buddha, who “ reascended ” b.c. 520, lays down in the Thibetian Scriptures that : “ Priests are prohibited from wearing rings, or having signets of gold, silver, or precious stones, but they may have seals made of copper, brass, bell-metal, or horn, or ivory. A man belonging to the religious order must have on his seal or stamp a circle with two deer on opposite sides, and below, the name of the founder of the Vihara (convent). A layman may have a full-length figure or a head engraved upon his signet.”*' These rules probably serve to elucidate the types of certain large classes of the Sassanian seals ; for example, that common device of the two antelopes rampant and confronted : and, still better, those Pali-inscribed gems from the Punjab, bearing symbols yet venerated amongst the very nations to whom Sakya’s rules are law, the Nepalese, Thibetians, Cingalese, Chinese, or the ancient Jainas south of the Indus — strict Buddhists down to the close of the Sassanian empire. Although one powerful motive for the engraving of intagli was wanting amongst the ancient Indians, which is indicated by Pliny’s remark, “ Non signat Oriens aut iEgyptus etiam nunc literis contenta solis meaning the non-employment of a seal’s impression, but merely of the writer’s signature to attest documents — yet still we should have expected that the Indians, as soon as they had learnt the fashion from their neighbours, and to a great extent, suzerains, the Persians (a race noted, from the most ancient times, for their fondness for * The close intimacy subsisting in after times between the Sassanian and Chinese empires increases the probability of a common origin of many symbols on their remains. Some of the figures on the stamps may therefore be elucidated by the rules of the Chow-li, “ Book of rites,” attributed to the eighth century before our era. The special figure there assigned to earth is the square, to fire the circle, to water the dragon, to the mountains a deer. ORECO-BA CTRIAN INFLUENCE. 89 engraved stones), they would have commenced augmenting the im- portance of their common gems, though but viewed as ornaments, by engraving on them sacred figures, either in intaglio like the Assyrians, or in relief, the first step of the Egyptians in the novel art. For it is sufficiently apparent that with the latter nation the scarabeus was worn as a sacred emblem on the necklace, long before the notion was entertained of employing its engraved base for a signet ; and the same observation holds good to a certain extent for their imitators, the Etruscans. But be this as it may, it is certain that no gems have yet come to light representing purely Hindoo types, and discovered in provinces of India lying without the sphere of the influence of Greco-Bactrian civilization. And how widely this sphere extended, one little fact will serve to attest, the discovery (quoted by Baspe) of an agate engraved with the head of Pan in the sands of the Ganges.* To come now to the rare attempts of the Hindoos in the glyptic art, a concise description of the chief examples known will furnish out, though but scantily, a department of my subject in which one tvould naturally have looked for profusion and barbaric magnificence. Wilson has figured in his ‘ Antiquities of Afghanistan ’ the small number of intagli known to him as discovered in the deposits already mentioned. Of these one is a portrait at once recognized as belonging to the Greek school ; two are common Homan gems, as was to he expected in sites where so many aurei of the Lower Empire have been discovered ; hut the others may he attributed with certainty to the art of the country in which they have been exhumed. Of these the most interesting is a sard with the bust of a female holding a flower, p\ettily executed, a legend below in the Sanscrit letter of the seventh century, perhaps the owner’s name : “ Kusuma-Dasaya,” The Slave of the Flower. Another, the portrait of a Raja with four large pearls in his ear, and wearing a necklace : the legend reads, “ Ajita Varmma,” Varmma the Victorious, in Sanscrit characters * But by far the largest number of the gems now found in the Punjab manifest the influence of Sassanian art, not only in style, but in shape and material, being usually ealcedony , stamps, and convex garnet ring-stones. 90 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. of the ninth century. The name is found to have been that of a king of Cashmere about that period. Another sard, turned up at Hidda, bears a regal head in the same style as the last, but without a legend. The same tope furnished two gold rings set with sards : one, a head in relief, appears that of Buddha ; the other, a portrait-bust, intaglio. The last in this list, a large sard intaglio, gives two seated figures in Hindoo costume, playing musical instruments, supposed by Wilson to be Krishna and Radama, but more probably the sign Gemini, so depicted by the Hindoo astrologers. As far as a judgment can be formed from the plate, the execution of this group is extremely neat, though the design somewhat stiff. Prinsep gives (Plate iii. 3) a ruby * of a pointed oval shape (1 X f inch), bearing a well-cut intaglio of a female head, a long pendant in her ear, and a flower in her hand. He styles it Grecian work, but the introduction of the latter attribute betrays either a certain influence of Indian taste upon the Greek engraver, or more probably the exact converse. It was found in the ruins of Khoja- o-ban, near Bokhara. Raspe’s No. 717 is certainly the head of a Hindoo raja with ear- pendant, pearl-necklace, and a club on his shoulder : the legend in early Sanscrit, or perhaps Pali, engraved in a fine garnet. No. 713, a man armed with spiked mace and round buckler embraces a female wearing on her arm two great chanh bangles, the regular decoration of a bride, both seated on a sofa : lapis-lazuli. Also No. 714, a similar couple, flanked by two guards standing. These groups are in all respects analogous to the bas-reliefs at Salsette, Buddhist works, and hence their date may be approximately arrived at. But his No. 715, a lion on emerald, is shown by its legend in the modern Sanscrit character to be altogether recent, or at least later than the thirteenth century. Under the head of Barbarian Camei will be found a notice of other Indian works of the kind that have fallen in my way. * Probably only a fine almandine garnet, a material as frequent in this class as it is unusual in Greek or Roman works. GRECO-BA CTRIAN ART. 91 Although the Greek colonists of Bactria founded a powerful and extensive kingdom, that flourished above two centuries, possessing also great wealth, as may be deduced from the large extant currency of its princes ; it is very singular they should have left behind them so few engraved gems, considering the universal frequency of such works in their native country during the same space of time. We should have expected to meet with here, at the very fountain-head of the gem-supply, a numerous class — the figures of Indian gods, but assimilated to the Greek taste, exactly as the same, Siva and Nannaia, appear on the reverses of the medals.* That the artistic skill to produce gem-works worthy of the mother country was not wanting amongst the Indo-Macedonians, during at least the first century of their establishment, is fully apparent from the excellence of the portraits upon the coinage issued by the sovereigns of the dynasty bearing purely Greek names, as Euthydemus, Heliocles, Menander, and Pantaleon, which lose nothing when compared with those of the contemporary Seleucidse.f * And still more conspicuous in certain bas-reliefs found in Peshawar (exhibited at the Arch. Inst., 1863), where these Indian deities are sculptured in the Greek style, and present a most graceful union of the form and manner. f The foregoing conclusions have lately (May, 1868) been strongly confirmed by the inspection of about two hundred gems, all collected in the Punjab during a residence of many years. They present a most heterogeneous mixture, commencing with Ninevitish cylinders, and including many late Boman and one Gnostic. Sassanian stamps and ring- stones in that peculiar style, whether original or imitative, formed the majority. But of unmistakable Greco-Indian work I could only discover one example, a warrior spearing a prostrate enemy, in the field a bent bow and flowers. 92 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. MODERN ORIENTAL ENGRAVING. Before quitting the subject of Oriental glyptic art, Mohammedan seals, mediaeval and modern, demand a brief notice — and for two reasons : — as being the immediate successors to the class last treated of, and as things the use of which kept alive the processes of gem engraving throughout the East during those ages when they were entirely forgotten in Europe. Here, once more, we have to return to Persia, the parent and the last refuge of the art. The transition of the Pehlevi into the Cufic has been already traced, and the seals exhibiting the latter mode of writing form a very interesting series. The earliest retain the shape of the hemispherical stamp, but the ring-stone in its common form speedily and entirely supersedes that peculiarly Mesopotamian fashion. Many are stones of fine quality — spinels, sards, sardonyx — importations ready shaped from India as of yore ; but in the majority the local loadstone maintains its ancient predominance. The legends are cut in the bold, vertical, connected Cufic, and often arranged so as to form certain definite figures, such as a horse, a bird, a balance, a vase, an equilateral cross, or the mystic Egyptian Tau. They contain the owner’s name and patronymic, or, more rarely, some MOHAMMEDAN SEALS. 93 brief sentence from the Koran. Tbe characters, often very delicate, apparently cut with the diamond-point, and now constituting the all-important element of the signet, are executed with the greatest precision and care, far different to the careless wheel-cut letters on their predecessors, the later Sassanian seals. The square vertical Cufic distinguishes the earliest class, the flowing and curvilinear Persian — its field often filled in with flowers and stars — embellishes the later mediaeval, and modern. The Cufic went out of use in the thirteenth century, and therefore the character employed gives a clue to the date of the signet. The mechanical execution of many of these inscriptions is of the most perfect quality. Nothing can exceed the freedom and elegance of the curves, or the depth and boldness of the engraving ; occurring, more- over, not unfrequently in the hardest stones, for admirable examples have been seen by me on the sapphire, the ruby, and the diamond ! These legends, beautiful as they may be to the eye of the artist, are the very plague of all Oriental scholars, who are constantly pestered by their unlearned friends to decipher for them some “ engraving of a signet,” which, after the words have been extricated with infinite labour from the caligraphic flourishes wherein they are entwined, enunciates some such truism as this : “ What is destined will surely come to pass or a religious axiom or ejaculation, as, “ Ali is the purest of men,” “ I pray for God’s blessing upon Mohammed or — deepest bathos of all — eulogy on a Captain Smith, revenue-collector in some out-of-the-way East Indian province. Pliny’s remark we have already quoted, “ that Eastern nations make no use of a seal, but are satisfied with the mere subscription of the name ” — a fact which struck him with peculiar force, seeing the universal use of seals over the whole Koman world as the sole established mode of authenticating writings. But the Eastern fashion still continues unchanged ; for the gem or metal signet inscribed with the owner’s name and titles, and truly “ literis contenta solis,” is never impressed on ivax, but inked over, and thus applied to the paper, after the manner of a copper-plate. By the term Oriens in this passage, 94 ANTIQUE GEMS AND TINGS. Parthia as well as India is designated ; for the xise of seals designed to imprint soft substances, such as clay or wax, which had originated in the primeval civilization of the Assyrians, seems to have been altogether abandoned during the domination of the Arsacidee. The seal-stones of all Mohammedan nations are universally set in silver, to which practice is due the loss of many a beautiful example of antique jewellery ; for an ancient ring when found in the earth is directly melted up, and its gem remounted in silver, to do duty for a talisman. Large numbers of mediaeval and modern silver rings are brought from Persia, set with late Eoman or Sassanian intagli ; these second mountings often displaying much taste, though simple enough in their pattern, more especially in those made for seals. This partiality for the poorer metal — paradoxical as it seems in a nation so much delighting in pomp and finery — springs from a religious notion thus mentioned by Tavernier (i. p. 654) : “ The royal goldsmiths . . . who make only silver rings, although competent to make them in gold ; because the Persians, not being allowed to say their prayers when they have any gold aboirt them, never wear either jewel or ring of gold, because it would be too troublesome to take them off and put them on again several times in the day. Hence, as our practice is to mount only in gold the gems we wear on our fingers, whenever I have sold the shah any stone set in a ring, he has had the ring immediately broken up, in order to set the stone in silver.” The reason for the custom is given by Giulianelli : “ Gold and silk being amongst the promised delights of Paradise, pious Mohammedans think to merit them by abstaining from their enjoyment in this life ; on which account they never wear stuffs of entire silk, but of silk mixed with wool, nor ornaments composed of gold entirely, but with some portion made of silver.” There is another class of intagli, valueless indeed as regards art, but of extreme interest to the palasographist, in that they clearly point out the origin of the present Hebrew alphabet, more properly termed Chaldee. These are the gems bearing legends in what is now called the Rabbinical letter, — virtually the same, only more HEBREW SEALS. 95 simple in its forms, with the ornate sacred character, and many of which, occurring amongst stones brought from the East, are of an antiquity hitherto little suspected. The most interesting known to me is a small jacinth en cabochon (Hertz, now Waterton Collection), engraved with a strange object, a bundle of branches with a round fruit by the side,* and the legend Hillel Bar Mosch, or, as read by a learned Hebraist (Bethel Jacob), Halolo bar colian Moslie, “ Hillel, son of Moses the priest.” This jacinth is engraved in exactly the same manner as the Sassanian works in precious stones. This resemblance is particularly striking in the mode of forming the letters, and there can be no doubt it is of contemporary work with the earliest of that series. One feels tempted to indulge in the pleasing fancy that it may be that most precious of historical records, the signet of the famous Babbi Hillel of Babylon, who flourished in the century before our era, and whose advent to Jerusalem was regarded as an inestimable accession to the collective wisdom of her doctors. Amongst a lot of Cube ring-stones brought from Bassora by M. Bichard (1860), I discovered a small sard with a Hebrew legend in two lines, engraved by the antique process, testifying to an age fully equal to the last described. The name reads Balsadi or Balsari, which latter in Greek would become Belisarius. These two gems, therefore, are the oldest genuine monuments that exhibit the use of the present Hebrew alphabet. A third of more recent date, an octagonal carnelian set in a silver ring most fancifully shaped, had for legend, Isaschar ha Cohen, “ Issachar the Priest.” This octagonal form of the seal-stone, so common in the Persian earlier cones, but neglected by the Sassanians, was again revived by the first subjects of the caliphs of Bagdad, and is very general for stones inscribed in Cufic, and yet more for those belonging to the * Representing the Lulub, carried at the Feast of Tabernacles, made up of one branch of palm, two of willow, and three of myrtle. It was the national emblem of Judeea. This, together with the etrom, the horn of consecrated oil, the seven-branched candlestick, and the roll of the Law, form the regular decorations upon Jewish sar- cophagi under the Lower Empire, many of which are to be seen in their newly discovered catacomb at Rome. 96 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. later period. Hence no doubt sprung in reality the preference for the octagonal form that marks all the mediaeval signets of European nations. Certain enormous gold rings, made, as it would seem, for the finger of Og himself, elaborately decorated with filigree-work, having a small temple surmounting the face, and inscribed on the inside with the Hebrew words Metzul Tub, “ Blessing be with us,” which sometimes are seen in collections, and puzzle the curious examiner to divine their original destination — these mysterious -looking jewels are the wedding ring of the synagogue, and serve that purpose in the marriage ceremony, being put on the fingers of the couple at a certain part in the rite. As may well be expected from their origin, these elaborate jewels often present most wonderfully-made specimens of the gold- smith’s craft. Their pattern goes back to the remotest antiquity, having its prototype in the Greek Dionysiac rings, similarly carrying minia- ture shrines in gold, and which in their turn are but adoptions of a primeval Indian superstition. But this interesting subject must be reserved for discussion in a more appropriate section of this treatise. Certain Hebrew seals are to be met with bearing a highly mystical device — two open hands, with their forefingers and thumbs joined into an equilateral triangle. A learned Biabbi informs me that this peculiar form expresses the position in which a Cohen (a descendant of Aaron the high-priest) holds his hands when pronouncing the sacerdotal benediction (Hum. vi. 24-26 ; Levit. ix. 22). Through this opening the divine light of the Shekinah is believed to shine for the moment when all the congregation veil their eyes ; for whoso dares to look is immediately struck blind in the right eye ; and if he looks again, in the left also ; and if a third time (to use a Hibernism), he is struck dead for his repeated impiety. The priest descended from Aaron on the father’s side only, can only make one half of the sacred triangle, and dispense a moiety of the ineffable radiance. The almond rod that budded in the high-priest’s hands, to prove his legitimacy, always is added to this figure for an explanatory symbol. ( 97 ) EGYPTIAN INTAGLT. The Egyptian scarabei, or beetle-stones, to borrow the, for once, neat and convenient German name for them, may perhaps dispute with the Assyrian cylinders the claim of being the earliest productions of the glyptic art.* They are so designated from the stone carrying the signet being carved into the shape of a beetle, frequently a most perfect copy of the actual insect. f On the flat base the hieroglyphs of the owner’s name or titles are engraved, usually inclosed within a border. As for their materials, the larger proportion will be found cut out of steatite, or else a calcareous schist of different colours, blue, green, dark, and white ; sometimes also in a soft limestone resembling chalk, which in many cases has been coated all over with the blue or green enamel to which the Egyptians were so partial. Many again are in blue vitrified clay, and some few in glass, hut these last the * A steatite scarabeus (British Museum) bears the cartouche of Cheops, builder ot the Great Pyramid, b.c. 2300, and therefore is somewhat anterior in date to Urukh’s cylinder. f This figure was so popular with the Egyptians for a very sufficient reason : they reverenced it as the symbol of the sun, Phre, and its habit of forming the balls of dung, the depositories for its eggs, aptly typified the creation of the globe. — (Plin. xxx. 30.) H 98 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. rarest of all. They also occur in lapis-lazuli, carnelian, amethyst, basalt, and other hard stones; but probably (judging from their style) few of these belong to the ancient Pharaonic dynasties, but are rather to be referred to the Ptolemaic era, when the Greeks had introduced into the country their improved process of gem engraving. The appearance of the work in the early specimens indicates that the harder stones were filed, so to speak, into shape with a frag- ment of emery, the “ Thynic file ” perhaps named by Maecenas in his lines — “ Nec quos Thynica lima perpolivit Anellos, nec iaspidas lapillos.” A splinter of flint was probably the instrument used in the earliest ages for fashioning the beetles and engraving the hieroglyphics in the softer substances ; for Herodotus notices the Ethiopian arrows “ headed with the stone made sharp with which they also engrave their signets * and in another passage the “ Ethiopian stone ” used for cutting open the corpse preparatory to embalment. That the stone in question was flint, is abundantly proved by the flint-headed arrows occasionally found in the mummy pits, as well as from their points annually turned up by the plough on the plains of Marathon, where the warriors described by Herodotus emptied their quivers. Even the scarabei and the tablets in the blue enamelled terra-cotta seem to have been thus incised separately in the piece, after it had been modelled and dried, which was then dipped in the glaze and “ fired.” The scarabei in the softer stones were often enamelled by the same process. t This mode of their manufacture, -which is per- * At'fios o£us Treiroirifiivos tw ko. 1 Tas crcppriyiSas y\v, the Etruscan form of Iv, adopted without changing its position ; and, similarly, the Etruscan v|/ for X (Greek), used as a cypher for 50, makes its appearance in the post of honour upon the first gold mintage of the Kepublic.t In fact, many circum- stances would incline us to transpose Tacitus’ attribution of the two alphabets, and to give the Latin a Corinthian origin, and to assign its introduction at Borne to the son of Damaratus, the Tarquinian Lucumon, Lucius, the first of the Tarquins. One almost convincing proof is to be found in its possessing the Corinthian § transformed into its letter Q, a character unknown in Etruscan inscriptions ; besides the fact, already noticed, of the direction in which the characters are written, even in the earliest specimens of it extant ; and, to conclude this part of my inquiry, the remarkable assertion of Tacitus (or Claudius) remains to be noticed, who makes the Phoenicians borrow their alphabet from the Egyptians, evidently supposing the Punic to be only a modification of the Demotic, as in all likelihood it was. From all the foregoing historical data it seems possible to construct a hypothesis that may rationally account for the anomalies this * “ Ante hanc jedem Tuscanica omnia in fedibus fuisse auctor est Varro,” referring to the temple of Ceres decorated with wall paintings and terra-cottas by two Greeks , Damphilus and Gorgasus, evidently Corinthians by their Doric names (Plin. xxxv. 45). f Many comic masks are evident fac-similes of a monkey’s head, and the Romans drew their histrimes from Etruria. “ From the Etruscans they learnt the system of drawing up their troops in legions ; from the Samnites the use of the scutum ; from the Iberians of the gcesum ” (Ath. vi. 273). ANTIQUE GEMS AN1) BINGS. 168 chapter has undertaken to explain — the Oriental character of the Etruscan signets, most particularly apparent in their form, the scara- beus, so persistently maintained ; the equally Oriental character of the designs upon many scarabei of the earlier class, but still more con- spicuous upon the engraved gold jewels (the graffiti), and the par- tiality of their owners for those commemorating the feats of Hercules, progenitor of the leader of the Asiatic immigration ; and, with respect to the Greco-Italian series, the very early period of the mythic events, and the markedly archaic mode of depicting the Grecian deities, limited as they are in number, who are figured upon them, down to the time when the scarabeus came to be discarded for gems cut to the modern form, and manifestly intended from the first to he set and worn in finger-rings. There is, indeed, a striking resemblance in the mechanical execution of the intagli upon the ruder class of Etruscan gems with that of the Assyrian Cylinders, especially those referred to the Second Babylonian Period. In both classes the designs are worked out entirely by means of the drill, whilst the lines necessary for connecting the reiterated indentations that roughly make out the intended figure have been incised with some hard, scratching medium, possibly a fragment of corundum. There is the same shallowness to be observed in the sinking of the intaglio, and the same sketchiness in the details when- ever they are attempted. As to the guilloclie (chain-border), common to each class, the fantastic birds and monsters, it is much more consistent with the nature of things to suppose such types, expressive of religious ideas,* to have been brought with them by the first colonists out of Asia, than (with Muller) to explain them as mere unmeaning imitations of the patterns on the Babylonian tapestry imported into Greece and Italy, but certainly not before much later times, when regular trade between Asia and Europe had been esta- * The most convincing example known to me is the graffito-ring (‘ Impronte Gemmarie,’ i. 57), with three figures in regular Babylonian costume, worshipping before a fountain discharging itself out of a colossal lion’s head into a basin, a palm tree in the midst. ORIENTAL SOURCE OF ART. 169 blished. And what is more, these supposed tapestry types are only to be found on the ruder and primitive scarabei, those of more finished work invariably drawing their subjects from the Grecian Epic Cycle. But the native Lydian dynasty was itself Babylonian, Herodotus (i. 7) positively stating that the first king of Sardis, of the IleracUdan line, was Agron, son of Belus. The Greek Heracles represented the As- syrian Sandon ; the Lydian kings therefore called themselves Sando- nidse, and Sandonis occurs as the name of a councillor of Croesus. No wonder, therefore, if on the scarahei, Heracles-Sandon wages his sym- bolical combats with the lion, the bull, the gryphon, and the harpy, in as numerous repetitions, and under but slightly differing forms, as upon the cylinders of the parent race. From the nature of the case, a tinge of Assyrian taste could not but have lingered for many generations amongst the opulent nobles of Etruria.* Sandon, indeed, as he figures in Babylonian, is the visible prototype of the Heracles of Etruscan art. In the former he wrestles with the Zodiacal Lion, in the exact attitude in which the latter depicts the Nemaean combat, and struggles with the Bull, as afterwards with that of Crete. His love of deep potations, that national vice of the Persian, and doubtless of the Assyrian kings before them (to judge from the occupation in which they commonly delighted to be sculptured), expressed so fre- quently by his floating on a raft of wine-jars, may be accepted as another evidence of the Assyrian origin of the hero, as well as of the notorious luxury of his European descendants. Other conspicuous reminiscences of Asia arrest our attention amongst Etruscan remains, especially in those where hereditary prac- tice longest survives — things connected with the burial of the dead. Athenasus (xii. 21) was struck with the appearance of the immense tumuli then covering the plains of the Peloponnesus in every direction, * Hercules was also the great god of Tyre, and afterwards of Carthage ; apparently the Greeks recognised their hero in the more ancient Baal ; in fact, both are explained as typifying the solar god. In Pliny’s day the marble Hercules, whom Carthage used to propitiate yearly with a human sacrifice, was standing in Pome, “ disregarded, upon the ground, not in any temple, at the entrance to the Cloister Ad Nationes ” (xxxvi. 5). Many of the Tharros scarahei exhibit a Hercules done quite in the Assyrian style. 170 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. but more especially in Lacedaemon, and found them ascribed by tradi- tion to the Lydians and Phrygians who had accompanied Pelops* when he settled there. Similarly, the conical earthen mound, or rather hill, of Alyattes, springing out of a confining ring-wall of Cyclopean masonry, was upon the plains of Umbria reproduced, though on a lesser scale, in the tomb of every Lucumon ; was adopted by their pupils, the Eomans, and again carried to its pristine magnificence in the Mausoleum of Augustus, constructed of the same materials, being an earthen mound, rising in stages, supported by several concentric retaining walls, as well as serving for the model to the stone-built, sepulchral towers of Csecilia Metella,| of Hadrian, and in the latest ages, of Helena. The grand tumulus of the Lydian king is still crowned with a colossal phallus in stone. The British Museum has lately acquired, out of an Etruscan tomb, the same symbol of the God of Change, Lord of Life and Death, encircled with the epitaph — .ytm m .my* “ Suses the Son of Phintias.” As for the influence of Egypt upon the civilization of the Etruscans, it was probably very small, and even so only exerted itself second- hand through the medium of that syncretistic people, the Phoenicians. Before recent researches had thrown light upon the antique art of the last-named race, the universal prevalence of the scarabeus in Etruscan remainsj was alone sufficient to suggest the belief of a connection in * The influence of the Lydian element in Italy was still very marked in the age of Theopompus (b.c. 350 ), who has these remarkable words upon it in the twenty- first book of his ‘ Philippica ’ (Athen. xii. 32 ). “ The nation of the Umbri (which dwells upon the Adriatic) is astonishingly given to luxury ; they have maimers and customs exactly identical with those of the Lydians, and possessing a fertile region^ have in consequence risen to great prosperity.” j The Metelli were an Etruscan clan, as appears from the well-known bronze “Orator,” inscribed \\ | 4 4 3 T 3 AA I AA 3 s| V fb “Aulus Metellus.” “ Thalna ” is a frequent name in the family Juventia. An Etruscan had no difficulty in taking the name of a goddess for his cognomen, the rule with his race being to call themselves after the mother, not the father ; they used the matronymic, not the patronymic, in their epitaphs ; e. ation the last, according to modern nations, to be chosen for the subject of a gem, hut easily intelligible when we know that this kind of hard labour formed the grand element in the training of the athlete ; and therefore the attitude possessed as much interest to those ages as that equally popular one of the discobolus, which many others of the finest gems present. This illustrates the anecdote told by Timseus (Atlien. xii. 518), that certain Sybarites, visiting at Crotona, on seeing the youths in training thus employed, expressed their wonder that people possessing so line a city should have no slaves to dig up the palaestra ground for them. It is for a different reason, as being the deified patron of husbandry, that Bonus Eventus, the Triptolemus of the Greeks, is figured on Roman monuments with a mattock (rutrum tenens) in his hand. Though all Archaic-Greek and Italiote * intagli much resemble the better-executed Etruscan — and for a sufficient reason, both races having derived the art of design from Assyria, directly or indirectly, its true fountain-head — yet, if we take the works of the Etruscan school, whose origin is authenticated by the Tyrrhenian legends upon them, we find the drawing, even in the best examples, more stiff, and, above all, more exaggerated, than in the Archaic-Greek, though in no respect falling short of the latter in the point of mechanical execution. The Italiote Greeks, as time went on, formed a peculiar style of their own, based on the “ first manner,” hut more loose and flowing, now known as the Campanian ; and it seems to have been engravers of this school who executed for the Romans the few intagli we have that can with certainty he assigned to the Republic. It is, indeed, this slightness of the intaglio, and careful finish of all the details, that form the grand distinction between the true Greek works and those done by the best artists of Roman times. As a general rule, these fine early intagli will be found in bright, * The ancient term neatly distinguishing the Greek colonists from the aboriginal Ituli. ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. 186 pale yellow sards, much resembling the European topaz in tint. This stone the Greeks classed under their jaspis, distinguishing such gems as the “ spliragides,” or seal-stones specially, “ quoniam optime signant,” as Pliny remarks ; and Dioscorides gives to the same sort the appro- priate name of terebinthizon, “ turpentine-like,” from its unctuous and limpid yellowness. XXwpo?, the usual epithet for the jaspis, means green or yellow indifferently. Our title sard for all such varieties is a complete misnomer ; for that appellation was confined by the ancients to the blood-red species, the signification of the word in Persian. The Etruscans and Italo-Greeks, on the contrary, often took for their scarabei the carnelians supplied by their own river-beds. Many Etruscan intagli, which now appear in the shape of ring-stones, retain traces of having been sawn off the bases of scarabei for setting in rings both in ancient and in modern times. The natives of Greece and Asia Minor did not employ the scarabeus form to any great extent, and when Greek intagli are quoted as occurring upon scarabei, a reference to the originals will prove that they are actually scara- beoids, upon which fashion and the reasons for its adoption sufficient has already been adduced under that head.* When we arrive at the most flourishing period of the glyptic art under Alexander and his immediate successors, we recognize at once the productions of the most refined natural taste now fully developed by education, and availing itself of a perfected technique. In the archaic period no portraits occur ; in this we obtain many heads of deities and of princes, f full of life and individuality, as well as whole- * The finest example of the true Greek scarabeoid known to me exists in the Leake Collection. The stone is of considerable size (|x| inch) a beautiful sappliirine calcedony. The intaglio is a lady, fully draped, with her hair filleted and veiled, seated in a chair of elegant form ; before her stands a handmaid similarly costumed, but without the veil, holding up a mirror, her left hand, depending, holds a garland. In the field, above, is written MIKH2 from left to right on the gem. Nothing can surpass the beauty of the drawing in the figures, the arrangement of the drapery, or the carefulness of the execution. A second scarabeoid of the same size and material bears Ulysses, nude, leaning on his beggar’s staff, and recognised by Argus, admirable for the treatment of the naked body. f As is curiously attested by Alexander’s restricting the privilege of engraving his PERFECT GREEK STYLE. 187 length figures. The latter are universally nude — the received mode for- expressing the divine nature of the personage represented in the perfect stage of Hellenic art. “ Grseca res est nihil velare,” observes Pliny, with regard to statuary. The intaglio still continues of little depth com- pared to that of the Eoman school, but yet is sunk deeper into the gem than in the works of the archaic style. There is a vigour and elegance in the drawing upon these gems that bespeak their origin at the first view, as well as a delicacy and a softness in the treatment of the flesh, never to be discovered in the productions of the Imperial ages. The finest examples known by me in this class are the Pulsky Ariadne and Demetrius Poliorcetes, a Philip Y. of Macedon, formerly Horace Walpole’s (all sards), and a Mithridates in amethyst, recently brought from India. The Blacas cabinet possesses a large and very spirited bust of Miltiades wearing a helmet (so attributed by Visconti upon satisfactory grounds) ; also another of Perseus, last of the line, in the winged helmet of his mythic namesake, upon the “ royal ” lazulite. But none of these regal portraits equal in historical value the sard recently communicated to me by Mr. Muirhead, which bears three heads side by side, in the grand Grrseco-Egyptian manner, of Ptolemy Soter, laureated, Berenice, and, furthest from the eye, their son Pliila- delphus, diademed. The last distinction declares the gem engraved after the apotheosis of his sire. The sole technical peculiarity that is noticeable in these perform- ances is the way in which the hair is treated. It is represented by a countless number of fine lines cut wit'll the diamond-point, never crossing, hut kept perfectly distinct from each other. Any ornaments that may be introduced, such as the wreaths round the heads of deities, the diadems of princes, the hair-cauls, fillets, earrings, necklaces, on portrait to Pyrgoteles alone (Pliny ; Apuleius). The gem chosen was, according to Pliny, the emerald, ever the favourite with the Orientals. This famous signet, given by the dying hero to Perdiccas, was long in known existence. As its second owner was slain in Egypt, it doubtless was carried (the rule in such cases) to the victor, Ptolemy Soter, and thus may have come down to Augustus, who used for his first imperial seal a head of Alexander, until, arrived at the height of his power, he ventured to employ his own image, engraved by Dioscorides. 188 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. the female busts, are always rendered with the most scrupulous fidelity. In a word, the artist shows himself to have been enamoured of his own work, and never to have dismissed it from his hands before every portion, even of the accessories, had received the last degree of finish. In this style, also, the amber-coloured sard continues the favourite material ; then the browner sarcloine. Portraits of sovereigns, however, are often met with in the fine dark purple Indian amethyst, a gem which at the time was perhaps confounded with the sapphire, and equally valued under the name of hyacintlius. The same school has left us many admirable heads and figures in the jacinth (essonite) * a stone so much loved by the Greeks, from its resemblance to the highly-prized amber, t and from its extreme lustre when polished. For figures single or grouped the favourite medium with the Greek from the very first was the sardonyx cut transversely (improperly called by collectors the banded, or tricoloured agate). Its great recommendation, says Pliny, was the non-adhesion of the wax to its surface in sealing. But on this stone, so commonly used in archaic glyptics, no heads or other subjects in the “ Perfect style ” ever occur; doubtless because of the interference of the bands of colour with the effect of the work itself, which had now become the paramount con- sideration. There is another kind of engraving, the incavo-relievo, which produces its impressions in flat relief within a sunken field. This rare style is sometimes termed “ Egyptian relief,” and was certainly borrowed from that nation, who have employed it generally in cutting out their hieroglyphics in the softer kinds of stone. In this method the design, though actually in relief, does not project beyond the surface of the slab, and is, consequently, protected by a sunken hollow. The ‘ Impronte Gemmarie ’ contains a Silenus bust in full * A variety of the garnet, varying in tint from bright yellow to brownish red, popularly the “ cinnamon stone.” f The Greek love for the colour yellow is manifest in their choice of gems, and in their preference of gold for small articles of jewellery, such as ear-drops, for which other nations preferred pearls and precious stones. On the contrary, with the Romans, children of Mars the nuu(j)6vos, red was the favourite. AUGUSTAN EPOCH. 189 face, a work of wonderful expression, done in this style, from an antique paste formerly Dr. Nott’s. Considering the effectiveness of this invention, and, still more, the protection it affords to the impression in the wax, it is only surprising that it was not more generally adopted by the ancients.* Much of this manner still survives in the productions of the Augustan age ; the finest portraits of him (like the large Marlborough sardoine |) and of the members of his family, exhibiting the same flat relief in the wax and the same careful treatment of the hair. But it remains true, that the attention to the latter particular is one of the main distinctions between the ancient and the later engraver that serve for the discrimination of either style in heads on gems ; being due to the difference of the instruments employed by each. Augustus had transplanted into Borne the' pure Greek art, still living, though with a waning lustre, in its native regions, and replaced therewith the debased Campanian and Sicilian schools, which alone, after the collapse^ of Etruscan art, had supplied the wants of the coarse, tumultuous Bepuhlic. This innovation displays itself in his coinage, much of it being as rude as the preceding consular series ; some, on the other hand, evincing much taste and skill in the moneyer — at least equal to those possessed by the later Seleucidan. Greek portraiture in gems had only reached its apogee in the preceding generation ; * Another uncommon caprice of Homan art is the union of cameo and intaglio in the same work. A magnificent example is the Blacas Livia, her bust as Ceres in intaglio, surrounded by seven groups of the attributes of all the other goddesses in low relief, very minutely represented. The second, much more elegant in design, gives the bust of Antinous, as Bacchus, intaglio, with two graceful Mamads in relief for supporters, to speak heraldically, a reclining Cupid above, Pan below, completing the encadrature of the portrait of the deified beauty. The stone is a remarkably fine nicolo (Heywood Hawkins). f Once Winckelmann’s ; there is a caduceus in the field, to deify the subject. X Which may be roughly taken as coincident with the Second Punic War, or b.c. 200. After its close Tib. Gracchus found the Etruscan territory entirely occupied by barbarian slaves. Marcellus first decorated Rome with Greek works, the spoils of Syracuse, for which the old conservatives loudly censured him. But soon after Cato the Censor had to complain that his countrymen thought nothing good that was not Greek. 100 ANTIQUE GEMS AND DINGS. I know nothing to equal the Townley paste, a head of Mithridates, taken from a gem of the same size as his tetradrachm, and identical with that magnificent coin in beauty and expression. And the same praise is due to an equally large paste of Nicomedes III., published in the ‘ Impronte Gemmarie ’ (iv. 85). The great camei of Augustan date are in design worthy of the best age of Greece. But it is amazing to mark how rapidly the glyptic art deteriorated under the following Caesars, especially in the latter branch, and how wide the degeneration between the camei of Claudius (so numerously extant) and those of his adoptive grandfather. The Boman style soon became fixed, and the following may be pointed out as its general characteristics. There is a great aiming at effect, with a negligence in details ; the intaglio is sunk as deep as possible into the stone, and heads in full face, for the same reason, now first come into fashion ; relief in colour is sought after by cutting through the blue stratum into the black ground of the nicolo (Arabian sardonyx), a stone unknown to the Greeks. The hair is rendered more in masses, as in a painting ; the drapery is merely indicated by a few touches — in short, everything is kept subordinate to the face ; and this, though usually effective and full of individuality, has a stiffness of expression unknown in likenesses after the life that come from the old Grecian hand. In the female portraits, indeed, more care is bestowed upon the hair, with its arrangement after the complicated and tasteless fashions of the age ; but even here the work falls very far short of the elaboration of the same portions in the heads dating from the period preceding the Empire. Portraits appear now figured as busts, with some drapery on the shoulder ; whereas the Greek show nothing beyond the head and neck. The full lengths are more or less draped ; * the emperor stands forth in complete armour, or, if a bust, usually with Jove’s aegis thrown across the breast. In groups we often see more than two figures intro- duced ; but except to image, in the capacity of a talisman, the patron * Pliny speaks of statues in the toga as a Eoman invention, like everything else with them, borrowed from the Etruscan, as the “ Aretine Orator,” an ancient Metellus, remains to assure us. ROMAN ART— ITS SUBJECTS. 191 god of the wearer, little is now drawn from Greek mythology, nothing from poetry. The general subjects are the occupations of daily life, religious ceremonies, the workman at his trade, hunting, fishing, portraits of the individual, or of some special friend, in which collectors vainly puzzle themselves to find out imperial likenesses. But the most productive source of gems with the Romans was their passionate addiction to judicial astrology,* and their love for the games of the circus. But for the two latter motives, the Lower Empire would have been entirely barren in this field of art ; skill had declined too far to produce portraits capable of satisfying even the moderate require- ments of the age. In the Roman period, even at its two most flourishing epochs, the ages of Augustus, and, a century later, of Hadrian, we no longer meet with scenes drawn from the Epic Cycle, so popular with the indepen- dent Greeks ; and so unalterable is this law, that the very appearance of a design, either poetical or historical in its nature, upon a supposed Roman gem, affords sufficient grounds for attributing the work to some artist of the Revival, a judgment which will usually be verified and confirmed by a careful examination of its details. With regard to mechanical execution, it is fully apparent, in many cases, that the stone has been hollowed out to a great depth by the aid of the drill, and the necessary finish of details, the features, the hair, and the drapery, put in afterwards with the adamant point. Much of the barbarous w T ork of the later times has, beyond all mistaking, been done with the wheel, an Oriental invention, f probably introduced by the makers of talismans from the native region of their trade. Certain it is that the rude intagli of the Lower Empire bear no traces of the primitive technique, probably then abandoned as too laborious, which so strongly characterises the works of a better age. Earlier * In which even the best of the emperors were the greatest proficients. Hadrian, says Spartian, had written out for himself an anticipatory diary containing the future events of each day down to the moment of his death. Sev. Alexander surpassed in the science all the adepts of his time, and founded colleges for its cultivation at Home, t Or rather a varied application of the drill. 192 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. intagli display a wonderful polish in their interior, and there may he some foundation for the opinion of the practical Natter, that the means used by the ancient engravers polished and cut the intaglio by one and the same operation, which would account for the perfect internal lustre of many seemingly unfinished engravings. In the modern practice this polish is the result of a tedious after process, the rubbing diamond- dust with a leaden point into the intaglio itself, and therefore it is only to he found in the works of the best artists, executed in imitation of the antique.* For this very reason, the constant presence of such a polish upon every variety of Eoman work down to a certain period is a most singular phenomenon, and in all probability the result of the peculiar agent employed in cutting the intaglio. It, therefore, is entirely wanting in the hasty talismanic engravings of the Lower Empire, which, beyond dispute, are entirely wheel-cut, as well as in the contemporary Sassanian seals executed by the same process. In many Eoman heads again, the hair when intended for -short and curly (as on those of Hercules, M. Aurelius, and Caracalla), is rendered by a succession of drill-holes set close together. But in true Greek work, every curl would have been minutely finished, and the hairs composing each represented by the light touches of the adamant point. The same peculiarity is observable in the busts of the Eoman school, in which, towards the close of the second century, the hair and beard are similarly done by holes drilled into the marble. The later camei also frequently exhibit the same perfunctory mode of obtaining the desired effect. Before quitting this part of the subject, it may be observed that certain portraits appear very abundantly on Eoman gems — of Augustus and of Nero especially. Of the youthful M. Aurelius they are also plentiful, but the magnificent bearded heads of himself, his colleague, L. Yerus, and his son Commodus, are almost invariably modern, and * The Cinque-Cento engravers must have thought this quality the most important in the antique style, for they exaggerated it to such a degree as often to obliterate by it all the lines of their figures, and one of the criteria of a Cinque Cento gem is this very polishing out of all its effectiveness. LATE ROMAN PORTRAITS. 193 copied from the coins. Coming later down, we meet with numerous heads of Caracalla, for the most part in a much debased style, pro- bably cut for the rings of the military, whose favour he lost no means of courting, according to the last injunctions of his father. After this date gem-portraits almost entirely disappear : they were superseded by the fashion of wearing the gold coins of the reigning emperor set in rings, or by a return to the primitive rude plan of cutting the device in the metal itself. On this account the green jasper, formerly in the Praun* cabinet, was of especial interest, for it hears a Janus bust, with the heads of Diocletian and Maximian — unmistakable likenesses. Notwithstanding Constantine’s | long tenure of empire and great popu- larity, only a single intaglio portrait of him, diademed, on amethyst, has come to my knowledge, and that only as quoted in Stosch’s catalogue, and Lippert gives one well executed of his son of the same name. This proves the rapid extinction of intaglio engraving, for his reign produced many large and splendid works in cameo, and forms an epoch of the revival of that art. Caylus gives (iv. PI. 76) a well- executed, youthful bust, long-haired, diademed, wearing the modius of Serapis, which he strangely attributes to Helena, Julian’s wife, not remembering that such an ornament necessarily bespeaks a male personage. The face is that of Julian when Ctesar, as he appears on his coins of that period, before he ventured, “ sapientem pascere barbam,” that outward and visible sign of heathenism in those times. He was especially addicted to the Egyptian religion, as he proved * In the same, classed amongst the unknown, I recognised a remarkable intaglio of the busts of Gallienus and Salonina, facing each other, three wheat-ears springing from each head, between them an altar supporting an eagle ; the stone a good sard. Their singular ornament probably commemorates the restoration of Africa to that emperor, through the defeat of the usurper Celsus by his cousin Galliena. The Beverley Cabinet has Elagabalus and Annia Faustina, confronted busts, fairly clone on a superb sard. The Blacas, the head of Maximian as a Hercules, boldly done. f A letter of his is preserved by Constant. Porphyrogenitus, accompanying the gift to the Chersonitfe of “ gold rings engraved with our own pious likeness,” as an acknow- ledgment of their services. The term would imply the head was cut in the metal, not on a gem, like the signet of Childeric. J When an “ Augusta ” is similarly complimented, she assumes the lily, lotus of Isis his consort. 0 194 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. by boldly introducing its imagery upon bis medals, when he had attained the supreme power.* But incomparably the finest of these memorials is the portrait of Theodosius II. (408-450). He is repre- sented exactly as on his solidi ; the complete bust seen in front covered with ring- mail, and finished with extraordinary care ; the face, also, is not without some individuality, a prodigy of art for those times — the best that they could produce, for the gem was un- doubtedly the imperial signet. Moss-agate, a most virtuous stone (as Orpheus teaches), is thus honoured. M. Montigny, Paris, possesses an intaglio portrait of Phocas, his bust in front-face, holding the orb, precisely as the type upon his solidi. The work is tolerable, and done in an oval lapis-lazuli, 1 X | inch in size.f In the late Praun cabinet was a large calcedony, 2 x inches oval, presenting in a very fair style the bust in front face of his predecessor Mauritius, holding the orb, with the legend above, dn mavritivs ppa. This piece is stated in the catalogue to have been found at Grafin, hut it has a somewhat suspicious look about it, and may after all be nothing more than a work of the Benaissance. Of the gems of the Carlovingian kings,:!: remarkable as belonging to a date posterior by many centuries to that of the supposed extinction of the art in Europe, a full account will be found in my memoir upon mediaeval gem-engraving. But it remains a fact, that after the middle of the third century portrait-gems are extremely rare, and to corroborate this observation, it may he stated that in the hetero- geneous Hertz collection, got together with only one object, that of amassing the greatest possible variety of subjects without discrimina- tion, I could discover no portraits later than the times of Severus. * In the same century the citizens of Antioch used to wear in their rings the portrait of their highly venerated bishop, Meletius, dep. a.d. 361, as Chrysostom mentions in his oration ‘ De laudibus Meletii.’ f Figured in the ‘ Rev. Archeol.’ for 1858. X Some of them hit upon the clever expedient of adopting an antique head some- what resembling their own, for their signet, by adding their own titles around on the setting Thus Pepin adopts an Indian Bacchus ; Charlemagne, a Serapis ; our Edgar, the fine portrait of some Greek prince. (‘ Handbook of Engraved Gems,’ pp. 118, 143.) L 0 WEB. EMPIRE-CINQ U E-CENTO. 105 After tlie revival of the art in Italy, the works of the Cinque-cento artists, though, as was to be expected, modelled upon the Eoman antique, are generally stamped with that curious exaggeration which characterises all the other productions of that period — the majolica paintings, the ivory carvings, and the bronzes. The rare works of the very earliest artists in this line, belonging to the preceding century,* and who sprung up under the patronage of Paul II., the Dukes of Milan, and, lastly, of the Medici, are to be distinguished from the above by their extreme stiffness and retention of the Gothic manner, in the same degree as the portraits by contemporary hands. The head-dress and the costume display the lingering Gothic fashion, rendered with the same fidelity as in the miniatures of the Quattro- cento school. In fact, all the examples of the dawning Eevival known to me are portraits. They are in shallow intaglio, upon gems of large size, and appear to have been worked out in great measure by a method now forgotten. Nothing can be more dissimilar than their style, to the flowing, facile, over-polished productions of fifty years later, when constant imitation of the antique and infinite practice had freed both eye and hand from the trammels of Gothic conventionality. With the regular school of the Cinque-cento in Italy, and its disciples of the Eenaissance in France, Eoman history, and Eoman fable, particularly as set forth by Ovid, furnished the most popular subjects for the engraver. Few intagli, however, were produced m that age, compared with the multitudes of camei which, proceeding from this source, have stocked the cabinets of the world of taste.j This * The first work of the Eevival that can be certainly identified, is that qiroted by Giulianelli, the bust of Pope Paul II. (1462), now at Florence; “intagliata in una sardonica.” It is by an excellent hand, supposed to be Paolo Giordano, described as a “ bravo legatore e pulitore di gioic.” f One of the most remarkable and characteristic productions of this school is a Triton carrying a nymph (Ehodes), unmistakably a transcript from Albert Durer’s “ Lurley Saga.” The engravings of the whimsical German had been made popular in Italy by Marcantonio’s piracy of them. These figures are in such high relief as to be in parts detached from the field ; their finish is miraculous, and all the details of the scenery are put in with microscopic minuteness. Nothing can be imagined more completely the reverse of the antique manner in every point. o 2 196 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. school, however, was eminent for one class of intagli peculiar to itself, both as to material and dimensions, subjects and mode of treatment. These are the plaques of rock-crystal, works upon which the fame of Valerio II Vicentino, Bernardi del Castel Bolognese, and Matteo del Nassaro, is principally founded. In this stone, for some unknown reason, antique intagli are scarcely to be found, although the material was so extensively worked up by the Romans for other purposes. The dimensions also of these pieces far exceed the customary limits of the antique for intaglio work, the plaques being squares or ovals of four or six inches in width ; in fact, the artist’s object evidently was to obtain as large a surface as possible, the only limit being the dimensions of the block. As they were designed entirely for show in large medallions worn in the hat, or pendent, or composing the sides of coffrets, or of large vases in the precious metals, such an extent of field was absolutely necessary, in order to prevent the unsightly introduction of metal joinings. Their subjects are very various, and bespeak the strange melange of religious notions then prevailing, when the mediaeval and the newly resuscitated mythology were perpetually jostling one another in the domains of art. Some are directly scriptural, others emblematical, such as II Vicentino’s “ Old and New Covenant,” expressed by classical figures ; or the “ Meeting of Alexander with the High Priest.” Again, the ancient deities often reappear, especially those rulers of the age, Venus and Hercules. A few are historical, like Bernardi’s “ Siege of Bastia ;” others, like M. Angelo’s “Tityus and the Vulture,”* mere fancy pieces, battles, and lion hunts. In composition and in drawing these works are truly admirable, though totally different from the antique manner in many points, such as the large number of figures introduced to fill every available space, and the violent action and display of anatomy and floating drapery, forced in for the mere purpose of animating the piece. The intaglio is shallow, and polished internally to an extraordinary * Now in the Blacas Cabinet; an oval 3 X 2j inches, set in a gold frame for a pendent-jewel. CINQUE-CENTO 1 NT AG LI. 197 degree of lustre. In fact, as just observed, in many gems of this age this excessive polish will he found to have destroyed all sharpness of outline, and impaired the drawing. These plaques in use were laid upon richly-coloured silks, with the engravings inwards, so as to produce, hy a singular illusion, the effect of works in relief, in consequence of the varying thickness of the refractive medium. The thinnest parts, allowing the most of the colour behind to pass through them, appear at first sight actually to stand out from the field. It is now very uncommon to meet with one of these crystal plaques still retaining its original setting, and thus showing how it was properly intended to be shown. Their rarity is due to the large intrinsic value of such mountings, which has occasioned their destruc- tion in the interval. One still complete lately came under my notice (Eastwood, 1863), of octagonal shape, subject, a youthful saint holding the host and a laurel branch, in a most costly frame of gold filigree, very broad and heavy, and ornamented at intervals with oblong table sapphires. Having a loop for suspension, it must have been intended to be worn as a medallion. Of the intagli upon other species of gems belonging to this school there are some particularly fine examples in the Marlborough cabinet, as the Ariadne rescued by Bacchus and his train. But the most interesting, historically, of the whole class, is the large oval agate, mounted as a pendant, presented by Archbishop Parker to Queen Elizabeth. The subject is Vulcan seated at his anvil, with Venus standing by, who despatches Cupid on some errand, bearing a flaming torch. This gem is preserved in the original ivory box, accompanied with a parchment, setting forth the physical virtues of the agate, with this distich — “ Regni n^os Elizabetha gerit, Mattkfeus ackatem Cantua., ei donat fidus dum vivit Achates;” where the good prelate, it will be seen, has, for the pun’s sake, been obliged to strike the 6 out of a%^o?. Now as he was made arch- bishop in 1559, his present must have been subsequent to that date. In the biographical section, it will be shown how and when the 198 ANTIQUE HEMS AND DINGS. antique mode of intag'lio engraving was in some measure rediscovered (from hints given by that great collector, Stosch) by Flavio Sirletti, at the beginning of the last century. By him and his successors a host of intagli have been left, many comparable to the best of the ancients, yet for the most part carrying with them the visible stamp of their age, especially in the treatment of the drapery, which enables the experienced eye to assign to them their proper origin.* Besides this, the most eminent artists, such as Natter and Picliler, aspired to a higher fame than that of mere copyists of antiquity. After attaining to celebrity, they both always signed their own works ; and, indeed, Picliler struck out a peculiar style, widely differing from the Greek, although perhaps of equal merit. Some, however, of his pupils became close imitators of the Greek, as exhibited in the Magna Grtecian medals, and I have seen intagli by Bega of Naples, the first in that line, as a head of Ariadne, on an unusually large scale, and the “ Despair of Ajax and again in cameo, a Proserpine, and the Rape of the Palladium, by Girometti, which equal, if they do not surpass, anything left to us by the ancients in either department. * Of this they were sensible. The late J. Brett informed me, on the authority of Mr. Constable (‘Walter Scott’s 1 Antiquary’), who had resided in Borne during^the most flourishing times of the modern art, that the engravers spared no pains in procuring antique pastes offering new subjects. These they accurately copied, after- wards destroying the originals, securing in this way the true antique treatment of the subjects they reproduced. ( 199 ) THE PORTRAITURE OF THE ANCIENTS. One of the most tantalising peculiarities belonging to the study of antique gems is the existence of that innumerable series, thrown together at the end of every catalogue under the designation of “ Unknown Portraits.” What can be more trying to one versed in ancient history than to possess some impress of a face full of life and individuality, to be morally conscious that he has therein the “ counterfeit presentment ” of some great philosopher, statesman, or warrior, and after all, to be obliged to content himself, at best, with the arbitrary ascriptions of Fulvius Ursinus, Leon Agostini, Gori, and Yisconti — ascriptions based, for the most part, upon the fancied agreement of the features with those of some restored, almost equally unreliable, bust or statue ? Where the assistance of medals fails us, we indeed have no other resource than this ; and even this poor resource labours under another disadvantage ; sculpture, when reproduced by drawing, losing so much of its character, that the marbles or bronzes are of little real service to our purpose unless we be enabled to examine the originals for ourselves, and compare them with the miniature heads we are endeavouring to identify. Yisconti, in his two 200 ANTIQUE OEMS AND IUNGS. Iconographies, has availed himself only to a very limited extent of engraved gems in order to complete his series of Greek and Eoman portraits, being probably deterred by the consideration that a mere supposed resemblance, when unsupported by an inscription, was insuffi- cient warranty for their admission amongst likenesses in the authen- ticity of which his own archaeological credit was involved. It is however possible, that had the acute Italian more attentively studied these minuter, hut far more perfect, memorials of ancient celebrities, he might have conscientiously augmented his muster-roll, and that to a very considerable extent. It was for posterity an unfortunate impulse of the pride of art, that made the Eoman engravers think it beneath them to continue the practice of their Etruscan predecessors (who carefully subjoined his name to every hero they portrayed), hut rather to trust to fidelity of portraiture for the sufficient declaration of their subjects. As far as regards the personages of mythology, they did not often err in this estimate of their own powers ; for in that province all the types had been fixed for them by immemorial tradition. Plutarch ( Aratus ) men- tions some curious facts, proving incidentally how familiar the aspect of their most ancient celebrities had been rendered to the Greeks by their repeated representations in every form of art. Thus, Nicocles, tyrant of Sicyon, was the exact image of Periander, one of the Seven Wise Men ; Orontas the Persian, of Alcmaeon ; and a certain young Lacedaemonian, of Hector. To the last-named this discovered resemblance proved fatal, he being crushed to death by the multitudes who fiocked to see him as soon as it was made known. But in the case of ordinary mortals, no amount of skill in the artist could preserve to his work the possibility of recognition after all remembrance of the deceased original had passed away together with his contemporaries. And, by an unlucky coincidence, it was precisely at the date when portraits from the life first began to appear upon gems, that the old explanatory legends were discontinued — a circum- stance that has robbed of its chief value what otherwise would have been by far the most interesting department of every gem-cahinet. GREEK PORTRAITS— NAMES. 201 The engraver remained satisfied with having by his skill ensured the recognition of his patron amongst contemporaries ; nevertheless it is inconceivable how he should have neglected so easy and obvious a method for immortalising him amongst the educated for all succeeding time. Such a precaution he has actually taken for the continuance of his own posthumous fame, in the case of his principal works, by adding his signature ; hut this very care has, in some instances, only served to mislead posterity (as in Solon’s case), by making us attribute to some celebrated namesake of the artist’s in Grecian history, the actual personality of his Koman employer. In other cases, when a name does accompany a likeness, it often proves no more than a client’s or freedman’s, paying thus his homage to the grandee really represented there — a species of adulatory deifica- tion borrowed from the very ancient custom of joining one’s own name to the figure of the patron-god upon the signet. But most frequently of all, alas ! Avlien the inscription does professedly designate the subject (if a noted historical character), it is easily detected as a mere clumsy interpolation by a modern hand, made in order to give value to an unknown head, in the same way as busts of private Bomans were commonly, during the same period, inscribed by their finders with the titles of the most eminent sons of Greece. How important, how intensely interesting, the class of gem-portraits would now he to us had the slightest means of identification been generally supplied by their authors, is a thought that must strike every one who considers the immense number still extant, the con- scientious diligence displayed in their execution by the highest ability in that branch of art ; and last, but not least, the ample means at the artist’s command for ensuring fidelity in his reproduction even of long departed worthies, when representing them at the order of their descendants or admirers. Throughout Asia Minor, Greece, and Italy, every town had its temples, gymnasium, agora, or forum, peopled with the statues, in all materials, of those amongst her sons who had in any way distinguished themselves in arms, letters, or the public games ; and as civilization advanced, popular adulation or private vanity 202 ANTIQUE OEMS AND RINGS. swelled their hosts to an extent perfectly inconceivable to our notions, often by the mere multiplication of the same figure. Plutarch notices, as a remarkable exception to the general rule, in the case of Agesilaus, the absence of all portraits or statues of so eminent a man ; for he would not allow any to be taken in his lifetime — nay, more, upon his deatlr-hed actually forbade it to his survivors. The antiquity of the practice appears from the same historian’s notice of the statue of Themistocles he had admired, standing in the temple of Athene Aristobule, both statue and temple erected by the great statesman, describing it as “ of an aspect as heroic as his actions.” Alexander, on entering Phaselis, in his Persian campaign, was delighted to find the statue of his favourite poet, the lately deceased tragedian, Theodectes, newly set up by his fellow-townsmen, and testified his gratitude by crowning it with garlands.* On entering Persepolis as victor, he sees a colossus of Xerxes thrown down by the rush of fugitives, and debates upon the propriety of re-erecting the same, but finally decides to leave the figure prostrate, as a punishment for the impiety of its original when in Greece. Such memorials, still preserved in Plutarch’s times, went back to the remotest antiquity : he speaks of a statue of Orpheus in cypress-wood then existing at Lebethea, in Thrace. Lysander, with his confederate generals, his own offering in gratitude for the termination of the Peloponnesian War, was still standing in marble in the Treasury of the Corinthians at Delphi. These dedicated groups often represented some noteworthy event in the hero’s life. Craterus sends to the same temple a work by Lysippus of Alexander attacking a lion with his hounds, and himself hastening to his aid. Philopoemen, “ last of the Greeks,” dedicates there his own equestrian figure, in the act of spearing the Spartan tyrant, Machanidas. Aratus destroys the portraits of the line of Sicyonian tyrants. Amongst them was that of Aristostratus, standing in a chariot and crowned by Victory, the joint work of all the scholars of Melantliius, including the great Apelles. Nealces, himself an admired painter, is employed to efface the tyrant’s figure, which he replaces by a palm-tree. The first proceeding of the Macedonian king, STATUES IN GREECE. 203 Antigonus Doson, when master of Sicyon, is to set up again the statues of these tyrants, whence it must he concluded that Aratus had not actually destroyed, but only removed them from their posts of honour in the public place. Public gratitude gave additional stimulus to artistic energy. Down to Plutarch’s age those very early masters, Silanion and Parrhasius, were honoured with annual sacrifices by the Athenians for their successful statues and pictures of the national hero, Theseus. A laughable example of cheap honour to a public benefactor is afforded by the lately discovered Sestine Inscription, which, after enrolling the vote of a bronze statue to a great local patriot, one Menas, goes on to declare that the resolution being delayed through want of funds, Menas had added yet this above all to his other enumerated services, that he had set up the statue at his own expense. To illustrate the unlimited multiplication of such honours, a few examples, taken at random, will more than suffice. Demetrius Phalereus, governor of Athens for Demetrius Poliorcetes, was com- plimented by that time-serving community with a bronze statue for every day in the year. At Rome, and in yet uncorrupt republican times, Marius Gratidianus, on account of his verification of the silver currency, obtained, from the gratitude of his fellow-citizens, a similar honour placed in every street of the city. Pausanias beheld the con- secrated ground, no less than half a mile in circuit, crowded with those of Hadrian alone, all congregated round his grand work, the Olympeum at Athens. Their number may be estimated from the fact, that every town pretending to he an Athenian colony had sent thither one in its own name ; the parent state, as was right and proper, outdoing them all by a colossus of her imperial second founder placed in the rear of the shrine. Doubtless that benefactor had, underhand, supplied the funds for so costly a memorial ; for the just-quoted example of Menas informs us that a man’s subscribing money to his own glorification is far from being the invention of our own day. For, the making a colossus, even in those ages of superabundant artistic power, swallowed up the revenue of a Grecian state. The Apollo of the Pontic town bearing his name, thirty cubits in height, had cost no less 204 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. than five hundred talents (100,0007.) ; the more celebrated one at Ehodes, seventy cubits high, required the outlay of three hundred (60,000/.);'* * * § the Mercury of Auvergne, made by Zenodorus, the dimensions of which Pliny does not give, stating only that they exceeded those of Nero’s by the same statuary (110 feet), — “ omnem amplitudinem ejus generis vicit ” — cost the equivalent of 400,000/. |CCCC|> and required ten years for its completion.t The rage for colossus-making flourished down to the last days of art. Gfallienus had commenced one to his own honour on a scale preposterously exceeding even the extravagance of Nero’s ambition, for the shaft of the spear held in the emperor’s hand contained a winding stair by which a man might mount to the top. Another remarkable example is the marble’ colossi of the imperial brothers, Tacitus and Florian, placed over their cenotaph at Terni, in the centre of their paternal estate, and which, when Yopiscus wrote, were lying on the ground, shattered and cast down by a recent earthquake. And lastly the insane ambition of the miserly Anastasius thus to indulge his vanity, hut at as cheap a rate as possible, led to the destruction of a whole street full of monuments of better times, all cast into the furnace to supply the requisite metal. i But to return to the regular class of these memorials, as showing the long perpetuation of the practice. Ammian notices such as raised by Constantius II. in the grand square at Amida, to commemorate certain officers who had fallen victims to the perfidy of the Persian, Sapor ; and again, Julian’s conferring the same distinction upon Victor, the historian. § From the terms in which Nicetas speaks of the statues of victorious charioteers adorning the Hippodrome at * This great disproportion in cost, as compared with the former, is explained by its material being furnished from the siege-train of Demetrius Poliorcetes, abandoned by him in his flight from the island, f xxxiv. 18. J The sole survivor of the class is the “ Colosso di Barletta ” of Theodosius, 19f palmi = 15 feet Soman in height. Said to have been brought from Constantinople by the Venetians, and the ship carrying it wrecked off Barletta. § xxi. 10. 5. COLOSSI— ROMAN STATUES. 205 Constantinople down to the year a.d. 1204 (when they were all melted down by the Franks on the capture of the city), it would appear that these popular heroes continued to be thus perpetuated in bronze so long as the circus-races themselves were maintained. Plutarch has preserved a good saying of old Cato the Censor’s, apropos of the multiplication of such memorials by every one that chose to pay for the gratification of his vanity. Many peojde of small note having statues set up to them in Rome, and himself none at all, not- withstanding his services to the State, Cato, on this being observed to him, replied, that “ he very much preferred it should he asked why he had not a statue than why he had one.” This neglect, however, was subsequently rectified, for Plutarch had seen a bronze statue of him in the character of Censor, standing in the temple of Salus. Again, some faint idea of their incredible numerousness is given by the casual notices of the swarms so long remaining in Greece for many gene- rations after that country had become the favourite foraging-ground of every Roman amateur who possessed authority to plunder — like Nero, who made a selection of five hundred bronze statues “ of gods and men indiscriminately ” out of those at Delphi alone.* Nevertheless, the learned Mucianus calculated that at the time of his tour in Greece, a few years later, there were still remaining three thousand statues in Rhodes singly, and an equal number at Athens, Olympia, and Delphi respectively. But what the pillage had been under the earlier Roman domination may he imagined from a single fact. Scaurus, Sylla’s step- son, had that very same number employed in the decoration of his temporary wooden theatre. But, in truth, the fecundity of Greek genius had been absolutely miraculous ; Lysippus alone having executed fifteen hundred statues, some of them colossal, and every one of them perfect in its kind. The Greeks, however, had the less right to complain of this Roman spoliation, having themselves set the example of the licence in this lust given by victory ; Cleomenes, on capturing Megalopolis, sending off all the statues and pictures he found * Pausan., x. 7. 1. ANTIQUE OEMS AND DINGS. liOfi therein, to decorate his own capital, Sparta. The new conquerors com- menced operations in the line of art-plunder at the taking of Syracuse, when Marcellus despatched one half of the statues found there (the other half to the Samothracian Cabiri) for the decoration of Eorne — an innovation strongly censured by his countrymen of the old school. Thirty-seven years later, Mummius similarly despoiled all the cities belonging to the vanquished Achaean League, leaving only, out of respect for his memory, the various statues erected to Philopoemen in each member of that confederacy. Eome again, and probably the other chief Latin cities (for the Etruscan we have positive statements), although destitute of the pro- ductions of Greek art previous to these conquests, nevertheless pos- sessed an abundant stock of her own in the primitive national style, corresponding with the very Archaic of the Greeks. These monu- ments, of infinite historic, though perhaps small artistic value, ascended, as Pliny incidentally informs us, to the Eegal Period, and even beyond ; for a Hercules was, in the historian’s day, venerated by religious antiquaries as the work of Evander himself. The author of the curious treatise, c De Eebus Bellicis,’ although writing under the Lower Empire, had undoubtedly very respectable ancient authority for his assertion, — “ iEris copiam in simulachris propriis ad virtutis sum testimonia figurabant speaking of the early times of Eome when coin of any kind was unknown. Such a tradition has met full and remarkable confirmation in the conclusion at which the best numisma- tists are at last arrived, that the ees grave, instead of remounting to Numa’s reign, can none of it claim higher antiquity than the re- building of Eome after the Gallic sack, b.c. 390 ; for its style does not display aught of the Archaic, hut merely the coarseness of had copies from fine Grecian models. We discover the reason for Pliny’s remarking that “ Signa Tuscanica, which nobody disputes were made in Etruria, are dispersed all over the world,” as well as of the present plentifulness of “ Etruscan bronzes ” (their modern synonym), from the single recorded fact, that at the capture of Yolsinii (b.c. 261), Fulvius Flaccus carried away to Eome no fewer than two thousand WAXEN IMAGINES. 207 statues !* — a number absolutely incredible, did not the hosts of their representatives that yet exist inform us of their real nature. They must have been mostly statuettes, and diminutive ones too ; although the “ Aretine Orator,” a Metellus, a masterly portrait-figure, is of life- size. But, what is more to our present purpose, Borne, and doubtless other Italian cities, possessed an inexhaustible treasury of portraiture in another and less costly material, yet one infinitely superior to all the rest in the essential point, exactitude. For as Polybius minutely describest the custom : upon the death of every person of family, his face was modelled in wax with the utmost care, and even coloured after the original ; which waxen casts were afterwards preserved in little cabinets arranged in genealogical order around the atrium of the ancestral residence. To take a cast from a person’s face in plaster, and to use this as a matrix for the melted wax, was the invention, says Pliny, of Lysistratus, the brother of Lysippus. The same artist was the first to make actual lilcenesses of his patrons, all Greek sculptors before him having invariably idealized their features, — “ cjuam pril- cherrimos facere studebant.”J If, therefore, the credit of this inven- tion was really due to Lysistratus, the primitive Boman imagines must have merely been modelled by hand, not direct casts from the face of the defunct. The profession of modeller consequently must have been a flourishing one at Borne, one proof of this amongst the rest, being the frequent occurrence of gems, the signets of such artists, exhibiting them at work upon these heads stipported on the left hand, conclusive evidence of the nature of the substance they are mani- pulating. These waxen masks were those imagines whose long array formed the pride of the degenerate nobles who despised Marius and Cicero for their want of them, and who, as the great orator sharply * One of these, a Vertmnnus, preserving the name of its maker, Mamurms, was standing, and admired, in the Forum, as late as the days of Propertius (iy. 2). “ Tuscus ego et Tuscis orior, nec pcenetel inter PrEelia Volsinos deseruisse focos.” f vi. 53. J xxxvi. 44. 208 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. says of Piso, “ crept into honours through the recommendation of smoke-dried ancestors, whom they resembled in nothing save in their complexion." Nothing resists the action of time so effectually as modelling wax, if only protected from pressure, a proof of which is afforded by regal seals (of the same composition) preserved from early Norman, and even Carlovingian reigns. The enduring nature of these memorials has lately received a yet more remarkable attestation. A large tomb at Cumae, opened towards the close of the year 1852 by the Conte di Siracusa, contained, besides ^several cinerary urns, three biers of stone upon which were extended four skeletons, each deprived of the head, hands, and feet. Two of these bodies had been supplied with heads in wax, having eyes of paste, male and female. The latter head fell to pieces when touched, but the other was fortunately sufficiently sound to admit of .being removed, in perfect condition, to the Museum, at least as far as regards the face. This face is that of a man of middle age, of good features, a slightly aquiline nose, and somewhat plump, having the beard close shaven, and the hair of the head cut short. A very interesting circumstance about it is that a slight dis- tortion of the nostrils and lips proves to a practised eye that the plaster mould in which the mask was cast must have been taken from the face during life. It is evident that the man, his wife, and their two companions in death had suffered execution and mutilation at one and the same time, and that the trunks of the two principal victims had been thus completed through the pious care of friends, when com- mitted to the family sepulchre — the extremities being reserved by the executioner for public exhibition, upon spikes fixed in some elevated position. The casts may, therefore, be supposed taken when the con- demned lay in prison awaiting their doom. Inasmuch as a coin of Diocletian was found in the same tomb, it was a natural conclusion for the discoverers to arrive at that these decapitated bodies belonged to real Christian martyrs. The mask is well figured in the ‘ Mus. Borbon,’ xv. pi. 54. Hence these imagines preserved unchanged the persona] appearance of the Homan’s ancestors for many generations WAXEN IMAGINES. ‘209 back. For this reason we may accept with all confidence the portraits of Brutus the Elder, Aliala, Metellus, Scipio Africanus, &c., upon the consular denarii, or upon gems, although such may only date from the last two centuries of the Bepublic. At the obsequies of any person of a patrician family, these heads were affixed to figures clad in the official costume appropriated to the former condition in life of each person ; and these effigies, so completed, followed in long proces- sion the last departed member of their line as far as the Rostra in the Forum, where the next of kin delivered a funeral oration in his honour, recapitulating, with the merits and exploits of the individual, all the traditionary glories of his gens. A good idea of the remote antiquity to which these memorials were carried back may be derived from Tacitus’s allusion to the interminable line of imagines which graced the funeral of Drusus, only son of the Emperor Tiberius. Beginning with iEneas, they went through the series of the Alban kings, then Attus Clausus and the Sabine nobility, finishing with the unbroken succession of the Claudian race.* In addition to these private stores of portraits, from their very nature the most authentic that could be desired, Pliny often refers to another class, to which a passing allusion has been made above. These were the host of statues, or rather statuettes ; a half life-size, tri^edanea, being (as he remarks in the case of those erected to the murdered envoys, Julius and Coruncanius, b.c. 231) considered in early times as something out of the common for such monuments. Beginning with the Kings of Borne, they illustrated each successive period of her history until they culminated in the grander works springing out of the vanity and ambition of the last ages of the Bepublic, and the commencement of the Empire. The extreme antiquity of the custom is manifest from Pliny’s mention of the statues of the Kings, which he quotes as authorities * This convoi of ancestors is what Cornelia means in the forced expression of Propertius, — “ Sum digna merendo Cujus honoratis ossa vehantur avis.” P 210 ANTIQUE OEMS AND RINGS. on a point of costume, a proof of the care bestowed upon their execu- tion. The very nature of the case proves these statues to have been works of the period they commemorated ; it being absurd to suppose that the early or late Republic should have erected statues in honour of a detested government, the very name whereof was synonymous with tyranny ; although even such hatred had been forced to spare these original monuments, as being sacred things, the property of Jupiter of the Capitol. Of their style of execution a good notion may be formed from the Jheads of Romulus, Sabinus, Numa, and Ancus, on the denarii, struck late in the Republic by families claiming descent from this ancient stock — portraits testifying to an experienced eye, by their peculiar style, that they were true copies of Archaic originals. Stiff in the extreme, they were none the less true to nature, as the sole surviving relic of their school, the Wolf of the Capitol, strikingly declares. Another, and a curious proof of the correct indivi- duality secured to his portraits by the Regal brass-founder, lies in the circumstance Plutarch records, respecting the statue of Brutus the Elder, holding a naked sword, and “ then standing amongst the Kings in the Capitol.” In the features, Posidonius the philosopher declared he could trace a strong family likeness to his celebrated namesake and imitator. But of the statue of the contemporary Porsenna, then existing in the Senate-house, he remarks that the style was rude and Archaic : a good testimony to its genuineness. To cite a few illustrations of the fecundity of the national Italian school in ages long preceding the date when “ Grfficia capta ferum victorem cepit et artes Intulit agresti Latio Pliny mentions that the statue which Spurius Cassius (who was put to death for treason b.c. 485) had erected to himself , long suffered to stand behind the temple of Tellus, was finally melted down by order of the censors, Scipio and Popilius, at the same time that they removed (not destroyed ) out of the Forum all statues of persons that had borne office which had not been authorized by public decree to enjoy that honour. This cruel onslaught upon a harmless gratification of vanity EARLY ROMAN STATUES. 211 took place in the year b.c. 159. Again, to quote Pliny’s own words : “ I would have supposed the three figures of the Sibyl, with that of Attus Nfevius made by Servius Tullius’s order, to be the most ancient works in Eome, were it not for the statues of the Kings which stand in the Capitol.” As early as the date b.c. 495, Appius Claudius, when consul, set up all his ancestry, with their titles underneath, in the temple of Bellona. By a proud generosity Borne preserved the memorials of even her bitterest enemies — a gold clyjaeus embossed with the bust of Hasdrubal (captured by Marius in Spain) was fixed over the portal of the Capitol. Of Hannibal himself no fewer than three statues were objects of interest (visuntur) to the historian’s contem- poraries ; whilst the colossal Baal of Carthage, propitiated of old with human victims, stood by neglected in the open air. And further, these honours were paid to the memory of the illustrious dead even under circumstances that one might fancy would have precluded them ; but it appears the victorious side had sufficient magnanimity to con- cede this innocuous consolation to the vanquished. For example, Plutarch had admired the statue of the younger Cato standing, sword in hand (like his predecessor of old) upon the Utican shore, marking the site of his funeral pile ; probably erected by the townsmen, who are mentioned as having celebrated the patriot’s obsequies with the greatest respect, regardless of all consequences to themselves from the displeasure of the conqueror. The source, therefore, being so astonishingly copious, it was only natural the Bonian gem-engravers should avail themselves thereof, and that* they did so to the full is manifested by the present abundance of antique portrait gems. That so small a proportion of their number has been identified, is partly due to the negligence of gem-collectors in not studying ancient sculpture with that view, or, better than all, the portraits on the consular coinage. The latter means, judiciously applied, often leads to the recognition of the great personages of the Bepublic, immortalised by history, and now recalled to life for us by the manifestation of their countenances upon the signets of their next descendants. 212 ANTIQUE GEMS AND DINGS. But the same study opens out a far more extensive field than the range of Boman history. Of the Grecian philosophers, the gem- portraits, though seldom contemporary (for reasons I have sufficiently discussed in another place), must by no means be regarded on that account as mere creations of the artist’s fancy, drawn in accordance with the popular conception of the character of each. A host of statuaries are catalogued by Pliny, beginning with Colotes, the partner of Phidias, such as Androbulus, Apollodorus, Alevas, Cephisodorus, &c., all distinguished for making the portraiture of philosophers their special walk in their profession ; or else like Chalcosthenes, devoting themselves exclusively to the sculpturing of athletes and charioteers. As all these (besides many more named by Pliny) principally occupied themselves in thus perpetuating the outward forms of the numerous literati of their respective generations, the series of authentic like- nesses in this class ascended considerably beyond the period of Plato, although probably somewhat idealised before the invention of Lysis- tratus already noticed. During the disasters of the Samnite War (b.c. 343) the statues of Pythagoras and Alcibiades were set up in Borne by the Senate, when ordered by the Delphic Oracle to pay this honour “ to the wisest and to the bravest of the Greeks.” Pliny is surprised at these particular two being preferred to Socrates and Tliemistocles ; but as far as regards the Samian sage, the Bomans found good reason in the tradition that made him to have been enrolled a citizen of the infant state, nay, the actual preceptor of Numa : his son Mamercus was claimed by the j®milii as the founder of their family. Of the first of these two bronzes the appearance is preserved to us by a contorniato medal ; the philosopher was seated in his chair in the attitude of meditation, his head resting on his hand. These likenesses were prodigiously multiplied so long as the study of philosophy continued in fashion at Borne, that is, during the first three centuries of the empire. Pliny* notices the “ modern invention ” of placing in libraries the figures of learned men, made of gold, silver, xxxv. 2. PHILOSOPHERS IN LIBRARIES. 213 or at poorest of bronze (“ aut certe ex sere ”), which he attributes either to Asinius Pollio, who first established a public library at Home, or else to the royal founders of those at Pergamus and Alexandria. Juvenal laughs at the swarms of impudent pretenders to the title of philosopher who usurped that dignified name on the strength of having their rooms crowded with plaster busts of Chrysippus, and who regarded themselves as quite perfected by the purchase of a good Aristotle or Pittacus, or a contemporary head of Cleanthes, to decorate their bookcase.* That the followers of the different schools displayed in their signets the heads of their respective founders, would readily be supposed from the nature of circumstances ; and this supposition is converted into certainty by Cicero’s laughing at the Epicureans amongst his friends for carrying about with them their master’s portrait in their table plate, and in their rings. t And a century later, Pliny mentions the fondness of the same sect for setting up his portrait in their rooms, and carrying it about with them whithersoever they went.J Such a practice accounts for the frequency of the heads of Socrates on gems of the Roman period ; for none perhaps are to be met with whose style approaches more closely to the epoch of the Athenian sage. Plato likewise makes his appearance on the same medium as his master, but to far less extent than collectors flatter themselves in their hope of so interesting a possession, for his grave and regular physiognomy is usually confounded with the established type of the Indian Bacchus. Aristotle, too, in his well-known attitude of meditation, with chin resting on his clenched hand, is occasionally to be seen on really antique gems, though with infinitely more frequency on those of the Cinque-cento school. Diogenes, ensconced within his capacious doliuin (oil-jar), was a much more fashionable device in times whose extra- vagant luxury had made the affectation of asceticism the favourite cloak for ambition and knavery. * III the Epicurean’s library at Herculaneum were found bronze busts of Epicurus, Ilermarclius, Metrodorus, Demosthenes, and Zeno — beautiful works of art. f ‘ De Fin.’ v. 1. f xxxiv. 1. 214 ANTIQUE OEMS AND JUNGS. The order of Poets is likewise as fully commemorated by our gdyptic monuments. Their distinctive badge is the vitta surrounding the head, a thin ribbon tied more loosely than the broader diadem of Grecian royalty. This only applies to the great lights of Hellenic literature, for their Roman successors assumed crowns more befitting the character of their muse. Ovid bids his friend at home strip from his brows the Bacchic ivy-wreath so ill suited to the sad estate of an exile : — “ Siquis babes nostros similes in imagine vultus Deme meis hederas, Bacelrica serta, comis ; Ista decent lretos felicia signa poetas, Temporibus non est apta corona meis.” * But of such portraits, with the exception of Homer’s well-known features (though but a fancy portrait, as Pliny himself confesses!) ; JE schylus, recognisable by his tortoise capping his bald pate ; and Sapplio, by her Lesbian head-cloth, — the attribution of such likenesses is a matter of great uncertainty. This circumstance is much to be regretted, since authentic portraits, so long as the possibility of recog- nition survived, went back to the very day-spring of art. Plutarch mentions how that Phidias himself got into very great trouble — nay, even endangered his life — by introducing his own figure in the Battle of the Amazons, chased upon the shield of his colossal Minerva, in the guise of a bald-headed old man lifting up a stone ; and likewise records how Themistocles rallied the poet Simonides for having his portrait painted, he being of most unsightly aspect. The absence of all distinguishing symbols is fatal to the recognition of the two great rivals of iEschylus, although it were but reasonable to seek for them amongst the same class of memorials. In fact, Visconti has published a cameo representing an aged man enveloped in the pallium, whom a female is presenting to a seated Muse ; and supposes that this protege of Melpomene’s has a head much resembling the portrait bust of Euripides found at Herculaneum. The subject he ingeniously interprets as the Muse receiving the Poet from the hands * ‘ lost.,’ i. 7. f Pariunt desideria non traditos vultus sicut in Homero evenit. POETS — VIRGIL'S PORTRAIT. 2] 5 of Palaestra, daughter of Hercules, in allusion to his original occupation of athlete. It is certain that this was the established type for com- memorating a successful dramatist. The fine Marlborough gem, No. 393, exhibits a youth holding, to mark his profession, the pedum of Thalia, engaged in conference with the Comic Muse, who is seated in precisely the same attitude as Palaestra in Visconti’s cameo. And what confirms this explanation, the pair of Bernay silver vases (in the Bibliotheque Imperiale), with chasings of Alexander’s epoch, give the same design with unimportant variations ; the thymele (theatrical altar) being introduced between each pair of interlocutors, as a symbol, intended plainly to declare that some dramatic celebrity was taken by the ancient toreutes for his theme. To this perplexing uncertainty, however, there is one fortunate and remarkable exception in the Lucretius, on black agate (formerly Dr. Nott’s), inscribed lvcre in the lettering of his own times ; accepted by the infallibility of the Boman Archaeological Institute, and K. 0. Muller, as the unquestionable vera effigies of the poet- philosopher. Virgil’s likeness, however, 'although beyond all doubt it must exist on gems, and on not a few of them too, has hitherto imitated the notorious bashfulness of its original, and shrunk from our recognition. But the anxious longing of the early Italian scholars has imposed upon the world two supposititious heads of strangely differing type ; one, that of a Muse with flowing hay-crowned locks (which, therefore, graces the title-page of Heyne’s beautiful edition of the poet) ; the other Apollo’s, with short crisp curls, in the Archaic style, perhaps taken from the Etruscan Colossus, standing, when Pliny wrote, in the Palatine Library ; and the very one put by the Calpur- nian family upon their denarii. And yet Virgil’s face must have been as familiar to the Bomans as Shakspeare’s is to us ; for with them, too, the author’s portrait formed the regular frontispiece to his works, as Martial tells us in this very instance : — “ Quam brevis immensum cepit membrana Marouem ! Ipsius vultus prima tabella gerit.” * xiv. 18G. 216 ANTIQUE GEMS AND RINGS. But, in reality, we are not left in doubt as to Virgil’s personal appearance. The ‘ Codex Bomanus,’ written probably in the fourth century, actually gives a full-length figure of the poet, which has every mark of genuineness about it. He is seated in front-face, closely wrapped in his toga, at his desk, a capsa of books by his side ; he is close shaved, and his hair cropped short, his face long and thin ; and, so far as the smallness of the drawing permits to judge, with a general resemblance to the portrait of Augustus. Of one thing we may be certain, that the great poet, the most modest of men, would have avoided nothing so much as any conspicuous deviation from the fashion of his own times. Martial thanks Stertinius A vitus for placing his bust {imago) within his library, and sends him an appropriate inscription to be put under' it. In another place he speaks of his own portrait as being then painted as a present for Csecilius Secundus, then commanding the army on the Danube.*' The portrait of Horace, equally to be expected amongst these relics, has hitherto evaded all research, — perhaps as completely as that of his great contemporary. But the lucky finder will in this case have the advantage of being able to verify his discovery by comparing it with the poet’s head upon the contorniato bearing his name. Although this medal belongs to the period of the Decline, the head has clearly been copied from some authentic original, such as the statue erected in the forum of his native town. This test the Blacas gem, unanimously accepted for a Horace in virtue of the bay branch and the initial h in the field, does not endure in an altogether satisfactory manner. By the aid of these medals, which have lately proved their own authenticity and source, by serving to identify in the most convincing manner a newly discovered statue of Terence, the gem-portraits of the same poet, of Sallust, Apollonius Tyaneus, and Apuleius, may possibly be hereafter recovered by some sagacious and fortunate collector. Our invaluable authority for all the details of Boman life, Martial, ix. 1, and vii. 84. POETS, TIJEIR PORTRAITS. 217 when celebrating the philosophic poetess, Theophila, betrothed to his friend Canius, seems to have penned his epigram * for the purpose of accompanying a portrait of the lady, as it begins with — “ II a? c est ilia tibi promissa Theophila, Cani, Cujus Cecropia pectora voce madent.” I am strongly tempted to recognise this ancient blue-stocking in a female figure, nude, in character of Venus, but with hair dressed in that very peculiar fashion first set by Domitian’s empress, inscribed very conspicuously C)EOIAA, which is engraved upon a plasma formerly belonging to the Praun Cabinet. The practice of rewarding poetic eminence with a statue (Christo- dorus, flourishing under the Byzantine Anastasius, extols one of Virgil amongst those of early Greece, decorating the Gymnasium of Zeuxippus) was perpetuated down to the last days of the Western Empire. Claudian was thus honoured by Honorious, and with the superadded compliment of the extravagant inscription : — E iv eve B epyeXe'oeo voov Kal ^Jiovaav 'Opeijpov KXavSeavov Brjp.o