DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.1310#0120
OF THE WORLD'S INDUSTRY. 01
divinities. "With a similar profusion, even large cups, goblets, vases, and urns were
made of solid onyx, sardonyx, and rock crystal, externally ornamented with relievo
work by great and eminent masters. Calculation is astounded at the enormous expense
and the immense time and labour that must have been bestowed upon this branch of
art. Some idea of it, though a very inadequate one, might have been formed, by the
examination of a small cup of rock-crystal in the Crystal Palace, the setting of which,
we were informed, had cost three hundred pounds; though undoubtedly the materials
of which that setting is composed fall far below in actual value that of many of the
tazze, which may be seen in the British Museum. The art of engraving on precious
stones gradually declined among the Romans from the time of Augustus to the begin-
ning of the seventh century, when it disappeared entirely in the long night of barbarity
and ignorance, justly designated, by the appropriate term of the dark ages.
Michael Angelo, Raphael, the Carraccis, Poussin, and other celebrated painters, have
borrowed largely from the gems of Greece : the sculptors the same. Some of Gibson's
finest productions—and where can finer be found?—have originated in the ideas they
have suggested to him. The Amazon defending her horse from the attack of a ferocious
tiger, by Kiss, of Berlin, so much admired in the Crystal Palace, was taken from an
antique gem; and the veiled figures of Tuscan (we will not say Austrian) workmanship,
which excited.equal wonder and admiration, were probably suggested by the exquisite
gem by Tryphon, of the marriage of Cupid and Psyche, wherein the bridal pair are
represented linked together by a chain of pearls, and covered with the nuptial veil,
through which their features are seen in all the beauty of youth and innocence—a
masterpiece of art, of which no imitation is to be found, save in the half-veiled head
of Ptolemy Auletes, on a gem in the Orleans collection, and that of the Empress Sabina
on another, formerly in the Crispi collection, at Ferrara. The art began to revive, how-
ever, in the fifteenth century, and its present state, in the skilful hands of such an artist
as Girometti, of Rome, warrants us in the assertion that, although neglected for so long
a period, it now bids fair to emulate the high and well-merited reputation it anciently
enjoyed. The artist we have just mentioned, we are informed, had prepared a magni-
ficent sample of his skill for the late Great Exhibition; the difficulty, however, of
finding a safe conveyance for so precious a gem, and his being prevented from visiting
our shores himself, proved, unfortunately for the lovers of art, insurmountable obstacles
to his design. We have hitherto chiefly spoken of the art of cutting subjects on gems
in intaglio, or indenting, a simpler and easier process than relieving the work from a
ground; we will now make a few remarks upon the more elaborate mode of relievo, or
relief. There has been much unsatisfactory discussion respecting the origin and ex-act
meaning of the word cameo, or camaieu, as it is sometimes written. In the language of
art, it is usually applied to gems or stones, and latterly to shells, that are worked in
relievo j and strictly speaking, it refers to such stones only as have strata or grounds of
different colours. It is impossible to describe works of this sort, containing so much fine
detail, with sufficient accuracy to convey a just idea of their merits. They must be
seen, and examined with care, to be properly appreciated; but it will not be amiss to
notice a few of the most celebrated camei that are preserved in the museums of Europe,
One of the finest is the Apotheosis of Augustus, in the collection at Vienna. It repre-
sents Augustus, his wife Livia, as Rome, accompanied by her family, with Neptune and
Cybele; another is of an Imperial Eagle; also a Ptolemy and Arsinoe, &c. &c. In
the French collection, the sardonyx or Tiberius is one of the best known: it exhibits
the Apotheosis of Augustus, and the princes of the house of Tiberius; a Jupiter
iEgioehus is a very fine specimen : to which may be added the Apotheosis of Germa-
nicusj and one ofAgrippina and Germanicus; with others, particularly some portraits
divinities. "With a similar profusion, even large cups, goblets, vases, and urns were
made of solid onyx, sardonyx, and rock crystal, externally ornamented with relievo
work by great and eminent masters. Calculation is astounded at the enormous expense
and the immense time and labour that must have been bestowed upon this branch of
art. Some idea of it, though a very inadequate one, might have been formed, by the
examination of a small cup of rock-crystal in the Crystal Palace, the setting of which,
we were informed, had cost three hundred pounds; though undoubtedly the materials
of which that setting is composed fall far below in actual value that of many of the
tazze, which may be seen in the British Museum. The art of engraving on precious
stones gradually declined among the Romans from the time of Augustus to the begin-
ning of the seventh century, when it disappeared entirely in the long night of barbarity
and ignorance, justly designated, by the appropriate term of the dark ages.
Michael Angelo, Raphael, the Carraccis, Poussin, and other celebrated painters, have
borrowed largely from the gems of Greece : the sculptors the same. Some of Gibson's
finest productions—and where can finer be found?—have originated in the ideas they
have suggested to him. The Amazon defending her horse from the attack of a ferocious
tiger, by Kiss, of Berlin, so much admired in the Crystal Palace, was taken from an
antique gem; and the veiled figures of Tuscan (we will not say Austrian) workmanship,
which excited.equal wonder and admiration, were probably suggested by the exquisite
gem by Tryphon, of the marriage of Cupid and Psyche, wherein the bridal pair are
represented linked together by a chain of pearls, and covered with the nuptial veil,
through which their features are seen in all the beauty of youth and innocence—a
masterpiece of art, of which no imitation is to be found, save in the half-veiled head
of Ptolemy Auletes, on a gem in the Orleans collection, and that of the Empress Sabina
on another, formerly in the Crispi collection, at Ferrara. The art began to revive, how-
ever, in the fifteenth century, and its present state, in the skilful hands of such an artist
as Girometti, of Rome, warrants us in the assertion that, although neglected for so long
a period, it now bids fair to emulate the high and well-merited reputation it anciently
enjoyed. The artist we have just mentioned, we are informed, had prepared a magni-
ficent sample of his skill for the late Great Exhibition; the difficulty, however, of
finding a safe conveyance for so precious a gem, and his being prevented from visiting
our shores himself, proved, unfortunately for the lovers of art, insurmountable obstacles
to his design. We have hitherto chiefly spoken of the art of cutting subjects on gems
in intaglio, or indenting, a simpler and easier process than relieving the work from a
ground; we will now make a few remarks upon the more elaborate mode of relievo, or
relief. There has been much unsatisfactory discussion respecting the origin and ex-act
meaning of the word cameo, or camaieu, as it is sometimes written. In the language of
art, it is usually applied to gems or stones, and latterly to shells, that are worked in
relievo j and strictly speaking, it refers to such stones only as have strata or grounds of
different colours. It is impossible to describe works of this sort, containing so much fine
detail, with sufficient accuracy to convey a just idea of their merits. They must be
seen, and examined with care, to be properly appreciated; but it will not be amiss to
notice a few of the most celebrated camei that are preserved in the museums of Europe,
One of the finest is the Apotheosis of Augustus, in the collection at Vienna. It repre-
sents Augustus, his wife Livia, as Rome, accompanied by her family, with Neptune and
Cybele; another is of an Imperial Eagle; also a Ptolemy and Arsinoe, &c. &c. In
the French collection, the sardonyx or Tiberius is one of the best known: it exhibits
the Apotheosis of Augustus, and the princes of the house of Tiberius; a Jupiter
iEgioehus is a very fine specimen : to which may be added the Apotheosis of Germa-
nicusj and one ofAgrippina and Germanicus; with others, particularly some portraits