Jewellery

Also in Barnfield's Affectionate Shepherd (1594):—

Contemporary designs prove that bracelets followed the same elaborate forms as other articles of jewellery, as may be seen from the engraved designs of Ducerceau, and the Livre de Bijouterie of René Boyvin of Angers (1530-1598).

One of the most interesting bracelets—as far as actual specimens are concerned—is preserved at Berkeley Castle amongst the heirlooms bequeathed by George Carey, Lord Hunsdon, who died in 1603. It is of crystal and gold, 3¾ inches in diameter. The crystal, a complete circlet overlaid with open-work gold, is encrusted all round with rubies, and has at intervals four clusters of rubies around a sapphire (Pl. XXXV, 5). It is somewhat difficult to arrive at a decision as to the origin of this remarkable object. It seems to bear traces of Oriental influence in the setting of the stones, though the goldwork is of different quality from what one would expect to find in Indian work. If, like the "nef" jewel at Berkeley, this armlet is to be associated with Sir Francis Drake, it may well have been obtained by him as part of some Spanish spoil, in like manner to the "crystal bracelet set in gold" procured by Sir Matthew Morgan at the capture of Cadiz in 1596—Cadiz being then the staple town for all the trades of the Levant and of the Indies.[168]

Bracelets formed of cameos are met with sometimes on portraits. The Bibliothèque Nationale at Paris preserves a pair of bracelets (Nos. 624 and 625) formed each of seven oval shell cameos representing figures of animals, enclosed in gold mounting enriched with blue enamel, and hinged together by a double chain ornamented with rosettes enamelled green. On the under side of the larger cameos which form the clasps are two interlacing C's within a wreath of palm and olive, enamelled green, and a barred S in blue enamel at each angle. These bracelets, of which the cameos as well as the mountings are of fine sixteenth-century work, have been traditionally associated with Diana of Poitiers. But the interlaced C's, according to M. Babelon, are in all probability the initials of some lady of the family of Harlay, from whom the bracelets were acquired by Louis XIV (Pl. XXXVII, 3, 4).

Bracelets, like necklaces, were not infrequently composed entirely of gold, with interwoven links, like mail-chains. A chain bracelet of this style, formed of circular fluted links, is in the Victoria and Albert Museum. Its clasp is enriched with a floral pattern in translucent champlevé enamel (Pl. XXXVII, 1). Three similar bracelets forming part of the Holtzendorff treasure from Pinnow (Ucker-Mark, N. Germany) are in the Germanic Museum, Nuremberg. They are composed of circular links, and have flat clasps like the bracelet just mentioned, ornamented with coats-of-arms in enamel. One of them bears the date 1612.

BROOCHES

One of the most important of ornaments throughout the Middle Ages was the brooch; but towards the end of the fifteenth century the mode of wearing garments changed, and the côtehardi having replaced the mantle, brooches disappeared little by little, till in Renaissance times they were rarely employed, except as ornaments for the hat. It is true that sixteenth-century inventories contain an immense number of owches and brooches—Henry VIII had no less than 324—but nearly all these, the larger ones especially, were worn as enseignes upon the hat; while the smaller were employed not as dress fasteners, but simply as ornaments sewn or pinned at regular intervals upon the front of the dress or the borders of the sleeves. A single elaborate jewelled brooch is sometimes seen in pictures attached to the upper part of the sleeve. We see it thus on the figure of Arithmetic in Pinturicchio's famous fresco in the Appartamento Borgia of the Vatican, and later in English pictures, notably the well-known painting in Sherborne Castle, Dorset, representing Queen Elizabeth's procession in litter to Blackfriars in 1600, where the ladies of her retinue have jewels fastened to the sleeves of their right arms.

The garments of this period were not fastened by means of brooches, but were closed with buttons or points, or with hooks and eyes. Sleeves were often held on by buttons to which the sleeve-loops or points were tied, while other portions of the clothing, especially if of leather and cumbersome to button, were secured with loops or hooks and eyes. The slashings of the dress were sometimes closed by buttons or pompoms formed of stones surrounded by pearls. Similar button-like ornaments, jewelled and richly enamelled, of which examples exist, were worn in rows all over the dress, but their delicate form and often irregular shape exclude the supposition that they were used as actual buttons. Of ornaments of this kind Mary Queen of Scots possessed a large number: thus—"Quatre vingtz bouttons dor esmaillez de blanc et noir garniz de chacune une perle." Others mentioned in her inventory are "à rose garniz de chacun trois perles"; others again are "percez à jour esmaillez de noir."

These individual jewelled ornaments, which it was the practice to sew on the dress at regular intervals by way of trimming, may be treated as distinct from ornamentation which formed part of the actual costume, such as masses of pearls and precious stones, with which dresses were literally loaded. Individual jewels often took the form of the monogram, crest, or device of the owner, in pure gold richly decorated. A curious instance of this custom has already been alluded to in connection with what occurred during the masque given by Henry VIII at Westminster. The fashion for wearing ornaments in the form of jewelled initials was still in vogue on the quilted dresses of the time of James I. Anne of Denmark is represented in her portraits wearing them both on her ruff and in her hair, and a "jewel, in form of an A and two CC, sett with diamonds" and others of similar kind are to be found in the lists of jewels supplied to the Queen by George Heriot.

Except occasionally for buttons, the chief means employed for fastening the garments was by aigulets or aglets. These ornamental loops or eyelets, formed of cords terminating with goldsmith's work, were movable and were changed from one dress to another according to pleasure. They are seen in pictures hanging not only from slashes and various parts of the garments, but also from the cap; and Henry VIII is described as wearing a cap ornamented with gold enamelled tags. His daughter, the Princess Mary, was supplied in 1542 by her jeweller, Mabell, with two dozen pairs of aglets. Mary Stuart had a number, such as: "Soixante cinq esguillettes dor facon de cheuilles sans esmail," "Soixante une esguillettes dor et de perle esmaillez de rouge," and "Quatre vingtz dixhuict esguillette dor esmaillez de blanc et noir." Queen Elizabeth possessed several sets, of different colours and patterns—some gold enamelled white, some blue, others purple, and some enriched with pearls and precious stones. These jewelled aglets are now extremely rare, and are not represented in any public collection.

CHAPTER XXIX

The majority of Renaissance girdles, confined solely to female attire, were made entirely of silver or silver-gilt, and even of silvered or gilded bronze. They took the form of flat chains composed of links, generally with solid pieces in the shape of oblong plaques, of cast or chased work, introduced at regular intervals. The solid parts, particularly those that formed the clasps, were occasionally enriched with enamels, precious stones, or engraved gems. The majority of collections contain specimens of such girdles; but simpler kinds, composed entirely of ring-shaped links, which, judging from numerous Flemish, Dutch, and German portraits, must have been in very general use in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, are much less frequently met with. A good example of such, a chain in silver-gilt, of German work of the second half of the sixteenth century, is preserved in the Musée du Cinquantenaire at Brussels. It is formed of rounded grooved links. At one end is a rosette-shaped girdle plate set with a white crystal, and having a hook behind to catch into any link of the chain. The other end terminates in a pear-shaped pomander 3½ inches long, and divided for the reception of different cosmetics into two parts, united by a screw from below.

A considerable number of girdles of leather or strips of material are found mounted after the mediæval style with buttons or studs, and instead of clasps, have buckles at one end, and at the other the pendants or chapes common in earlier times.

It is not unusual to meet with girdles of Flemish or German work which, though dating from the latter part of the seventeenth century, are ornamented with Gothic patterns. The buckle and pendant (mordant), deeply pierced with open-work tracery of flamboyant design, are generally united by only a short thong, and are so overcharged with ornament that it is doubtful if they could have been of any practical use. Such objects appear in reality to be but specimens of their work submitted by girdlers who were desirous of obtaining admission to the Girdlers' Company. They serve to show how long-lived were Gothic traditions among the guilds. Examples in silver or bronze gilt are to be found in the Germanic Museum, Nuremberg, the Victoria and Albert Museum (No. 2304-'55), the Waddesdon Bequest (No. 226), dated 1680, the Wallace Collection (No. 783), dated 1709, and in many other public collections (Pl. XXXVIII, 3).

A number of articles, both useful and ornamental, were suspended from the girdle. For practical purposes the housewife carried at her side, besides a knife, such objects as small scissors in a case, a purse, and also her keys. Cases or étuis for knives were attached either by silken cords or by chains. When cords were employed the cover of the étui was furnished with loops on each side through which the cords slid. Open quiver-like sheaths for knives hung by chains were often worn, in order to display the rich decoration of the knife-heads.

The Italianate costume, such as is found in the type of "Vanity" in emblem books of the age, and which made its way everywhere, favoured the addition of many other accessories to the girdles, such as fans, gloves, looking-glasses, books, watches, scent-cases, and pomanders. Mirrors, besides being worn from the neck, formed, as did miniature-cases, a frequent pendant from the girdle. These were either in a frame of ivory or goldsmith's work, or inserted in the fan. Stubbes, the censor of the follies of his day, speaks of the looking-glasses which ladies carried with them "wheresoever they go." Etienne (Stephanus) Delaune has left eight engraved designs for hand mirrors of great beauty. Their handles terminate with small rings for attachment by a chain to the girdle. In the Louvre is an interesting pendent mirror-case, or rather back of a mirror, formed of an oval plaque of glass encrusted with designs in enamel on gold (émail en résille sur verre),[169] bearing the inscription "Grace dedans, le lis-ha."

Small books, mainly devotional, were also worn at the girdle. It appears to have been a common practice for ladies to carry such books, and in Lyly's Euphues mention is made of "the English damoselles who have theyr bookes tyed to their gyrdles." Queen Elizabeth had several. Amongst the "juelles given to her Majestie at Newyere's-tyde," 1582, was "a litle boke of golde enamuled, garnished and furnished with smale diamondes and rubyes, with claspes, and all hanging at a chayne of golde." The inventory of the jewels of the Duchess of Somerset, widow of the Protector, in 1587, likewise contains "a booke of golde inamyled blacke." Two drawings for small pendent books intended to be executed in niello or black enamel appear amongst Holbein's designs for jewellery in the British Museum; and the Earl of Romney possesses a small manuscript Prayer Book in binding of enamelled gold of the same style.

The most magnificent book-cover in existence, provided with loops for hanging by a chain to the girdle, is one preserved in the Victoria and Albert Museum. It is of enamelled, repoussé gold, and has been ascribed to Cellini. Of less beauty, though of great interest as an example of English work, is the gold binding of a pendent Prayer Book in the British Museum. The subjects on the sides, raised and enamelled, are the Brazen Serpent, and the Judgment of Solomon, with English inscriptions around. It is said to be the work of George Heriot of Edinburgh;[170] and there is a tradition that it was worn by Queen Elizabeth. Whatever associations this object may have had with Elizabeth, there is better authority for such with regard to the small book of prayers, the property of Lord Fitzhardinge, and one of the Hunsdon heirlooms. This very interesting English jewel, measuring 2¼ by 2 inches, is of gold, inlaid with black enamel, with a rosette of white enamel at each corner. The centre of one cover is decorated with translucent red and green enamel, that of the other with a shell cameo. It contains the last prayer of King Edward VI in MS. written on vellum. The title runs: "The Prayer of Kynge Edward the VI which he made the vj of Julij, 1553, and the vij yere of his raigne, iij howres before his dethe, to him selfe, his eyes being closed, and thinkinge none had herd him, the xvj yere of his age." The book was worn by Queen Elizabeth at her girdle, and came into the Berkeley family through her cousin, Lord Hunsdon (Pl. XXXV, 7).

The Earl of Leicester, it is recorded, presented Queen Elizabeth on New Year's Day, 1581, with a long gold chain set with diamonds and "hanging thereat a rounde clocke fullie garnished with dyamonodes, and an appendante of diamondes hanging thearat." Though occasionally worn thus suspended from the neck-chain, watches appear to have been more frequently carried at the girdle—a position somewhat similar to that which they subsequently occupied upon the chatelaine.

The honour of the invention of portable timepieces is probably due to Peter Henlein, of Nuremberg, in the last quarter of the fifteenth century, but it was not till a century later that they came into anything like general use. The cases, which received the same beautiful enrichment in the way of enamel-work and precious stones as was bestowed on other personal ornaments of the time, were made à jour to emit the sound of the ticking and striking, and the lid was pierced with an aperture over each hour, through which the position of the hand might be seen.

The makers of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries endeavoured to vary as much as possible both the figure of the machine and the material in which it was placed. Not only square, oval, octagonal, and cruciform watches occur, but some in such fanciful shapes as death's-heads, books, shells, acorns, tulips, pears, etc; while rock crystal (to render the works visible) and other stones were often converted into cases. Oval watches, known as "Nuremberg eggs", are usually reckoned among the earliest, but this title was not given to watches till some time after their invention, and as a matter of fact, according to Dr. Rée (Nürnberg, p. 172), all egg-watches that have been preserved belong to the seventeenth century. In Hollar's set of plates of the Four Seasons, dated 1641, the lady representing Summer has on her left side depending from her girdle an object of this shape, apparently a watch.

The most important pendent ornament to the girdle, from the present point of view, is the pomander, the early history of which has already been alluded to. Throughout the sixteenth, and until about the middle of the century following, the pomander formed an almost invariable adjunct to the girdle, and was occasionally, in the case of men, hung to the long and heavy chains worn at that period round the neck.[171]

Most of the pendants still termed pomanders were, as has been already noted, in reality cases for scents or different cosmetics; but from their fruit-like shape, though often innocent of the original pomander ball, they have retained the title, but solely, it would seem, in our own language[172] (Pl. XXXI, 7).

LATER AND MODERN JEWELLERY

CHAPTER XXX

SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY JEWELLERY (GENERAL)

THROUGH the whole jewellery of the late Renaissance there runs a gradual and profound change of taste. Slowly and by imperceptible stages the earlier style, with its minute enamelled figures in high relief, gives place to a desire for sparkling diamonds, and a pleasure in the glitter of faceted stones. In the sixteenth century, diamonds, rubies, and other stones played a comparatively insignificant part in jewellery, and were prized mainly for their decorative value, but during the course of the seventeenth century a more prominent rôle was gradually conceded to precious stones. Used singly at first, in table-cut form, to give a centre of interest or a note of colour, they came finally to be arranged in juxtaposition and long rows. A complete change was brought about in the whole character of jewellery by the prominence thus given to the precious stone—a position it has retained ever since.

From the commencement of the seventeenth century Germany began to lose the position which, during the greater part of the century previous, she had occupied as a jewel-producing centre; while the Thirty Years' War, by handicapping her industries, caused the jewellers to seek employment elsewhere. It was mainly from France that the new ideas in the form of ornaments emanated.

The French are fortunate in possessing separate words to distinguish different kinds of jewellery: bijouterie, a general term applied to all jewellery formed of gold, enamels, and precious stones; and joaillerie, used for jewellery composed of stones along with a minimum of metal-work. By the revolution of taste in the later days of the Renaissance the joaillier gradually superseded the bijoutier; while the two crafts of the silversmith and the jeweller replaced the ancient craft of the goldsmith.

Changes in the mode of wearing clothes, and in the materials employed for them, had an enormous influence on jewellery. In place of the velvet and brocade that prevailed during the Renaissance, damask came to be worn, together with an extravagant taste for lace and ribbons. The wearing of the silken stuffs that began to be issued from the factories of Lyons, and of the lace that formed their accompaniment, necessitated the use of ornaments more in keeping with these materials; with the result that the jewellery of the period assumed an open and lace-like character, suitable also for the display of precious stones.

At first coloured stones were used—the ruby, sapphire, and the emerald; but soon the diamond held sole possession of the field. In Renaissance ornaments this latter gem played only a secondary part, and was employed solely for the sake of contrast, but it now appeared as the chief object in view, and formed the ornament by itself, all other parts of the jewel, the setting, and possible addition of other stones, being wholly subordinate to it.

For the first general employment of the diamond in jewellery one must look back to the fifteenth century, to the invention of the art of cutting that stone, which is generally credited, in spite of Laborde's opinion to the contrary, to Louis de Berghem of Bruges in the year 1475. From that date until the beginning of the seventeenth century every diamond, as is seen both by jewels and their designs, was one of two forms: either the "point," a four-sided pyramid produced by polishing the faces of the native octahedral crystal of diamond and making them exactly true and regular; or the "table," in which the point of the crystal is reduced to a square or oblong plane, the opposite extremity being also in plane form, but of smaller extent, with sloping faceted edges. This simple cutting did so little to augment the brilliance of the diamond that the jewellers of the sixteenth century had to depend on the tinctura or foiling of the stone, in which art Cellini in his treatise, with his characteristic appreciation of his own merits, tells us that he particularly excelled.

The change of taste in the seventeenth century may be attributed to the opening up of the diamond fields of Golconda on the southern borders of the State of Hyderabad, at the beginning of that century, and to the enterprise of the French travellers, Tavernier, Chardin, and others, who, during their frequent voyages to Persia and India, dealt largely in precious stones. These travellers succeeded in establishing new commercial relations, which led to the introduction into Europe of abundance of precious stones and particularly diamonds; while the narratives of their journeys, furnishing more exact knowledge of the quality and value of the products of the East, attracted towards precious stones a new interest.

Owing to the abundance of material imported from the East, the market for precious stones assumed an entirely different aspect; while the quantity and beauty of the material thus at their disposal spurred on the stone-cutters towards the improvement of their technique, until at the end of the century they arrived at the true cutting of the diamond. Besides the "point," which was but rarely used, the table-cut diamond alone was employed until the commencement of the seventeenth century. About that time there came into use the "rose," a half-crystal, flat at the base and with a convex top covered with a number of small facets. Stones faceted in this manner were at first mostly small and unimportant and cut very irregularly into four or six facets.

Between the years 1641 and 1643, Cardinal Mazarin, a great lover of the diamond, is said to have encouraged the promotion of experiments by the Dutch lapidaries which led to the true "rose" cutting. Anyhow, a more systematic method of faceting in sixteen facets—the taille en seize—began to be employed about that time. This process, though it left much to be desired, was an immense improvement, and set forth the qualities of the stone in a way that had not been possible by the forms previously in use. "Roses," together with "tables," as the designs of Gilles Légaré and his contemporaries show, lasted until the invention of the "brilliant" at the commencement of the eighteenth century by the Venetian, Vincenzo Peruzzi, though rose cutting was popular for some time after, and is still used for certain stones.

The "rose" leaped into fashion at its first appearance, and the taste for diamonds and other precious stones seems to have dominated under Louis XIII and Louis XIV, when they became the principal objects in jewellery. Gold was worked into the form of garlands, flowers, and all sorts of designs for the purpose of mounting precious stones and setting off their beauty. The enormous increase of luxury in this direction was entirely in keeping with the whole conception of an absolute monarchy as developed by Louis XIV, who made it the duty of the grandees of France and Spain to wear their whole property, in the form of glittering gems, and to carry the value of lands and forests upon their own and their wives' apparel when they appeared before the eyes of their sovereign.

Though actual examples of the seventeenth-century jewellery are rare, at any rate in public collections, we can become acquainted with its characteristics by the numerous prints bequeathed by the goldsmiths and draughtsmen of the time. These prints, like those of the sixteenth century, were not invariably the work of their designers, since it was no uncommon practice for the master-goldsmith to have his designs multiplied for use in his own workshop, and for general circulation, by placing them in the hands of an engraver. As a rule the nationalities of existing jewels may be in some measure determined by means of the designs from which they were executed. But it is often difficult to make clear distinctions in this manner, owing to the continual artistic interchange which brought the fashions of one place to another, and caused the methods and ideas of the craftsmen to become common property. The bi-lingual inscriptions which one finds on the frontispieces of many of the pattern-books or sets of designs then published, prove that they were intended for international use.

The first attempts to base the composition of the ornament exclusively upon the effect of stones arranged in definite forms, without granting the setting of the plastic metal any independent part, are found in some of the prints of Daniel Mignot, of the year 1590. Mignot, probably of French extraction, was a goldsmith of Augsburg, where between the years 1590 and 1616 he produced a number of highly important designs for jewellery, which form a link between the old and the newer styles. While following the artists of the late sixteenth century in the representation of figure designs in cartouche-shaped ornaments formed of flat strapwork curves characteristic of the older school, he presents engravings of pendants, earrings, and aigrettes, in which the stones are set in juxtaposition.

That the transition to the newer forms was slow, is shown in the works of the goldsmith-engraver of Amsterdam, whose models for pendants, signed with the initials P. R. K., and dated 1609 and 1617, are formed of elaborate open scrollwork of tendril design, almost destitute of stones. Exhibiting features more in keeping with those of Mignot are the designs of Paul Birckenhultz of Frankfort-on-the-Main (1617). They are of fine quality, and take the form of aigrettes and earrings set with precious stones and elaborate oval pendants terminating with pearls and ornamented with scroll ornaments intended for execution in enamel (Pl. XL, 4). Birckenhultz is the last of the German school of designers to model his work on the productions of the sixteenth-century masters.

Henceforth one must look for designs chiefly to France, where an entirely new type of ornament for jewellery, such as is found in no other art production of the time, was brought into existence by endeavours to associate leaf patterns with a number of stones. Its characteristic is the use of a sort of pea-pod or husk ornament, termed Schotenornamentik in German, and known generally by the French name of genre cosse de pois (pea-pod style). In the designs of the time this formal ornament is largely employed for elaborate aigrettes; but owing to the jewels executed from such designs having been set with stones, the result has been that change of fashion has suffered scarcely a jewelled example to survive. As a consequence, the objects existing at the present day chiefly represent enamelled miniature-cases and pendants. The number and variety of engraved designs for this kind of ornament in the form of jewelled bouquets or palmettes, chiefly for aigrettes, dating from the first half of the seventeenth century is surprising, considering that it remained a comparatively short time in use. One of the chief advocates of this style is Pierre Marchant, who worked in Paris about 1623. His rare designs for aigrettes, and wreaths for the borders of pendants, are most graceful, and show a form of leaf ornament which is extremely happily adapted for materials in which the precious stone had to play a prominent part (p. 306). Another Frenchman who employed it is Pierre Labarre (1630), goldsmith to Louis XIV, who, together with a well-known jeweller, Julien Defontaine, had apartments in the Louvre. Amongst other French designers were Jacques Caillard (1627), Baltasar Lemersier (1626-1630), Claude Rivard (1592-1650), François Lefebure (1635-1661), and Gédéon Légaré (1615-1676), to whom as "orfévre-esmailleur," together with Pierre Bain, Louis XIV in 1671, on the suggestion of Colbert, granted quarters in the Louvre. Designs of the same nature were executed in Strasburg by P. Symony (1621) and Hans Mosbach (1626), and in Holland by Jacques Honervogt (1625). The foregrounds or bases of nearly all these engravings are remarkable for the landscapes and for the quaint and vigorous genre figures in the style of the painter-engraver, Jacques Callot, that enliven them.

Of all the goldsmiths of the time the best known is Gilles Légaré of Chaumont-en-Bassigny, who was jeweller to Louis XIV, and worked in Paris about 1663. His series of designs, entitled Livre des Ouvrages d'Orfévrerie, is perhaps the most interesting of the kind produced during the seventeenth century. These fine compositions, when formed of precious stones, show knots and interlacings for clasps, pendants, and earrings, in which diamonds are fully displayed in rose-cut forms. As models for objects not composed entirely of stones, we find seals, rings, bracelets and chains decorated with ribbons and bows mingled with monograms, and emblems, such as death's-heads. Together with these appear tasteful arrangements for enamel-work in the form of natural flowers of great charm and delicacy. To these last reference will be made later. Contemporary with Légaré was the painter and engraver Balthazar Moncornet, who worked at Rouen and Paris. His book of designs, of which he was probably the inventor as well as engraver, entitled Livre nouveau de toutes sortes d'ouvrages d'orfévries, was published about 1670[173]. The jewels, in the form of pendants, earrings, and brooches, are composed of stones set in various ways; the last plate is a miniature portrait of Louis XIV set as a brooch. All his designs are accompanied by garlands of natural flowers.

For jewellery intended to be carried out by this champlevé method, or on rare occasions to be covered with translucent enamels, we have at our service again a number of dated designs. These engravings, known as Schwarzornamente or niello ornaments, are in the nature of silhouettes. The patterns, reserved in white upon a black ground, are composed of curves of flat and broken strapwork. The designs are occasionally for complete jewels, but most of them take the form of very small motives intended as patterns for the shoulders of finger rings, or for the borders, frames, or other details of jewels. Some engraved plates are made up entirely of such motives; on other plates they appear as details, either within a complete design or upon the field outside it. Germany and the Netherlands furnish the earliest examples of these. Several dating from the latter part of the sixteenth century are by "monogrammists," who signed their engravings with their initials, and whose names are mostly unknown—such as the German master A. C. of the year 1598. Among recognised engravers in this style are the following:—Of the German school: Arnold Jörg (1586-1596), Corvinianus Saur (1590-1597), the rare Hans Hensel of Sagan (1599), Daniel Hailler (1604), Jonas Bentzen (1615), and Daniel Mignot (1590) and P. Symony (1621), both of whom placed these motives on the field of their plates. Of the Netherlandish school is the well-known Michel Le Blon, called Blondus, goldsmith at the Court of Queen Christina of Sweden, who was born at Frankfort-on-the-Main in 1587 and died at Amsterdam in 1656. His designs in silhouette, the earliest of which, in the British Museum, is dated 1605,[174] were in great demand, and appear not only on knife-handles, but on oval and octagonal box-shaped pendants—presumably watch-cases. Also of the same school are: the rare master, Hans van Ghemert (1585), Hans de Bull (1590), the monogrammist P. R. K. (1609), and Guillaume de la Quewellerie of Amsterdam (1611-1635). In addition there is Giovanni Battista Costantini of Rome, who published his Ornementi per lavorare Giorje in 1622 and 1625.

The French goldsmith-engravers, who produced designs in the "silhouette" manner intended for jewels that were to be enamelled by the champlevé method, include Jehan Vovert (1602), an anonymous engraver A. D. (1608), Jacques Hurtu (1614-1619), Stephanus Carteron of Châtillon (1615), Pierre Nolin (1620), and Jean Toutin (1619) and his son Henri (1628).

The most important of these is the goldsmith and enameller Jean Toutin of Châteaudun, whose plates—six in number, dated 1618 and 1619—are filled with charming motives for watch-cases or lockets, to be carried out in enamel. They are ornamented with patterns reserved in white on black ground in the form of trailing leaves and tendrils, partly in the "pea-pod" style, and accompanied by lively genre figures in various attitudes. Perhaps the most attractive of these plates is that which represents a jeweller—probably Toutin himself—firing a jewel which he holds in the furnace by a pair of long tongs, while above is figured a model of the actual jewel—an octagonal box-like pendant (p. 289).

Toutin, who appears to have been an experimenter in enamels, is entitled to distinction as the discoverer of a new process of using them. The process consisted in covering a plate of gold or copper with an opaque monochromatic enamel, on which designs were painted with colours, opaque and fusible, and of greater variety than had previously been employed. This method of enamel painting, extensively used for jewellery, proved to be peculiarly suitable to the representation of natural flowers which came into high favour about the same time.

The employment of naturalistic flower designs, as displayed on the margins of manuscripts, was one of the features of late Gothic art. The same tendency with regard to flowers was manifested on the enamelled jewellery of the fifteenth century, the most striking example of which is the wonderful necklace seen on the Flemish portrait of Maria Baroncelli in the Uffizi Gallery. Renaissance ornaments on the whole did not favour naturalistic floral patterns, though flowers enamelled in full relief are occasionally found, as on the border of the Phœnix Jewel in the British Museum.

The general return in the early part of the seventeenth century to flower designs for the decoration of jewellery is associated with a curious phase in the social history of the time that accompanied the deep interest then taken in flowers and horticulture. Among flowers, of which the Dutch have ever been enthusiastically fond, and never tired of growing and of painting, the most prominent position was occupied by the tulip. From about the year 1634 the cultivation of the tulip became a perfect craze in Holland, and "Tulipomania" like a violent epidemic seized upon all classes of the community. Gambling of an almost unparalleled nature was carried on in the bulbs, and the flower became fashionable everywhere. In the bouquets which the enamellers arranged with great taste, and painted with extraordinary skill, the tulip is always prominent.

This and many other flowers, and occasionally fruits, were painted in the same manner as a picture, on an enamel ground of uniform colour—generally white, and sometimes pale blue, yellow, or black. Small plaques enamelled and painted thus are popularly known by the name of "Louis Treize" enamels, though the majority of them were produced after Louis XIII's death in 1643.

About 1640 it became the custom occasionally to model the design in relief with a paste of white enamel, which was afterwards painted with vitreous colours according to nature. Towards the middle of the century the background of the flowers was pierced and cut away, so that every single flower, exquisitely modelled and coloured, stood out by itself. In addition to tulips of every variety, and hyacinths, sunflowers, and roses, all kinds of lilies were in favour, especially the tiger-lily, the "crown imperial," and different species of fritillaries, whose beautifully spotted or chequered blossoms were rendered in their natural colours with striking fidelity. Flowers executed in this realistic style for jewellery were arranged chiefly in garlands and festoons, in the manner of the wreaths painted by Jan Brueghel round several of Rubens' pictures, the flower pieces of such Dutch and Flemish painters as Jan de Heem, Van den Hecke, Daniel Seghers, and Van Thielen, and the wood carvings of Grinling Gibbons (himself Dutch by birth), which display the same remarkable realism.

Among the goldsmiths and draughtsmen of the time who have left designs for jewels in painted enamel are the Germans Heinrich Raab and Johann Paulus Hauer, both goldsmiths of Nuremberg. Their engravings, with natural flower ornamentation very finely designed and executed, were published about 1650. They comprise crosses, étuis, scissor, watch, and scent cases, and pendants—star- and bow-shaped, and set each with a pendent pearl. Work in the same direction by the artists of the French school is of great importance. Gédéon Légaré, though he practised the pea-pod style, is the first to show a decided preference for natural flowers in his engravings, which date from about 1640. He is followed by three famous masters of flower ornament—Balthazar Moncornet, Gilles Légaré, and Jean Vauquer. Vauquer worked at Blois between 1670 and 1700, and like many other engravers of jewellers' designs, was a jeweller and enamel painter by profession. He was a pupil of Morlière of Orleans, who also worked at Blois. His fine plates of flowers and ornamental foliage, engraved after his own designs and entitled Livre de fleurs propres pour orfévres et graveurs, were published in 1680.[175] Vauquer was an enamel painter of pre-eminent ability, and one of the greatest exponents of the day of the art of representing natural flowers.

Of the designs of Moncornet (c. 1670) and Gilles Légaré (c. 1663) for jewelled ornaments we have already spoken. Moncornet, a great lover of flowers, accompanied his jewels by charming garlands. With him and Vauquer and Légaré must be associated the renowned enamel painter Jean Petitot (1607-1691), who was first an enameller of jewellery. So highly skilled was he as a painter of flower designs and foliage on rings and other ornaments, that on going over to England in 1635 he entered at once into the service of Charles I, where he brought to perfection his famous enamelled portraits.

Several actual examples have survived of the enamel-work of Gilles Légaré, whose designs—the best-known of this time—reveal a charming feeling for natural flower ornaments. His chef d'œuvre is generally considered to be the garland of flowers painted in enamel in open-work relief that surrounds a miniature by Petitot of the Countess d'Olonne in the collection of Major Holford at Dorchester House. This splendid piece, on which the tints of the flowers are rendered with striking fidelity, was formerly in the collection of a great French connoisseur of the eighteenth century, P. J. Mariette. At his death it passed into the possession of Horace Walpole, who counted it as one of his special treasures. It joined the Dorchester House collection after the Strawberry Hill sale in 1842. If this magnificent enamel-work be by the hand of Légaré, and we may take Mariette's word for it that it is,[176] this clever craftsman must have worked for Petitot; for another very fine example of the same kind of work, a wreath of enamelled flowers finely modelled and painted, surrounds a miniature by Petitot in the possession of the Earl of Dartrey.

To sum up the characteristic styles of seventeenth-century ornament which we have endeavoured to describe, the first feature is the general preference for precious stones, and especially diamonds, and the use of the "pea-pod" ornament for displaying them. From this style, practised by Marchant and many others, we pass, secondly, to the "Schwarzornamente" or "silhouette" designs of Le Blon and Toutin employed for champlevé enamel. Thirdly comes the development of naturalistic flower designs, and the application of these to the painted "Louis Treize" enamel evolved by Toutin, and perfected by Petitot, Vauquer, and Légaré.