Different their forms-in iron Mars commands; And, ever mindful of her ancient fires, With amorous breath his martial breast inspires. Lifts the loved weight, close round his helmet twines Her loving arms, and fond embraces joins. TOURMALINE. The Tourmaline is a dark olive-green stone, often nearly black and almost opaque. But Brazil, the land of coloured gems, produces also a blue and a bright-green variety, transparent and ornamental ring-stones. A red kind, or Rubellite, comes from India; the specimen in the British Museum is of extraordinary size, and valued at 10007. This stone is the most electric of all gems; one end of the crystal attracts, the other repels, light objects, when heated by friction. Some have supposed the Rubellite to be the Lychnis of the Ro mans; but its inferior hardness, only equal to that of quartz, controverts this theory. On the olive-coloured sort I have met with intagli, but all modern; in fact, the Tourmaline was not known in Europe before the last century. AVENTURINE. The Sandaresus, an Arabian stone, classed by Pliny among the Carbunculi, seems to have been our Aventurine, for he describes it as full of golden stars shining through a transparent substance, not from the surface, but from within the body of the stone. The true Aventurine, or Goldie-stone, is a brownish semi-transparent quartz, full of specks of yellow mica. It is very hard, and takes a high polish: in the last century it was of considerable value, but now is altogether neglected. The common sort, so often seen in Italian ornaments, is a composition made by stirring brass filings into melted glass, and is said to have been discovered by accident, "per aventura," whence the name Aventurine. Hercules. Obsidian. OBSIDIAN. Pliny describes the Obsidian as a stone found in Æthiopia by a certain Obsidius, who gave it his own name. It was very black, and sometimes transparent. Used as slabs to 66 line walls of rooms, it acted as a dark mirror reflecting shadows instead of the objects themselves. Many persons make ring-stones out of it, and we have seen complete figures of Augustus made of it." That prince was charmed with the deep colour (crassitudine) of the stone, and himself dedicated four elephants of Obsidian in the Temple of Concord. An Obsidian statue of Menelaus, found among the property of a former prefect of Egypt, was restored by order of Tiberius to the Heliopolitans, its original destination—a fact which proves the ancient use of the stone itself, now so largely imitated in glass. I have met with a few intagli in this stone, which greatly resembles black glass, and is semitransparent in the thinnest parts; indeed it can only be distinguished from black glass by its superior hardness, easily scratching the latter substance. I know of a splendid head of Hercules crowned with poplar-leaves in Obsidian, a work apparently of the Augustan age: a gem generally considered by its former owners as nothing better than a modern dark paste. By a curious coincidence this stone was employed by the old Peruvians also for mirrors, as well as for cutting instruments, specimens of which are often found in their tombs. 3 The first of these extremely hard stones is easily recognised by its deep red colour, thickly dotted with small white spots. It was chiefly employed by the Romans for columns and bas-reliefs, and first introduced by Vitrasius Pollio, who brought from Egypt statues of Claudius on this stone: though 3 Among the Praun gems I observed a gryllus of the common type, the cock and masks, cut in a very bold deep manner on this stone; and a rare addition, with a Gnostic device, of apparently coeval work, upon the reverse. 4 Hence called Leptopsephos. it did not take, at least in Pliny's time, as he adds that no one followed Pollio's example. However, as taste declined, it became under the Lower Empire a favourite building material, magnificent relics of which are still preserved. It was also, probably when still a novelty, used for intagli, on selected pieces of peculiar bright colour, some of which I have noticed of very good work, and of an early imperial date. It was also employed for this purpose by the Italian artists of the Revival: the Florence Gallery possesses a fine head of Leo X., engraved on a piece of large size, and set in iron, to be used as an official seal. On Basalt, a dark, iron-coloured stone of a very fine grain, looking when worked more like metal than a stone, intagli also occur, but usually rude in style, and of the Gnostic class. This stone was largely used for statues, both by the Egyptians and the Romans of the Empire. OPALS. Opals came to the Romans from India; at present the best are brought from Hungary. The largest known to the ancients did not exceed the size of a hazel-nut; this was the famous Opal of Nonius, valued at 20,0007. of our money; rather than yield which to M. Antony, he preferred going into exile. The Turks at present esteem the stone almost as highly, and readily give 10007. for a fine and perfect one of the abovenamed size. Pliny grows quite poetical in his description of the Opal:-" Made up of the glories of the most precious gems, to describe them is a matter of inexpressible difficulty. For there is amongst them the gentler fire of the Ruby, there is the rich purple of the Amethyst, there is the sea-green of the Emerald, and all shining together in an indescribable union. Others by an excessive heightening F of their hues equal all the colours of the painter, others the flame of burning brimstone, or of a fire quickened by oil.” Yet the mines of Hungary now supply Opals infinitely larger than those known to Pliny, the finest of which are preserved among the Austrian crown-jewels. Although so high a value is set upon this beautiful gem, yet it is but a precarious possession, being extremely brittle, sometimes cracking when the hand is held near the fire in cold weather, and losing its beauty completely by wear, after dust and grease have closed the innumerable cracks of its flinty substance, which produce the brilliant play of colours constituting its only charm. It is said that by roasting an Opal thus spoilt, and so expelling the grease from its pores, its former lustre can be restored; a process which seems to me extremely hazardous. The Opal was counterfeited by the Indians in glass more successfully than any other gem (similitudine indiscreta). The Romans named it the Pæderos, or Cupid, as being the perfection of beauty; for the same reason it was called, in the Latin and German of the Middle Ages, the Orphanus and the Waise. up Some rude intagli, but apparently antique, sometimes are found upon bad and opaque Opals. Though Pliny calls India the sole mother of the Opal, yet he can only mean of the best variety, as he afterwards mentions some found in Egypt, Pontus, Galatia, Thasos, and Cyprus: these had less lustre than the Indian, their colours being a mixture of skyblue and purple, "ex aere et purpura," which wanted the emerald green of the Indian variety. 5 But there is a fine Opal in the Praun Collection, engraved with heads of Jupiter, Apollo, and Diana, surrounded by nine stars, of me diocre Roman work, and pronounced antique by the best judges—a truly unique gem. |