Featured Eyes Have It: Are These Intaglios the Same?

@PepperAnna Can I pull you into this thread? Think you will find it interesting &, if you have any thoughts, they would be deeply appreciated.

 

Sure. Thank you for thinking of me. It looks interesting. I love stuff like this. I will take a look carefully at the pictures.

 

After reading the whole thread and looking at the pictures, I think your glass intaglio is extremely similar to the amethyst gem. There are so many similarities and the differences could be caused by angle, lighting, or the production process. I am leaning towards the signature being put on at a later date, not concurrent with the completion of the amethyst gem. Of course, I am a complete novice in this area. It seems to me a road trip would be in order to come to a real decision.

 

I don't remember ever seeing this thread before! Well, sometimes I miss the interesting conversations.

@Bronwen , I recently posted an announcement in the "Where the Heck Is..." thread. (Or whatever the title is.) Mr. shallow_ocean_spectre passed away last September or October. I recently learned of this through the eBay Booksellers group. He used to be a regular poster there, long ago. Not so often here.

So, there will be no more jokes of an obscure nature. At least, not from him. He was a very intelligent person with a deep knowledge of antiquarian books, among other things.

 

SOS began PMing me (& a few other female members) & we even talked on the phone once. From things he said, like having made arrangements for his many cats, & the way his voice sounded, I had concluded that he might be terminally ill. Sad, but not so surprising. Sparring with him was a challenge. Thank you for letting me know.

 

Thanks for lending me your eyes & brain. Doubt this matter will ever be completely resolved, but to me the preponderance of evidence is that the signature was added at a later time, either as a genuine owner's name or a later fraud.

You have seen how accomplished the engraving of the scene is, yet the same person proudly put their name on like this? (IMO marring the composition.)



And not a trace on the glass?

 

We are on the same page. I agree.

 

Despite the claim of a find spot, I mistrust this completely:

http://medaillesetantiques.bnf.fr/ws/catalogue/app/collection/notices/record/ark:/12148/c33gbrr8m

 

Bronwen- Found this thread on my 'First Jewelry Post'. Here's all I can figure re Your paste copy of the gem-

1.The Face appears to be more refined in the paste version (could be a trick of the light because amethyst is translucent/paste not so much,& we’re dealing w/ photos-OR it could be an Georgian/Elizabethan/Regency interpretation of how a Greek/Roman face ‘should’ look ).

2.No lettering to the left of the harp/lyre (as you said-this could have been added later).

3.When do you deduce this paste copy would have been made ? If a Jeweler had access to a ‘Curiosity’ like this, they could very likely have made a Plaster Impression . Antiquities were much more ‘available’ 100-200 years ago. Look at Lord Elgins purchase (pillaging) of The Parthenon friezes.

A craftsmen wouldn’t have to go thru the Board of Directors of The British Museum or get Governmental clearance to borrow a small antiquity for a few days.

A-Artist makes a cast (hopefully returns gem ).

B-Makes several trial impressions (cast sketches so to speak).

C-Said Artiste has to make a living, and ‘tweaks’ or refines said piece to suit contemporary tastes (makes it look more like Alexander or Byron)-remember, he’s also a ‘commercial’ artist who needs to eat).

D. Your Piece could be a copy done from a contemporary engraving or an original cast of the actual ancient piece, w/ perhaps some (marketable) enhancements by the creator of the paste piece. One Artist emulating another Artist-an interpretation.

Of course it would be expensive, but if one could manage a trip to the Bibliotheque Nationale-it would be easier, but perhaps not conclusive…. You’ve seen the Nova Specials where they spend 6 mos. or a year analyzing a Tang Vase or a Viking Sword-absurdly exhaustive, plus what private person could afford the analysis ?

Some kind of laser measurement and comparison of the 2 pieces could be possible-a kind of scientific forensic archaeology, analyzed by a computer?
Good fortune on your quest-these journeys drive me nuts and yet are a part of what makes life worth living !

 

Thank you for all the attention & thought you have given my little mystery. (And thanks again to the many who also gave me the benefit of their observations when the item was first posted.)

At this point there is no doubt about the glass being a true copy of the amethyst. Any apparent differences are due to imperfections in the glass (there is a good sized crater in the kithara strings left by a bubble), camera angles, lighting, & my minimal camera skills & equipment. Two of the biggest names in the field have unhesitatingly identified it as such.

Both of them were initially equally emphatic in declaring it of ancient origin. The first was intrigued by the lack of any trace of a signature & found it material for speculation about what the relationships between gem engravers & glass workshops may have been. The second attributed the absence of a name to the shallowness of the engraving, that the glass simply hadn't picked it up. When provided additional photos of the empty field where the name should be, the complete lack of the slightest trace, while very fine detail is captured on either side, the second expert revised her opinion to declare the glass 'modern', which can mean any time from the Renaissance on, although provided me with no plausible - or even implausible - explanation for why someone would make a copy obliterating the name, when that is a major part of its claim to fame.

The name engraved on the gem is really not that shallow.


The quality & skill of the engraving of the name is far inferior to that of the rest of the piece.

The name is engraved strongly enough that some modern glass copies can pick up traces:



You could buy an impression of the amethyst from James Tassie's establishment, or of any of several others showing the same episode from the Iliad. This is Louis's gem on the left & a recreation of it by William Brown on the right:



A couple of anonymous copies:



And two of the same scene, different composition, that also bear the name Pamphilos on them:



So anyone could have had an inexpensive impression of the gem from the late 18th century onward. However, even though it does not really show in the photograph of the impression, I cannot imagine Tassie would have been satisfied with it if the impression he took directly from the gem had not clearly picked up the signature. The quality of his work was good enough for Catherine the Great.

If the glass gem was not made from an impression taken before the stone had the name applied, who would have had access to the stone to take an impression before Tassie did? Why would they fill in the name? And how did they do so without leaving any flattening? There is no interruption in its convex surface.

I truly believe that the two most plausible explanations are that the glass was produced before the name was gouged in, either at the behest of an owner (the stone bears the genitive form of the name, which can mean equally by Pamphilos or belonging to him) or as a fraudulent 'enhancement' before it was given to Louis. Another expert in the field, Gisela Richter, has written that engravers themselves were more like to place their names inconspicuously; owners, more blatantly.

There are a couple more people in the field from whom I would love to have an opinion, but so far have not succeeded in getting any reply to my inquiries.

I also made inquiries to a couple of experts in ancient glass, asking only about the glass, not about its faithfulness to the amethyst. Both said there was no way they could be absolutely certain, but also that there was nothing about it to suggest it was not, part of the reasoning being that there were enough genuinely ancient glass gems around that there really was no gain to be had by faking them.

 

This is great ' -nothing about it to suggest it was not, part of the reasoning being that there were enough genuinely ancient glass gems around that there really was no gain to be had by faking them.'
The amount of genuine Antiquities available were probably mind-boggling-'Signore,may I dig Your field for gold-we split,eh ?' It was probably much like modern day Bottle Diggers asking permission.
Great research narrative !
PS-Have You followed 'The Steele Box' story at all ?

 

Sorry, no. What is it? Should warn you I do not have television in any form other than the membership privilege of watching the PBS offerings of my local station on line.

 

The Steele Box is a thread on this Forum-very interesting.

 

http://www.antiquers.com/threads/welcome-to-the-steele-box.61542/

The discussion mostly happened in 2021. Interesting thread!

 

Figtree-I agree,reads like a DaVinci Code of Ephemera...and-He got it all for FREE,free as a birdie ! What did He do with all that stuff-put His kids thru college I guess.

 

Bronwen- You're not missing much.Between PBS & YouTube You'll be fine.If an actual national 'insurrection' starts,in NY-You'll know about it.
Paul Simon-'I get all the news I need on the weather report'-The Last Living Boy in New York.

 

Only Living Boy in New York. Weather & transit really are about all the news I need, but public radio keeps me up on the bigger affairs, with BBC World Service giving me the major international stuff, sometimes also tidbits about the US the domestic media doesn't report. In my decades here, my first job & then my last, I worked for the polling units of 2 of big broadcast networks. During the first gig we were proud of our news division. When I finally got to see the nightly news program that used our work at the second one, I was appalled. Not sure there was a total of 15 minutes real content in half an hour, some of that human interest, the rest ads & them telling you what they were going to tell you about that was coming up.