Featured A Cameo For Bronwen's Commentary

Giving this a gentle bump to the top of the page.

 

uh ohhhh, i ran her off, SORRY! it's FRIDAY the 13th! I see another post asking for an opinion by kyratango

 

Bakers, I absolutely LOVE your little Cameo!!! LOVE the fact that it's not TOOO ornate......!!!

 

She's talking to you on the OPINION thread......why not here ???

 

Hello All - Sorry, I was not ignoring you. I saw kyratango's post, replied to that one without realizing this one was here. In order to get this reply up quickly, I have only glanced at previous remarks, which I will go through after.

She is carved in helmet shell, going by the color, probably Cassis madagasariensis, which provides a darker background layer than the other commonly used variety, Cypraecassis rufa. The carving is well executed and the piece appears to be in excellent condition.

Saw she has already been correctly identified as the goddess Ceres/Demeter. For more about that and other examples, see: http://cameotimes.com/index.php/profiles-1/olympian-gods/ceres-demeter

I think the findings are deceptive as to age. Looks to me like the clasp has been replaced to something more secure than the original. On the other hand, I do not think she is quite so old as the T hinge suggests. She looks right for around the time great-grandma got married and may have been an engagement gift, when she was no doubt bought new.

You would have to have the metal tested to know for sure. Pinchbeck is a possibility. The little ring is an attachment point for a guard chain. Some of these were detachable; often enough the fine chain got pulled off. Can easily image unpinning the brooch to take it off & forgetting to undo the little guard chain, with predictable results.

Slammed this up as fast as I could. No doubt there will be corrections/additions needed.

 

See a change needed immediately. First sentence should be Sorry, I was not ignoring you!

 

Thanks very much for posting, Bronwen! I will print all that out to store near her for future reference.

I had her looked at by a dealer in antique jewelry back in the late 80's, but unfortunately I seem to have lost what she wrote up. Or misplaced the paper which will not emerge from hiding until I'm no longer around to care.

 

I spend my days in the world of these cameos, so am not always up to date on latest ways of doing things. I don't fully understand this exchange. No communication that I got flagged it for special attention. I am not on Facebook or Twitter. And I have received so many communications in the 2 days since I joined, I now have to wonder what else I have overlooked.

 

Ah. Let me explain how "tagging" works here. I'm not on any other social media either.

When someone wants your attention to a thread, they can type your user ID after the @ symbol (like this @Bronwen) and you get an alert (along with other notifications such as "Likes") as a little red number in the upper right corner of the page. You can click on the notification to see where the "Tag" occurred and go straight to it.

 

Glad you found the reply quickly. Very sorry you felt you were being specifically neglected, as it is understandable you would have after seeing the extensive reply to kyratango's cameo. This one would have needed to be longer too if I had not been able to direct people to the article on Ceres for additional info.

When I was working on the reply to kyra, I dropped her a note by way of the communication feature to let her know I had seen her cameo & was working on it. Knew it was going to take a while & wanted to avoid exactly this sort of thing.

 

Interesting, i got tagged the other day on a different thread & was not aware of how that worked either.

 

What I really need to do is look through my e-mail inbox more carefully. By the time I looked today there were so many messages that came in after yours & were at the top of the list that yours had been bumped down to where it was off the screen. It's possible my blurry eyes ran over it but did not at the time realize it was not a message related to kyra's post.

I scroll through my alerts, but so many of them are to let me know that someone has 'liked' one of my posts, it's easy for something to get lost. The likes are not relayed to e-mail, so messages needing a reply are more easily found there.

 

No worries, B. You found my request and added great information.

 

And I have received so many communications in the 2 days since I joined..

u must be popular !!!!

 

I don't know if I am, but people seem to enjoy looking at cameos & what I write about them My intro thread took on a life of its own. It went from cameos to tea by way of Copenhagen.

 

That's the way we roll !

 

Living in New York, I get the opportunity to go to some of the big antique jewellery shows, where I browse and chat. Many dealers have some cameos in their display; few know very much about them, although they're very good on the settings. Hopefully the woman who looked at your lovely piece gave you accurate information. If she did not, you did not lose much by losing the paper. To have a complete description, you can always have a jeweller test the gold for you.

 

Case in point. I see far too much of this sort of thing to trust most dealers when it comes to cameos: http://www.ebay.com/itm/162708081586
The cameo is mass produced molded glass, in terrible shape.