Leadwork, Old and Ornamental and for the most part EnglishLethaby, W. R. (William Richard)
History
Leadwork, Old and Ornamental and for the most part English
Lethaby, W. R. (William Richard)
Leadwork
A great number of small objects in lead are in our museums, and first we
should mention the medals and plaques of the great masters of the
Renaissance. Lead will cast with more delicacy than any other material,
and Cellini especially recommended it for proofs. The proofs of the
great work of the medallists,--the modelling just a film, fading into
the background--presentments and allegories of the Malatestas and
Gonzagas by Pisanello and Sperandio, are certainly the most precious
things ever formed in lead. There are a great number of these medals and
decorative plaques in the British Museum and at Kensington.
For coins in lead see Gaetani and Fiscorni. For tokens and pilgrim
badges, of which a great number have been found in the Seine, see
_Gazette des Beaux Arts_, Vol. VI. and XVIII. Some of these remind us of
the lead figures that, according to “Quentin Durward,” Louis XI. wore in
his hat. At the Guildhall there is a collection of hundreds of these
small objects found in the Thames; most are of great delicacy, many very
beautiful. There are, in the British Museum, little Greek objects, rings
and toys, armlets of a snake pattern, and pierced ornaments for applying
to other objects.
Other objects in the Kensington Museum are:--A small tankard only two
and a half inches diameter but modelled with figures in low relief, it
is German of the sixteenth or seventeenth century; a pair of little
inkstands the circular drums modelled with foliage and projecting top
and bottom rims, also German; and a square canister with panel of St.
George on each face.
Another is a beautiful little Gothic box of the fourteenth century. It
is hexagonal, with three feet, a flat hinged cover has a sitting lion
which forms the knob, a slight relief of the Annunciation under a
canopy, and two shields of arms. Round the sides are delicate bands of
foliage and Gothic lettering; it is three and a half inches high, and of
cast lead. There are other portions of little Gothic boxes in the
British Museum. At Gloucester Museum there is a square box of late
fifteenth century work, the sides formed of four cast panels of lead,
soldered at the angles. The panels all repeat the same relief of the
dead Christ and the Virgin, right and left are the other two Marys, and
the background bears the cross, crown, spears, dice, and all the
implements of the Passion.[23] Small canisters, and candlesticks the
stems of which are formed of a little lead figure, were made quite
recently.
[23] See _Antiquary_, Feb., 1893.
§ XIII. OF LEAD GLAZING.
This subject, in which lead is only secondary, has been treated so often
by others in connection with glass that little more need be said here.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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