One of the very curious cases of the employment of a purely secular
Roman gem for ecclesiastical uses is offered by the exceedingly
beautiful convex blue aquamarine engraved with the head of Julia,
daughter of Titus, a fine work of the Augustan Age, now in the French
Cabinet des Médailles in Paris. This was donated in the ninth century by
the Carolingian emperor, Charles the Bald, to the Treasury of St. Denis,
after it had been given a setting of pearls and precious stones. In St.
Denis it was placed at the apex of a reliquary, which became known as
the Oratorium of Charlemagne, and the head of the vain and worldly
princess is said to have been venerated by the pious monks and priests
as that of the Virgin Mary. As a work of portrait art this gem is one of
the finest examples from classic times.[522]
The strange decadence and the conventionalized but profoundly earnest
quality of Early Christian art is shown in an intaglio gem of the Royal
Numismatic Museum in Munich. This is a dark-hued sardonyx of two layers,
and the engraving depicts a bearded Christ, enthroned and accompanied by
the twelve apostles, six on either side, four of them beardless while
the remainder are represented with beards; they are all gazing
reverently upon the central figure, behind whose head appear the arms of
the cross and above them the letters _I̅C̅_ _X̅C̅_ Ἰησοῦς Χριστός.[523]
Another somewhat similar Early Christian gem is a cameo cut in a
sardonyx of three layers, the groundwork being a brownish-black, and the
figures of a light-bluish hue, the upper parts yellowish-brown. Here
also we have an enshrined Christ; above his head two angels hold a
diadem. This is of superior workmanship to the intaglio gem just
described.[524] There is a sardonyx cameo showing a rude figure of the
Prophet Daniel, a lion on either side of him, and inscribed with his
name in Greek letters. This is of Byzantine workmanship.[525]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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