Engraved Gems

The Empress Catherine II., wishing to confer a great favor and special reward on an ambassador to her court from her remarkable collection in the Museum of the Hermitage at St....

Now in order that only the faithful should enter, and that the enemies might be detected, a system of tesseræ was invented, and soon these were made in the form of engraved piet...

The place of these Babylonian cylinders in the history of art cannot be classed as decorative, for as they were originally used only as seals, and mostly business or official si...

Produced by Chris Curnow, Wayne Hammond and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The...

What patience it must have required to cut those ornaments in Jade which we find on their scepters and on the handles of their official swords! Many pieces which are shown in mu...