Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

of Scots; one of them mentioned by Britten 708 is enclosed in a piece of rock-crystal shaped like a coffin. The same author also says that in the Vienna Treasury there is a small skull-watch of the reign of the Emperor Rudolph II (1576-1612), in which the movable lower jaw has been constructed to strike the number of the hours against the upper jaw. A rock-crystal watch shaped like a death'shead, which I have illustrated,709 is said to have belonged to that mentally-morbid character, King Henry III of France (Fig. 142). Another curious death's-head watch,

[graphic]

FIG. 142.-A rock-crystal death's-head watch. (After Guiart.)

made by the English clock-maker, Daniel Quare (16481724), was in the collection of Catharine II of Russia, that extraordinary "Semiramis of the North." There are several silver death's-head watches in the Cluny Museum at Paris. A rather commonplace silver seventeenthcentury death's-head watch is in the Fitzwilliam Museum (Frank Smart Bequest) at Cambridge.

Here likewise may be mentioned the small silver

708 Britten, loc. cit.

700 With the kind permission of Professor Jules Guiart, from Aesculape, Paris, January, 1913, p. 20.

pomander boxes or vinaigrettes in the shape of a human skull with an hour-glass on the top-some of them probably made in quite modern times for the benefit of curio-hunters.

710

Amongst memento mori jewels in the British Museum are locket-like pendants or charms (seventeenth century) shaped like a coffin, containing the minute figure of a skeleton. One of these coffin-shaped pendants is of gold, enamelled, bearing the words, COGITA MORI VT VIVAS ("Think of dying so that you may live"). Another in silver is inscribed with the name of the deceased. A coffin-shaped pendant of this kind is figured by H. Clifford Smith, in his work on Jewellery," It is of enamelled gold and contains a minute articulated skeleton. In the collection of the late Mr. M. P. W. Boulton was a fine jewel (German sixteenth-century work) of enamelled gold, shaped as a sarcophagus with nude figures of Adam and Eve and a serpent on the cover; on the sides were Greek inscriptions signifying "Know thyself" and "Remember the end"; inside was a miniature skeleton. A locket-like memorial pendant of a later date in the possession of Lady Evans is in the shape of a minute coffin; the lid is made to open on a hinge, and in the inside is some hair in an ornamental border of gold thread, with a death's-head (there were originally doubtless two death's-heads) and the initials P.B. in fine gold wire; the back is inscribed: “P.B. obit yo 17 Mar: 1703 Aged 54 years."

A little pendant (early seventeenth century) in the British Museum is of gold and enamel in the form of a skull; in the interior of the skull, which opens on a

710 H. Clifford Smith, Jewellery, London, 1908, Plate xliv. No. 16. 11 It is figured in F. W. Fairholt's Miscellanea Graphica (London, 1856, Pl. i. Figs. 3, 4) from the Londesborough Collection, but is now exhibited in the Gold Ornament Room of the British Museum.

hinge, is a minute enamelled figure of a skeleton with an hour-glass under its neck as a pillow. A small heartshaped memorial locket of gold, enamel, and gold-thread ornamentation (late seventeenth century) represents a skeleton emerging from a tomb, with an angel on either side, trumpeting the resurrection; below is the monogram of the deceased, with the inscription, COME YE BLESSED. A small memorial brooch of the same period and kind of work bears the device of a figure seated at a table with open book, candle, and death's-head; and the legend, LEARN TO DIE.

This design may be compared to that of the reverse of a medal, dated 1556, supposed to be the work of Jacques Jonghelinck (1530-1606), a sculptor and medallist of Antwerp. The obverse of the medal bears the portrait (at the age of 49 years) of Viglius van Zuichem van Aytta, the learned and bigoted President of the Privy Council of Philip II. The reverse presents his punning device and motto (on his name, Viglius): a lighted candle, an open book, and an hour-glass, on a table; with the motto, Vita mortalium vigilia, "the life of mortals is a vigil." Cf. St. Matthew, xvi. 41 (and other parts of the New Testament) : "Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation"; and the Latin Vulgate version: "Vigilate et orate"; and such mottoes (sometimes inscribed on old sun-dials, &c.) as Laborare est orare, and Ora ne te ultima hora fallat.

A small eighteenth-century mourning brooch exhibited in the Victoria and Albert Museum has a miniature painting of the deceased's relatives mourning at his tomb, in the usual style of the period, with the inscription: HEAVEN HAS IN STORE WHAT THOV HAST LOST. (See back, in regard to the popular eighteenth century consolatory saying, Not lost, but gone before.)

Minute skulls in ivory or white enamel (with perhaps ruby-eyes) have sometimes been mounted for use as pins for the scarf or necktie, probably to supply an occasional demand for eccentric jewels and ornaments in modern times. Some specimens of macabre fingerrings and jewels are actually spurious, being modern imitations of cinquecento objects, cheaply made by casting, &c., in order to deceive unwary curio-hunters who have never seen original specimens of elaborate workmanship.

Even mirrors used by ladies, and mirror-cases, have been decorated with death's-heads and similar devices.

[graphic][subsumed][subsumed][graphic][subsumed][subsumed]

FIG. 143.-Medal (1552) of the physician, Adolph Occo III, of Augsburg. (After Picqué.) The reverse design has been suggested by a woodcut in the Anatomy of Vesalius, published in 1543. (See Fig. 144.)

C. W. King alludes to a mirror-frame of this kind which he speaks of as Lucrezia Borgia's. The little gorgon's head above the curious design of the back of the famous

[graphic][subsumed][subsumed][subsumed][subsumed][subsumed]

FIG. 144.-Anatomical woodcut by Jan von Calcar (see Part I. D.), from the great anatomical work of Vesalius, De Humani Corporis Fabrica, first edition, printed by J. Oporinus, at Basel, 1543, p. 164. This woodcut suggested the design on various memento mori medals, &c. Cf. Part I. D.; Part III., medals of the Occo amily of physicians, of Augsburg (Fig. 143), and Danish and German memento mori medals of about 1634.

« AnteriorContinuar »