GLASS.
[Illustration:
Fig. 294.
Glass Vase or Bottle; height,
3½ ins. (B.M.)
]
The manufacture of glass is of great antiquity. The invention has been
ascribed to the Phœnicians, but specimens of glass beads, amulets,
plaques, vases, and small phials or bottles have been found in some of
the oldest Egyptian tombs. In the British Museum there is a small piece
of blue opaque glass in the form of a lion’s head, which bears the
prenomen of the Egyptian monarch Nuntef IV., belonging to the Fourth
Dynasty (B.C. 2423-2380). There are also paintings on the walls of early
tombs representing bottles with red wine, as well as figures engaged in
glass-blowing.
A number of glass bowls, vases, and bottles from Nimroud may be seen in
the British Museum, the earliest specimen of which is an Assyrian
transparent glass vase with two handles, and is inscribed with the name
of the monarch Sargon (B.C. 722-705). This is supposed to be the oldest
known specimen of transparent glass (Fig. 294).
[Illustration:
Fig. 295.
Phœnician Alabastron.
]
Many long-shaped little bottles—_alabastron_—of pale greenish, and
others of brilliant colours, with slightly varied shapes, have been dug
up from the ruins of Assyrian palaces, and have been found in most of
the ancient tombs in Greece, Italy, and in the islands of Cyprus,
Sardinia, and Rhodes. These little bottles have been made by the
Egyptians, Assyrians, Phœnicians, and Greeks, and their shape, being
consecrated by use, remained unchanged for many centuries; they were
portable objects of barter, as glass beads also were with the
Phœnicians, who distributed them in trade to all parts of the countries
bordering on the Mediterranean (Figs. 295, 296).
Common forms of the Phœnician glass bottles were small vessels in the
shapes of heads, and of dates, grapes, and other fruits, which were
blown in moulds. These vessels probably came from the great workshops of
Tyre and Sidon; some of them bear the names of their makers—Eugenes,
Ennion, and “Artas the Sidonian.”
The shapes of many of these vessels are decidedly Greek, and if not
Greek in manufacture, have been copied from the shapes of Greek pottery.
The colours used were yellow, turquoise, and white on blue, green, or
brown, and a common arrangement of these was in zigzag or wavy
alternating lines; in other examples the surface was reeded, as may be
seen in the alabastron, Fig. 295.
[Illustration: Fig. 296.—Necklace of Glass and Gold, Phœnician. (B.M.)]
Ancient Roman glass is of great variety in colour, and many specimens
show the highest technical skill combined with great artistic beauty.
The lovely iridescent effect on Roman and other antique glass is due to
the chemical changes of the surface decomposition, and in other
instances to the minute flaking of the glass, which reflects the light
at various angles, and thus producing the prismatic hues.
At the time of the Roman occupation of Egypt, during the period of rule
under the Ptolemies, glass making was a great industry in the latter
country. It is said that the Romans learnt the art from the Egyptians,
and it is known that many of the latter were brought to Rome to practise
their art as glass-blowers.
The making of the glass known as _mille-fiori_ was taught to the Romans
by the Egyptians, and was extensively employed in vase and bottle making
by the former; the Venetians from the fourteenth century have imitated
the Romans in their uses of mille-fiori glass for bead making and other
purposes, with great success.
The method of making this variety of glass consists in arranging a
number of thin rods or threads of glass of the required variety of
colours, gold being sometimes used; these united rods were then fused
together by heat, and drawn out or twisted, so that when transverse
sections were cut the pattern would always be the same.
Another way of mixing the colour in glass, which was employed by the
Egyptians, Romans, and later by the Venetians, was in the making of
regular patterns of mosaic-like designs of the various colours, and
another was in imitating the precious stones and marbles, such as onyx,
agate, serpentine, porphyry, and murrhine; the latter is supposed to be
a variety of agate, with red and purple shades. The murrhine glass
examples of Roman manufacture are very rare.
The Romans used these glass imitations of the precious stones and
marbles to line their walls and floors, as in mosaic work.
Egyptian and Roman glass in their transparent varieties have such
colours as yellow, purple, blue, green, and pink; opaque colours are
generally found in shades of yellow, blue, green, and black. The most
valuable kind of glass was that of the clearest white or crystal; this,
it would appear, was the most difficult to make, as the commoner clear
variety had usually a slight greenish or bluish hue.
The Romans made a special variety of glass ware which consisted of
interlaced bands of opaque white or coloured glass, ingeniously made to
form a pattern by twisting them with clear or coloured transparent
glass, like that of the elegant lace-glass variety known as the “vitro
di trina” of the Venetians (Fig. 302).
In the arts of glass cameo and intaglio engraving, and in the imitation
of gems, the Romans were exceedingly skilful.
The cameo engraved glass was produced by placing a layer of white opaque
glass on a ground of transparent blue, the design being formed by
cutting away the white surface to the blue ground, leaving the blue as
the background; the remaining white which formed the design was then
carefully finished by engraving. Light and shade was produced according
to the thicknesses of the cameo left by the engraver.
[Illustration: Fig. 297.—Ancient Roman Glass Bottle. (S.K.M.)]
The celebrated Barberini or Portland Vase, in the British Museum, is
made in a blue and white cameo. This splendid work of art was discovered
in a marble sarcophagus near Rome, which is supposed to have been the
tomb of the Emperor Alexander Severus. The vase is ten inches in height,
is two-handled, and has for the subject of one side a figure decoration
representing Thetis consenting to be the bride of Peleus, attended by
Poseidon and Eros; on the other side is Peleus and Thetis on Mount
Pelion, and on the bottom is a bust of Paris. The ground is transparent
blue glass, and the subjects are beautifully engraved in cameo out of
the superimposed white layer.
[Illustration: Fig. 298.—Roman Glass Tablet in relief. (S.K.M.)]
A similar kind of vase, but smaller, was found at Pompeii, and is now in
the Museum at Naples, and the remains of the Auldjo Vase in the British
Museum is also in a similar style, the cameo decoration of it consisting
of vine-leaves.
Intaglios and cameos, sometimes of a large size, were copied in glass
from gems; these were usually cast in moulds, and many of them are of
high value as works of art. (Fig. 298).
The Romans made window glass of small squares or oblongs, which was
manufactured by rolling it on a plate.
In the early Christian period gold leaf was used as a means of
decoration on glass: sometimes the gold was annealed to the surface, and
sometimes it was placed, as the making of the gold smalto for mosaics,
between two layers of thin glass, and afterwards fired. Patterns and
figure subjects were executed in gold foil, and formed the decoration of
glass dishes and bowls, the broken remains of which have been found in
the Christian tombs of the Roman Catacombs.
Though extensive glass works are known to have existed at Constantinople
and at Thessalonica between the ninth and thirteenth centuries, there
are scarcely any remains of Byzantine glass in existence that can with
certainty be ascribed to the Eastern empire, unless we except the five
cups and two shallow basins of thick green glass that are decorated with
Byzantine ornament, and which form part of the treasure of St. Mark’s at
Venice. Glass was used in the windows of Byzantine churches and, of
course, in the making of the mosaic tesseræ.
It is highly probable that glass objects were made in Syria, and at
Damascus especially, since the Roman period, yet examples of the earlier
work from these parts are very rare. The celebrated gold cup of
Chrosroes (A.D. 531-579) is a Persian work which has been set with glass
lozenges and rosettes. Other examples are small glass weights, discs, or
tokens, and a Saracenic glass basin in the Cluny Museum at Paris, which
has been made either in Egypt or Syria, and is known to date between
1279 and 1294.
With the above exceptions there is no authentic work that can be pointed
to which dates earlier than the fourteenth century. The finest examples
of Saracenic glass, some of which may be seen in our museums, are the
beautiful enamelled glass mosque lamps (Fig. 299). They mostly date from
the fourteenth century, and are usually decorated richly with Arabic
inscriptions—sometimes with the name of the artist—in gold and coloured
enamels.
In the city of Damascus glass cups and other vessels of great beauty
were made at this period, having enamelled Saracenic decorations.
The “cups of Damascus” were much prized, and according to the
inventories of the kings of England, France, and Germany, we learn that
they were set in gold stands or mounts, and were usually presents to
Western monarchs, brought by their ambassadors from the East.
The cup kept by the Musgrave family, and known as the “Luck of
Edenhall,” is made in enamelled Saracenic glass, and has a leather
covering of fifteenth-century workmanship.
[Illustration: Fig. 299.—Enamelled Oriental Glass Bottle and Mosque
Lamp.]
Venetian blown glass has always been renowned for its beauty, both in
its elegance of form-as in the wine-glasses, goblets, and cups—and in
the beautiful opalescent hues of its delicate colouring.
The making of glass in Venice began to assume great importance in the
fourteenth century, but many small glass furnaces were in operation for
more than a hundred years prior to this date.
The Venetians apparently, in the early period of the Renaissance,
studied very closely the remains of the Roman glass, and eventually
imitated and produced nearly all the kinds of glass that in former days
were made in ancient Rome.
Another direct cause which led to the advancement of the glass makers’
craft in Venice was the parricidal conquest of Constantinople by the
Christians of Rome, aided by the fleets of Venice, in 1204, for after
the sacking of the Byzantine capital, most of the portable works of art
of every kind-including the bronze horses that had been brought from
Rome to Constantinople by its founder, and which now adorn the front of
St. Mark’s-were carried off to Venice, and it is more than likely that
after this the glass mosaic workers, among other Byzantine craftsmen,
had come to Venice, where they found employment in the rising republic.
The work in the mosaic decoration of St. Mark’s doubtless helped to
develop the making of glass in Venice, and the lagunes were rich in
marsh-loving plants that would yield alkali and furnish the fine sand
requisite for its manufacture.
Mention is made in one of the documents in the archives of Venice, dated
1090, of one Petrus Flavianus, who was a “phiolarius,” or glass maker,
and the trade regulations of the glass makers’ societies or corporations
are preserved at Venice and Murano, which show that in the thirteenth
century they had become important bodies.
Glass furnaces were becoming so numerous in Venice that the Great
Council decreed, in 1291, they should be demolished, but permitted them
to be set up outside the city, in the suburban districts. In the
following year, however, the decrees were altered to the effect that the
small glass workers might remain in the Rialto (the city proper),
provided fifteen paces were left between each atelier. These decrees
were made to guard against a possible spread of fire.
It is supposed that this had the effect of moving many of the principal
glass works to Murano, a district of Venice which had become renowned
for the production of Venetian glass, and where to-day the eminent firm
of Salviati & Co. have their extensive works.
The glass house at Murano, which was known as the “Sign of the Angel” in
the early half of the fifteenth century, was the most renowned of the
ateliers of that century. Angelo Beroviero was one of its earliest
directors, who was succeeded by his son Marino in that position. The
latter was a head or master of the Company of “Phioleri” (Glass Makers’
Corporation) in 1468, which was a very strong society at that time and
enjoyed exceptional privileges from the city council.
The intercourse of Venice with the East furnished the Venetian glass
makers with patterns of Damascus and Egyptian glass, and the enamelled
and gilded Oriental varieties were imitated and improved on by the
Murano artists. Some of the products of this period are preserved in the
museums. The illustration (Fig. 300) is from a Venetian enamelled cup of
green glass in the Kensington Museum.
In the sixteenth century the glass-making furnaces of Murano had
increased to a great extent, and were placed under the special
protection of the Council of Ten. Owing to the jealousy at this time of
other European States, Venetian glass-blowers were bribed by offers of
money and large salaries to set up furnaces abroad, and laws were then
made forbidding workmen to leave the country to carry on glass making in
other places under the penalty of death. This, however, did not prevent
Venetian glass-blowers from taking service under the protection of
foreign rulers in such countries as Flanders, Spain, and England.
The natural consequences followed, that the exports in glass from Venice
to foreign countries became lessened, so much so that the workmen of
Murano complained of being thrown idle for several months in the year.
[Illustration: Fig. 300.—Venetian Enamelled Glass; Fifteenth Century.
(S.K.M.)]
Venetian glass has been made in many colours, such as blue, green,
purple, amber, and ruby, and in variegated mixtures of clear or
transparent and opaque glass. The clear variety is remarkable for
elegance of shape and fantastic designs of handles or wings, consisting
of twisted and knotted interlacings, which were generally executed in
blue or red colours and attached to the sides of wine-glasses and other
vessels (Fig. 301). One beautiful variety of glass is clouded with a
milky-like opalescent tint, which is supposed to be produced from
arsenic. The opaque white glass is made by the addition of oxide of tin
to the usual ingredients.
[Illustration: Fig. 301.—Venetian Glass of the Sixteenth Century. (J.)]
[Illustration: Fig. 302.—Venetian “Vitro di trina.” (S.K.M.)]
Glass was made by the Venetians to imitate precious stones, were
streaked, splashed, or spotted with various colours, gold, and copper;
the aventurine spotted glass was obtained from a silicate of copper.
The _latticinio_ variety was formed of rods of transparent glass
enclosing lines of opaque white glass forming patterns. The _vitro di
trina_ is the so-called lace-glass (Fig. 302); the latter and the
mosaic-like or _mille-fiori_ glass were made by the Venetians in
imitation of the Roman varieties. Another variety was that known as _a
reticelli_, in which ornament of opaque network sometimes enclosed air
bubbles. That known under the German name of _Schmelz_ is the variegated
or marble opaque glass made in the Murano furnaces, which imitated
chalcedony, lapis lazuli, tortoiseshell, and jasper. Crackled glass was
made by the sudden cooling of the half-blown material; this was again
heated and drawn out in order to increase the spaces between the
crackled lines.
In the sixteenth century the forms of the Venetian glass vessels were of
the Renaissance type; the long shanks and the wide bowls gave them an
appearance of elegance and grace. The light and thin character of the
material had also a great deal to do with the fragile look of elegance
in Venetian glass of this period; the glass of the former (fifteenth)
century was of a much thicker kind.
The lightness and superior strength of Venetian glass was due to the
absence of lead in its composition, which is so much used in the modern
flint glass.
The materials of the composition of the clear Murano glass are supposed
to be—one part of alkali, obtained from ferns, moss, lichen, or seaweed,
and two parts of pebbles of white quartz or fine clean white sand, and a
small quantity of manganese, all well mixed together and melted in the
furnace.
The colouring matter is produced from the oxides of various metals, as
in the vitreous coloured glazes used in the enamels for glazed pottery.
Vessels and objects in endless variety have been made by the Venetians,
such as ewers, basins, drinking-glasses, bottles, standing cups, bowls,
goblets, large and small candlesticks, beads, and mirrors, and were
exported in great quantities to all parts by the Venetian galleys.
Bead making at Venice was a separate trade, and was one of great
importance in the sixteenth and two following centuries. The makers of
the small beads were called the “Margariteri,” and those who made the
large beads were known as the “Perlai.” The beads were made from small
sections broken or cut off from rods or tubes of glass and placed in an
iron pot that was made to rotate, so that the motion prevented the beads
from adhering to each other, and at the same time formulated their
spherical shape.
Mirrors were made by the ancients of polished metal and from slabs of
black obsidian—a kind of natural glass. In mediæval times they were made
of clear glass behind which was placed a sheet of lead foil. Glass
mirrors were made in Venice from the year 1507, when methods had been
discovered of polishing the glass and of applying the “foglia,” or layer
of metal leaf, to the back. After this date the making of mirrors soon
developed into great importance, and the “Specchiai,” or mirror makers,
had their own corporation. Like the other glass wares of Venetian
manufacture, the mirrors were exported to all parts of Europe.
Some good examples of sixteenth-century mirrors and mirror-frames in
glass cut into ornamental shapes, with bevelled edges and engraved, are
preserved in our museums and in old houses.
Glass painting for windows was known and practised in Venice as early as
the fourteenth century. The very early Italian stained glass used in
windows is said to have been executed for Leo III. in 795.
Besides the painted or stained glass used in church windows during the
Middle Ages throughout Italy, there were glass manufactories in Rome,
Verona, Milan, and Florence for the production of similar wares as those
of Venice.
In France and Spain glass making was carried on at various places from
the days of the Romans; antique fragments of glass have been dug up in
Normandy and in Poitou. In the latter province glass making flourished
from a very early date up to the fifteenth century. It was revived in
1572 by the Venetian Fabriano Salviati, who came to Poitou and set up a
glass workshop. At Paris, Rouen, Normandy, and in Lorraine glass was
made prior to the sixteenth century. The Normandy glass was of a coarse
kind, made chiefly for windows and common utensils, but many of the
Venetian varieties were made at the other places named.
Some Venetian glass makers came to Paris in 1665, when an establishment
was formed for the making of mirrors, and about the same time another
factory was set up at Four-la-Ville; these two factories were united by
the French Minister Colbert, and were under the patronage of the king.
We find that soon afterwards, and especially in the Louis-Quinze period,
large panels and wall spaces were filled with glass mirrors as interior
decorations.
[Illustration: Fig. 303.—Spanish Glass; Sixteenth Century. (S.K.M.)]
Glass was made in Spain in the Ibero-Roman period, as the remains of
glass vessels and necklaces have been found in tombs, and the ruins of
Roman furnaces have been found in the valleys of the Pyrenees. It is
supposed that the art was carried on under the Gothic kings of Spain,
and also by the Moors in the thirteenth century, who brought with them
glass workers as well as some of the wares of the East. Much of the
glass made in Spain subsequent to this date is in imitation of the
shapes of Arabian pottery, and this is still the case in much of the
modern Spanish glass. Spanish glass of the Renaissance was similar in
form and in material to the Venetian work of the same period, and during
the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries the work was in imitation more
or less of the contemporary Dutch and Flemish glass (Fig. 303).
In Holland, glassware seems to have been made by Murano artificers, who
from time to time settled in that country and brought the secrets of
their trade with them. The objects made were naturally imitations of the
Venetian glass, and many of the Dutch drinking-glasses were very
graceful in design.
In Amsterdam, Antwerp, Brussels, and throughout the Low Countries
generally Venetian glass had been imported in great quantities in the
time of and prior to the seventeenth century, and it is difficult to say
how much of the old glass found at those places is Dutch, Flemish, or
Venetian.
Engraving on glass was much practised in Holland, and many Dutch goblets
have well executed portraits of kings, queens, and other persons.
Glass making has been practised in Germany, like in most European
countries, from the days of the Romans downwards, especially in the
Rhenish Provinces, but German examples dating from the Middle Ages are
very rare.
[Illustration: Fig. 304.—German Glasses. (S.K.M.)]
There is documentary evidence which proves that glass was made at Mainz
as early as the beginning of the eighth century.
The earliest example of German glass in this country is a _wiederkom_,
or cylindrical drinking-vessel, which bears the date of 1571, but an
older one, of the date of 1553, is preserved in the Künstkammer at
Berlin.
A favourite decoration on the German Wiederkoms is the arms of the
emperor or electors, those of the different states of the empire, and of
private owners (Fig. 304).
The colour of this kind of glass is usually green and the decorations
are enamelled or painted in grisaille; as a rule the German cups and
wine glasses of the seventeenth century are richly decorated (Fig. 305).
In the German wine-glasses known as “flügelgläser” is seen an imitation
of the Venetian “winged glasses” (Fig. 301).
[Illustration: Fig. 305.—Decorated German Vases; Seventeenth Century.
(S.K.M.)]
Bohemian glass of the seventeenth century is noted for its clearness and
good quality, and illustrates the advancement made in the art of
engraving on glass. The engraved work was done with a diamond point as
in etching, with the lapidary’s wheel, and by means of biting the glass
with fluoric acid; the latter method is said to have been discovered by
Henry Schwanhard of Nüremberg in 1670. John Schäper was a very clever
glass engraver and decorator of this period.
A beautiful kind of German glass is known as Kunckel’s ruby glass, the
originator of which was the director of the Potsdam glass works, where
he produced this variety about 1680.
Many relics of glass vessels and beads have been found in Roman tombs,
and in various parts of England, of a greenish or blue colour. These may
have been imported or may have been made in England, but there is no
certain evidence of this. Glass vessels for drinking purposes have been
found which are believed to have belonged to the Anglo-Saxon period
(Fig. 306).
The material of these is thin, the colour is generally of a pale straw
tint, and strips of thickened glass ornament the outside, arranged in
the nature of parallel lines, or wound spirally to produce a kind of
network decoration.
[Illustration: Fig. 306.—Anglo-Saxon Drinking Cup. (S.K.M.)]
Venetian glass found its way to England in the sixteenth century; in the
inventories of Henry VIII. (1529) and of Robert, Earl of Leicester
(1588), large quantities of Venetian glasses are mentioned as belonging
to the above.
Some Muranese glass workers were engaged at this time (1550) in the
service of the King of England. The name of an Italian—Jacob
Vessaline—is mentioned as a glass maker who worked at Crutched Friars in
the beginning of Elizabeth’s reign (1557), and in the year 1589 there
were supposed to be fifteen glass houses in England.
Sir Robert Mansel was a prominent glass maker of the seventeenth
century; he obtained patents in the year 1616 for the making of window
glass and all kinds of vessels, and from the remains of glass objects
that were found on the site of Princes Hall, in Broad Street, London, it
is believed that his works were on that spot.
Mansel employed Italian workmen in the first instance, and it appears
that prior to 1623 he had set up works in Milford Haven, at
Newcastle-on-Tyne, in Scotland, and other places. The Newcastle furnaces
were the most successful, the others being practically failures. Mr.
Nesbitt thinks that the success of the Newcastle-on-Tyne works was due
to the new system of flint-glass making, which must be credited as an
English invention.
Flint or crystal glass is made of a mixture of silicate of potash and
lead. It was known but imperfectly made by the Romans in their clear
glass variety, which contained a small portion of lead. In the Middle
Ages the glass which contained lead was called “Jewish glass,” and was
generally used for painting on, as it was more fusible than other
varieties which did not contain lead. But all authorities agree that the
English invented a new product in their flint glass, which was made
after many experiments at Lambeth in 1673, as “clear, ponderous, and
thick as crystal.”
Mr. Nesbitt infers that it was the use of coal in the furnaces instead
of wood that led to the development of the process. When using coal the
melting-pots had to be covered in the furnace, which lessened the
heating powers and thus made the fusing more difficult. To put more
alkali in the mixture would have helped it to fuse at a much lower heat,
but it would have injured the colour and quality of the glass, so lead
was added in certain proportions, which gave the requisite clearness and
strength.
All kinds of glass vessels and plate glass for carriage windows were
made at Lambeth, under the management or patronage of the Duke of
Buckingham.
[Illustration: Fig. 307.—Stained Glass; Fifteenth Century.]
Though there are no records of glass making in Ireland of a very early
date, the glass beads and glass bosses which decorate the objects of
Irish art, such as the crosses, croziers, brooches, book-covers, and the
celebrated Ardagh Chalice, prove that the art was known in Ireland at
least in the ninth century, if not earlier. Mention has also been made
in old writings of this period of glass vessels for use in Irish
churches.
[Illustration: Fig. 308.—Window Glass; English, Fifteenth Century.]
Painted or stained window glass is the glory of our Mediæval churches.
The earliest coloured windows were doubtless made from mosaic-like
arrangements of different bits of coloured glass. The mosaic window led
to the representation of pictorial subjects in stained glass, the latter
being formed of pieces of self-coloured glass, or that kind having each
piece stained in one colour throughout, cut in the requisite shapes, and
fastened together by an arrangement of lead lines which form the main
lines of the design; to help out the drawing and expression the stained
glass is shaded in hatchings, stippling, and bold lines, usually in a
brown colour. Painted glass, as distinguished from stained glass, is
that which is painted on clear or tinted grounds with various enamel
colours made from metallic oxides. After the painting is finished the
piece of glass is fired, and the enamel colours become fused with the
glass surface, and really become part of the glass itself. More finish,
a wider range of colouring, greater detail, and generally a more
pictorial effect is produced by the artist being able to use freely the
enamel colours; but a corresponding loss of depth and brilliancy of
colour and of bold decorative effect which belonged to older examples of
stained glass must be set against any advantages the painted variety may
possess from its pictorial point of view.
The earliest instance in the use of stained glass for church window’s is
supposed to have been in those that were given by Count Arnold to the
Abbey of Tegernsee in Bavaria in the year 999. The thirteenth and
fourteenth century were the finest periods for the stained-glass windows
of the Gothic cathedrals both in England and on the Continent. About the
middle of the sixteenth century enamel colours began to be used, and, as
before observed, the designs showed a striving after pictorial effects.
[Illustration: Fig. 309.—Chinese Glass Bowl. (S.K.M.)]
The revival of classic art in the Renaissance period has also a great
deal to do with this change in the style and method of execution in
painted glass, and we find that the greatest painters—but not always the
greatest decorators-of the period supplied cartoons and designs for this
class of work.
Glass making has been known in China and Japan from very early times,
but it appears to be difficult to obtain anything like authentic
information as to its history from our present imperfect knowledge or
acquaintance with the native records.
There are stories of ancient Chinese glass vessels that are said to have
been seen by the French missionaries of the last century, one of which
vessels was so large that “a mule could have been put into it,” and that
the Chinese made a kind of glass called “lieou-li” that was sufficiently
elastic as to bend easily.
The vitreous enamels of the Chinese were of course used as glazes on
their porcelain wares and pottery, but it seems that formerly they only
made glass objects in the imitation of precious stones, gems, and in
their enamels. Chinese glass is often made to simulate rock crystal and
jade carvings; their glass snuff-boxes and other small objects are
usually well coloured, and are decorated with relief work of ornament,
landscapes or figure subjects, the objects generally being of a massive
character (Fig. 309).