THE ENAMELLED VENETIAN GLASS OF THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY
In the fourteenth century, as we have seen, the Venetian galleys
brought glass ware to the ports of England and the Netherlands. M. de
Laborde (_Les Ducs de Bourgogne_) found in the archives of Lille an
order for payment, signed by Duke Philip of Burgundy, ‘_pour seze
voirres et une escuelle de voirre, des voirriers que les galées de
Venise ont avan apportez en nostre pays de Flandres—quatre franc_.’
This is dated from Paris, 1394. Even after making every allowance for
the larger purchasing power of money in those days, the seventeen
vessels of glass bought by a royal prince for four francs cannot have
been of exceptional quality. Again, in the year 1399, Richard II.,
shortly before his deposition, granted permission to certain traders to
sell, on the decks of the Venetian galleys lately arrived in the port
of London, their cargo of small glass vessels and earthenware plates
(_Calendar of State Papers—Venetian_, 1899-1900). Here again there is
nothing to suggest any high artistic value in the glass offered for
sale.
As we have seen, with the possible exception of two goblets in the
British Museum, there does not exist a single example of glass of an
earlier date than the fifteenth century, which can definitely claim to
be of Venetian origin.
The _quattro-cento_ glass of Venice,[144] for the most part decorated
with enamel and gilding, may be conveniently arranged in accordance
with the nature of the enamels that cover it.
I will take first a class in which the enamel plays but a subordinate
part. The clear white glass, somewhat thick and heavy compared with
later examples, is often ornamented with _appliqué_ bosses of coloured
glass; such glass is sparingly decorated with opaque enamels, and this
decoration takes the form of little beads or studs, at times combined
with an imbricated pattern in gold. We sometimes meet with large bowls
on low feet (a form of _drageoir_ or sweetmeat dish) which are so
decorated. There is, however, no finer example of this style of
ornament than the standing beaker with cover in the British Museum
(Slade, 362). The general outline and the obliquely curved gadroons of
this magnificent cup were no doubt suggested by some piece of late
Gothic silver-plate. On the flat-headed knob that surmounts the cover
are the half obliterated remains of a coat of arms, but otherwise the
enamelling is confined to some sparely applied studding and filleting.
There is a covered goblet of the same class in the Waddesdon collection
remarkable for an inscription in some South-Slavonic dialect, scratched
with a diamond on the foot. The blue and purple bosses round the body
of these beakers partake somewhat of the nature of prunts.
Another class of fifteenth-century enamelled glass calls to mind in the
manner of its decoration the contemporary enamelled copper ware of
Venice (_émaux peints_). Indeed, in some examples where the enamel is
spread over the whole field and subsequently decorated with other
colours, there is little to indicate that such a vessel has a basis of
glass rather than of metal. This is the case with the beautiful goblet
covered with pale turquoise blue enamel in the Waddesdon Room in the
British Museum. The decoration is given by an elaborate imbrication of
white, red, and gold; the well-drawn male and female figures, in
lozenge-shaped medallions, closely resemble certain woodcuts in
Venetian books of the fifteenth century. If, as is probable, this cup
is not much later in date than the year 1450, we have in it one of the
earliest examples in glass of the complete goblet or wine-glass form,
with bowl, stem, and foot.[145] The outline of the bowl should be
noticed: the double curve, _tending somewhat inwards_ at the top, is
characteristic of these _quattro-cento_ glasses; here again the form is
doubtless derived from silver-plate.
These opaque solid enamels are, however, more frequently applied here
and there upon a basis of transparent coloured glass. For the ground a
deep cobalt blue was most in favour, but a rich leafy green and other
colours also occur at times. The opaque enamels are laid on thickly in
masses; upon these again details are painted by further touches of
colour.
Perhaps the most famous example of this class is the _Coppa Nuziale_ in
the Museo Civico at Venice (Plate XXIX.). This cup, in outline somewhat
like a Greek _crater_, with simple massive foot and stem, is of deep
blue glass; it is some eight or nine inches in height. On one side we
have a procession of knights and ladies on horseback; on the other side
the company are seen bathing in an open fountain. Between are
medallions with male and female heads—presumably the bride and
bridegroom. The costume would point rather to the first than to the
second half of the fifteenth century. There is not much prominent
colour apart from the green of the grass and the trees; the horses and
the flesh-tints are rendered by white enamels, and gilding, of course,
is freely used; here and there we see a little pale blue enamel. This
_coppa_ is traditionally assigned to Angelo Berovieri, the greatest
name among the Venetian glass-workers of the fifteenth century. To him
indeed the introduction, or at least the perfection, of the process of
enamelling on glass is generally attributed.
[Illustration:
_PLATE XXIX_
MARRIAGE CUP BY BEROVIERI
VENETIAN, FIFTEENTH CENTURY]
In the British Museum (Slade, 363) is another _Coppa Nuziale_, on which
the style of the decoration closely follows that of the Berovieri cup.
We have the same deep blue ground and the same treatment of the solid
opaque enamels; the bowl, however, in this case is cylindrical. On one
side we see a Cupid seated on a two-headed swan, conducting a triumphal
car; on the other, Venus enthroned in another car is preceded by a
figure—presumably Hymen—bearing a torch; in front a centaur is
grasping the hand of a man in full armour.[146]
The bright green enamel by which on these cups the grass and the
conventional trees are rendered, is perhaps the most characteristic
colour of this _quattro-cento_ ware. Note also on the wide-spreading
foot the manner in which the gold is applied: in the use of this metal,
if in nothing else, the Venetians surpassed their Saracenic
predecessors. Here we have an early instance of gilding _semé_ or
broken up into minute irregular fragments. The gold appears to be
incorporated with the glass; it must have been laid on at an early
stage, for it lies scattered in detached fragments, and this is
undoubtedly caused by the dragging of the glass, while still soft,
during the process of manufacture. This manner of applying gold was
used with great effect by the Venetians during the finest
period—before and after 1500. Notice especially a little cup of thin
white glass in the British Museum, on which the decoration is confined
to a delicate powdering of gold of this nature.
Of the application of enamels of this class to a deep green ground,
there is no finer example than the standing cup from the Debruge and
Soltykoff collections (Slade, 361). This, too, is without doubt a
_Coppa Nuziale_, and in the heads in the two medallions we may again
recognise the bride and bridegroom. On a scroll by the latter head we
read, AMOR VOL FEE—‘Love needs faith.’ The quaint head-dress of the
woman calls to mind certain figures in Carpaccio’s pictures of
contemporary Venetian life.
In the enamelled cups of this class the technical imperfections of the
deep-coloured glass ground should be noticed. This is seen above all in
the irregular outline of the margin. We have here a class of
imperfection of quite a different nature from the tendency to collapse
so often seen in large pieces of Saracenic glass. In the case of the
Venetian glass the unevenness appears to arise from the imperfect
fluidity of the metal when in the hands of the blower.
The date of this enamelled glass is fairly well fixed by the style in
which the figure subjects are treated. The processions—the
_trionfi_—are but rudely executed reproductions of those found on
fifteenth-century marriage coffers, the heads in the medallions we meet
with again on the contemporary mezza-majolica. Both may be seen in the
woodcuts of the earliest printed books. We find the source of the
gadroons and imbricated patterns in the _repoussé_ forms given by the
Venetians to their enamelled copper-ware.
There is somewhat more difficulty in determining the date of another
class of Venetian enamelled glass. I refer to that on which the opaque
enamels are painted with a brush upon a ground of thin colourless
glass. In this decoration, especially in the conventional foliage, the
drag of the brush loaded with the thin, somewhat intractable pigment,
may often be clearly traced. There are some early examples of these
‘painted’ enamels which we may regard as the prototypes of a style of
decoration on glass which soon obtained almost a monopoly among
enamelled wares. We see the same technique and the same opaque colours
on the French glass of the sixteenth century, and the faults are
exaggerated and the palette even heavier in the case of the German
glass of a still later time. We must seek the origin of this school in
the Italian painters on majolica; on the other hand, in the eighteenth
century the methods of the enamellers on glass no doubt influenced the
decorators of porcelain both in Germany and elsewhere.
And here I may say that certain important technical difficulties, that
must always have hampered the use of true transparent enamels on glass,
have scarcely received the attention that they deserve. I mean the
relations of the enamels, as regards the softening-point and rate of
contraction on cooling, to the ground on which they rest. The question
here is very similar to that which presents itself in the case of
porcelain. Our present problem is, however, somewhat simpler, for with
the latter material we have not only to consider the relation of the
enamels to the glaze on which they lie (this takes, indeed, the place
of our glass ground), but in addition the relation of the glaze itself
to the porcelain body beneath must not be neglected.
The first condition for the successful application of an enamel is that
it should be more fusible than the glass to which it is applied; not
only that, but at the temperature at which the enamel fuses, the glass
must still maintain its rigidity, otherwise the vessel on coming from
the enameller’s stove will not preserve its original symmetry. It has
been already suggested that the partial collapse so often observed in
the large Cairene lamps may probably be explained in this way.
On the other hand, if the surface of the glass is not to some degree
softened, there will be no intimate connection between it and the
enamel, and the latter will be likely to scale off before long. This
tendency will be increased if there is much difference in the rate or
amount of contraction between the two materials. Difficulties of this
kind long hindered the employment of certain fluxes and colours—that
of cobalt, for instance, combined with a transparent flux. Such
obstacles may, however, be surmounted in a measure, and the process
simplified by employing (in place of a transparent lead flux) an opaque
white, stanniferous enamel merely stained, in cases only externally, by
a little colouring material. This apparently was the plan universally
adopted by the Venetians in the fifteenth century, and it is here that
their experience of the use of a similar enamel on copper may have
served them.
One cannot but marvel at the technical dexterity so early acquired,
and, alas! so soon lost by the Saracens, in the application of enamels
to glass. The means by which they avoided the use of a lead flux in the
case of their famous translucent blue, is above all worthy of
admiration (see above, Chapter X.).
Certain defects which we note in the glass to which the Venetians
applied their thick enamels may have been inseparably bound up with the
use of these same enamels, and the impossibility of overcoming these
defects may have been one of the causes of their abandonment and of the
general adoption in their place of the painted decoration—mere thin
skins of colour—which they were now able to apply to their white
_cristallo_, the typical glass of Venice. After the commencement of the
sixteenth century, indeed, the use of the solid enamels was almost
confined to beadings and subsidiary ornament sparingly applied.
[Illustration:
_PLATE XXX_
VENETIAN GLASS
1. ENAMELLED LAMP. EARLY SIXTEENTH CENTURY 2. ENAMELLED GLASS CUP.
FOUND IN EXCAVATIONS FOR CAMPANILE. FIFTEENTH CENTURY]
To return after this long digression to our class of thinly painted
enamels. We find that the use of these painted colours came in at quite
an early date. I will take as typical examples a pair of goblets or
wine-glasses in the British Museum, one from the Slade collection (No.
391), the other presented by the late Sir A. W. Franks. These are both
conical cups of simple outline, of which the bowl passes directly into
the spreading foot. The edge of this foot is turned over to form a sort
of ring on the upper margin. In fact, these goblets may be taken as
representatives of one of the earliest types of that long series of
wine-glasses that we shall come across again and again in later days.
On the first of these cups we see two figures on horseback, one waving
a banner and the other holding a flag; the costume points to the end of
the fifteenth century. This is a detail of some importance, for as a
rule the decoration of this class of enamelled glass is confined to
foliage, scrolls, and classically treated figures of sirens or satyrs.
Almost identical in shape, and decorated in a similar manner, is a
little goblet, or rather fragment of a goblet, lately dug up in the
Piazza of St. Mark at Venice during the excavations for the foundations
of the new Campanile. (Plate XXX. 2). This little glass, between four
and five inches in height, is of a thinnish clear metal, decorated with
scrolls of a somewhat Gothic character, indicated by lines of opaque
white; the other enamels are green, an opaque red, a rich yellow, and a
deep as well as a turquoise blue, the latter laid on thickly. This
goblet may perhaps be referred to the middle of the fifteenth century.
A still finer example of these ‘painted’ enamels is to be found in a
very beautiful ewer now in the Louvre. The colours are laid on with a
brush as in the previous specimens, but as we often find in later
examples—and this applies equally to the French and German enamelled
glass—the opaque red is here replaced by a poor brown. Within a large
medallion is seen a herald riding on a griffin; the ground is covered
by scale patterns and scrolls of many colours.