ENGLAND, SIXTEENTH CENTURY
(HENRY VIII--ELIZABETH--MARY STUART)
With the accession of Henry VIII a new period opens in the history of
the jeweller's art. The spirit of the revival, which had previously
affected only the Court, began to spread rapidly throughout the
community, under the influence of the example set by the great jewellers
of Italy. The King inherited an enormous treasury, and the display of
jewellery on his own person and on that of his Court was prodigious. We
are indebted to the Venetian ambassador, Giustinian, for the following
graphic description of the King's personal adornment a year or two after
his accession--
"He wore a cap of crimson velvet, in the French fashion, and the brim
was looped up all round with lacets and gold enamelled tags.... Very
close round his neck he had a gold collar, from which there hung a
rough-cut diamond, the size of the largest walnut I ever saw, and to
this was suspended a most beautiful and very large round pearl. His
mantle was of purple velvet lined with white satin, the sleeves open,
with a train more than four Venetian yards long. This mantle was girt in
front like a gown, with a thick gold cord, from which there hung large
golden acorns like those suspended from a cardinal's hat; over this
mantle was a very handsome gold collar, with a pendent St. George
entirely of diamonds. Beneath the mantle he wore a pouch of cloth of
gold, which covered a dagger; and his fingers were one mass of jewelled
rings."[130]
[130] Brewer (J. S.), _Henry VIII_, I, p. 10.
Many a lively and detailed picture has been left us by the chronicler
and lawyer, Edward Hall, of the equipage and adornment of Henry VIII on
his coronation and at the court entertainments, and particularly of the
famous meeting of the Cloth of Gold, where, in their insane desire to
outshine each other, the English and French nobles entered into
boundless extravagance in dress, and so loaded themselves with
jewellery, that, in the words of Du Bellay, "they carried the price
of woodland, water-mill, and pasture on their backs." Many are the
elaborate descriptions of entertainments and pageants by the chroniclers
Leland, Holinshed, and Stowe, in which rich jewellery figures; but
Hall's Chronicle, the most minute in its accounts of contemporary
fashions, teems with references to "Gold Smithe's woorke" and to the
wealth of precious stones broidered on the garments. The passion for
personal ornaments ran such riot that even foreign critics inveighed
against Englishmen for their extravagance.
This love of jewellery was largely due to foreign fashions, which
hitherto discountenanced, were growing popular at Court, in consequence
of the increasing communication with the Continent. From the
commencement of Henry's reign merchants and craftsmen from abroad
swarmed in numbers into London, and Hall, who shared the characteristic
English antipathy to all things foreign, gives an instance of an
invasion by these alien artificers. It was on the occasion of a
magnificent embassy from France in 1518 in connection with the betrothal
of the Princess Mary to the Dauphin that there came, he says, "a great
number of rascals and pedlars and jewellers, and brought over divers
merchantize uncustomed, all under the color of trussery [baggage] of the
ambassadors." In accordance with the system of his predecessors in
pursuit of their own personal interests, Henry VIII extended his
protection to the foreigner, while the example of the French Court, the
rivalry with Francis I, and the foreign proclivities of Wolsey and
Cromwell induced him to patronise extensively foreign jewellers and
merchants in precious stones. Occasionally Henry was a sufferer in his
transactions with sharp Italian dealers; and Cellini relates a story of
how a Milanese jeweller counterfeited an emerald so cleverly that he
managed to palm off the same for a genuine stone on the sovereign of
"those beasts of Englishmen," as he elsewhere terms them, for 9000
golden scudi. And all this happened, because the purchaser--who was no
less a person than the King of England--put rather more faith in the
jeweller than he ought to have done. The fraud was not found out till
several years after.
A considerable number of the foreign craftsmen patronised by the King
were Italians; but in jewellery the French influence seems to have
predominated--judging by the frequent mention of jewels of "Paris work,"
and by the fact that the majority of the jewellers mentioned in the
"King's Book of Payments,"[131] bear French names. Among those of
foreign extraction the following were the most prominent: Robert Amadas,
John Cryspyn, Allart Ploumyer, Jehan Lange, Cornelius Hays, Baptist
Leman, John Cavalcant, John Baptista de Consolavera, Guillim Honyson,
Alexander of Brussels, John of Utrecht, and John (Hans) of Antwerp. The
mention, however, of such names as John Angell, Morgan Fenwolf (a
Welshman), John Freeman, John Twiselton, Thomas Exmewe, Nicolas Worley,
John Monday, and William Davy indicates the English nationality of
several of the royal jewellers--though it is well to remember the
common tendency of the time to Anglicise foreign names.
[131] _Letters and Papers of Henry VIII_, II, p. 1441, etc.;
III, p. 1533, etc.
Throughout the first half of his reign Henry placed huge orders in
the hands of these craftsmen, but advancing years and an exhausted
treasury appear to have somewhat diminished his expenditure on personal
ornaments. Some interesting correspondence between the above-mentioned
Jehan Lange, a jeweller of Paris, and certain of his native townsmen has
been preserved.[132] "The King," he writes in 1537, referring to certain
jewelled garments he had submitted to His Majesty, "was very glad to see
such riches. He said he was too old to wear such things, but he has
offered 4000 cr." To Allart Ploumyer he writes: "The King always
makes good cheer, but he has grown cold, and we have not quite sold
everything; for the gentlemen have spent their money in the war." "I
find the King," he says in another place, "disinclined to buy, for he
has told me he has no more money, and it has cost him a great deal to
make war."
[132] _Letters and Papers_, XII, No. 47.
In spite of Lange's complaints, it was only just before his death that
Henry VIII acquired a famous and magnificent historical jewel, the great
pendant of Charles the Bold, last Duke of Burgundy.[133] In its centre
was set the wonderful diamond--a deep pyramid five-eighths of an inch
square at the base--believed to be the first on which Louis de Berghem
tried his newly invented method of cutting. Around it were set three
balas rubies, styled from their equality in size and weight the "Three
Brothers," which, owing to their fine quality, were set open, without
the foil with which stones were then usually backed. Between these were
four enormous pearls (Pl. XXV, 3). According to the universal custom of
his day, the Duke, accompanied by all his treasure when campaigning,
carried this jewel with him, partly to have it constantly under his
personal supervision, and partly because of the magic properties then
attributed to precious stones. Captured by a common soldier from his
tent after his memorable defeat at the battle of Granson in 1475, the
pendant came into the possession of the magistrates of Berne, and from
them was purchased by Jacob Fugger, of the opulent merchant family of
Augsburg, whose son, after keeping it for several years, disposed of
it to Henry VIII. Fifty years later the jewel was still intact, and
in James I's inventory of the crown jewels in 1603, it is thus
described:[134] "A fayre Flower,[135] with three greate ballaces, in the
myddest a greate pointed dyamonde, and three greate perles fixed, with a
fayre greate perle pendaunte, called _the Brethren_." The last we hear
of this famous jewel is in 1623, when it is described in the same words
in the list of jewels removed from the Tower by James I, and handed over
to his jeweller Heriot to be refashioned for the use of Charles and
Buckingham on their visit to Spain. That it was then remounted is
evident from the King's letter to his son, in which he says: "I send for
your wearing the Three Brethren, that you knowe full well, but newlie
sette."
[133] Lambecius, _Bibliotheca Cæsarea Vindobonensi_, II, p. 512.
[134] _Kalendars and Inventories of the Exchequer_, II, p. 304.
[135] That pendants were termed "flowers" is clear from W. Thomas's
_Italian Grammar_ (1548), where a _fermaglio_ is defined as "the
hangeing owche, or _flowre_ that women use to tye at the chayne or
lace that they weare about their neckes" (_Way, Prompt. parv._,
p. 359, n. 3).
About the year 1536 the great painter Hans Holbein, who had come to
England several years previously, entered into the service of Henry
VIII, and it was between that date and his death in 1543 that he
executed those masterpieces of design for jewellery which will ever
stand as a landmark in the history of the subject. There is no evidence
to show that Holbein himself worked in the precious metals. But brought
up under similar influences as had moulded the great Italian artists of
the Renaissance, Ghiberti, Pollaiuolo, Verrocchio, Francia, and
Ghirlandaio, who combined the arts of painting, architecture, and
sculpture with the jeweller's craft, he had been well grounded in the
limitations of his materials, and knew how far the draughtsman could
display his skill in this direction.
The most important of Holbein's designs for jewellery are preserved in
the British Museum, to which they were bequeathed by Sir Hans Sloane in
1753. The collection, originally mounted in a quarto volume, termed
Holbein's London Sketch-book, is now remounted and systematically
arranged. The designs, comprising 179 separate items, are for the most
part drawn with a pen with black ink, and then some slight touches of
brown put in for the shadows. Several of the designs have the ground
blackened, the ornaments being left in white. Some of the jewels,
entirely coloured and often touched up with gold, are designed for
enamelling in high relief; some are perhaps designed for execution in
niello, though it is not improbable that these were intended to be
ornamented with black champlevé enamel. The most attractive are the
patterns for jewels enriched with precious stones and enamels, the
majority of which were for neck pendants intended to hang from a chain,
ribbon, or silken cord, itself sometimes shown in the drawing (Pl.
XXVI).
The design of a few of these pendants is based upon the prevailing
custom of wearing initials of the name either in embroidery or in pure
gold attached to the garments. Some curious instances of this fashion
are recorded by Hall, particularly in his graphic account of what took
place at a masque given by Henry VIII at his palace at Westminster. Upon
the King's invitation to divide the rich garments of the maskers sewn
with letters of "fine and massy gold in bullyon as thicke as they might
be," which generally went as largess to the ladies, a rabble of
citizens, who were allowed to look on, broke in, and "ranne to the Kyng
and stripped hym into his hosen and dublet, and all his compaignions in
like wyse. Syr Thomas Knevet stode on a stage, and for all his defence
he lost his apparell. The ladies like wyse were spoyled, wherfore the
Kynges garde came sodenly, and put the people backe, or els it was
supposed more inconvenience had ensued." So pure was the gold of which
these letters were composed that it is recorded subsequently that a
"shipeman of London who caught certayn letters sould them to a goldsmyth
for £3. 14. 8"--quite a considerable sum in those days.
In the same way jewelled initials were also frequently worn in the form
of pendants and a jewelled B can be seen hanging from the neck of Anne
Boleyn in her portrait in the National Portrait Gallery. Holbein's
drawings contain several beautiful instances of this type of design,
generally completed with three pendent pearls. One of them has a
monogram of the initials R and E in chased and engraved gold set at the
four corners with two rubies, an emerald, and a diamond. Another has the
letters H and I (probably for Henry and Jane Seymour) with an emerald in
the centre; and a somewhat similar jewel, formed of the sacred monogram,
is worn by Jane Seymour in her portrait by Holbein at Vienna.
The designs for the larger pendants, mostly circular or lozenge-shaped,
are set with sapphires, diamonds, rubies, and pearls, and terminate with
large pear-shaped pearls. The spaces between the stones are filled with
chased or enamelled arrangements of scroll or leaf work.
The smaller jewels, which might also have been worn as enseignes or
badges on the hat, or as brooches, are of open goldwork with leaf or
ribbon ornament set with stones and pearls. They include a very
beautiful design of a half-length figure of a lady in the costume of
the period holding between her hands a large stone, upon which is the
inscription WELL LAYDI WELL (Pl. XXVI, 9). The fifteenth-century
traditions seem to have influenced Holbein in the design of this jewel,
which at once calls to mind the Flemish-Burgundian brooches (an example
of which, in the British Museum, has already been mentioned) ornamented
with similar figures, full-faced, and holding a large stone before them.
The jewels actually executed from these designs were probably the work
of Hans of Antwerp, known as John Anwarpe.[136] He was a friend of
Holbein, and one of the witnesses of his will; and his portrait, painted
by Holbein, is now at Windsor. Hans of Antwerp appears to have settled
in London about 1514, having perhaps been induced to do so by Thomas
Cromwell, who in early life resided for a time in Antwerp as secretary
to the English merchants there. It was presumably Cromwell who, as
"Master of the King's Jewel House," was instrumental in procuring for
him the post of the King's goldsmith. His name occurs several times in
Cromwell's accounts, and it was in accordance with the latter's "ryght
hartye commendations" that he obtained the freedom of the Goldsmiths'
Company of London. The chief duty of the King's goldsmith was to supply
the New Year's gifts (_estrennes_), so popular at that time. These
usually took the form of personal ornaments, and it seems likely that
Holbein's famous sketches were specially designed for this purpose.
[136] His family name was Van der Gow or Van der Goes.
See L. Cust, _Burlington Magazine_, VIII, p. 356.
ELIZABETH--MARY STUART
However remarkable the Court of Henry VIII was for its profusion of
jewellery, that of Queen Elizabeth, who inherited the Tudor love for
display, was still more extravagant. Throughout her reign--a period
marked also upon the Continent for its prolific production of
jewellery--the fashion set by the jewel-loving Queen for a
superabundance of finery maintained its sway. The country suddenly
becoming wealthy, was tempted, like one not born to riches, to use the
whole in outward show, and this display was rendered comparatively easy
by the influx of gold and precious stones after the Spanish conquests in
America.
Numerous portraits of courtiers and court ladies afford ample evidence
of the prevailing fashions in jewellery, while the portraits of the
Queen herself, all overburdened with ornaments, are too well known to
need detailed description.[137] "There is not a single portrait of her,"
says Walpole, "that one can call beautiful. The profusion of ornaments
with which they are loaded are marks of her continual fondness for
dress, while they entirely exclude all grace, and leave no more room for
a painter's genius than if he had been employed to copy an Indian idol,
totally composed of hands and necklaces. A pale Roman nose, a head of
hair loaded with crowns and powdered with diamonds, a vast ruff, a
vaster fardingale, a bushel of pearls, are features by which every body
knows at once the pictures of Queen Elizabeth."
[137] An enormous number of these exist. A catalogue of them
has been drawn up by Mr. F. M. O'Donoghue, of the British Museum.
An excellent description of the jewellery of Elizabeth towards the close
of her brilliant reign is given by Paul Hentzner, who visited England in
1598: "The Queen had in her ears two pearls with very rich drops; she
wore false hair and that red; upon her head she had a small crown; her
bosom was uncovered, and she had on a necklace of exceedingly fine
jewels. She was dressed in white silk, bordered with pearls of the size
of beans, and over it a mantle of black silk shot with silver threads;
her train was very long. Instead of a chain, she had an oblong collar
of gold and jewels." To a courtier who knelt to her, "after pulling off
her glove, she gave her right hand to kiss, sparkling with rings and
jewels."
The best of all representations of that "bright occidental Star" is her
faded waxwork effigy, still to be seen in Westminster Abbey--no other
than the one which on the 28th of April, 1603, was carried on her coffin
to the Abbey. It shows the veritable passion Elizabeth possessed for
pearls. Her stomacher is encrusted with large Roman pearls, while
strings of pearls hang round her throat and neck. Her earrings are
circular pearl and ruby medallions, with huge pear-shaped pearl
pendants.
Full of detail are the records of costly "juelles" that have come down
to us, particularly in the list, preserved in the British Museum,[138]
of the New Year's gifts presented to the Queen, from the fourteenth to
the thirty-sixth year of her reign. The practice of exchanging presents
on New Year's Day attained extraordinary proportions at the Court of
Elizabeth, and was supplemented by birthday presents, which, as Her
Majesty's weakness for jewellery was well known, took for the most part
the form of personal ornaments of every kind. The very accurate accounts
that were kept by the officers of the Queen's wardrobe of every item in
her enormous store of jewellery is witnessed by a number of curious
entries in her wardrobe-book of losses of jewellery sustained by Her
Majesty.[139]
[138] British Museum. MSS. No. 4827.
[139] Strickland, _Queens of England_, IV, pp. 262, 416.
In addition to numerous inventories and wills full of information
concerning the jewellery of the period, we have at our service, as in
Roman times, the works of social satirists, such as _The Anatomie of
Abuses_, by Philip Stubbes (1583), and Bishop Hall's poetical satires of
1597, to which we are indebted for many valuable details. In accepting
these it is well to bear in mind the common tendency of every age to
ridicule its own fashions; yet, in spite of Puritan narrowness, and
the exaggerated indignation of the satirist, it is manifest that
extraordinary luxury and extravagance in dress and jewellery were
prevalent not only at Court, but among all classes of the community.
Of greater importance, however, than the information to be gleaned from
pictorial and literary sources is that derived from the actual jewels
themselves, a considerable number of which, through all the changes
and chances of more than three centuries, have been handed down
still practically intact, and retaining the chief feature of their
decoration--their exquisite enamel. Shakespeare, while appreciating the
charm of its harmonious combination of colours, recognised, it appears,
the delicacy of this beautiful medium, when in the _Comedy of Errors_ he
makes Adriana say:--
I see the jewel best enamelled
Will lose his beauty; yet the gold bides still,
That others touch, and often touching will
Wear gold.
The New Learning, which made itself felt in England during the reign of
Henry VII, began at this time to exercise a direct influence on the
choice of the designs of jewels and on the arrangement of their
ornamentation. As witnesses of the intellectual revival, they often took
emblematic forms, bearing in exquisite enamel-work fancy mottoes and
devices, generally obscure in their interpretation, and intended to
express the sentiments of their wearers, or those of donors, regarding
the presumed state of mind of their recipients.
The passion for these reached its height in the golden days of Good
Queen Bess, when it became the fashion for the bejewelled gallants who
fluttered like a swarm of glittering insects around her to display their
wit and ingenuity in devising jewelled emblems as fit presents to the
Virgin Queen. Thus in the list of costly articles of jewellery offered
to Elizabeth, we meet with the present, made in Christmas week 1581, by
some courtiers disguised as maskers, of a jewel in the form of "a flower
of golde, garnished with sparcks of diamonds, rubyes, and ophales, with
an agathe of her Majestis phisnamy and a perle pendante, with devices
painted in it." The love for strange devices and enigmatical mottoes was
fostered by the spirit of an age that witnessed the production of Lyly's
_Euphues_ and Spenser's _Faerie Queene_; while Elizabeth's colossal
vanity prompted the dedication to her of highly laudatory mottoes, like
the inscription on a jewel belonging to Mr. Pierpont Morgan: HEI MIHI
QUOD TANTO VIRTUS PERFUSA DECORE NON HABET ETERNOS INVIOLATA DIES. Few
of the jewels of this stirring period display a more charming symbolism
than those produced after the defeat and destruction of the Spanish
Armada, whereon England is figured as an ark floating securely and
tranquilly on a troubled sea, surrounded by the motto, SAEVAS TRANQUILLA
PER UNDAS. The most remarkable of these Armada jewels is Mr. Pierpont
Morgan's, just mentioned, and another of the same class in the
Poldi-Pezzoli Museum, Milan.
A jewel more characteristic of the period than any other, and an
historical relic of singular interest, is that _chef d'oeuvre_ of
inventive genius--the Lennox or Darnley jewel, the property of His
Majesty the King. It is covered inside and out with the most elaborate
symbolism, and contains altogether no less than twenty-eight emblems and
six mottoes (Pl. XXVIII, 4). Internal evidence proves this remarkable
jewel to have been made by order of Lady Margaret Douglas, mother of
Henry Darnley, in memory of her husband, Matthew Stuart, Earl of Lennox,
who was killed in 1571.
Among many other examples of Elizabethan jewellery, there stand out
above the rest a certain number to which, besides their high artistic
excellence, is attached the additional interest of historical
associations. To this class belong the following important jewels: the
Berkeley heirlooms, belonging to Lord Fitzhardinge; the Drake jewels,
the property of Sir Francis Fuller-Eliott-Drake; the Wild Jewel (Miss
Wild); the Barbor Jewel (Victoria and Albert Museum); and the Phoenix
Jewel (Sloane Collection, British Museum). Public and private
collections likewise contain a considerable number of enamelled
miniature cases furnished with loops for suspension, and cameos set
with jewelled and enamelled mountings of the period.
The Berkeley heirlooms, among which is the Anglo-Saxon ring already
mentioned, include the Hunsdon Onyx, the Drake pendant in form of a
ship, Edward VI's Prayer Book, and a crystal armlet. These exquisite
jewels, according to tradition, were presented by Queen Elizabeth to her
cousin Henry Carey, Lord Hunsdon, who died in 1596. They then passed to
his son George, the second Baron Hunsdon, who so highly valued them,
that he bequeathed them on his death, in 1603, to his wife, and
afterwards to his only daughter Elizabeth, with strict injunctions to
transmit the same to her posterity, to be preserved (according to the
actual terms of his will) "Soe longe as the conscience of my heires
shall have grace and honestie to perform my will, for that I esteeme
them right jeweles, and monumentes worthie to be kept for theire
beautie, rareness, and that for monie they are not to be matched, nor
the like yet knowen to be founde in this realme." The jewels mentioned,
which came into the Berkeley family through the marriage of the
above-named Elizabeth Carey with Lord Berkeley, are still preserved at
Berkeley Castle.
[Illustration: _PLATE XXVIII_ RENAISSANCE JEWELLERY OF ENAMELLED GOLD
(THE PROPERTY OF HIS MAJESTY THE KING)]
Further reference to these and other remarkable Elizabethan jewels will
be given when the special species of ornaments to which they belong is
being dealt with. There is one jewel of this date, however, which,
though it no longer exists, is of particular interest from the fact
that it is specially mentioned in the famous inventory of Charles I's
collection drawn up by Abraham Van der Doort in 1639.[140] This golden
jewel, we learn, was round, and hung with a small pendent pearl; one
side was enamelled with a representation of the battle of Bosworth
Field, and the other with the red and white roses of Lancaster and York
upon a green ground. Within were four miniatures, Henry VII, Henry VIII,
Edward VI, and Queen Mary. The miniatures are still preserved at Windsor
Castle, but shorn of their enamelled case, which has long since
disappeared. The jewel was bought by the King, so Van der Doort tells
us, from "young Hilliard," son of the famous miniaturist Nicholas
Hilliard, who, besides painting the miniatures, probably also executed
the enamel-work upon the jewel itself. Hilliard, like the artists of
the Renaissance already cited, had been brought up as a goldsmith and
jeweller, and, as we see by the inscription which he placed round his
own portrait, held an appointment as goldsmith at Elizabeth's Court;
while his knowledge and love of jewellery are admirably displayed in his
miniatures, in which every jewel is painted with faultless accuracy and
care.
[140] Vertue (G.), _Catalogue of the collection of Charles I_, p. 47.
The mention of Hilliard introduces to our notice the other creators of
the beautiful jewellery of the period. English work continued to be
influenced by the Continent; and engraved designs for jewellery by the
Frenchmen Ducerceau and Woeiriot, and by the eminent goldsmith and
engraver Theodor de Bry, who himself worked in London in 1587 and the
two following years, must have been well known and imitated in England.
In spite of this, however, it would appear that Englishmen were no
longer actually dependent for their jewellery upon foreigners. The
latter ceased to hold the virtual monopoly they had once enjoyed; and
their place was taken by a number of native craftsmen. Among these, the
following were the most prominent: Dericke Anthony, Affabel Partridge,
Peter Trender, and Nicolas Herrick--elder brother of William Herrick,
James I's jeweller, and father of Robert Herrick the poet. During the
latter years of her reign Hugh Kayle and his partner Sir Richard Martin
supplied the Queen with jewels as New Year's gifts and presents to
ambassadors amounting to upwards of £12,000.
Enough has been said to demonstrate that the reign of Elizabeth, fertile
in great events, was productive of much important jewellery, whose
charm, excellence, and historic interest have, up to the present, by no
means received the attention they deserve. And it may be stated, without
prejudice, that jewels of the period which bear a clear stamp of English
origin compare favourably, nay even advantageously, with the productions
of contemporary jewellers of the Continent.
* * *
The jewels of the unhappy Mary Stuart form a subject of peculiar
interest. Like her jealous rival Queen Elizabeth, Mary was most lavish
in her display of jewellery. In addition to the crown jewels she had
a profusion of personal ornaments, her own private property. Her
inventories, published by the Bannatyne Club (1863), furnish many a
vivid description of the splendid objects which, during the course of
her turbulent life, she bestowed on her friends or lost under stress of
circumstances. They have further acquired quite an historical celebrity
"from the frequency with which they were claimed by their unfortunate
mistress in her appeals for mercy and justice during her long captivity,
and the rapacity with which her royal jailer and other enemies sought or
retained possession of these glittering spoils."
It is impossible here to enter into details respecting the many
beautiful things recorded in her inventories, or the strange
vicissitudes that they underwent. Their dispersal would seem to have
begun with her infatuated passion for Bothwell. The number of jewels she
lavished on him when they parted on Carberry Hill, those she distributed
as personal gifts, and others that served in the various emergencies in
which the unfortunate Queen found herself, afford some idea of the
extraordinary quantity of precious articles in her possession. A few of
Mary's actual jewels, such as the Duke of Norfolk's rosary and jewelled
necklace, the Duke of Portland's jewelled cameo, and the Penicuik jewel,
have been preserved to our own day. Along with the historical documents
must rank the Leven and Melville portrait--the brilliant centre-piece of
Mr. Andrew Lang's _Portraits and Jewels of Mary Stuart_. As far as
jewellery in general is concerned, this portrait may be said to merit
greater consideration than any picture of its own or of other times, in
that it displays a complete parure of contemporary jewellery, each item
of which is entered and described in detail in the personal inventories
of the individual it represents.