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inclining more to a violet cast than the pyrope, and can be obtained
in larger pieces. The ancientflgarnets, from Etruscan and Byzantine
remains, some of which are at plates set in gold, or carved with
mythological designs, were probably obtained from India or perhaps
from the remarkable locality for large masses of garnet in German
East Africa. Many are cut with the portraits of Sassanian kings with
their characteristic pearl earrings. The East Indians carve small
dishes out of a single garnet.
The carving of elegant objects from transparent quartz, or rock
crystal, has been carried on since the 16th century, first in Italy, by
the greatest masters of the time, and afterwards in Prague, under
Rudolph II., until the Thirty Years' Vi/ar, when the industry was
wiped out. Splendid examples of this work are in the important
museums of Europe. Many of these are reproduced now in Vienna,
and fine examples are included in some American museums. Among
them are rock-crystal dishes several inches across, beautifully engraved
in intaglio and mounted in silver with gems. Other varieties
of quartz minerals, such as agate, jasper, &c., and other ornamental
stones of similar hardness, are likewise wrought into all manner of
art objects. Caskets, vases, ewers, coupés and animal and other
fanciful forms, are familiar in these opaque and semi-transparent
stones, either carved out of single masses or made of separate pieces
united with gold, silver or enamel in the most artistic manner.
Cellini, and other masters in the 16th and 17th centuries, vied with
each other in such work.
The greatest development of agate (q.v.), however, has been seen
in Germany, at Waldkirch in Breisgau, and especially at Idar and
Oberstein on the Nahe, in Oldenburg. The industry began in the
14th century, at the neighbouring town of Freiburg, but was transferred
to Vi/aldkirch, where it is still carried on, employing about 120
men and women, the number of workmen having increased nearly
threefold since the middle of the 19th century. The Idar and
Oberstein industry was founded somewhat later, but is much more
extensive. Mills run by water-power line the Nahe river for over
30 m., from above Kreuznach to below Idar, and gave employment in
1908 to some 5000 people-1625 lapidaries, 160 drillers, Ioo engravers,
2900 cutters, &c., besides 300 jewellers and 300 dealers. The industry
began here in consequence of the abundance of agates in the amygdaloid
rocks of the vicinity; and it is probable that many of the Cinque
Cento gems, and perhaps even some of the Roman ones, were obtained
in this region. By the middle of the 18th century the best
material was about exhausted, but the industry had become so
firmly established that it has been kept up and increased by importing
agates. In 154O there were only three mills; in 1740, twenty five;
in 1840, fifty; in 187O, one hundred and eighty-four. Agents
and prospectors are sent all over the world to procure agates and
other ornamental stones, and enormous quantities are brought there
and stored. The chief source of agate supply has been in Uruguay,
but much has been brought from other distant lands. It was estimated
that fifty thousand tons were stored at Salto in Uruguay at
one time.
The grinding is done on large, horizontal wheels like grindstones,
some 6 ft. in diameter and one-fourth as thick, run by. water-wheels.
The faces of some of these grindsto1.es are made with grooves of
different sizes so that round objects or convex surfaces can be ground
very easily and rapidly. An agate ball or marble, for instance, is
made from a piece broken to about the right size and held in one of
these semicircular grooves until one-half of it is shaped, and then
turned over and the other half ground in the same way. The
polishing is done on wooden wheels, with tripoli found in the vicinity;
any carving or ornamentation is then put on with a wheel-edge or a
drill by skilled workmen.
In the United States the Drake Company at Sioux Falls, South
Dakota, has done cutting and polishing in hard materials on a grand
scale. It is here, and here only, that the agatized wood from Chalcedony
Park, Arizona, has been cut and polished, large sections of
tree-trunks having been made into table-tops and columns of
wonderful beauty. with a polish like that of a mirror.
Much of the finest lapidary work, both on a large and a small scale,
is done in Russia. Catherine II. sought to develop the precious
stone resources of the Ural region, and sent thither two Italian
lapidaries. This led to the founding of an industry which 110w employs
at least a thousand people. The work is done either at the
great imperial lapidary establishment at Ekaterinburg, or in the
vicinity of the mines by lapidary masters, as they are called, each
of whom has his peculiar style. The products are sold to dealers
at the great Russian fairs at Nizhniy Novgorod, Moscow and
Ekaterinburg. The imperial works at the last-named place have
command of an immense water-power, and are on such a scale that
great masses of hard stones can be worked as marble is in other
countries. Much of the machinery is primitive, but the applications
are ingenious and the results unsurpassed anywhere. The work
done is of several classes, ranging from the largest and most massive
to the smallest and most delicate. There is (1) the cutting of facetted
gems, as topaz, aquamarine, amethyst, &c., from the mines of the
Ural, and of other gem-stones also; this is largely done by means of
the cadrans, a small machine held in the hand, by which the angle
of the facets can be adjusted readily when once the stone has been
set, and which produces work of great beauty and accuracy. Then
there is (2) a vast variety of ornamental objects, large and small,
some weighing 2000 lb and over, and requiring years to complete;
they are made from the opaque minerals of the U1'al and Siberiamalachite,
rhodonite, lapis-lazuli, aventurine and jasper. A peculiar
type of work is (3) the production of beautiful groups of fruit, flowers
a11d leaves, in stones selected to match exactly the colo11r of each
object represented. These are chosen with great care and skill,
somewhat as in the Florentine mosaics, not to produce a fiat inlaid
picture, however, but a perfect reproduction of form, size and colour.
These groups are carved and polished from hard stones, whereas the
Florentine mosaic work includes' many substances that are much
softer, as glass, shell, &e.
Enormous masses of material are brought to these works; the
supply of rhodonite, jade, jaspers of various colours, &c., sometimes
amounting to hundreds of tons. One mass of Kalkansky jasper
weighed nearly 9 tons, and a mass of rhodonite above 50 tons;
the latter required a week of sledging, with ninety horses, to bring it
from the quarry, only 14 m. from the works. About seventy-five
men are employed, at twenty-five roubles a month (£2, 11s. 6d.),
and ten boys, who earn from two to ten roubles (4s. to £I). A
training school is connected with the works, where over fifty boys are
pupils; on graduating they may remain 'as government lapidaries
or set up on their own account.
There are two other great Russian imperial establishments of the
same kind. One of these, founded by Catherine II., is at Peterhof,
a short distance from the capital; it is a large building fitted up
with imperial elegance. Here are made all the designs and models
for the work done at Ekaterinburg; these are returned and strictly
preserved. In the Peterhof works are to be seen the largest and most
remarkable achievements of the lapidarian art, vases and pedestals
and columns of immense size, made from the hardest and most
elegant stones, often requiring the labour of years for their completion.
The third great establishment is at Kolyvan, in Siberia,
bearing a like relation to the minerals and gem-stones of the Altai
region that the works of Ekaterinburg do to the Ural. The three
establishments are conducted at large expense, from the private
revenue of the tsar. The Russian emperors have always taken
special interest in lapidary work, and the products of these establishments
have made that country famous throughout the world. The
immense monolithic columns of the Hermitage and of St Isaac's
Cathedral, of polished granite and other hard and elegant stones,
are among the triumphs of modern architectural work; and the
Alexander column at St Petersburg is a single polished shaft, 13 ft.
in diameter and 82 ft. in height, of the red Finland granite.
The finest lapidary work of modern France is done at Moulin la
Vacherie Saint Simon, Seine-et-Marne, where some seventy-five of
the most skilful artisans are engaged. The products are all manner
of ornamental objects of every variety of beautiful stone, all finished
with absolute perfection of detail. Columns and other ornaments of
porphyry and the like, of ancient workmanship, are brought hither
from Egypt and elsewhere, and recut into smaller objects for modern
artistic tastes. Here, too, are made spheres of transparent quartz“
crystal balls ”-up to 6 in. in diameter, the material for which is
obtained in Madagascar.
A few words may be said, by way of comparison and contrast,
about the lapidary art of japan and China, especially in relation to
the crystal balls, now reproduced in France and elsewhere. The tools
are the simplest, and there is no machinery; but the lack of it is
made up by time and patience, and by hereditary pride, as a Japanese
artisan can often trace back his art through many generations
continuously. To make a quartz ball, a large crystal or mass is
chipped or broken into available shape, and then the piece is trimmed
into a spherical form with a small steel hammer. The polishing is
effected by grinding with emery and garnet-powder and plenty of
water, in semi-cylindrical pieces of cast iron, of sizes varying with
that of the ball to be ground, which is kept constantly turning as it
is rubbed. Small balls are fixed in the end of a bamboo tube, which
the worker continually revolves. The final brilliant polish is given
by the hand, with rouge-powder (haematite). This process is
evidently very slow, and only the cheapness of labour prevents the
cost from being too great.
The spheres are now made quite freely but very differently in
France, Germany and the United States. They are ground in semicircular
grooves in a large horizontal wheel of hard stone, such as is
used for grinding garnets at Oberstein and Idar, or else by gradually
revolving them on a lathe and fitting them into hollow cylinders.
Plenty of water must be used, to prevent heating and cracking.
The polishing is effected on a wooden wheel with tripoli. Work of
this kind is now done in the United States, in the production of the
spheres and carved ornaments of rock-crystal, that is equal to any
in the world. But most of the material for these supposed japanese
balls now comes from Brazil or Madagascar, and the work is done in
Germany or France.
The cutting of amber is a special branch of lapidary work developed
along the Baltic coast of Germany, where amberis chiefly obtained.
The amber trafhc dates back to prehistoric times; but the cutting
industry in northern Europe cannot be definitely traced further back
than the 14th century, when gilds of amber-workers were known at
Bruges and Ltibeck. Fine carving was also done at Konigsberg as
early as 1399. The latter city and Danzig have become the chief
Seats of the amber industry, and the business has increased immensely<noinclude><references/></div></noinclude>