History of European Jewellery

HISTORY OF EUROPEAN JEWELLERY The Empire of Rome, which had extended to the Rhine, the Danube and the Scottish frontier, and the trade of Rome, which had passed beyond these limits through Bohemia to the northern countries, left behind them a tradition so strong that it long outlived the Roman empire itself. In all this region the form, technique and decoration of jewels were influenced by Roman usage. The use of gold filigree remained general; and the varied Roman fibula forms became the basis of yet more complicated brooches. The most important development was in the use of thin slices of garnet set like enamel in metal cells (Plate A 2, 4, 7, 8), a technique ultimately derived from Egypt and probably transmitted through the Crimea. It is represented in the great 4th-century treasure found at Petrossa, 6o m. from Bucharest, and appears to have been in use nearly all over Europe between the 3rd and 8th centuries A.D. At the same time under Byzantine in fluence cloisonné enamel (see ENAMEL) was used for exceptional pieces, such as the famous Alfred jewel (Plate A, 1-3). This com mon tradition, however, was modified by each of the great Euro pean tribes into a style characteristic both in design and technique. Thanks to the general custom of burying their jewels with the dead these types of jewellery are well represented in European museums.

Ostrogothic Jewellery.

In Italy classical influence was strong, but the Ostrogoths developed the type of the Roman radiated fibula into brooches of great magnificence, and combined the Byzantine interlaced style with the northern style of animal decoration, to produce a type of ornament that was to be yet more fully developed in Scandinavia.

Visigothic.

The Visigoths used cloisonné work set with gar nets or pastes, combined with pearls and cabochon gems set in fretted gold. The most splendid surviving Visigothic jewels are the crowns dedicated by Kings Svinthila (621-623) and Recces vinthus (649-672), now in the Musee de Cluny, Paris, and the Real Armeria, Madrid.

Frankish.

The Franks practised a more Germanic style, but with their settlement of Gaul came under the influence of the Gaulish classical tradition. Their characteristic forms are rosette or circular brooches, generally decorated with filigree, brooches shaped as birds, and buckles of heavy rectangular form. They also developed the Roman type of radiated fibula with oval foot and square or semicircular headplate (a type which was also used with a lozenge foot in the Rhineland), and occasionally used the classical fish and horse forms of brooch. The goldsmiths of the Belgian provinces practised a "chip carving" style of design, that was common over a wide area in the 5th century but was later characteristic of Scandinavia.

Scandinavian.

Scandinavia developed the common types along complex lines and produced fibulae of great size and elabo ration. In the 5th century Sweden was the end of a Byzantine trade route, but after this period classical influences are very slight. The Swedish "bracteates," circular pendants of thin gold, are at first imitated from Roman medallions of the time of Con stantine, but in the 5th century the local style of animal ornament supersedes this, and when coins are imitated they are Anglo Saxon sceattas.

In Norway, too, fibula types of the 4th, 5th and early 6th centuries are derived from Roman or Crimean Gothic originals but after about 55o the types become national. The Scandinavian "tortoise" and trefoil brooches are entirely characteristic ; the former date from the 7th to the early I 1 th century, while the latter are characteristic of the 9th and loth centuries. These and cognate circular brooches (Plate I., fig. 5) are generally decorated with symmetrical designs of considerable beauty. The relations between Scandinavia and Ireland in the 8th and 9th centuries brought in the type of penannular brooch which in its attenuated northern form is characteristic of the Viking age.