406 Cameo of Augustus in the Blacas Collection. 



cameos were rarer than the others, and were probably seldom 

 given to the artists of inferior merit who employed themselves 

 on intaglios, and the two processes differed considerably in 

 the manner of carrying them into execution. In modern t 

 excavations on ancient sites, an intaglio is often found, but a 

 cameo very rarely. Even now we do not know where the 

 Eomans obtained the large sardonyxes on which they engraved 

 the fine cameos which are preserved. 



The sardonyx on which the fine head of Augustus in the 

 Blacas collection is engraved forms an oval, five inches and a 

 quarter in length, by three inches and three quarters in 

 breadth, and is of very good quality. The ground, or layer, 

 of the stone out of which the head rises is of a fine russet 

 colour, which throws the engraving into very delicate, though 

 rather low relief. A head of Medusa appears to form the centre 

 of the shield which covers the breast. Augustus has a band, 

 or fillet, round his head, the sign of his imperial dignity, on 

 which are set four precious stones, an emerald on the left, and, 

 following it in their order towards the right, a sapphire, a 

 topaz, and a ruby, and round the figure in the middle are 

 arranged four very small diamonds. In the collection of the 

 Imperial Library at Paris, there are several cameos as large, 

 and perhaps a little larger, than the Augustus of the Blacas 

 collection, but there is hardly one of them that equals it, and 

 certainly not one that excels it as a work of art. The expres- 

 sion of the countenance is brought out with great delicacy and 

 refinement, and the artist has displayed the greatest skill in 

 taking advantage of the colours and shades offered him by the 

 stone. Little appears to be known of the history of this 

 remarkable work of art, except that it was formerly in the 

 Strozzi collection. 



The age of Augustus is said to have been that at which the 

 art of engraving precious stones was cairied to the highest 

 degree of excellence among the Romans, and we need not 

 therefore be surprised if we find so many of them representing 

 the features of that emperor. Pliny (xxxvii. 4) celebrates the 

 merits of a portrait of Augustus by an engraver named Dios- 

 corides, which was used as the signet of the empefors who 

 succeeded him. One of the finest cameos known is a tri- 

 coloured sardonyx, about a foot high, representing, in twenty- 

 two figures, the apotheosis of the Emperor Augustus, and 

 which was therefore probably engraved soon after his death. 

 It was brought from Constantinople Jn the reign of St. Louis, 

 and being, in the ignorance of that time, supposed to represent 

 the triumph of Joseph over Pharaoh, it was considered to 

 regard the church more than the laity, and was placed by that 

 monarch among the treasures of the Sainte Chapelle in Paris. 



