among the most important pieces of plate. During the 16th century Augsburg and Nuremberg, long celebrated for their silver work, developed a school of craftsmen whose splendid productions have often been ascribed to the great Cellini himself. In the first decade of the 16th century, Paul Müllner, a Nuremberg goldsmith, furnished Frederick the Wise with several silver-gilt reliquaries for his collection at Wittenberg. Later in the same century came the Jamnitzer family of Nuremberg, chief among them being Wentzel Jamnitzer, one of whose masterpieces, an enamelled silver centre-piece, belongs to the baroness James de Rothschild of Paris. Mathaeus Wallbaum of Augsburg was another celebrated goldsmith of the 16th century. His chief works are religious ornaments of ebony mounted in silver, and the Pommerscher Kunstschrank in the Kunstgewerbe Museum, Berlin. But the chief German goldsmith of the 16th century was Anton Eisenhoit[1] of Warburg, who wrought the fine crucifix (1589), the chalice and other ecclesiastical vessels which belong to the Fürstenberg family. Other notable craftsmen of this period were Hans Petzolt and Melchior Bayr, the latter having made the silver altar (with scenes from the Life of Christ after Dürer) for the king of Poland, which is in the Sigismund chapel in Cracow Cathedral.[2] Jakob Mores, the elder, of Hamburg, was employed by the royal house of Denmark. A large number of his original designs for plate are in the public art library at Berlin. Jakob Mores, the younger, executed the silver altar at Frederiksborg in the 17th century. In Germany the traditions of earlier Gothic art were less rapidly broken with, and many purely Gothic forms survived there till the end of the 16th century, and Gothic decorative features even later. In the first half of the 17th century, though the technical skill of the German silversmiths reached a high standard of merit, there was some falling off in the execution and in the purity of outline in their designs. Germany is richer in secular plate than any other country. The remarkable royal collections of plate in the green vaults at Dresden, Gotha and Munich, as well as public museums in Germany, including the treasure of Lüneburg at Berlin, afford excellent opportunities for the study of the German goldsmith's art, the remarkable chalice, 12th century, of St Gothard's church, Hildesheim; the celebrated Kaiserbecher of Osnabrück of the 13th century; the cup given by the emperor Frederick III. and Mathias Corvinus to Vienna in 1462, and the splendid ewer of Goslar, 1477, are notable specimens of early German work. In England the only public collections of German plate worthy of notice are the “Waddesdon” in the British Museum, and the Victoria and Albert Museum. Prior to its dispersal among his five daughters, the late baron Carl von Rothschild's collection at Frankfort-on-Main was the most extensive private collection in existence. The Gutmann collection, acquired by Mr J. Pierpont Morgan, contains many rare pieces, as does that of the baronesses Alphonse and Salomon de Rothschild in Paris. Many of the most beautiful vessels of crystal, agate, &c., formerly attributed to Italian artists, were carved and engraved and set in beautiful enamelled gold and silver mounts, in southern Germany in the 16th and 17th centuries. At the end of the 17th and the beginning of the 18th centuries household plate and other ornaments were frequently decorated with painted enamels, mostly originating from Augsburg. Dinglinger of Dresden and his school at about this time exercised considerable influence in the production of ornaments in pearl and other materials, elaborately carved, mounted and enamelled.
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Fig. 13.—Silver Cup, 8¼ in. high, usually attributed to Jamnitzer, but more probably by Paul Flint. Made at Nuremberg about the middle of the 16th century. (S. K. M.) |
Fig. 14.—Ewer by François Briot, about 10 in. high. Middle of 16th century. |
Several specimens exist of the models of cups required of candidates for the rank of master-craftsmen in the second half of the 16th century. One of these, at the Victoria and Albert Museum, is believed to have been wrought by Martin Rehlein of Nuremberg in 1572-1573.[3]
Many of the famous 15th and 16th century artists—such as Martin Schön, Israel von Mecken, Aldegrever, Altdorfer, Brosamer, Peter Flötner, the Behams, Hopfer and Hans Holbein the younger, supplied the silversmiths with designs for plate. Several of Holbein's original designs, including one for the gold cup probably wrought by his friend, John of Antwerp, for Queen Jane Seymour, are in the Print Room, British Museum, where there is also an original design for a table fountain by the celebrated artist, Albrecht Dürer. Virgil Solis of Nuremberg (1514-1562) was especially fertile in designing plate, and he executed a large series of etchings of designs for vases, cups, ewers, tazze, &c.[4] Many of the German silver ewers and basins resemble those made in pewter at the end of the 16th century by François Briot and Gaspar Enderlein, who migrated from Switzerland to Germany.
Switzerland.-This country produced several silversmiths whose work in the main follows that of the German school. The three historical beakers in the national library at Zurich were made in that city from money sent out as gifts from England by the three English bishops, jewel of Salisbury, Horn of Winchester, and Parkhurst of Norwich, in appreciation of the hospitality afforded them during their exile at Zürich, in the reign of Queen Mary I.[5] Important plate was wrought at Berne, Rappersweil and other Swiss towns.
Russia.—In no country is the ecclesiastical and secular plate of greater interest than in Russia, where so many different influences have been at work in its designs and decoration-Byzantine, Oriental, Gothic, Renaissance, &c. The “golden age” of ecclesiastical art was undoubtedly the 17th century, when the churches and monasteries were being enriched with many priceless ornaments in the precious metals. Enamels of great richness—which had been introduced there by Hungarian artists—niello and precious stones were employed in the decoration A drinking-cup or bowl exclusively Russian in form and character, known as bratina, was largely made (see the fine one of gold, enamelled and set with precious stones, in the royal collection at Vienna), as was a smaller bowl, called czarka, with a single handle. Another secular vessel, peculiarly Russian, is the kovsh, a pointed or boat-shaped bowl with a long handle. Much of the domestic plate after Peter the Great's time was influenced by that of western countries, particularly Germany.
Poland.—Though not without a character of its own, the
- ↑ Lessing, Die Silber-Arbeiten von Anton Eisenhoit (1880).
- ↑ Illustrated by Ordzywolski, in Renesaus w Polsce, pls. 11-12.
- ↑ See Rosenberg in Kunst und Gewerbe (1885).
- ↑ See twenty-one facsimiles of these etchings published by J. Rimell (London, 1862).
- ↑ Keller, “Three Silver Cups at Zürich, ” Arch. Journ. xvi. 158.
