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Lapis Lydius, Touchstone, Assaying

Lapis Lydius, Touchstone, Assaying Page of 384 Lyncurium, Jacinth Text size:minus plus Restore normal size   Mail page  Print this page
LAPIS LYDIUS.
159
Livianum, as "imitating the excellence of aurichalcum" (xxxiv. 2), in its fine colour evidently. The latter quality is further indicated by the fact he mentions that aurichalcum was used for foiling the paler sorts of the Chrysolithus. That it was a costly metal is also clear from Horace's (A. P. 202) allusion to its use for binding the large and expensive flutes then in fashion at the theatre : besides Ovid's introduction of the same article into the architecture of heaven.
" Regia Sools erat sublimibus alta columnis, Clara micante auro flammasque imitante pyropo. "
Its manufacture was preserved by the Italians down to the Eevival, but only as the material of foils for precious stones ; as will appear from a consideration of the recipes for making the different foils given by Cellini in his ' Orefeceria.' Pliny only mentions three kinds of them, the aurichalcum, the pyropus, and a silver foil (argentœ bracteœ) for the Sard. Now Cellini directs the jeweller how to make thin sheets out of gold, silver, and pure copper, united in varying proportions according to the colour required. This last was produced by holding the polished sheet of metal (hence its name ßôïôá. foglio) over a charcoal fire until it acquired the proper tint : exactly as they now-a-days blue steel.* It will be perceived that Cellini's alloys answer to the various kinds of Corinthian Brass. Foils in the present trade are manufactured much more simply, by painting a sheet of silver-foil with the required colour mixed in a transparent varnish.
I * Cellini says nothing of the curious recipes given by Porta for pro­ducing the different colours in the metallic sheet, by meaus of the smoke of different substances burnt on the furnace below : the sapphire-colour by the smoke of the blue feathers of a drake, the emerald by box-leaves, the ruby by scraps of scarlet cloth, &c.
Lapis Lydius, Touchstone, Assaying Page of 384 Lyncurium, Jacinth
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