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Vitrum Annulare, Pastes

Vitrum Annulare, Pastes Page of 453 Vitrum Annulare, Pastes Text size:minus plus Restore normal size   Mail page  Print this page
346
VITRUM ANNULARE.
surface, produced by the oxidising of the glass from the action of the salts of the earth. Another is the porous, bubbly texture, not only of the surface, but of the entire substance. The latter peculiarity does indeed distinguish them from those of the modern fabrique, which, when they counterfeit the transparent gems, are pure and homogeneous throughout, being in fact made of what is technically called " pot-metal," or glass stained of one colour. These, from the greater fusibility of the composition, usually ex­hibit a polished surface within the intaglio, not far below that of the real stone whence it was derived. But it must be remem­bered that this hardness would be found equally in modern pastes, supposing them made out of the fragments of ancient glass, so abundantly procurable about Rome whenever the soil is disturbed, whilst the roughness of the surface entirely depends upon the coarseness of the matrix, which may be obtained at pleasure. As for the iridescence on which some amateurs set such store, I strongly suspect it is often produced by chemical means. But indeed bits of glass, after a few years' exposure to the acids of a garden soil, often turn up with surfaces fully as iridescent as the most indubitable antique of the class.
As counterfeits of precious stones, Pastes can be traced back to the most remote ages of antiquity. Herodotus describes the pendants piit in the ears of the sacred crocodiles, under the name of "λίθινα χυτά,1 " fused gems," a curious yet accurate peri­phrasis. Such pendants, in blue or green transparent pastes, figure much more frequently than real stones in those elegant and elaborate ear-rings that carry us back to the early ages of
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