his special use as a private signet. The native country of Dioscorides is known from the inscription on the Minerva of the Prince di Avella at Naples, which runs thus:-"Eutyches, son of Dioscorides of Aege, made this." This Aege was probably the town of that name in Aeolia of Asia Minor."

Hyllus, known to us by his grand Dionysiac Bull, treated in a style similar to the type of the autonomous coins of Sybaris, may for this very reason be placed among the artists anterior to the Roman empire.

Of Antiochus the date is quite unknown. The Head of Sabina, ascribed to him by Bracci, does in reality read Antiochis, the name of the lady it represents. To the age of Septimius Severus we may safely assign Gauranus, Carpus, and Apelles, absurdly read Apsalus by Stosch.

Amongst those earlier than the reign of Augustus we may reckon Apollodotus, for his style, though not altogether accurate, is yet of considerable simplicity; Plutarchus, on account of the beauty of the characters of his signature on his cameo at Florence, a design also treated with considerable talent; and Teucer, on account of the purity of his style. Caecas is but the false reading of Cascae, the owner's name. Lucius, from his name, belongs to imperial times.

To return to Roman artists belonging to the Greek school,

4 This form of the artist's signature upon a gem is quite without precedent. Visconti appears to entertain no doubt of its authenticity, but it seems to me to have been suggested to some Italian gem-improver by the inscription on the splendid mosaic found at Pompeii in 1764, representing a comic scene, Dioscorides of Samos made this.' This picture is the very perfection of the art of the mosaic worker, and may be assigned with some confidence to the great engraver himself if we

bear in mind the versatility of genius of the old artists, as well as rare occurrence of the name; the same peculiarity of spelling occurs in this also as upon the gems, where we always find Dioscourides, not Dioscorides. As the early mosaics were principally composed of tesserae of hard stones, and not exclusively of glass, like those of Byzantine date, there is a kind of relationship between mosaic and the art of gemengraving, by which he subsequently became illustrious.

such as Quintus, Aulus, and Gnæus. The finest works of the last are his young Hercules, his Cleopatra, one in the Strozzi, the other in the Kircherian Collection at Rome. Both are examples of most exquisite skill. His Juno Lanuvina, or Head of Hercules covered with the hide of the Bull of Marathon, is indeed an antique intaglio, but the name Gnæus is a forgery of Ant. Pikler.

Of the period of the Lower Empire, the famous Sapphire of Constantius, published by Ducange, is now in the Rinuccini Cabinet at Florence. To this epoch must be assigned Chaeremon, Phocas, Nicephorus, and Zosimus, if indeed the works bearing these names are originals, and not copies of more ancient gems. As for the names themselves, they afford no argument as to the date of the artists, having been borne in the early as well as in the later times of Greece.

The large size and beauty of the pieces of Sardonyx used for the Byzantine camei representing Scriptural subjects, is a proof that the decay of the empire had not rendered these stones more rare or more difficult to procure-a fact confirming the opinion that the supply of this material came from India, with which a very active trade was kept up during the whole period of the Greek empire.

THE ANTIQUE GEMS OF THE BRITISH MUSEUM.

These hidden treasures of the great National Collection, a portion of its contents so highly interesting and yet so little

known, may be briefly noticed in this place, inasmuch as amongst them will be found some gems inscribed with the signature of the artist, which may be ranked amongst the finest in existence. The collection is small in point of numbers, consisting of about 500 rings and unset stones; the former arranged in five cases and mounted in gold, with some few in silver settings. They come from the bequests of Townley, Payne Knight, and Cracherode; the collection of the latter containing indeed no work of very great importance, but still characterised throughout by his usual excellent taste in the selection of nothing but what is to be admired either for the elegance of the subject or the beauty of its execution; or lastly, for the fine quality of the stone itself. For example, to take a single instance in this casket, an Emerald, engraved with a Cupid teasing a goose with a bunch of grapes, is in every respect the most charming intaglio that can be possibly imagined, and equally graceful is the Cupid mounted on a dolphin, cut on a fine Aquamarine.

But the Townley gems number in their ranks some half dozen intagli not to be surpassed by any in the most famous cabinets of Europe. First among these is the Julius Cæsar of Dioscorides, a front-face portrait on Sard, the brows encircled with a laurel wreath (its leaves of unusual size) the face full of life and energy, but hard-featured, haggard, and expressed with all the unflattering fidelity of a photograph; and evidently taken but shortly before the close of his life. The name of Dioscorides is engraved at the side in the most minute and elegant characters, indubitably of the same time as the intaglio itself. Far superior to this in beauty of subject, though yielding to it in historical importance, is the front-face bust of an empress, probably Livia in the character of Abundantia, with veiled head, and holding a cornucopia

It bears the letters EIII, and therefore is with little doubt from the hand of Epitynchanus, the author of the famous head of Germanicus, in the Paris Cabinet. The stone is a fine dark Amethyst. Perseus standing and holding the harpé in one hand, in the other the Gorgon's head, upon a large Sard, is a figure of careful and minute finish. Of Aspasius we find here two works: the first, a full-face of the bearded Bacchus on red Jasper, very deeply cut, and of the most vigorous execution; the name inscribed in small neat letters across the breast of the bust. The work is worthy of the age of Augustus; still there is something in the aspect of the stone itself that appears to tell against its antiquity. The other intaglio by the same artist, representing an Athenian warrior supporting a dying Amazon, her shield and battle-axe cast on the ground, is an exquisite design of high finish, upon Amethyst. A full-face portrait of a young man (apparently one of the family of Augustus) by Aelius, upon a Sard, is an admirable work, both for expression and execution, and undoubtedly antique. Cupid advancing to the rescue of Psyche caught by the foot in a trap, engraved by Pamphilus on a most splendid ruby coloured Sard, is a lovely composition, but is either the work of some eminent Italian artist of modern times, or else the stone has been re-polished; for it certainly does not present an antique surface. There is also an intaglio by Heius; the work, though antique, is by no means of the archaic style characterising the famous Diana by the same artist, which Visconti considered to be the oldest gem in existence inscribed with the engraver's name. Heius however was a common name among the Sicilian Greeks, and may have been borne by more artists than one, and at different dates. A head of a laughing faun (strongly resembling the portrait of John Wilkes), a face beaming with mirth and mischief, by Ammonius, whose signature, cut in

the finest characters and close to the edge of the gem, is almost imperceptible, closes this list of inscribed intagli. The Jacinth, on which beams forth this embodiment of fun. and frolic, is the most splendid stone of the kind for colour and lustre that has ever come in my way.

Many also of the uninscribed intagli are equal to any of the above in artistic merit. Worthy of special notice amongst these, is a sacred hawk, on Sard, in the GrecoEgyptian style, and though of smaller size, by no means inferior in execution to the famous gem of the same subject in the Berlin Cabinet, an intaglio always quoted as the masterpiece of that period of the art. Another, of the highest interest to numismatists, is a Sard engraved with the human-headed bull with the legend гEAAE in the field, done in a very ancient manner, and exactly resembling the type of the early coins of that city. A Medusa's head in profile is of uncommon merit. A female sacrificing to Priapus is equally remarkable for the beauty of the execution, and for the singularity of the design. This part of the collection. also boasts of many fragments of gems of extraordinary dimensions, and still preserving portions of engravings whose wonderful beauty only serves to make us the more feel the irreparable loss of the entire work. I may single out for particular mention a large brown Sardonyx, bearing the lower portion of an exquisite female profile, backed by a head of Ammon, which has apparently formed the neck-piece of the helmet originally covering the head of the goddess; a work in very flat relief, and of the best Greek period. Another preserves a portion of the portrait of Caracalla, of the size of his largest medallions, and most characteristic and life-like in the expression of his truculent physiognomy.

The collection is also peculiarly rich in Gnostic gems, most of the finest examples that have been published at various times (many of them of a degree of excellence in point of art

R