The Cameo

1907

Gets Its Name From the Cutting, Not From the Stone

The true nature of a cameo is very much misunderstood by the public generally. Most people think it is the stone itself, when in reality the method of cutting is what produces the cameo. The real meaning of the word is unknown, Its derivation having never been discovered; but, correctly speaking, cameos are small sculptures executed in low relief on some substance precious either for its beauty, rarity or hardness.

There are emerald cameos, turquoise cameos, shell cameos, coral cameos. Indeed, any substance that lends itself to carving in such minute detail can be used for cameo cutting, and nearly all precious stones, except diamonds, have been so used for intaglios, but never for cameos. Emerald is the most common precious stone from which cameos have been made, and there are some very fine emerald portrait cameos in existence, notably those of Queen Elizabeth in the British museum. Shell cameos were first made in the fifteenth century.

Banded onyx is generally used for cameo work because of its hardness and coloring, and it is this fact that has caused the misapprehension, the stone being used so much in making cameos that it has now become better known as "cameo" than by its right name. — St. Louis Globe-Democrat.

Once in India, The Most Famous of Thrones

1914

That of Indian Moguls in the Ancient City of Delhi a Marvel of Richness

Among bare and ugly British barracks in the ancient capital of the Mogul empire in India known as Delhi are remnants of two famous gems of Oriental architecture. They are the Diwan-i-Am, or hall of public audience, and the Diwan-i-Khas, or hall of private audience.

The Diwan-i-Am is still a splendid building 100 feet by 60, formerly plastered with chunam and overlaid with gold. It was in a recess in the back wall of this building that the famous Peacock throne used to stand. It was six feet long by four feet wide, and was supported by feet of solid gold encrusted with gems. The throne was also of gold, inlaid with diamonds, emeralds and rubies and surmounted by a canopy supported by 12 gold columns decorated with rows of splendid pearls.

The throne was given its name from the figures standing behind it of two peacocks with outspread wings blazing with precious stones, their tails expanded and the whole so inlaid with sapphires, rubies, emeralds, pearls and other gems of appropriate colors as to represent life.

The throne was valued at $30,000,000 and was carried off by the Persian invader, Nadir Shah, in 1739. Presumably it was constructed in the days of Shah Jahan, a decade less than three hundred years ago.

The Elevator, as Far Back as Archimedes

1920

Ancient Elevator

The earliest mention of a device in any way resembling the modern elevator may be read in Vitruvius, who describes a hoisting machine invented by Archimedes. The elevator of the second century B. C. was worked by ropes coiled upon a winding drum by a capstan and levers.


Antiquity of the Emerald

The emerald has been known since early times both in Europe and in certain parts of the Orient, where its attractive color and rarity have endowed it with the highest rank. Its name may be traced back to an old word which appeared in Greek as smaragdos, mentioned in Greek by Theoprastus 300 B. C.


Values

Mrs. Peavish says that, although she would be the last to knock Mr. Peavish, sometimes she feels as if she would give twenty years of married life for ten years in widow's weeds.— Dallas News.


On Life's Journey

We should rather be life's good comrades than its passionate lovers, neither easily offended, nor imagining evil, yet not taking its affairs too lightly. Let us hold Life faithfully by the hand, loving it through fair and ill repute; as good travelers, grumbling little, praising much, and sharing sun and shadow and wayside inns. — Exchange.

—Bedford Gazette, Bedford, Pennsylvania, January 2, 1920, page 3.