EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY JEWELLERY

THE jewellery that came into fashion towards the close of the seventeenth century and flourished during the greater part of the eighteenth follows the style known as "rococo." Rococo ornament with its assemblage of rich fantastic scrolls and crimped conventional shellwork wrought into irregular and indescribable forms, though overcharged and inorganic, yet possesses certain beauty and artistic quality. Like most objects in this style, rococo jewellery has a real decorative charm. But the title of baroque or rococo is really less adapted to jewellery than to other art productions of the time, for jewellery itself never indulged in the same extravagant use of this form of ornament.

Except for slight changes in design, eighteenth-century jewellery, as far as its general form is concerned, does not at first display any marked variation from that of the previous century. A charming but somewhat superficial sentimentality expressed by means of pastoral subjects results in ornaments on which tokens of friendship are represented in all manner of forms. The naturalistic tendency in ornament is still strong, but is less striking than it was before, since feather, ribbon, and other conventional designs make their appearance, mingled with flowers and leaves. These rococo jewels, on account of the setting and arrangement of the precious stones which entirely govern their composition, are in their way masterpieces both technically and artistically. Unlike the earlier jewels, one cannot help regarding them rather more as accessories to costume than as independent works of art.

The general character of the jewellery of the period with which we are now dealing may best be judged by a notable series of original designs in colour for such objects executed by the Santini family of Florence, and now preserved in the Library of the Victoria and Albert Museum. This remarkable collection comprises upwards of 382 separate designs, which are mostly constructed in a manner best calculated to show off the brilliant character and size of the stones and pearls, on which their effect mainly depends. A large proportion of the drawings take the form of what at this period constituted a parure, or set of jewels, composed of three items of similar design—a bow-shaped breast ornament hung with a cross, and a pair of earrings en suite. In place of the breast ornament is sometimes a V-shaped corsage in imitation of hooks and eyes or braidwork, set with various precious stones. The whole work shows that in the eighteenth century the stone cutter and stone setter had practically supplanted the artist in precious metals. In the metal-work of the settings—in most cases a matter of minor consideration—gold is employed for coloured stones and silver for diamonds.

The general tendency is towards the rococo, but this type of ornament is here by no means strongly marked. In other directions, however, it is more apparent, and already in the seventeenth century we meet with traces of it in engraved designs for jewellery. The best work of this kind is that of Friedrich Jacob Morisson, a draughtsman and jeweller who worked at Vienna from about 1693 to 1697. He was one of the most popular jewellers of the day, and his plates, which are rich in motives for ornaments in precious stones and fine metal-work, found a wide circulation. They comprise aigrettes, earrings, brooches, pendants, bracelets, rings, Étuis, and seals. Other Germans who have left designs in the same style are F. H. Bemmel (1700) of Nuremberg, D. Baumann (1695), Johann Heel (1637-1709), and J. F. Leopold (1700)—all of Augsburg.

French designers led European taste in jewellery as in furniture, and published a number of important designs. The most remarkable are those of the master-goldsmith Jean Bourguet of Paris, whose models for earrings, pendants, and clasps, dated 1712 and 1723, are set with large faceted stones, and have their backs chased or enamelled with flower designs. His Livre de Taille d'Épargne with designs for enamel-work published as models for jewellers' apprentices, contains amongst other patterns a series of twelve rings set with large faceted stones; beside each ring is a design for the enamel decoration of its shoulder: "Petits morceaux" he calls them, "de taille d'Épargne facile À coppier." Contemporary with Bourguet was Pierre Bourdon, of Coulommiers en Brie, who worked at Paris. His designs, dated 1703, are for seals, scent cases, and watch covers of rococo work, and pendent medallions and miniature frames set with precious stones. Among other Parisian designers are the master-goldsmiths Briceau (1709), and Mondon (c. 1730-1760) whose Livre de Pierreries, Pour la Parure des Dames contains patterns for earrings, brooches, and aigrettes set with brilliants, and for enamelled and jewelled watches. Of Italian designs for jewellery set with precious stones in the rococo style we may note those of G. B. Grondoni of Genoa, who worked at Brussels about 1715, Carlo Ciampoli (1710), and D. M. Albini, whose Disegni moderni di gioiglieri were published in 1744.

The publication in London of several series of designs proves that England was not far behind the Continent in the production of high-class personal ornaments. Among the most important pattern-books for jewellery, are those of Simon Gribelin, who was born in Paris in 1662, and worked chiefly in London, where he died in 1733. His work includes A book of seuerall Ornaments inuented and ingraued by S. Gribelin, 1682, and A Book of Ornaments usefull to Jewellers, etc., 1697. These were republished in 1704. Gribelin's productions were followed by those of J. B. Herbst, who issued in 1708 A book of severall ornaments fit for Juweler, made by J. B. Herbst, and in 1710 A Book of Severall Juwelers work, ... Sold by Mr. Eymaker, Juweler in Earls Court drury lane London. The patterns are chiefly for seals, and for breast ornaments and clasps set with rose-cut stones in rococo settings. About the same time similar pattern-books were published by J. Smith and Thomas Bowles. In 1736 appeared A book of jeweller's work design'd by Thomas Flach in London, engraved by J. Fessey. It contains designs for buckles, seals, watch-keys, a chatelaine with a watch and another with an Étui, pendants and bow-shaped breast ornaments hung with drop pearls. In 1762 J. Guien published in London a Livre de jouailleries—A book of Ornaments for Jewellers, containing various designs in precious stones in the manner of Morisson and Grondoni.

An isolated phenomenon in the midst of the universal love for precious stones that then dominated the productions of the jewellers, there stands out Johann Melchior Dinglinger, who carried the traditions of the sixteenth century far into the eighteenth. Born at Biberach, near Ulm, in 1665, Dinglinger worked first at Augsburg, and, having visited Italy, was summoned to Dresden in 1702 by Augustus II, Elector of Saxony, where he lived until his death in 1731. During these thirty years, aided by his brother Georg Friedrich (d. 1720) and his son Johann Melchior (1702-1762), he was employed as court jeweller to the Elector, whom he assisted in planning and arranging the GrÜne GewÖlbe at Dresden, which marvellous assemblage of precious objects contains the best examples of his work. All the processes of the Cinquecento craftsmen, of whose technique he possessed a fine knowledge, were employed by Dinglinger with wonderful care and exactitude—though his productions naturally betray in design the period of their execution. He exercised considerable influence on his contemporaries, more especially with regard to the revival of the art of enamelling in the second half of the century, when jewellery made a notable advance in the time of Louis XVI.

A change in style was first experienced on the arrival in power of Madame de Pompadour, who led the way in that coquettish return to simple conditions of life which showed itself in the pastorals of the Louis Quinze epoch. It resulted in a preference for simple gold; this metal, coloured by alloys such as platinum and silver, and popular under the name of À quatre couleurs, being at most only set off by enamel painting. This later rococo period, as far as its technique is concerned, is one which has never been equalled either before or since.

An event of importance in the history of jewellery, as of art generally, was the discovery in 1755 of the city of Pompeii, succeeding that in 1713 of Herculaneum, buried for centuries beneath the ashes of Vesuvius. The journeys of artists to Italy and to Naples, and the interest aroused thereby in ancient art, a weariness with the mannerism of rococo ornament, and the whim of fashion, gradually transformed jewellery like other decorative arts, and resulted in the classicism of the style of Louis XVI. Antique forms as they then were known showed themselves in a very charming manner in well-balanced jewels, where different coloured gold took the form of classical motives in the midst of ribbons, garlands, and the pastoral subjects dear to the previous epoch. Enamel returned into fashion, and accomplished its chief triumph with painting en plein in fine transparent tones over guillochÉ gold. In conjunction with the art of gem setting and cutting, and metal chasing, this species of enamel produced effects which were all the more surprising, seeing that it was often confined to the smallest of spaces.

Among the first craftsmen who created, or followed the fashion, was the jeweller Lempereur. Some of his designs were published by his pupil Pouget the younger in 1762 and 1764, in a treatise entitled TraitÉ des pierres prÉcieuses et de la maniÈre de les employer en Parure, the plates of which, mostly coloured, and representing models of jewellery of all kinds set with precious stones, were engraved by Mlle. Raimbau. Another pupil of Lempereur, August Duflos, published in 1760 a similar work entitled Recueil de Dessins de Joaillerie. Other French designers of jewellery at this time were: Maria, a jeweller of Paris, who issued about 1765 an important series of plates, thirty-five in number, of pendants, brooches, clasps, chatelaines, aigrettes, seals, rings, and buckles; P. Moreau (1740-1780) and J. B. Fay (1780-1790), both of Paris; and L. Van den Cruycen (1770) of Brussels.

In 1770 was published in London by T. D. Saint A new book of designs for jewellers' work containing eleven plates of ornaments of various kinds in the style of Pouget and Duflos. One of the last English jewellers of the old school was George Michael Moser (1707-1783), one of the founders of the Academy—like Fuseli, a Swiss by birth, and a native of Schaffhausen. He was originally a gold chaser—"the first in the kingdom," so Sir Joshua Reynolds described him; but when that mode of decorating jewellery was put aside in favour of enamels, he turned his attention to enamel compositions of emblematical figures, much in vogue for the costly watch-cases of the day, for chatelaines, necklaces, bracelets, and other personal ornaments. He succeeded so well in this class of work that the Queen patronised him, and he executed a considerable number of commissions for the King.

Another eminent jeweller, who was likewise a painter and enameller, was Augustus Toussaint. He worked principally with his father, a noted jeweller of Denmark Street, Soho, and exhibited at the Royal Academy from 1775 to 1778, sending in both miniatures and enamels. He died between 1790 and 1800. Several of the fine open-work jewelled frames which held the choice miniatures of the day, were made in the workshop of Toussaint the elder, and on his death his son Augustus is said not only to have retained for his own use all the examples of these frames which were in stock, but to have continued to supply a few fellow-artists, with whom he was on terms of intimacy, with the celebrated Toussaint frames.[186]

The excess of ornamentation and the desire for jewellery formed of precious stones had, since the seventeenth century, favoured the use of imitations. Rock crystal or quartz had long been employed to imitate diamonds. Forgeries and imitations which were intended to pass as precious stones will be spoken of in another place. But at this time even people of great wealth wore imitation jewels, such as certainly would not be worn by persons in a corresponding position nowadays. These made no profession of being real stones. They were recognised as imitations. The credit of the production of the first satisfactory substitute for the diamond is due to a German—Stras or Strass by name—who about 1758 established himself at Paris on the Quai des OrfÉvres, where he met with great success as a vendor of paste imitations of diamonds, which still bear his name. Competitors were not slow in making their appearance, and one ChÉron also gave his name for a considerable time to the false diamonds that issued from his workshop. So large and flourishing did the industry in imitations become that in 1767 a corporation of joailliers-faussetiers was established in Paris.

Imitation pearls were likewise very largely worn; even ladies of high position did not disdain to wear them—"Un collier de perles fausses" occurs in the inventory of the jewels of Madame de Chamillart made on her death in 1731. False pearls first appeared in Paris about the time of Henry IV, the production of one named Jaquin, whose descendants carried on a large business in them in Paris till the middle of the eighteenth century. "So well have pearls been imitated," writes Pouget the younger, in 1762, "that most of those of fine Orient have found their way back from Europe to Asia, and are so rare in France that nowadays one scarcely sees any good specimens."

Productions such as these were rendered necessary to satisfy the luxury which from the nobility had extended over the whole middle classes, and also on account of the strained condition of French finance. Étienne de Silhouette, Controller of Finance, endeavoured to cut down expenses, and issued in 1759 an invitation to the wealthy to bring in their jewels to be converted into cash for the benefit of the Treasury. Such attempts at economy, though rewarded only by ridicule, so that portraits henceforth executed in the commonest manner were À la Silhouette, yet met with this result, as Pouget observes, that since the time of M. de Silhouette marcasite had become very much the fashion in France. In Switzerland, too, since it was forbidden to wear diamonds, ladies, he tells us, wore no other ornaments than marcasite, and spent a good deal of care and money in the setting of it. The mineral known as marcasite, a word which was spelled in many ways, is a crystallised form of iron pyrites cut in facets like rose diamonds, and highly polished. It was used for a number of ornaments. Steel, likewise cut in facets, was similarly employed.

Steel jewellery appears to have been invented in England, and from Birmingham, the centre of its manufacture, found its way all over Europe, reaching France by way of Holland. It was carried out largely by Boulton and Watt and other firms of Birmingham, Sheffield, and Wolverhampton. This steel jewellery, which was in high favour in the latter half of the eighteenth, continued to be worn until the second quarter of the nineteenth century, when it finally went out of fashion. Even after that, cut steel was still made at Birmingham, and the firm of Hipkins, one of the most prominent, continued for many years to supply the Court of Spain with buttons and buckles ornamented with it (Pl. LI, 1, 2). Steel was largely employed as mounts for the fictile cameos of Wedgwood, Tassie, Adams, and Turner, which were in considerable demand for rings, brooches and buttons. Mountings for these were also made in silver or Sheffield plate, principally the work of Thomas Law & Co., of Sheffield. In the latter part of the century England occupied a unique position with regard to the production of objects of this kind, which were eagerly sought for throughout the whole of the Continent.

Another characteristic of the changed condition of the times was the use in jewellery, together with strass, false pearls, and marcasite, of various substitutes for gold. The best-known of these substitutes was "pinchbeck," so called after its inventor, Christopher Pinchbeck (d. 1732), a clock and watch maker, of Fleet Street. This pinchbeck gold was an alloy of copper and zinc. When fused together the metals assumed the colour of fine gold, and preserved for a time a bright and unoxidised surface, though in some cases objects thus fashioned received a washing of gold. Pinchbeck was much used for cheaper jewellery of all kinds. The larger articles made of this metal were chatelaines, snuff-boxes, and Étuis, while watch-cases, miniature-frames, buckles, clasps, and so forth, are to be found for the most part ornamented in relief and carefully chased. These several articles to which pinchbeck was suited, went in those days by the name of "toys". The term "Toyman" was employed by Pinchbeck himself, but the title had, of course, no reference to what are now known as toys. In France and Germany a metal composition like gold, in imitation of pinchbeck, called Similor or "goldshine," was produced, first by Renty, of Lille, about 1729, and subsequently improved by Leblanc, of Paris. But the name of the English inventor of the metal was well known in France, where it was retained in such forms as "pinsebeck" or "pinsbeck."

The head-ornament—the aigrette—was still an important jewel in the eighteenth century. Generally a kind of delicately formed bouquet of precious stone in very light setting, it continued long in fashion, together with strings of pearls among the hair. For a while the aigrette was set aside for bows, small birds, etc., made of precious stones mounted upon vibrating spiral wires which were then attached to the hair-pin. These went under the name of "wasps" or "butterflies." In the days of Marie Antoinette they were supplemented by hair-pins and aigrettes set entirely with diamonds, which about 1770 had almost entirely superseded coloured stones. Many designs for these head-ornaments were published by Pouget the younger and Duflos, the latter of whom complains in the preface to his work of the tendency shown in his day to do away with the admixture of coloured stones with diamonds; a proof that up to this date, in spite of the general preference for the diamond, taste had not yet learned to do without colour effect in jewellery.

Earrings, as has been noticed in reference to the Santini designs, were in particular favour at this period. The majority were composed of large faceted stones or of pearls, formed girandole fashion—that is to say, of a large circular stone above, with three briolettes or pear-shaped pendants below. A pair of earrings of this form, said to have belonged to Madame du Barry, are in possession of Lady Monckton. They are set each with four sapphire pastes of very fine quality; the three drop-pendants being separated from the upper stone by open spray-work of silver set with white pastes (Pl. XLVI, 5, 6). Similarly elaborate pendent earrings in seven sections composed of brilliants are seen in an original mezzotint portrait of Queen Charlotte by Thomas Frye (c. 1760). Drop-shaped pendants, mostly diamonds, were then very highly esteemed. Marie Antoinette had a pair of diamond earrings with stones of this form hanging from a perpendicular line of large brilliants. The designs of Ciampoli, Mondon, Guien, Pouget, Van den Cruycen, and Fay, all contain varieties of earrings, mostly girandole fashion.

For necklaces the engravings of these same designers supply many patterns. Like the carcan of the fifteenth century, they are often in the form of a band about an inch in width, composed of precious stones—rubies, emeralds, pearls, and diamonds—in open-work, or attached to velvet. They are generally constructed so as to reach only half-way round the neck, the back part being a band of black velvet. Portraits of the time frequently exhibit ropes of pearls, and finally rows of large diamonds, like the renowned collier of Marie Antoinette composed by the Court jewellers Boehmer and Bossange. Numerous circumstances connected with it, too lengthy to relate here, gave to the affaire of the diamond necklace a world-wide celebrity, making it one of the chief events of the century. Though historically one of the world's most famous pieces of jewellery, the necklace itself, described in quaint but vivid language by Carlyle in his Miscellanies, calls for no special comment, being on the whole of comparatively small artistic importance. Its value—£90,000, a great sum for those days—lay in the size and quality of the brilliants and pendeloques of which it was composed.

A favourite point of adornment in female attire was still the breast, where, in the first part of the century, jewelled ornaments, or sÉvignÉs, in the form of bows and rosettes, hung with pendants and set with table-cut stones or rose diamonds, continued to be worn. Generally they assumed the girandole shape hung with pear-shaped pendants. About 1770 a large bunch of flowers, or a bouquet-shaped ornament formed of precious stones, was worn in the breast. For the latter the jeweller Lempereur enjoyed a great reputation. Upon the stiff bodice, which came into fashion at the end of the seventeenth century, scope was afforded for a goodly use of ornament, and soon we find the corsage literally covered with jewels, in a manner similar to that in which the ladies of the Renaissance almost completely covered the upper part of their dresses with pendent chain-ornaments. At the time, however, of which we now speak the ornaments are single pieces mounted upon the dress and arranged symmetrically in the form of a jewelled "stomacher" or devant de corsage. The Santini drawings contain many examples of this kind of open framework composed of precious stones; and several interesting designs for the same are figured on Plates 16, 17, and 18 of Maria's Livre de Dessins de Jouaillerie et de Bijouterie. At this period also, when luxury reached its climax, even the panier or tucked-up upper skirt had the whole of its exaggerated dimensions sprinkled with pieces of jewellery, so that of this time again it may be said that the ladies of the Court displayed the whole of their wealth, and often enough of their credit too, upon a single dress.

Fashion endeavoured to fill a corresponding part in gentlemen's attire by adorning coat and waistcoat with buttons of artistic workmanship. To match the beautiful embroidered garments of the time, buttons were sewn with bugles, steel beads, or spangles; and many have survived which may be reckoned as real articles of jewellery. Every material and mode of decoration was applied to them. Occasionally we find buttons set with diamonds and other precious stones, but more often paste, or with odd natural stones such as agates, carnelians, marcasite, blood-stones, lapis-lazuli, or buttons of tortoise-shell, or of compositions such as Wedgwood ware, in frames of cut steel. Translucent blue glass or enamel, mounted or set with pearls, diamonds or pastes, and chased and coloured gold, were all fashionable. On the whole, cut steel was the most popular. A Birmingham craftsman by name of Heeley, who worked for Wedgwood about 1780, is recorded is being especially skilful at this class of work; while in France a certain Dauffe had almost a monopoly in the production of steel objects. Certainly some of the open-work steel buttons of the time—English as well as French—are jewels of a very high order.

Bracelets were mostly formed of bands of velvet with oval clasps. The clasp was decorated in a variety of ways, and was very frequently fitted with a painted or enamelled miniature. The practice of wearing miniatures in this way seems to have been a common one, judging by the numerous advertisements inserted in the London Public Advertiser about the middle of the century by "ingenious artists," willing on "reasonable terms to paint elegant portraits in miniature for bracelets, rings, etc." Madame de Chamillart had amongst other jewels "Un petit portrait en mignature en forme de bracelet garny de quatre diamants, montÉ en or." In fact, according to Fontenay, the terms bracelet and boÎte À portrait had for a time practically the same meaning.[187] Cameos were sometimes employed as bracelet clasps, but not to the same extent as they were subsequently under the Empire. In the BibliothÈque Nationale at Paris are two portrait cameos in sardonyx (Nos. 788 and 927) which served as the clasps of the bracelets of Madame de Pompadour, and were bequeathed by her to Louis XV in 1764. The work of the celebrated gem-engraver Jacques Guay, the one represents Henri IV, and the other, which is signed, Louis XV. The mounting of each, an admirable example of French jewel-work of the time, is formed of a circlet of emeralds arranged in the manner of a laurel wreath, and tied at intervals by cords of rose diamonds terminating above and below in knots. Among other decorations for bracelets, mention may be made of the celebrated enamels produced at Battersea between 1750 and 1775, very many of which, oval in shape, were set in gold frames so as to be easily mounted in bracelets. The productions of the rival establishment at Bilston, in Staffordshire, were similarly employed, and, like the former, were frequently worn as buttons.

The finger ring in the eighteenth century was a particularly favourite jewel. That considerable attention was paid at the time to the design and decoration of the ring, may be judged from Bourguet's designs, which contain patterns for enamel-work intended for its enrichment. The beauty of the sentiments displayed on the rings of the time is nowhere more charmingly expressed than on an English wedding-ring at South Kensington, which is formed of two hands in white enamel, holding between the thumbs and first fingers a rose diamond in the shape of a heart set in silver and surmounted with a jewelled coronet. It bears the date 1706 (Pl. XXXVI, 3). Other rings of similar style have the bezel formed of two precious stones in the form of hearts united by a knot. Rings which served simply as souvenirs of affection were very popular. In addition to the plain gold ring engraved with a posy or motto, were rings containing a like sentiment read by means of the first letters of the stones with which they are set.

The most typical ring of the period is perhaps the marquise ring, which dates from the second half of the century. The bezel, which is oblong, and either oval or octagonal, is often of such size that it covers the whole joint of the finger. It is formed of a plaque of transparent blue glass on matted gold, surrounded with diamonds, and set either with a single diamond, or with several arranged at regular intervals, sometimes in the form of a bouquet. Often instead of diamonds are pastes and even marcasite. Of other varieties of rings of the time it is necessary only to mention those set with Wedgwood cameos, or with stones such as moss-agates, and a form of agate somewhat similar, but of lighter colour, called the mocha stone. Mourning and memorial rings, of which this period was so prolific, will be spoken of subsequently.

An ornament that showed a peculiarly wide development throughout the eighteenth century was the shoe-buckle. Various kinds of buckles are recorded in the Caution to the Public, issued in 1733, in connection with his famous ware, by Edward, the son of Christopher Pinchbeck. They include the following: buckles for ladies' breasts, stock-buckles, shoe-buckles, knee-buckles, girdle-buckles. Of these the most important was the buckle worn on the shoes of every one—man woman, and child—attached to the latchet or strap passing over the instep. It assumed all sorts of forms and was made and enriched with every conceivable material. It is interesting to observe that in spite of the immense number produced, hardly any two pairs of buckles are precisely alike—this is shown in the case of the collection of Sir S. Ponsonby Fane, which contains upwards of four hundred specimens. Towards the last years of the century buckles began to be supplanted by shoe strings. During this period of transition many attempts were made to foster their use.[188] On tickets to public entertainments at the time one occasionally finds a notice that "Gentlemen cannot be admitted with shoe strings." The latter, however, won the day, and about the year 1800 shoe-buckles disappeared from use.

The chatelaine was perhaps the most characteristic of all eighteenth-century ornaments. It was exceedingly popular, and formed, it may be observed, a very favourite object of the time for a wedding present. It usually consisted of a shield with a stout hook, suspended from which were several chains united by another plate or shield which carried the watch. Besides this were two or more chains for holding the watch-key or seals. Extraordinary skill was exercised in the elaboration of chatelaines. The plaques, hinged or united by chains, withstood the incursion of the precious stone that dominated all other forms of jewellery, and afforded peculiar opportunities for the display of the art of the goldsmith in chased and repoussÉ metal-work enriched with exquisite enamels. The jeweller's whole artistic skill was thus exhibited, not only upon the shields, but upon the solid links of the chains and upon the various breloques hung therefrom. The chief of the latter was of course the watch. Its dial-plate was enriched with enamel, and chased and coloured gold: even the hands when made of gold showed a high degree of skilled workmanship within a very small space. The principal ornamental part was, however, the outer case; and it may be maintained that there was not any species of work connected with the goldsmith's art that was not displayed in its finest form upon watch-cases, more especially in the time of Louis XVI.

Beside the watch was hung the watch-key and seals, and all sorts of ornamental knick-knacks, as Étuis and such-like. The elaborate chatelaine upon which nearly every conceivable kind of trinket could be attached, is the "equipage" thus described by Lady Mary Wortley Montagu in her fourth Town Eclogue:—

While women carried elaborate chatelaines, men hung from the watch in the fob-pocket bunches of seals which dangled beneath their embroidered waistcoats. Thus in Monsieur À la Mode, published about 1753, we read of—

It was the seal above all which experienced particular artistic development. Ever since the sixteenth century the seal had been worn in addition to the signet ring. Though hung perhaps like a pomander from a chain at the neck or from the girdle, the seal seems to have been but rarely displayed on the person until the general introduction in the early seventeenth century of the watch, to which for more than a couple of centuries it was a regular accompaniment. The majority of seventeenth-century seals are of silver with the arms engraved in the metal; others of steel are on swivels and have three faces; others, again, of gold set with stones engraved with heraldic devices, have finely worked shanks, occasionally enriched with delicate enamel-work. The gold seals of the eighteenth century, which are among the best examples extant of rococo jewellery, are of open-work in the form of scroll and shell patterns, of admirable design and workmanship. It is out of the question to attempt a description of the numerous attractive forms these pendent seals assumed, or the peculiar interest they possess from an heraldic point of view.

About the year 1772 fashionable men carried a watch in each fob-pocket, from which hung bunches of seals and chains. From the custom set in England of introducing masculine fashions into dress, ladies likewise wore two watches, one on each side, together with rattling breloques, seals, and other appendages. In addition to the real watch with beautifully enamelled back which adorned the left side, they wore on the right what was called a fausse montre or false watch. These false watches were, however, often little less costly than the genuine article, being made of gold and silver, with jewelled and enamelled backs. The front had either an imitation dial-plate, some fanciful device, or a pin-cushion. For those of less ample means the fausse montre was made of gilt metal or even of coloured foils.