But now I’ll tell you yet something further about the cunning of this charming art; I’ll tell you of a wonderful and priceless work that was shown me in France, in Paris, their most beautiful & richest city—which the French, according to their language, call ‘Paris simpari,’ that is to say ‘sans peer,’ or without equal. It was in the service of King Francis in the year 1541. This most royal and splendid of Kings retained me in Paris, and gave me of his liberality a castle, standing in the city itself, and called by the name of the ‘little Nello.’ Here I worked for four years, the which will be recounted all in its place when I come to tell of the great works which I made for this most worthy King. Here I will continue my talk as to the way of working in filigree, and as I promised, tell of a work most rare—a work such as may perchance never again be executed—which I saw in this city. One day—a solemn fête day—the King went at Vespers to his ‘Sainte Chapelle’ in Paris. He sent word to me that I was to be at Vespers too, as he had something nice to show me. When Vespers were over the King called me to him through the Constable, who sometimes represents the King himself. This gentleman came, took me by the hand, & led me before the King, who with great kindness and affability began to show me the most beautiful trinkets and jewels, and briefly asked me my opinion on them. After these he showed me a variety of ancient camei about as big as the palm of a large hand, and asked me many things about them, on which I gave him my opinion. They had stood me in the middle of all of them;—there was the King, and the King of Navarre his brother-in-law, and the Queen of Navarre, and all the first flower of the nobility, & of those that came nearest to the crown; & before all of them his Majesty showed me many beautiful & priceless things, about which we talked for a long time to his great delight. Thereupon he showed me a drinking bowl without a foot & of a middling size, wrought in filigree with the choicest spray-work, upon which much other ornamental detail was admirably applied. Now list to my description of it! In among the spray-work and interstices of filigree were settings of the most beautiful enamel of various colours; and when you held it to the light these enamel fillings almost looked as if they were transparent—indeed it seemed impossible that such a piece of work should ever have been made. Thus at least thought the King, & asked me very pleasantly, since I had thus highly praised the bowl, could I possibly imagine how the work was done. I thereupon answered his question thus: ‘Sacred Majesty,’ quoth I, ‘I can tell you exactly how it is done, even so much so that you, being the man of rare ability that you are, shall know how just as well as the master himself that made it, knew, but the explanation of the methods that underlie its making will take rather a long time.’ At these words of mine all the noble assembly that waited on his Majesty thronged around me, the King declared he had never seen work of so wondrous a kind, and since it was so easy of explanation, bade me tell as I had promised. Then spake I: ‘If you want to make a bowl like this, you must begin by making one of thin sheet iron, about the thickness of a knife back larger than the one you want ultimately to produce in filigree. Then with a brush you paint it inside with a solution of fine clay, cloth shearings & Tripoli clay[23] finely ground; then you take finely drawn gold wire of such a thickness as your wise-minded master may wish that of his bowl to be. This thread should be so thick that if you beat it out flat with a hammer on your clean little cup, it bends more readily in the width than otherwise, in such a way that it may then be flattened out to a ribbon shape, two knife-blades broad, & as thin as a sheet of paper. You must be careful to stretch your thread out very evenly, & have it tempered soft, because it will then be easier to twist with your pliers. Then with your fine design before you, you commence to compose your stretched thread inside the iron bowl, first the principal members, according to their way of arrangement, piece by piece painting them over with solution of gum tragacanth, so that they adhere to the clay-solution with which you pasted the inside. Then when your craftsman has set all his principal members and larger outlines, he must put in the spray work, each piece in its place, just as the design guides him, setting it spray by spray, bit by bit in the way I have told you. And then when all this is in proper order, he must have ready his enamels of all colours, well ground and well washed. It is true you might do the soldering first before you put in the enamel, & you would do it in the way that I explained above when I considered the soldering of filigree work, but it’s as good one way as the other, soldered or not soldered. And when all the preliminary work is carefully done, and all the interstices nicely filled with the coloured enamels, you put the whole thing in the furnace, in order to make the enamel flow. To begin with you must only subject it to a slight heat, after which, when you have filled up any little openings with a second coat of enamel you may put it in again under a rather bigger fire, & if it appear after this that there are still crannies to be filled up, you put it to as strong a fire as the craft allows and as your enamels will bear. When all this is done you remove it from the iron bowl, which will be easy by reason of the paste of clay to which the actual work and the enamels are attached. Then with a particular kind of stones called “frasinelle,” and with fresh water you begin the process of smoothing it down, and you must go on with this so long till the enamel is polished down to an equal thickness throughout and as may seem good to you. And when you have got as far as the “frasinelle” can take you, you may continue your polishing with still finer stones, and lastly with a piece of reed and tripoli clay (as I explained it in niello work), then the surface of your enamel will be very smooth and beautiful.’ When the admirable King Francis heard all this description of mine, he declared that they who knew so well how to explain, doubtless knew still better how to perform, & that I had so well pointed out to him the whole process of a work that he had erst thought impossible, that now, owing to my description, he really thought he could do it himself. And therewith he heaped great favours upon me, such as you can’t possibly imagine.
FOOTNOTES:
[18] Fine granules of gold are made by cutting gold wire into short lengths, mixing the cut pieces with charcoal, placing the mixture in a crucible and then heating the whole up to the melting point of the metal. Afterwards the charcoal is washed away, and the gold granules (which have been fused into a round form) sorted according to size by sifting.
[19] Borraciere: perhaps a borax pan.
[20] Dragante.
[21] Uno scarpelletto augnato.
[22] ‘Gomma di botte,’ i.e., tartrate of potash.
[23] Tripolo.
CHAPTER III. CONCERNING THE ART OF ENAMELLING.
Now let us have a talk about the beautiful art of enamelling, and therewith consider those excellent craftsmen who wrought best therein; and with the knowledge of their lovely creations before us see what is beautiful and what is difficult in this art, and get to understand the difference between what is really good and what is indifferent. As I said in the first chapter of my book, this art was well practised in Florence, and I think too that in all those countries where they used it, and pre-eminently the French and the Flemings, and certainly those who practised it in the proper manner, got it originally from us Florentines. And because they knew how difficult the real way was, & that they would never be able to get to it, they set about devising another way that was less difficult. In this they made such progress, that they soon got according to popular opinion the name of good enamellers. It is certainly true that if a man only works at a thing long enough, all his practising makes his hand very sure in his art: & that was the way with the folk who lived beyond the Alps.