Ivory and blue porcelain were the materials of which those worn by the lower classes were made.[41]
An ancient ring of jet has been dug up in England.
There were some rings of a single metal, and others of a mixture of two;[42] for the iron, bronze and silver were frequently gilt, or, at least, the gold part was fixed with the iron, as appears from Artemidorus.[43] The Romans were contented with iron rings a long time; and Pliny assures us that Marius first wore a gold one in his third consulate. Sometimes the ring was iron, and the seal gold; sometimes the stone was engraven, and sometimes plain; and the engraving, at times, was raised, and also sunk. (The last were called gemmæ ectypæ, the former gemmæ sculpturâ prominente.)
An incident, mentioned by Plutarch, shows how distinctive was a gold ring.[44] When Cinna and Caius Marius were slaughtering the citizens of Rome, the slaves of Cornutus hid their master in the house and took a dead body out of the street from among the slain and hanged it by the neck, then they put a gold ring upon the finger, and showed the corse in that condition to Marius’s executioners; after which they dressed it for the funeral, and buried it as their master’s body.
The rings of the classical ancients were rather incrusted than set in gold in our slight manner.[45]
The first mention of a Roman gold ring is in the year 432 U. C.; but they, at last, were indiscriminately worn by the Romans. Three bushels were gathered out of the spoils after Hannibal’s victory at Cannæ.[46]
“Lovely soft pearls, the fanciful images of sad tears,” have been used in rings from the time of the Latins. Cleopatra’s drinking off the residuum of a pearl, worth three hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars, aside from luxurious extravagance, seems to be somewhat nasty; but we are inclined to believe that this fond queen had faith in its supposed medicinal and talismanic properties:
“—— Now I feed myself
With most delicious passion.”
Pliny, the Roman naturalist, gravely tells us that the oyster which produces pearls, does so from feeding on heavenly dew. Drummond thus translates him: