How much these little vases were valued appears from the stands of gold (decorated with applied spirals of an early type) on which they were sometimes placed in the tombs. M. Reinach mentions some instances from Crimean tombs, where chevron vases of the usual type have been found attached by a fine chain of gold to the bracelet worn by the deceased (Tolstoi and Kondakof, Antiquités de la Russie Méridionale, 1891). The little bottles that we see in the hand of the recumbent effigy on Phœnician sarcophagi, are probably to be identified with our glass vases; we have an instance of this on the well-known female figure in the Palermo Museum (figured by Perrot and Chipiez and elsewhere).
Later Survivals of the Primitive Glass
There are in the British Museum some little glass amphoræ from Camirus and Ialysus in Rhodes, and others from Amathia and Salamis in Cyprus, on which the chevron bands are not incorporated into the glass base, but laid on the surface as in later enamelled ware. The chevrons in such cases cannot have been ‘dragged’ by the old ingenious plan; they must have been elaborately applied one by one. We may recognise probably in such cases the survival of an old method of decoration after the technical process by which it was produced had been lost. The glass itself, too, is of a late type—transparent and hastily formed. I think that the date of some of these ‘scamped’ chevron vases may be later than is generally thought.
The beads and other objects of verroterie from the Cyprian and Rhodian tombs differ much from those found in the Mycenæan sepulchres of Continental Greece. There are in the British Museum some large beads of perfectly clear glass from Ialysus in Rhodes[[18]]; these are probably of Asiatic origin. We must also range with this ‘primitive’ glass the large beads—if beads they are to be called—in the form of satyr-like masks, so widely spread through Mediterranean lands ([Pl. XV.], 1), as well as those of irregular shape that so closely resemble the old ‘bull’s eye’ sweetmeats, built up of interlacing bands of various colours. Indeed the technique of the manufacture of these beads was probably very similar to that of those handmade ‘lollipops,’ for in spite of its lower fusing-point, and of its solubility in water, there are many points of resemblance between sugar in a state of semi-fusion and glass in a similar condition.[[19]]
What little I have to say of the rare specimens of glass of a more advanced type found in Greek tombs, I will postpone to the next chapter.
The Primitive Glass of Western Asia
The civilisation of the inhabitants of the Euphrates valley reaches probably as far back as that of the Egyptians. Its influence has extended at various times from the Balkan peninsula to the borders of India, including Persia on the one hand, and on the other the kingdoms that grew up in Syria, and among the primitive races of Asia Minor. Now, if we are to judge by the contents of our museums, all these lands, at least up to the time of the conquest of Alexander, may be passed over as of no concern to the writer of a history of glass. If, however, we allow ourselves to be influenced by less material evidence, we shall find that a good case may be made out for the early existence of glass in these lands. But before discussing this evidence, I would impress upon the reader how much the survival of objects of glass depends upon the habit of burying in tombs, and their discovery upon the systematic exploration of these tombs. Compared with Egypt, how little has been accomplished in this way in these Western Asiatic countries!
I have already noticed the coincidence of the sudden development of the manufacture of glass in Egypt with the first close contact, at the period of the Eighteenth Dynasty, of the Egyptians with races already affected by Babylonian culture; and we must remember that the glass made within a few years of this first contact was never surpassed in later times. Nor must we overlook the classical tradition concerning the invention of glass handed down to us by Pliny and other writers. According to this tradition, glass was first made by Phœnician traders on the coast of Syria. Here, at any rate, the three great requisites for the manufacture were at hand—a pure silica in the convenient form of a white sand, alkali either from the ashes of marine plants or from adjacent salt deposits, and finally, an abundant supply of fuel. And yet, for the present, all that can be said is that we must associate all the early glass that has been found in other countries than Egypt with the trading peoples of the Eastern Mediterranean, whether Pelasgians, Carians, or Phœnicians. To a similar source we may refer the rare glass beads found in tombs of the bronze period in Western Europe, as well perhaps as the scanty specimens of glass that have come from Assyria and Persia. To these last we will now turn.
Of glass of undoubted Assyrian origin, by far the most important example known to us is the little barrel-shaped vase with stunted handles found so many years ago by the late Sir Henry Layard in the ruins of Kouyunjik. This little vessel, after many vicissitudes, has found its way into the British Museum. It is three and a quarter inches in height, and is formed of a glass that is perfectly white and nearly transparent; it still remains, indeed, our earliest example of such glass. The date is fixed to the latter part of the seventh century B.C., by an inscription cut in cuneiform characters containing the name of Sargon, together with his titles as king of Assyria; on it is also engraved the figure of a lion. Layard speaks of this vase as being shaped and hollowed on a turner’s lathe after being ‘blown in one solid piece’ (Nineveh and Babylon, 1853)—a curious expression for one who interested himself so much in the manufacture of glass! We may, perhaps, regard it as having been carved like an object of rock crystal out of a solid piece of glass. We know of nothing like it from Egypt, but then the Egyptians had no love for transparent, colourless materials; from an early time, as we have seen, they had covered their beads of rock crystal with a blue glaze (cf. p. [20]). Here I may add that the other specimens of glass discovered by Layard at Nineveh have no claim to so early a date. Among them, however, were two bowls of great interest, formed of a vetro di trina or ‘lace glass,’ with very fine meshes. These are now in the Assyrian Department of the British Museum. Some almost identical bowls from the late Greek tombs of Canosa, in Southern Italy, may be seen in the Glass-Room in the same Museum.
The Assyrians and the Babylonians before them were, we know, from an early date past masters in the manufacture of coloured glazes. The turquoise blue glaze of their pottery and wall tiles has been handed down in these lands apparently without a break, through Persian and Sassanian times to their later Arab masters. In the Louvre are some slabs of a translucent glass of a fine turquoise tint, about three inches square, and three-quarters of an inch in thickness, which were found in Babylonia, associated apparently with objects of great age. Such masses of glass paste were perhaps manufactured as articles of commerce to be employed afterwards in the preparation of glazes.[[20]]