A curious account of a banquet given at Mantua, on the occasion of the marriage of the Marquis, is quoted by Mr. Nesbitt from a contemporary writer. There was, we are told, on this occasion such a display of ‘diversi bicchieri, carrafe, e giarre ed altri bellissimi vasi di cristallo di Venezia, che credo vi fussero concorse tutte le botteghe di Morano!’ And there was need of this store, he adds, seeing that after they had drunk, the guests proceeded to break the glasses they held in their hands ‘per segno di grande allegrezza.’[[150]] We are reminded of the feast described by Joinville, though in that case the glasses were swept off the table by the well-aimed Bible of one of the guests (see p. [136]).
I shall now have to pass in rapid review the principal varieties and applications of the glass made at Murano in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
The Frosted or Crackle Glass is perhaps the simplest modification of the pure cristallo. To produce this, the paraison is plunged rapidly into cold water, and after reheating to the necessary degree, but not beyond, it is worked into the desired form. A similar effect is at times produced by rolling the molten paraison upon fragments of crushed glass. I have spoken in the introductory chapter of certain rare cases where a minute fissuring has been set up in the substance of the glass. This true crackle is probably in all cases the result of a subsequent structural change.
Latticinio, Lattisuol, or Lattimo are names given by the Venetians to a milk-white opaque glass. White enamels were freely used in the fifteenth century, but the earliest known specimen of Venetian glass, the whole body of which is rendered opaque by the presence of oxide of tin (calcina di stagno)—the vetro bianco di smalto of the early writers[[151]]—can hardly be older than the beginning of the next century.
The spherical vase (Slade, 402) formerly in the possession of the Marquis D’Azeglio, is an exceptionally beautiful example of this milk-white glass ([Plate XXXII.]). The gilt scrolls harmonise well with the slightly warmish ground, and were it not for the rudely executed mermaids on either side, an Eastern origin might well have been sought for this quite exceptional piece; in fact, I do not know of any other specimen of undoubted Venetian glass so distinctly Persian in character.
In the Museo Civico at Venice is a flask (circa 1530) of this lattimo glass, about five inches in height, decorated in blue, with allegorical subjects. Although somewhat rudely executed, the painting is masterly in style, and may be compared to that on the best contemporary majolica ([Plate XXXIII.]). At a first glance this little vase might be taken for an example of Medici porcelain, and indeed we must bear in mind that all through the sixteenth century attempts were being made in Venice to imitate the porcelain of the Far East, more especially the plain white and the blue and white wares which were already arriving at Venice in considerable quantity.
This lattimo glass came much into favour for a second time early in the eighteenth century; it was at that time often decorated in colours in a pseudo-Japanese style. This later milk-white glass is once more closely associated with the attempts then again made at Venice, as in so many other countries, to imitate the porcelain of China and Japan. This had indeed, before the end of the previous century, been in a measure accomplished in France by means of a soft paste, in the composition of which a glass-like frit played an important part. At a still later time this lattimo glass was even painted in monochrome, in imitation of our early printed Worcester porcelain!
PILGRIM’S BOTTLE; DESIGN IN BLUE ON LATTIMO GLASS
VENETIAN, EARLY SIXTEENTH CENTURY