RENAISSANCE JEWELLERY
[CHAPTER XX]
ITALY, FIFTEENTH CENTURY
THE history of Renaissance jewellery in general may be approached by reviewing the condition of Italian jewellery in the fifteenth century. In the foregoing outline of European jewellery to the end of the fifteenth century—which has served as an approximate date for the termination of the mediæval epoch—practically no reference has been made to Italy. One need only examine the general style of Italian painting, architecture, and sculpture of the Quattrocento, to see how far apart the art of Italy stands from that of the rest of Europe.
Italian jewellery certainly merits the great reputation it has always possessed. Nor is this surprising, considering the prominent part played by the goldsmiths in the renaissance of artistic taste—by these craftsmen who, in the highest sense artists, were the first to break the fetters of tradition, and yield to those impulses that sought a wider field for the gratification of their creative instinct. Hence the history of the jeweller's art in Italy at the period of the Quattrocento largely resolves itself into the biographies of those master sculptors and painters, who worked first as goldsmiths and jewellers, and throughout their careers remained ever mindful of their original trade.
Venice, which in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries was the wealthiest city and the principal port in Europe, though rivalled in the former century by Bruges and by Antwerp in the latter, encouraged the use of luxurious jewellery, as did the great cities of the north. But Florence undoubtedly took the lead as an artistic centre, judging alone by the artists she produced. The paintings of the Venetian school (the work of Crivelli, for instance), and those of the schools of Tuscany, etc., reveal the exquisite beauty of ecclesiastical jewellery, and of the ornaments with which men, no less than women, loved to deck their persons. Nearly every painter possessed an insight into the mysteries of the goldsmith's craft, and represented his subject, whatever it might be, with careful attention to its jewelled accessories. The great merchants of opulent and artistic cities, such as Siena, Milan, and others, besides Venice and Florence, delighted in rich jewels; and the masters of the schools of painting which had their centres in these towns have preserved in glowing pigment a faithful record of these delicate works of art, on which the eminent jewellers of the day lavished their skill and ingenuity.
The great superiority and beauty of the personal ornaments revealed to us in this manner must first of all be ascribed to that awakening to the full joy of life that was so characteristic a feature of the Renaissance. The rapture of spring ran hot in men's veins. Life was an uninterrupted succession of revelry and gaiety, amid splendour of colouring and glitter of gold. The goldsmith emerges from the subordinate state he occupied in the mediæval guild, and attains fame as a free artist, whose duty was to minister personally to the luxurious tastes of those who played a part in the gorgeous pageant of the new epoch. The goldsmiths included among their ranks great master craftsmen, whose perfection of technical skill seemed to find satisfaction only in overcoming the greatest problems that their art could offer.
Vasari tells of the very close connection and almost constant intercourse that existed between the goldsmiths and the painters. Indeed, nearly every artist, before applying himself to painting, architecture, or sculpture, began with the study of the goldsmith's craft, and "passed the years of his apprenticeship in the technical details of an industry that then supplied the strictest method of design."[117]
The names of several artists of the Renaissance have been handed down who are specially recorded as having worked at jewellery. One of the earliest of those who began their career in the goldsmith's workshops is Ghiberti (b. 1378), who throughout life remained faithful to that species of work. His jewellery is specially extolled by Vasari.