CRYSTAL IN ART. - Rock crystal (colorless transparent quartz) has been known since antiquity as a material for fashioning small objects. Small figures or carvings in crystal with secular subjects are often found in the early Christian era in the Roman catacombs (Vatican, Profane and Christian Museum). Larger than usual are two lions' heads, probably created for the decoration of a piece of furniture, now preserved in the Cluny Museum in Paris. Pieces of crystal without decoration were used in barbarian goldsmithing and thus in Merovingian art. Objects of crystal with figurations of a religious character are extremely rare; for example, a fish (Vienna, Museum) and a carving with the Adoration of the Magi (Vatican, Sacred Museum).
In the early Middle Ages the use of crystal is more frequent, both for objects of religious use and for objects of secular use.
Some carvings from the Carolingian era repeat classical forms, technically as well. Notable is the seal of King Lothair in the cross of Aachen, formed from a disc with the story of Susanna (London, British Museum), it was perhaps worked in Metz. But the great mass of medieval objects in crystal is of Eastern origin. Many were brought to Europe during the crusades (such as those of the treasury of St. Mark's in Venice). Indeed in almost all the great treasuries, besides Venice, Aachen, Essen, Quedlinburg, Bamberg, Capua and the museums of Paris, London and Nuremberg, these Eastern works are found; generally they are glasses, cups, ampullae, plates, flasks or pendants. The name of the caliph of Egypt that appears on a pitcher in Venice and on a lunula in Nuremberg demonstrates that these crystals are largely Egyptian works of the 10th-12th century. Another group of tall vases, of simple form, without decoration, were instead probably worked at the Norman court of Palermo and show the influence of Fatimid art.
Another center for works in crystal developed in Venice. Characteristic of it is a decoration with filigree, as can be seen in the candelabra of Charles II of Anjou (Bari, Cathedral) or in a reliquary from S. Galla in Rome (Vatican, Christian Museum). But in Venice smooth pieces of crystal are also used to protect relics; thus in the ancient reliquary of the Volto Santo in Rome (Treasury of St. Peter's), dedicated by two Venetians in the year 1350. Sometimes crystals are placed on miniatures to protect them and give them the splendor of enamels, as in the triptych of Alba Fucense (Rome, Palazzo Venezia), or they are placed at the center of large crosses (Assisi, Atri, Pisa).
In the northern countries too, crosses, reliquaries, and pitchers of crystal were worked in the Middle Ages; a document of 1260 found in Paris alludes to this, while some beautiful crystal pitchers seem to have been made at the court of Burgundy.
At the beginning of the 16th century a school for the working of crystal flourished in northern Italy. Very famous is the Head of Lucrezia in Vienna (Lederer collection), attributed to Tullio Lombardi. For the most part these carvings served to be inserted into caskets (for example, the Farnese casket in the gallery of Naples by Giovanni Bernardi and in a small coffer by Valerio Belli in the Pitti Palace in Florence), into crosses or candelabra (see the cross and candelabra of Antonio Gentili in the Treasury of St. Peter's in Rome). Other objects of crystal such as paxes, crosses, or simple plaquettes are found in all the great collections. A beautiful portrait of Alessandro de' Medici worked by Domenico di Polo is today in the National Library of Paris. In Germany this art was imported from northern Italy. Artists such as the Miseroni from Milan worked in Prague, while the Saracchi operated in Munich. Francesco Gundelach derives his art from their influence. A great center of crystal production developed from the 16th century in Bohemia. In the 17th century glass, being less costly, contributed to diminishing the production of worked crystals. Only for the decoration of chandeliers (toward the end of the 18th century) and in the neoclassical period for executing carvings of great fineness does one sometimes return to using this noble material. - See plate LVI.
Bibliography3 works
Fritz Volbach