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Fig. 28.

Fig. 29.

Perhaps no article of personal ornament has exhibited a greater variety of design and decorative enrichment than the cross. It has at once been made an embellishment and a badge of faith. We select in Fig. 29 one of singular elaboration and beauty, now the property of Lady Londesborough. It is a work of the early part of the sixteenth century; the ground is of frosted gold, upon which is a foliated ornament in cloissonné enamel of various colours. It is also enriched with pearl and crystal; the lower part of this cross is furnished with a loop, from which a jewel of value might be suspended.

Figs. 30 and 31.

By way of curious contrast, as well as to show the style of various ages in the article of necklaces, we give, in Figs. 30 and 31, two examples of widely different eras. The upper one is that of a Roman lady, whose entire collection of jewellery was accidentally discovered at Lyons, in 1841, by some workmen who were excavating the southern side of the heights of Fourvières, on the opposite side of the Seine. From an inscribed ring and some coins deposited in the jewel-box, the lady appears to have lived in the time of the Emperor Severus, and to have been the wife of one of the wealthy traders, who then, as now, were enriched by the traffic of the Rhone. The necklace we engrave is of gold, set with pearls and emeralds; the cubical beads are cut in lapis lazuli, as are the pendants which hang from others. This love of pendent ornament was common to all antique necklaces, from the days of ancient Greece to the end of the sixteenth century. Our second specimen is an illustration of this: it is copied from the portrait of a lady (bearing date 1593), and composed of a series of enamelled plaques, with jewels inserted, connected with each other by an ornamental chain.