Stop 7 - Gemma Constantiniana

Cameo, c. 312-324 AD, white-blue agate, 21.1 x 29.7 cm, National Museum of Antiquities, Leiden.

The story of this object is too long to summarise in a few words but it is worth considering how the interpretation and value of an object like this changes from one context to another. In the fourth century, a craftsman carved a relief in this precious three-layered white-blue agate, resulting in one of the largest antique cameos ever made. In ancient times, cameos were mostly used as signet rings and large earrings, but the size and weight of this agate – it weighs three kilos – means it was made as an independent artwork and probably gifted to Emperor Constantine to celebrate one of his victories. The scene shows the triumphant Emperor together with his wife Fausta and one of their sons in a chariot drawn by two centaurs - mythological creatures that were half-human, half-horse. We don't know who owned the hardstone after Constantine's death, but the cameo resurfaced in early seventeenth-century Antwerp, where the famous painter Peter Paul Rubens made a drawing of it. In Rubens' time, the stone's owner thought it showed the Triumph of the ancient god Bacchus in India. This may be one of the reasons why the agate was shipped to the East, combined with the knowledge that cameos were in high demand in India. In 1623, a disappointed Antwerp merchant reported that no more agates could be found in Constantinople because they had all been bought by Indians who had a “great desire” for the jewels. By the time that this cameo arrived in India however, the market had been flooded by imported stones and prices had dropped by fifty per cent.

The cameo was probably the most precious item on the Batavia when she was shipwrecked off the Western Australian coast in 1629. As part of his rescue mission, Commander Pelsaert brought divers from Indonesia who managed to salvage the cameo. Over the next thirty years, the Dutch East India Company desperately tried to sell the jewel in Persia, India, and Aceh but in vain. One Dutch officer explained that Muslims weren't interested in jewels showing human figures but only desired representations of animals, whereas another complained about the imperfection of the stones in the seventeenth-century frame. Unsold, the cameo returned to the Netherlands where in the early nineteenth century it was finally bought by the Dutch King William I for the impressive amount of 50,000 guilders, which in today's money would be the equivalent of about half a million AUD.

Cameo

ARC Centre of Excellence for the History of Emotions