Rare Roman cameo in glass. Griffon and snake.


Rare Roman glass cameo of Augustan period. Fight among a griffon and a snake. The griffon with its head turned right, fighting with the snake. This specific piece is a contemporary copy of an onyx cameo of 27 x 31 mm, signed by …MIΔIOΥ, now in the Cabinet des Médailles (Babelon 182). This type is very much rarer than the Augustan sphinx – of which the Vienna museum has a very comparable glass cameo of 12 x 15 mm (Eichler-Kris 70). Precious pieces from the imperial collection used to be reproduced in glass to be given as presents (“kostbare Stücke aus der kaiserlichen Sammlung wurden in Glas reproduziert und vermutlich als Ehrengeschenke vergeben” Erika Zwierlein-Diehl, Antike Gemmen und ihr Nachleben, Berlin & NY 2007, p. 326, where she gives two examples of Augustan portrait cameos). One knows of an ancient glass-cameo (in Aquileia) reproducing an ancient stone-cameo (in Florence). References: Gemma Sena Chiesa & Elisabetta Gagetti, Aquileia e la glittica di età ellenistica e romana, Trieste 2009, pp. 94 - 95, pl. 19 - 20. mm 15 x 14 x2; gr. 0.66
1st century A.D.