The process of sheet-glass manufacture described above is typical of that in use in a large number of works, but many modifications are to be found, particularly in the furnaces in which the glass is melted. In some works, the older method of melting the glass in large pots or crucibles is still adhered to, although the old-fashioned coal-fired furnaces have nearly everywhere given place to the use of producer gas and regenerators. For the production of coloured sheet-glass, however, the employment of pot furnaces is still almost universal, probably because the quantities of glass required of any one tint are insufficient to employ even a small tank furnace continuously; the exact control of the colour is also more readily attained with the smaller bulk of glass which has to be dealt with in pots. The general nature of the colouring ingredients employed, and the colour effects produced by them, have already been mentioned. In coloured sheet-glass, two distinct kinds are to be recognized; in one kind the colouring matter is contained in the body of the glass itself, while in the other the coloured sheet consists of ordinary white glass covered upon one side with a thin coating of intensely coloured glass. The latter kind is known as “flashed,” and is universally employed in the case of colouring matters whose effect is so intense that in any usual thickness of glass they would cause almost entire opacity. Flashed glass is produced by taking either the first or the last gathering in the production of a cylinder out of a crucible containing the coloured “metal,” the other gatherings being taken out of ordinary white sheet-glass. It is important that the thermal expansion of the two materials which are thus incorporated should be nearly alike, as otherwise warping of the finished sheet is liable to result.
Mechanical Processes for the Production of Sheet-glass.—The complicated and indirect process of sheet-glass manufacture has led to numerous inventions aiming at a direct method of production by more or less mechanical means. All the earlier attempts in this direction failed on account of the difficulty of bringing the glass to the machines without introducing air-bells, which are always formed in molten glass when it is ladled or poured from one vessel into another. More modern inventors have therefore adopted the plan of drawing the glass direct from the furnace. In an American process the glass is drawn direct from the molten mass in the tank in a cylindrical form by means of an iron ring previously immersed in the glass, and is kept in shape by means of special devices for cooling it rapidly as it leaves the molten bath. In this process, however, the entire operations of splitting and flattening are retained, and although the mechanical process is said to be in successful commercial operation, it has not as yet made itself felt as a formidable rival to hand-made sheet-glass. An effort at a more direct mechanical process is embodied in the inventions of Foucault which are at present being developed in Germany and Belgium; in this process the glass is drawn from the molten bath in the shape of flat sheets, by the aid of a bar of iron, previously immersed in the glass, the glass receiving its form by being drawn through slots in large fire-bricks, and being kept in shape by rapid chilling produced by the action of air-blasts. The mechanical operation is quite successful for thick sheets, but it is not as yet available for the thinner sheets required for the ordinary purposes of sheet-glass, since with these excessive breakage occurs, while the sheets generally show grooves or lines derived from small irregularities of the drawing orifice. For the production of thick sheets which are subsequently to be polished the process may thus claim considerable success, but it is not as yet possible to produce satisfactory sheet-glass by such means.
Crown-glasshas at the present day almost disappeared from the market, and it has been superseded by sheet-glass, the more modern processes described above being capable of producing much larger sheets of glass, free from the knob or “bullion” which may still be seen in old crown-glass windows. For a few isolated purposes, however, it is desirable to use a glass which has not been touched upon either surface and thus preserves the lustre of its “fire polish” undiminished; this can be attained in crown-glass but not in sheet, since one side of the latter is always more or less marked by the rubber used in the process of flattening. One of the few uses of crown-glass of this kind is the glass slides upon which microscopic specimens are mounted, as well as the thin glass slips with which such preparations are covered. A full account of the process of blowing crown-glass will be found in all older books and articles on the subject, so that it need only be mentioned here that the glass, instead of being blown into a cylinder, is blown into a flattened sphere, which is caused to burst at the point opposite the pipe and is then, by the rapid spinning of the glass in front of a very hot furnace-opening, caused to expand into a flat disk of large diameter. This only requires to be annealed and is then ready for cutting up, but the lump of glass by which the original globe was attached to the pipe remains as the bullion in the centre of the disk of glass.
Coloured Glass for Mosaic Windows.—The production of coloured glass for “mosaic” windows has become a separate branch of glass-making. Charles Winston, after prolonged study of the coloured windows of the 13th, 14th and 15th centuries, convinced himself that no approach to the colour effect of these windows could be made with glass which is thin and even in section, homogeneous in texture, and made and coloured with highly refined materials. To obtain the effect it was necessary to reproduce as far as possible the conditions under which the early craftsmen worked, and to create scientifically glass which is impure in colour, irregular in section, and non-homogeneous in texture. The glass is made in cylinders and in “crowns” or circles. The cylinders measure about 14 in. in length by 8 in. in diameter, and vary in thickness from1⁄8to3⁄8in. The crowns are about 15 in. in diameter, and vary in thickness from1⁄8to ½ in., the centre being the thickest. These cylinders and crowns may be either solid colour or flashed. Great variety of colour may be obtained by flashing one colour upon another, such as blue on green, and ruby on blue, green or yellow.
E. J. Prior has introduced an ingenious method of making small oblong and square sheets of coloured glass, which are thick in the centre and taper towards the edges, and which have one surface slightly roughened and one brilliantly polished. Glass is blown into an oblong box-shaped iron mould, about 12 in. in depth and 6 in. across. A hollow rectangular bottle is formed, the base and sides of which are converted into sheets. The outer surface of these sheets is slightly roughened by contact with the iron mould.
(D)Bottles and mechanically blown Glass.—The manufacture of bottles has become an industry of vast proportions. The demand constantly increases, and, owing to constant improvements in material in the moulds and in the methods of working, the supply fully keeps pace with the demand. Except for making bottles of special colours, gas-heated tank furnaces are in general use. Melting and working are carried on continuously. The essential qualities of a bottle are strength and power to resist chemical corrosion. The materials are selected with a view to secure these qualities. For the highest quality of bottles, whichare practically colourless, sand, limestone and sulphate and carbonate of soda are used. The following is a typical analysis of high quality bottle-glass: SiO2, 69.15%; Na2O, 13.00%; CaO, 15.00%; Al2O3, 2.20%; and Fe2O3, 0.65%. For the commoner grades of dark-coloured bottles the glass mixture is cheapened by substituting common salt for part of the sulphate of soda, and by the addition of felspar, granite, granulite, furnace slag and other substances fusible at a high temperature. Bottle moulds are made of cast iron, either in two pieces, hinged together at the base or at one side, or in three pieces, one forming the body and two pieces forming the neck.
C, Bottle.
A, Conical piece of iron to form the inside of the neck.
B, B, Shaped pieces of iron, which can be pressed upon the outside of the neck by the spring-handle H.
A bottle gang or “shop” consists of five persons. The “gatherer” gathers the glass from the tank furnace on the end of the blowing-iron, rolls it on a slab of iron or stone, slightly expands the glass by blowing, and hands the blowing iron and glass to the “blower.” The blower places the glass in the mould, closes the mould by pressing a lever with his foot, and either blows down the blowing iron or attaches it to a tube connected with a supply of compressed air. When the air has forced the glass to take the form of the mould, the mould is opened and the blower gives the blowing iron with the bottle attached to it to the “wetter off.” The wetter off touches the top of the neck of the bottle with a moistened piece of iron and by tapping the blowing iron detaches the bottle and drops it into a wooden trough. He then grips the body of the bottle with a four-pronged clip, attached to an iron rod, and passes it to the “bottle maker.” The bottle maker heats the fractured neck of the bottle, binds a band of molten glass round the end of it and simultaneously shapes the inside and the outside of the neck by using the tool shown in fig. 18. The finished bottle is taken by the “taker in” to the annealing furnace. The bottles are stacked in iron trucks, which, when full, are moved slowly away from a constant source of heat.
The processes of manipulation which have been described, although in practice they are very rapidly performed, are destined to be replaced by the automatic working of a machine. Bottle-making machines, based on Ashley’s original patent, are already being largely used. They ensure absolute regularity in form and save both time and labour. A bottle-making machine combines the process of pressing with a plunger with that of blowing by compressed air. The neck of the bottle is first formed by the plunger, and the body is subsequently blown by compressed air admitted through the plunger. A sufficient weight of molten glass to form a bottle is gathered and placed in a funnel-shaped vessel which serves as a measure, and gives access to the mould which shapes the outside of the neck. A plunger is forced upwards into the glass in the neck-mould and forms the neck. The funnel is removed, and the plunger, neck-mould and the mass of molten glass attached to the neck are inverted. A bottle mould rises and envelops the mass of molten glass. Compressed air admitted through the plunger forces the molten glass to take the form of the bottle mould and completes the bottle.
In the case of the machine patented by Michael Owens of Toledo, U.S.A., for making tumblers, lamp-chimneys, and other goods of similar character, the manual operations required are (1) gathering the molten glass at the end of a blowing iron; (2) placing the blowing iron with the glass attached to it in the machine; (3) removing the blowing iron with the blown vessel attached. Each machine (fig. 19) consists of a revolving table carrying five or six moulds. The moulds are opened and closed by cams actuated by compressed air. As soon as a blowing iron is in connexion with an air jet, the sections of the mould close upon the molten glass, and the compressed air forces the glass to take the form of the mould. After removal from the machine, the tumbler is severed from the blowing iron, and its fractured edge is trimmed.
Compressed air or steam is also used for fashioning very large vessels, baths, dishes and reservoirs by the “Sievert” process. Molten glass is spread upon a large iron plate of the required shape and dimensions. The flattened mass of glass is held by a rim, connected to the edge of the plate. The plate with the glass attached to it is inverted, and compressed air or steam is introduced through openings in the plate. The mass of glass, yielding to its own weight and the pressure of air or steam, sinks downwards and adapts itself to any mould or receptacle beneath it.
The processes employed in the manufacture of the glass bulbs for incandescent electric lamps, are similar to the old-fashioned processes of bottle making. The mould is in two pieces hinged together; it is heated and the inner surface is rubbed over with finely powdered plumbago. When the glass is being blown in the mould the blowing iron is twisted round and round so that the finished bulb may not be marked by the joint of the mould.
III.Mechanically Pressed Glass.(A)Plate-glass.—The glass popularly known as “plate-glass” is made by casting and rolling. The following are typical analyses:
The raw materials for the production of plate-glass are chosen with great care so as to secure a product as free from colour as possible, since the relatively great thickness of the sheetswould render even a faint tint conspicuous. The substances employed are the same as those used for the manufacture of sheet-glass, viz. pure sand, a pure form of carbonate of lime, and sulphate of soda, with the addition of a suitable proportion of carbon in the form of coke, charcoal or anthracite coal.
The glass to be used for the production of plate is universally melted in pots or crucibles and not in open tank furnaces. When the glass is completely melted and “fine,”i.e.free from bubbles, it is allowed to cool down to a certain extent so as to become viscous or pasty. The whole pot, with its contents of viscous glass, is then removed bodily from the furnace by means of huge tongs and is transported to a crane, which grips the pot, raises it, and ultimately tips it over so as to pour the glass upon the slab of the rolling-table. In most modern works the greater part of these operations, as well as the actual rolling of the glass, is carried out by mechanical means, steam power and subsequently electrical power having been successfully applied to this purpose; the handling of the great weights of glass required for the largest sheets of plate-glass which are produced at the present time would, indeed, be impossible without the aid of machinery. The casting-table usually consists of a perfectly smooth cast-iron slab, frequently built up of a number of pieces carefully fitted together, mounted upon a low, massive truck running upon rails, so that it can be readily moved to any desired position in the casting-room. The viscous mass having been thrown on the casting-table, a large and heavy roller passes over it and spreads it out into a sheet. Rollers up to 5 tons in weight are employed and are now generally driven by power. The width of the sheet or plate is regulated by moving guides which are placed in front of the roller and are pushed along by it, while its thickness is regulated by raising or lowering the roller relatively to the surface of the table. Since the surfaces produced by rolling have subsequently to be ground and polished, it is essential that the glass should leave the rolling-table with as smooth a surface as possible, so that great care is required in this part of the process. It is, however, equally important that the glass as a whole should be flat and remains flat during the process of gradual cooling (annealing), otherwise great thicknesses of glass would have to be ground away at the projecting parts of the sheet. The annealing process is therefore carried out in a manner differing essentially from that in use for any other variety of flat glass and nearly resembling that used for optical glass. The rolled sheet is left on the casting-table until it has set sufficiently to be pushed over a flat iron plate without risk of distortion; meanwhile the table has been placed in front of the opening of one of the large annealing kilns and the slab of glass is carefully pushed into the kiln. The annealing kilns are large fire-brick chambers of small height but with sufficient floor area to accommodate four or six large slabs, and the slabs are placed directly upon the floor of the kiln, which is built up of carefully dressed blocks of burnt fireclay resting upon a bed of sand; in order to avoid any risk of working or buckling in this floor these blocks are set slightly apart and thus have room to expand freely when heated. Before the glass is introduced, the annealing kiln is heated to dull red by means of coal fires in grates which are provided at the ends or sides of the kiln for that purpose. When the floor of the kiln has been covered with slabs of glass the opening is carefully built up and luted with fire-bricks and fire-clay, and the whole is then allowed to cool. In the walls and floor of the kiln special cooling channels or air passages are provided and by gradually opening these to atmospheric circulation the cooling is considerably accelerated while a very even distribution of temperature is obtained; by these means even the largest slabs can now be cooled in three or four days and are nevertheless sufficiently well annealed to be free from any serious internal stress. From the annealing kiln the slabs of glass are transported to the cutting room, where they are cut square, defective slabs being rejected or cut down to smaller sizes. The glass at this stage has a comparatively dull surface and this must now be replaced by that brilliant and perfectly polished surface which is the chief beauty of this variety of glass. The first step in this process is that of grinding the surface down until all projections are removed and a close approximation to a perfect plane is obtained. This operation, like all the subsequent steps in the polishing of the glass, is carried out by powerful machinery. By means of a rotating table either two surfaces of glass, or one surface of glass and one of cast iron, are rubbed together with the interposition of a powerful abrasive such as sand, emery or carborundum. The machinery by which this is done has undergone numerous modifications and improvements, all tending to produce more perfectly plane glass, to reduce the risk of breakage, and to lessen the expenditure of time and power required per sq. yd. of glass to be worked. It is impossible to describe this machinery within the limits of this article, but it is notable that the principal difficulties to be overcome arise from the necessity of providing the glass with a perfectly continuous and unyielding support to which it can be firmly attached but from which it can be detached without undue difficulty.
When the surface of the glass has been ground down to a plane, the surface itself is still “grey,”i.e.deeply pitted with the marks of the abrasive used in grinding it down; these marks are removed by the process of smoothing, in which the surface is successively ground with abrasives of gradually increasing fineness, leaving ultimately a very smooth and very minutely pitted “grey” surface. This smooth surface is then brilliantly polished by the aid of friction with a rubbing tool covered with a soft substance like leather or felt and fed with a polishing material, such as rouge. A few strokes of such a rubber are sufficient to produce a decidedly “polished” appearance, but prolonged rubbing under considerable pressure and the use of a polishing paste of a proper consistency are required in order to remove the last trace of pitting from the surface. This entire process must, obviously, be applied in turn to each of the two surfaces of the slab of glass. Plate-glass is manufactured in this manner in thicknesses varying from3⁄16in. to 1 in. or even more, while single sheets are produced measuring more than 27 ft. by 13 ft.
”Rolled Plate” and figured “Rolled Plate.”—Glass for this purpose, with perhaps the exception of the best white and tinted varieties, is now universally produced in tank-furnaces, similar in a general way to those used for sheet-glass, except that the furnaces used for “rolled plate” glass of the roughest kinds do not need such minutely careful attention and do not work at so high a temperature. The composition of these glasses is very similar to that of sheet-glass, but for the ordinary kinds of rolled plate much less scrupulous selection need be made in the choice of raw materials, especially of the sand.
The glass is taken from the furnace in large iron ladles, which are carried upon slings running on overhead rails; from the ladle the glass is thrown upon the cast-iron bed of a rolling-table, and is rolled into sheet by an iron roller, the process being similar to that employed in making plate-glass, but on a smaller scale. The sheet thus rolled is roughly trimmed while hot and soft, so as to remove those portions of glass which have been spoilt by immediate contact with the ladle, and the sheet, still soft, is pushed into the open mouth of an annealing tunnel or “lear,” down which it is carried by a system of moving grids.
The surface of the glass produced in this way may be modified by altering the surface of the rolling-table; if the table has a smooth surface, the glass will also be more or less smooth, but much dented and buckled on the surface and far from having the smooth face of blown sheet. If the table has a pattern engraved upon it the glass will show the same pattern in relief, the most frequent pattern of the kind being either small parallel ridges or larger ribs crossing to form a lozenge pattern.
The more elaborate patterns found on what is known as “figure rolled plate” are produced in a somewhat different manner; the glass used for this purpose is considerably whiter in colour and much softer than ordinary rolled plate, and instead of being rolled out on a table it is produced by rolling between two moving rollers from which the sheet issues. The pattern is impressed upon the soft sheet by a printing roller which is brought down upon the glass as it leaves the main rolls. Thisglass shows a pattern in high relief and gives a very brilliant effect.
The various varieties of rolled plate-glass are now produced for some purposes with a reinforcement of wire netting which is embedded in the mass of the glass. The wire gives the glass great advantages in the event of fracture from a blow or from fire, but owing to the difference in thermal expansion between wire and glass, there is a strong tendency for such “wired glass” to crack spontaneously.
Patent Plate-glass.—This term is applied to blown sheet-glass, whose surface has been rendered plane and brilliant by a process of grinding and polishing. The name “patent plate” arose from the fact that certain patented devices originated by James Chance of Birmingham first made it possible to polish comparatively thin glass in this way.
(B)Pressed Glass.—The technical difference between pressed and moulded glass is that moulded glass-ware has taken its form from a mould under the pressure of a workman’s breath, or of compressed air, whereas pressed glass-ware has taken its form from a mould under the pressure of a plunger. Moulded glass receives the form of the mould on its interior as well as on its exterior surface. In pressed glass the exterior surface is modelled by the mould, whilst the interior surface is modelled by the plunger (fig. 20).
The process of pressing glass was introduced to meet the demand for cheap table-ware. Pressed glass, which is necessarily thick and serviceable, has well met this legitimate demand, but it also caters for the less legitimate taste for cheap imitations of hand-cut glass. An American writer has expressed his satisfaction that the day-labourer can now have on his table at a nominal price glass dishes of elaborate design, which only an expert can distinguish from hand-cut crystal. The deceptive effect is in some cases heightened by cutting over and polishing by hand the pressed surface.
The glass for pressed ware must be colourless, and, when molten, must be sufficiently fluid to adapt itself readily to the intricacies of the moulds, which are often exceedingly complex. The materials employed are sand, sulphate of soda, nitrate of soda, calcspar and in some works carbonate of barium. The following is an analysis of a specimen of English pressed glass; SiO2, 70.68%; Na2O, 18.38%; CaO, 5.45%; BaO, 4.17%; Al2O3, 0.33%; and Fe2O3, 0.20%. Tanks and pots are both used for melting the glass. The moulds are made of cast iron. They are usually in two main pieces, a base and an upper part or collar of hinged sections. The plunger is generally worked by a hand lever. The operator knows by touch when the plunger has pressed the glass far enough to exactly fill the mould. Although the moulds are heated, the surface of the glass is always slightly ruffled by contact with the mould. For this reason every piece of pressed glass-ware, as soon as it is liberated from the mould, is exposed to a sharp heat in a small subsidiary furnace in order that the ruffled surface may be removed by melting. These small furnaces are usually heated by an oil spray under the pressure of steam or compressed air.
See Antonio Neri,Ars vitraria, cum Merritti observationibus(Amsterdam, 1668) (Neri’s work was translated into English by C. Merritt in 1662, and the translation,The Art of making Glass, was privately reprinted by Sir T. Phillipps, Bart., in 1826); Johann Kunkel,Vollständige Glasmacher-Kunst(Nuremberg, 1785); Apsley Pellatt,Curiosities of Glass-making(London, 1849); A. Sauzay,Marvels of Glass-making(from the French) (London, 1869); G. Bontemps,Guide du verrier(Paris, 1868); E. Peligot,Le Verre, son histoire, sa fabrication(Paris, 1878); W. Stein, “Die Glasfabrikation,” in Bolley’sTechnologie, vol. iii. (Brunswick, 1862); H. E. Benrath,Die Glasfabrikation(Brunswick, 1875); J. Falck and L. Lobmeyr,Die Glasindustrie(Vienna, 1875); D. H. Hovestadt,Jenaer Glas(Jena, 1900; Eng. trans. by J. D. and A. Everett, Macmillan, 1907); J. Henrivaux,Le Verre et le cristal(Paris, 1887), andLa Verrerie au XXesiècle(1903); Chance, Harris and Powell,Principles of Glass-making(London, 1883); Moritz V. Rohr,Theorie und Geschichte der photographischen Objektive(Berlin, 1899); C. E. Guillaume,Traité pratique de la thermométrie de précision(Paris, 1889); Louis Coffignal,Verres et émaux(Paris, 1900); R. Gerner,Die Glasfabrikation(Vienna, 1897); C. Wetzel,Herstellung grosser Glaskörper(Vienna, 1900); C. Wetzel,Bearbeitung von Glaskörpern(Vienna, 1901); E. Tscheuschner,Handbuch der Glasfabrikation(Weimar, 1885); R. Dralle,Anlage und Betrieb der Glasfabriken(Leipzig, 1886); G. Tammann,Kristallisieren und Schmelzen(Leipzig, 1903); W. Rosenhain, “Some Properties of Glass,”Trans. Optical Society(London, 1903), “Possible Directions of Progress in Optical Glass,”Proc. Optical Convention(London, 1905) andGlass Manufacture(London, 1908); Introduction to section 1,Catalogue of the Optical Convention(London, 1905).
See Antonio Neri,Ars vitraria, cum Merritti observationibus(Amsterdam, 1668) (Neri’s work was translated into English by C. Merritt in 1662, and the translation,The Art of making Glass, was privately reprinted by Sir T. Phillipps, Bart., in 1826); Johann Kunkel,Vollständige Glasmacher-Kunst(Nuremberg, 1785); Apsley Pellatt,Curiosities of Glass-making(London, 1849); A. Sauzay,Marvels of Glass-making(from the French) (London, 1869); G. Bontemps,Guide du verrier(Paris, 1868); E. Peligot,Le Verre, son histoire, sa fabrication(Paris, 1878); W. Stein, “Die Glasfabrikation,” in Bolley’sTechnologie, vol. iii. (Brunswick, 1862); H. E. Benrath,Die Glasfabrikation(Brunswick, 1875); J. Falck and L. Lobmeyr,Die Glasindustrie(Vienna, 1875); D. H. Hovestadt,Jenaer Glas(Jena, 1900; Eng. trans. by J. D. and A. Everett, Macmillan, 1907); J. Henrivaux,Le Verre et le cristal(Paris, 1887), andLa Verrerie au XXesiècle(1903); Chance, Harris and Powell,Principles of Glass-making(London, 1883); Moritz V. Rohr,Theorie und Geschichte der photographischen Objektive(Berlin, 1899); C. E. Guillaume,Traité pratique de la thermométrie de précision(Paris, 1889); Louis Coffignal,Verres et émaux(Paris, 1900); R. Gerner,Die Glasfabrikation(Vienna, 1897); C. Wetzel,Herstellung grosser Glaskörper(Vienna, 1900); C. Wetzel,Bearbeitung von Glaskörpern(Vienna, 1901); E. Tscheuschner,Handbuch der Glasfabrikation(Weimar, 1885); R. Dralle,Anlage und Betrieb der Glasfabriken(Leipzig, 1886); G. Tammann,Kristallisieren und Schmelzen(Leipzig, 1903); W. Rosenhain, “Some Properties of Glass,”Trans. Optical Society(London, 1903), “Possible Directions of Progress in Optical Glass,”Proc. Optical Convention(London, 1905) andGlass Manufacture(London, 1908); Introduction to section 1,Catalogue of the Optical Convention(London, 1905).
(H. J. P.; W. Rn.)
History of Glass Manufacture.
The great similarity in form, technique and decoration of the earliest known specimens of glass-ware suggests that the craft of glass-making originated from a single centre. It has been generally assumed that Egypt was the birthplace of the glass industry. It is true that many conditions existed in Egypt favourable to the development of the craft. The Nile supplied a waterway for the conveyance of fuel and for the distribution of the finished wares. Materials were available providing the essential ingredients of glass. The Egyptian potteries afforded experience in dealing with vitreous glazes and vitreous colours, and from Egyptian alabaster-quarries veined vessels were wrought, which may well have suggested the decorative arrangement of zigzag lines (see Plate I. figs, 1, 2, 4d) so frequently found on early specimens of glass-ware. In Egypt, however, no traces have at present been found of the industry in a rudimentary condition, and the vases which have been classified as “primitive” bear witness to an elaboration of technique far in advance of the experimental period. The earliest specimens of glass-ware which can be definitely claimed as Egyptian productions, and the glass manufactory discovered by Dr Flinders Petrie at Tell el Amarna, belong to the period of the XVIIIth dynasty. The comparative lateness of this period makes it difficult to account for the wall painting at Beni Hasan, which accurately represents the process of glass-blowing, and which is attributed to the period of the XIth dynasty. Dr Petrie surmounts the difficulty by saying that the process depicted is not glass-blowing, but some metallurgical process in which reeds were used tipped with lumps of clay. It is possible that the picture does not represent Egyptian glass-blowers, but is a traveller’s record of the process of glass-blowing seen in some foreign or subject country. The scarcity of specimens of early glass-ware actually found in Egypt, and the advanced technique of those which have been found, lead to the supposition that glass-making was exotic and not a native industry. The tradition, recorded by Pliny (Nat. Hist.xxxvi. 65), assigns the discovery of glass to Syria, and the geographical position of that country, its forests as a source of fuel, and its deposits of sand add probability to the tradition. The story that Phoenician merchants found a glass-like substance under their cooking pots, which had been supported on blocks of natron, need not be discarded as pure fiction. The fire may well have caused the natron, an impure form of carbonate of soda, to combine with the surrounding sand to form silicate of soda, which, although not a permanent glass, is sufficiently glass-like to suggest thepossibility of creating a permanent transparent material. Moreover, Pliny (xxxvi. 66) actually records the discovery which effected the conversion of deliquescent silicate of soda into permanent glass. The words are “Coeptus addi magnes lapis.” There have been many conjectures as to the meaning of the words “magnes lapis.” The material has been considered by some to be magnetic iron ore and by others oxide of manganese. Oxides of iron and manganese can only be used in glass manufacture in comparatively small quantities for the purpose of colouring or neutralizing colour in glass, and their introduction would not be a matter of sufficient importance to be specially recorded. In chapter 25 of the same book Pliny describes five varieties of “magnes lapis.” One of these he says is found in magnesia, is white in colour, does not attract iron and is like pumice stone. This variety must certainly be magnesian limestone. Magnesian limestone mixed and fused with sand and an alkaline carbonate produces a permanent glass. The scene of the discovery of glass is placed by Pliny on the banks of the little river Belus, under the heights of Mount Carmel, where sand suitable for glass-making exists and wood for fuel is abundant. In this neighbourhood fragments and lumps of glass are still constantly being dug up, and analysis proves that the glass contains a considerable proportion of magnesia. The district was a glass-making centre in Roman times, and it is probable that the Romans inherited and perfected an indigenous industry of remote antiquity. Pliny has so accurately recorded the stages by which a permanent glass was developed that it may be assumed that he had good reason for claiming for Syria the discovery of glass. Between Egypt and Syria there was frequent intercourse both of conquest and commerce. It was customary for the victor after a successful raid to carry off skilled artisans as captives. It is recorded that Tahutmes III. sent Syrian artisans to Egypt. Glass-blowers may have been amongst their captive craftsmen, and may have started the industry in Egypt. The claims of Syria and Egypt are at the present time so equally balanced that it is advisable to regard the question of the birthplace of the glass industry as one that has still to be settled.
The “primitive” vessels which have been found in Egypt are small in size and consist of columnar stibium jars, flattened bottles and amphorae, all decorated with zigzag lines, tiny wide-mouthed vases on feet and minute jugs. The vessels of later date which have been found in considerable quantities, principally in the coast towns and islands of the Mediterranean, are amphorae and alabastra, also decorated with zigzag lines. The amphorae (Plate I. figs. 1 and 2) terminate with a point, or with an unfinished extension from the terminal point, or with a knob. The alabastra have short necks, are slightly wider at the base than at the shoulder and have rounded bases. Dr Petrie has called attention to two technical peculiarities to be found in almost every specimen of early glass-ware. The inner surface is roughened (Plate I. fig. 4c), and has particles of sand adhering to it, as if the vessel had been filled with sand and subjected to heat, and the inside of the neck has the impression of a metal rod (Plate I. fig. 4a), which appears to have been extracted from the neck with difficulty. From this evidence Dr Petrie has assumed that the vessels were not blown, but formed upon a core of sandy paste, modelled upon a copper rod, the rod being the core of the neck (seeEgypt:Art and Archaeology). The evidence, however, hardly warrants the abandonment of the simple process of blowing in favour of a process which is so difficult that it may almost be said to be impossible, and of which there is no record or tradition except in connexion with the manufacture of small beads. The technical difficulties to which Dr Petrie has called attention seem to admit of a somewhat less heroic explanation. A modern glass-blower, when making an amphora-shaped vase, finishes the base first, fixes an iron rod to the finished base with a seal of glass, severs the vase from the blowing iron, and finishes the mouth, whilst he holds the vase by the iron attached to its base. The “primitive” glass-worker reversed this process. Having blown the body of the vase, he finished the mouth and neck part, and fixed a small, probably hollow, copper rod inside the finished neck by pressing the neck upon the rod (Plate I. fig. 4b). Having severed the body of the vase from the blowing iron, he heated and closed the fractured base, whilst holding the vase by means of the rod fixed in the neck. Nearly every specimen shows traces of the pressure of a tool on the outside of the neck, as well as signs of the base having been closed by melting. Occasionally a knob or excrescence, formed by the residue of the glass beyond the point at which the base has been pinched together, remains as a silent witness of the process.
If glass-blowing had been a perfectly new invention of Graeco-Egyptian or Roman times, some specimens illustrating the transition from core-moulding to blowing must have been discovered. The absence of traces of the transition strengthens the supposition that the revolution in technique merely consisted in the discovery that it was more convenient to finish the base of a vessel before its mouth, and such a revolution would leave no trace behind. The roughened inner surface and the adhering particles of sand may also be accounted for. The vessels, especially those in which many differently coloured glasses were incorporated, required prolonged annealing. It is probable that when the metal rod was withdrawn the vessel was filled with sand, to prevent collapse, and buried in heated ashes to anneal. The greater the heat of the ashes the more would the sand adhere to and impress the inner surface of the vessels. The decoration of zigzag lines was probably applied directly after the body of the vase had been blown. Threads of coloured molten glass were spirally coiled round the body, and, whilst still viscid, were dragged into zigzags with a metal hook.
Egypt.—The glass industry flourished in Egypt in Graeco-Egyptian and Roman times. All kinds of vessels were blown, both with and without moulds, and both moulding and cutting were used as methods of decoration. The great variety of these vessels is well shown in the illustrated catalogue of Graeco-Egyptian glass in the Cairo museum, edited by C. C. Edgar.
Another species of glass manufacture in which the Egyptians would appear to have been peculiarly skilled is the so-called mosaic glass, formed by the union of rods of various colours in such a manner as to form a pattern; the rod so formed was then reheated and drawn out until reduced to a very small size, 1 sq. in. or less, and divided into tablets by being cut transversely, each of these tablets presenting the pattern traversing its substance and visible on each face. This process was no doubt first practised in Egypt, and is never seen in such perfection as in objects of a decidedly Egyptian character. Very beautiful pieces of ornament of an architectural character are met with, which probably once served as decorations of caskets or other small pieces of furniture or of trinkets; also tragic masks, human faces and birds. Some of the last-named are represented with such truth of colouring and delicacy of detail that even the separate feathers of the wings and tail are well distinguished, although, as in an example in the British Museum, a human-headed hawk, the piece which contains the figure may not exceed ¾ in. in its largest dimension. Works of this description probably belong to the period when Egypt passed under Roman domination, as similar objects, though of inferior delicacy, appear to have been made in Rome.
Assyria.—Early Assyrian glass is represented in the British Museum by a vase of transparent greenish glass found in the north-west palace of Nineveh. On one side of this a lion is engraved, and also a line of cuneiform characters, in which is the name of Sargon, king of Assyria, 722B.C.Fragments of coloured glasses were also found there, but our materials are too scanty to enable us to form any decided opinion as to the degree of perfection to which the art was carried in Assyria. Many of the specimens discovered by Layard at Nineveh have all the appearance of being Roman, and were no doubt derived from the Roman colony, Niniva Claudiopolis, which occupied the same site.
Plate I.
Plate II.
Roman Glass.—In the first centuries of our era the art of glass-making was developed at Rome and other cities under Roman rule in a most remarkable manner, and it reached a point ofexcellence which in some respects has never been excelled or even perhaps equalled. It may appear a somewhat exaggerated assertion that glass was used for more purposes, and in one sense more extensively, by the Romans of the imperial period than by ourselves in the present day; but it is one which can be borne out by evidence. It is true that the use of glass for windows was only gradually extending itself at the time when Roman civilization sank under the torrent of German and Hunnish barbarism, and that its employment for optical instruments was only known in a rudimentary stage; but for domestic purposes, for architectural decoration and for personal ornaments glass was unquestionably much more used than at the present day. It must be remembered that the Romans possessed no fineporcelaindecorated with lively colours and a beautiful glaze; Samian ware was the most decorative kind of pottery which was then made. Coloured and ornamental glass held among them much the same place for table services, vessels for toilet use and the like, as that held among us by porcelain. Pliny (Nat. Hist.xxxvi. 26, 67) tells us that for drinking vessels it was even preferred to gold and silver.
Glass was largely used in pavements, and in thin plates as a coating for walls. It was used in windows, though by no means exclusively, mica, alabaster and shells having been also employed. Glass, in flat pieces, such as might be employed for windows, has been found in the ruins of Roman houses, both in England and in Italy, and in the house of the faun at Pompeii a small pane in a bronze frame remains. Most of the pieces have evidently been made by casting, but the discovery of fragments of sheet-glass at Silchester proves that the process of making sheet-glass was known to the Romans. When the window openings were large, as was the case in basilicas and other public buildings, and even in houses, the pieces of glass were, doubtless, fixed in pierced slabs of marble or in frames of wood or bronze. The Roman glass-blowers were masters of all the ordinary methods of manipulation and decoration. Their craftsmanship is proved by the large cinerary urns, by the jugs with wide, deeply ribbed, scientifically fixed handles, and by vessels and vases as elegant in form and light in weight as any that have been since produced at Murano. Their moulds, both for blowing hollow vessels and for pressing ornaments, were as perfect for the purposes for which they were intended as those of the present time. Their decorative cutting (Plate I. figs. 5 and 6), which took the form of simple, incised lines, or bands of shallow oval or hexagonal hollows, was more suited to the material than the deep prismatic cutting of comparatively recent times.
The Romans had at their command, of transparent colours, blue, green, purple or amethystine, amber, brown and rose; of opaque colours, white, black, red, blue, yellow, green and orange. There are many shades of transparent blue and of opaque blue, yellow and green. In any large collection of fragments it would be easy to find eight or ten varieties of opaque blue, ranging from lapis lazuli to turquoise or to lavender and six or seven of opaque green. Of red the varieties are fewer; the finest is a crimson red of very beautiful tint, and there are various gradations from this to a dull brick red. One variety forms the ground of a very good imitation of porphyry; and there is a dull semi-transparent red which, when light is passed through it, appears to be of a dull green hue. With these colours the Romanvitrariusworked, either using them singly or blending them in almost every conceivable combination, sometimes, it must be owned, with a rather gaudy and inharmonious effect.
The glasses to which the Venetians gave the name “mille fiori” were formed by arranging side by side sections of glass cane, the canes themselves being built up of differently coloured rods of glass, and binding them together by heat. A vast quantity of small cups and paterae were made by this means in patterns which bear considerable resemblance to the surfaces of madrepores. In these every colour and every shade of colour seem to have been tried in great variety of combination with effects more or less pleasing, but transparent violet or purple appears to have been the most common ground colour. Although most of the vessels of this mille fiori glass were small, some were made as large as 20 in. in diameter. Imitations of natural stones were made by stirring together in a crucible glasses of different colours, or by incorporating fragments of differently coloured glasses into a mass of molten glass by rolling. One variety is that in which transparent brown glass is so mixed with opaque white and blue as to resemble onyx. This was sometimes done with great success, and very perfect imitations of the natural stone were produced. Sometimes purple glass is used in place of brown, probably with the design of imitating the precious murrhine. Imitations of porphyry, of serpentine, and of granite are also met with, but these were used chiefly in pavements, and for the decoration of walls, for which purposes the onyx-glass was likewise employed.
The famous cameo glass was formed by covering a mass of molten glass with one or more coatings of a differently coloured glass. The usual process was to gather, first, a small quantity of opaque white glass; to coat this with a thick layer of translucent blue glass; and, finally, to cover the blue glass with a coating of the white glass. The outer coat was then removed from that portion which was to constitute the ground, leaving the white for the figures, foliage or other ornamentation; these were then sculptured by means of the gem-engraver’s tools. Pliny no doubt means to refer to this when he says (Nat. Hist.xxxvi. 26. 66), “aliud argenti modo caelatur,” contrasting it with the process of cutting glass by the help of a wheel, to which he refers in the words immediately preceding, “aliud torno teritur.”
The Portland or Barberini vase in the British Museum is the finest example of this kind of work which has come down to us, and was entire until it was broken into some hundred pieces by a madman. The pieces, however, were joined together by Mr Doubleday with extraordinary skill, and the beauty of design and execution may still be appreciated. The two other most remarkable examples of this cameo glass are an amphora at Naples and the Auldjo vase. The amphora measures 1 ft.5⁄8in. in height, 1 ft. 7½ in. in circumference; it is shaped like the earthern amphoras with a foot far too small to support it, and must no doubt have had a stand, probably of gold; the greater part is covered with a most exquisite design of garlands and vines, and two groups of boys gathering and treading grapes and playing on various instruments of music; below these is a line of sheep and goats in varied attitudes. The ground is blue and the figures white. It was found in a house in the Street of Tombs at Pompeii in the year 1839, and is now in the Royal Museum at Naples. It is well engraved in Richardson’sStudies of Ornamental Design. The Auldjo vase, in the British Museum, is an oenochoe about 9 in. high; the ornament consists mainly of a most beautiful band of foliage, chiefly of the vine, with bunches of grapes; the ground is blue and the ornaments white; it was found at Pompeii in the house of the faun. It also has been engraved by Richardson. The same process was used in producing large tablets, employed, no doubt, for various decorative purposes. In the South Kensington Museum is a fragment of such a tablet or slab; the figure, a portion of which remains, could not have been less than about 14 in. high. The ground of these cameo glasses is most commonly transparent blue, but sometimes opaque blue, purple or dark brown. The superimposed layer, which is sculptured, is generally opaque white. A very few specimens have been met with in which several colours are employed.
At a long interval after these beautiful objects come those vessels which were ornamented either by means of coarse threads trailed over their surfaces and forming rude patterns, or by coloured enamels merely placed on them in lumps; and these, doubtless, were cheap and common wares. But a modification of the first-named process was in use in the 4th and succeeding centuries, showing great ingenuity and manual dexterity,—that, namely, in which the added portions of glass are united to the body of the cup, not throughout, but only at points, and then shaped either by the wheel or by the hand (Plate I. fig. 3). Theattached portions form in some instances inscriptions, as on a cup found at Strassburg, which bears the name of the emperor Maximian (A.D.286-310), on another in the Vereinigte Sammlungen at Munich, and on a third in the Trivulzi collection at Milan, where the cup is white, the inscription green and the network blue. Probably, however, the finest example is a situla, 10½ in. high by 8 in. wide at the top and 4 in. at the bottom, preserved in the treasury of St Mark at Venice. This is of glass of a greenish hue; on the upper part is represented, in relief, the chase of a lion by two men on horseback accompanied by dogs; the costume appears to be Byzantine rather than Roman, and the style is very bad. The figures are very much undercut. The lower part has four rows of circles united to the vessel at those points alone where the circles touch each other. All the other examples have the lower portion covered in like manner by a network of circles standing nearly a quarter of an inch from the body of the cup. An example connected with the specimens just described is the cup belonging to Baron Lionel de Rothschild; though externally of an opaque greenish colour, it is by transmitted light of a deep red. On the outside, in very high relief, are figures of Bacchus with vines and panthers, some portions being hollow from within, others fixed on the exterior. The changeability of colour may remind us of the “calices versicolores” which Hadrian sent to Servianus.
So few examples of glass vessels of this period which have been painted in enamel have come down to us that it has been questioned whether that art was then practised; but several specimens have been described which can leave no doubt on the point; decisive examples are afforded by two cups found at Vaspelev, in Denmark, engravings of which are published in theAnnaler for Nordisk Oldkyndeghedfor 1861, p. 305. These are small cups, 3 in. and 2½ in. high, 3¾ in. and 3 in. wide, with feet and straight sides; on the larger are a lion and a bull, on the smaller two birds with grapes, and on each some smaller ornaments. On the latter are the letters DVB. R. The colours are vitrified and slightly in relief; green, blue and brown may be distinguished. They are found with Roman bronze vessels and other articles.
The art of glass-making no doubt, like all other art, deteriorated during the decline of the Roman empire, but it is probable that it continued to be practised, though with constantly decreasing skill, not only in Rome but in the provinces. Roman technique was to be found in Byzantium and Alexandria, in Syria, in Spain, in Germany, France and Britain.
Early Christian and Byzantine Glass.—The process of embedding gold and silver leaf between two layers of glass originated as early as the 1st century, probably in Alexandria. The process consisted in spreading the leaf on a thin film of blown glass and pressing molten glass on to the leaf so that the molten glass cohered with the film of glass through the pores of the metallic leaf. If before this application of the molten glass the metallic leaf, whilst resting on the thin film of blown glass, was etched with a sharp point, patterns, emblems, inscriptions and pictures could be embedded and rendered permanent by the double coating of glass. The plaques thus formed could be reheated and fashioned into the bases of bowls and drinking vessels. In this way the so-called “fondi d’oro” of the catacombs in Rome were made. They are the broken bases of drinking vessels containing inscriptions, emblems, domestic scenes and portraits etched in gold leaf. Very few have any reference to Christianity, but they served as indestructible marks for indicating the position of interments in the catacombs. The fondi d’oro suggested the manufacture of plaques of gold which could be broken up into tesserae for use in mosaics.
Some of the Roman artificers in glass no doubt migrated to Constantinople, and it is certain that the art was practised there to a very great extent during the middle ages. One of the gates near the port took its name from the adjacent glass houses. St Sofia when erected by Justinian had vaults covered with mosaics and immense windows filled with plates of glass fitted into pierced marble frames; some of the plates, 7 to 8 in. wide and 9 to 10 in. high, not blown but cast, which are in the windows may possibly date from the building of the church. It is also recorded that pierced silver disks were suspended by chains and supported glass lamps “wrought by fire.” Glass for mosaics was also largely made and exported. In the 8th century, when peace was made between the caliph Walid and the emperor Justinian II., the former stipulated for a quantity of mosaic for the decoration of the new mosque at Damascus, and in the 10th century the materials for the decoration of the niche of the kibla at Cordova were furnished by Romanus II. In the 11th century Desiderius, abbot of Monte Casino, sent to Constantinople for workers in mosaic.
We have in the work of the monk Theophilus,Diversarum artium schedula, and in the probably earlier work of Eraclius, about the 11th century, instructions as to the art of glass-making in general, and also as to the production of coloured and enamelled vessels, which these writers speak of as being practised by the Greeks. The only entire enamelled vessel which we can confidently attribute to Byzantine art is a small vase preserved in the treasury of St Mark’s at Venice. This is decorated with circles of rosettes of blue, green and red enamel, each surrounded by lines of gold; within the circles are little figures evidently suggested by antique originals, and precisely like similar figures found on carved ivory boxes of Byzantine origin dating from the 11th or 12th century. Two inscriptions in Cufic characters surround the vase, but they, it would seem, are merely ornamental and destitute of meaning. The presence of these inscriptions may perhaps lead to the inference that the vase was made in Sicily, but by Byzantine workmen. The double-handled blue-glass vase in the British Museum, dating from the 5th century, is probably a chalice, as it closely resembles the chalices represented on early Christian monuments.
Of uncoloured glass brought from Constantinople several examples exist in the treasury of St Mark’s at Venice, part of the plunder of the imperial city when taken by the crusaders in 1204. The glass in all is greenish, very thick, with many bubbles, and has been cut with the wheel; in some instances circles and cones, and in one the outlines of the figure of a leopard, have been left standing up, the rest of the surface having been laboriously cut away. The intention would seem to have been to imitate vessels of rock crystal. The so-called “Hedwig” glasses may also have originated in Constantinople. These are small cups deeply and rudely cut with conventional representations of eagles, lions and griffins. Only nine specimens are known. The specimen in the Rijks Museum at Amsterdam has an eagle and two lions. The specimen in the Germanic Museum at Nuremberg has two lions and a griffin.
Saracenic Glass.—The Saracenic invasion of Syria and Egypt did not destroy the industry of glass-making. The craft survived and flourished under the Saracenic régime in Alexandria, Cairo, Tripoli, Tyre, Aleppo and Damascus. In inventories of the 14th century both in England and in France mention may frequently be found of glass vessels of the manufacture of Damascus. A writer in the early part of the 15th century states that “glass-making is an important industry at Haleb (Aleppo).” Edward Dillon (Glass, 1902) has very properly laid stress on the importance of the enamelled Saracenic glass of the 13th, 14th and 15th centuries, pointing out that, whereas the Romans and Byzantine Greeks made some crude and ineffectual experiments in enamelling, it was under Saracenic influence that the processes of enamelling and gilding on glass vessels were perfected. An analysis of the glass of a Cairene mosque lamp shows that it is a soda-lime glass and contains as much as 4% of magnesia. This large proportion of magnesia undoubtedly supplied the stability required to withstand the process of enamelling. The enamelled Saracenic glasses take the form of flasks, vases, goblets, beakers and mosque lamps. The enamelled decoration on the lamps is restricted to lettering, scrolls and conventional foliage; on other objects figure-subjects of all descriptions are freely used. C. H. Read has pointed out a curious feature in the construction of the enamelled beakers. The base is double but the inner lining has an opening in the centre. Dillon has suggested that this central recess may have served to support a wick. It is possible however,that it served no useful purpose, but that the construction is a survival from the manufacture of vessels with fondi d’oro. The bases containing the embedded gold leaf must have been welded to the vessels to which they belonged, in the same way as the bases are welded to the Saracenic beakers. The enamelling process was probably introduced in the early part of the 13th century; most of the enamelled mosque lamps belong to the 14th century.
Venetian Glass.—Whether refugees from Padua, Aquileia or other Italian cities carried the art to the lagoons of Venice in the 5th century, or whether it was learnt from the Greeks of Constantinople at a much later date, has been a disputed question. It would appear not improbable that the former was the case, for it must be remembered that articles formed of glass were in the later days of Roman civilization in constant daily use, and that the making of glass was carried on, not as now in large establishments, but by artisans working on a small scale. It seems certain that some knowledge of the art was preserved in France, in Germany and in Spain, and it seems improbable that it should have been lost in that archipelago, where the traditions of ancient civilization must have been better preserved than in almost any other place. In 523 Cassiodorus writes of the “innumerosa navigia” belonging to Venice, and where trade is active there is always a probability that manufactures will flourish. However this may be, the earliest positive evidence of the existence at Venice of a worker in glass would seem to be the mention of Petrus Flavianus, phiolarius, in the ducale of Vitale Falier in the year 1090. In 1224 twenty-nine persons are mentioned as friolari (i.e.phiolari), and in the same century “mariegole,” or codes of trade regulations, were drawn up (Monografia della vetraria Veneziana e Muranese, p. 219). The manufacture had then no doubt attained considerable proportions: in 1268 the glass-workers became an incorporated body; in their processions they exhibited decanters, scent-bottles and the like; in 1279 they made, among other things, weights and measures. In the latter part of this century the glass-houses were almost entirely transferred to Murano. Thenceforward the manufacture continued to grow in importance; glass vessels were made in large quantities, as well as glass for windows. The earliest example which has as yet been described—a cup of blue glass, enamelled and gilt—is, however, not earlier than about 1440. A good many other examples have been preserved which may be assigned to the same century: the earlier of these bear a resemblance in form to the vessels of silver made in the west of Europe; in the later an imitation of classical forms becomes apparent. Enamel and gilding were freely used, in imitation no doubt of the much-admired vessels brought from Damascus. Dillon has pointed out that the process of enamelling had probably been derived from Syria, with which country Venice had considerable commercial intercourse. Many of the ornamental processes which we admire in Venetian glass were already in use in this century, as that of mille fiori, and the beautiful kind of glass known as “vitro di trina” or lace glass. An elaborate account of the processes of making the vitro di trina and the vasi a reticelli (Plate I., fig. 7) is given in Bontemps’sGuide du verrier, pp. 602-612. Many of the examples of these processes exhibit surprising skill and taste, and are among the most beautiful objects produced at the Venetian furnaces. That peculiar kind of glass usually called schmelz, an imperfect imitation of calcedony, was also made at Venice in the 15th century. Avanturine glass, that in which numerous small particles of copper are diffused through a transparent yellowish or brownish mass, was not invented until about 1600.
The peculiar merits of the Venetian manufacture are the elegance of form and the surprising lightness and thinness of the substance of the vessels produced. The highest perfection with regard both to form and decoration was reached in the 16th century; subsequently the Venetian workmen somewhat abused their skill by giving extravagant forms to vessels, making drinking glasses in the forms of ships, lions, birds, whales and the like.
Besides the making of vessels of all kinds the factories of Murano had for a long period almost an entire monopoly of two other branches of the art—the making of mirrors and of beads. Attempts to make mirrors of glass were made as early asA.D.1317, but even in the 16th century mirrors of steel were still in use. To make a really good mirror of glass two things are required—a plate free from bubbles and striae, and a method of applying a film of metal with a uniform bright surface free from defects. The principle of applying metallic films to glass seems to have been known to the Romans and even to the Egyptians, and is mentioned by Alexander Neckam in the 12th century, but it would appear that it was not until the 16th century that the process of “silvering” mirrors by the use of an amalgam of tin and mercury had been perfected. During the 16th and 17th centuries Venice exported a prodigious quantity of mirrors, but France and England gradually acquired knowledge and skill in the art, and in 1772 only one glass-house at Murano continued to make mirrors.
The making of beads was probably practised at Venice from a very early period, but the earliest documentary evidence bearing on the subject does not appear to be of earlier date than the 14th century, when prohibitions were directed against those who made of glass such objects as were usually made of crystal or other hard stones. In the 16th century it had become a trade of great importance, and about 1764 twenty-two furnaces were employed in the production of beads. Towards the end of the same century from 600 to 1000 workmen were, it is stated, employed on one branch of the art, that of ornamenting beads by the help of the blow-pipe. A very great variety of patterns was produced; a tariff of the year 1800 contains an enumeration of 562 species and a vast number of sub-species.
The efforts made in France, Germany and England, in the 17th and 18th centuries, to improve the manufacture of glass in those countries had a very injurious effect on the industry of Murano. The invention of colourless Bohemian glass brought in its train the practice of cutting glass, a method of ornamentation for which Venetian glass, from its thinness, was ill adapted. One remarkable man, Giuseppe Briati, exerted himself, with much success, both in working in the old Venetian method and also in imitating the new fashions invented in Bohemia. He was especially successful in making vases and circular dishes of vitro di trina; one of the latter in the Correr collection at Venice, believed to have been made in his glass-house, measures 55 centimetres (nearly 23 in.) in diameter. The vases made by him are as elegant in form as the best of the Cinquecento period, but may perhaps be distinguished by the superior purity and brilliancy of the glass. He also made with great taste and skill large lustres and mirrors with frames of glass ornamented either in intaglio or with foliage of various colours. He obtained a knowledge of the methods of working practised in Bohemia by disguising himself as a porter, and thus worked for three years in a Bohemian glass-house. In 1736 he obtained a patent at Venice to manufacture glass in the Bohemian manner. He died in 1772.
The fall of the republic was accompanied by interruption of trade and decay of manufacture, and in the last years of the 18th and beginning of the 19th century the glass-making of Murano was at a very low ebb. In the year 1838 Signor Bussolin revived several of the ancient processes of glass-working, and this revival was carried on by C. Pietro Biguglia in 1845, and by others, and later by Salviati, to whose successful efforts the modern renaissance of Venetian art glass is principally due.
The fame of Venice in glass-making so completely eclipsed that of other Italian cities that it is difficult to learn much respecting their progress in the art. Hartshorne and Dillon have drawn attention to the important part played by the little Ligurian town, Altare, as a centre from which glass-workers migrated to all parts of Europe. It is said that the glass industry was established at Altare, in the 11th century, by French craftsmen. In the 14th century Muranese glass-workers settled there and developed the industry. It appears that as early as 1295 furnaces had been established at Treviso, Vicenza,Padua, Mantua, Ferrara, Ravenna and Bologna. In 1634 there were two glass-houses in Rome and one in Florence; but whether any of these produced ornamented vessels, or only articles of common use and window glass, would not appear to have as yet been ascertained.
Germany—Glass-making in Germany during the Roman period seems to have been carried on extensively in the neighbourhood of Cologne. The Cologne museum contains many specimens of Roman glass, some of which are remarkable for their cut decoration. The craft survived the downfall of the Roman power, and a native industry was developed. This industry must have won some reputation, for in 758 the abbot of Jarrow appealed to the bishop of Mainz to send him a worker in glass. There are few records of glass manufacture in Germany before the beginning of the 16th century. The positions of the factories were determined by the supply of wood for fuel, and subsequently, when the craft of glass-cutting was introduced, by the accessibility of water-power. The vessels produced by the 16th-century glass-workers in Germany, Holland and the Low Countries are closely allied in form and decoration. The glass is coloured (generally green) and the decoration consists of glass threads and glass studs, or prunts (“Nuppen”). The use of threads and prunts is illustrated by the development of the “Roemer,” so popular as a drinking-glass, and as a feature in Dutch studies of still life. The “Igel,” a squat tumbler covered with prunts, gave rise to the “Krautstrunk,” which is like the “Igel,” but longer and narrow-waisted. The “Roemer” itself consists of a cup, a short waist studded with prunts and a foot. The foot at first was formed by coiling a thread of glass round the base of the waist; but, subsequently, an open glass cone was joined to the base of the waist, and a glass thread was coiled upon the surface of the cone. The “Passglas,” another popular drinking-glass, is cylindrical in form and marked with horizontal rings of glass, placed at regular intervals, to indicate the quantity of liquor to be taken at a draught.
In the edition of 1581 of theDe re metallicaby Georg Agricola, there is a woodcut showing the interior of a German glass factory, and glass vessels both finished and unfinished.
In 1428 a Muranese glass-worker set up a furnace in Vienna, and another furnace was built in the same town by an Italian in 1486. In 1531 the town council of Nuremberg granted a subsidy to attract teachers of Venetian technique. Many specimens exist of German winged and enamelled glasses of Venetian character. The Venetian influence, however, was indirect rather than direct. The native glass-workers adopted the process of enamelling, but applied it to a form of decoration characteristically German. On tall, roomy, cylindrical glasses they painted portraits of the emperor and electors of Germany, or the imperial eagle bearing on its wings the arms of the states composing the empire. The earliest-known example of these enamelled glasses bears the date 1553. They were immensely popular and the fashion for them lasted into the 18th century. Some of the later specimens have views of cities, battle scenes and processions painted in grisaille.
A more important outcome, however, of Italian influence was the production, in emulation of Venetian glass, of a glass made of refined potash, lime and sand, which was more colourless than the material it was intended to imitate. This colourless potash-lime glass has always been known as Bohemian glass. It was well adapted for receiving cut and engraved decoration, and in these processes the German craftsmen proved themselves to be exceptionally skilful. At the end of the 16th century Rudolph II. brought Italian rock-crystal cutters from Milan to take control of the crystal and glass-cutting works he had established at Prague. It was at Prague that Caspar Lehmann and Zachary Belzer learnt the craft of cutting glass. George Schwanhart, a pupil of Caspar Lehmann, started glass-cutting at Ratisbon, and about 1690 Stephen Schmidt and Hermann Schwinger introduced the crafts of cutting and engraving glass in Nuremberg. To the Germans must be credited the discovery, or development, of colourless potash-lime glass, the reintroduction of the crafts of cutting and engraving on glass, the invention by H. Schwanhart of the process of etching on glass by means of hydrofluoric acid, and the rediscovery by J. Kunkel, who was director of the glass-houses at Potsdam in 1679, of the method of making copper-ruby glass.
Low Countries and the United Provinces.—The glass industry of the Low Countries was chiefly influenced by Italy and Spain, whereas German influence and technique predominated in the United Provinces. The history of glass-making in the provinces is almost identical with that of Germany. In the 17th and 18th centuries the processes of scratching, engraving and etching were brought to great perfection.
The earliest record of glass-making in the Low Countries consists in an account of payments made in 1453-1454 on behalf of Philip the Good of Burgundy to “Gossiun de Vieuglise, Maître Vorrier de Lille” for a glass fountain and four glass plateaus. Schuermans has traced Italian glass-workers to Antwerp, Liége, Brussels and Namur. Antwerp appears to have been the headquarters of the Muranese, and Liége the headquarters of the Altarists. Guicciardini in his description of the Netherlands, in 1563, mentions glass as among the chief articles of export to England.
In 1599 the privilege of making “Voires de cristal à la faschon Venise,” was granted to Philippe de Gridolphi of Antwerp. In 1623 Anthony Miotti, a Muranese, addressed a petition to Philip IV. of Spain for permission to make glasses, vases and cups of fine crystal, equal to those of Venice, but to be sold at one-third less than Venetian glasses. In 1642 Jean Savonetti “gentilhomme Verrier de Murano” obtained a patent for making glass in Brussels. The Low Country glasses are closely copied from Venetian models, but generally are heavier and less elegant. Owing to the fashion of Dutch and Flemish painters introducing glass vases and drinking-glasses into their paintings of still life, interiors and scenes of conviviality, Holland and Belgium at the present day possess more accurate records of the products of their ancient glass factories than any other countries.
Spain.—During the Roman occupation Pliny states that glass was made “per Hispanias” (Nat. Hist.xxxvi. 26. 66). Traces of Roman glass manufactories have been found in Valencia and Murcia, in the valleys which run down to the coast of Catalonia, and near the mouth of the Ebro. Little is known about the condition of glass-making in Spain between the Roman period and the 13th century. In the 13th century the craft of glass-making was practised by the Moors in Almeria, and was probably a survival from Roman times. The system of decorating vases and vessels by means of strands of glass trailed upon the surface in knots, zigzags and trellis work, was adopted by the Moors and is characteristic of Roman craftsmanship. Glass-making was continued at Pinar de la Vidriera and at Al Castril de la Pena into the 17th century. The objects produced show no sign of Venetian influence, but are distinctly Oriental in form. Many of the vessels have four or as many as eight handles, and are decorated with serrated ornamentation, and with the trailed strands of glass already referred to. The glass is generally of a dark-green colour.