BOHEMIAN GARNETS AS DECORATIVE MATERIALS FOR GLASS VESSELS FROM THE LATE SIXTEENTH TO EARLY EIGHTEENTH CENTURIES

The decorative craft of setting cut garnets on colorless or yellow glass vessels was invented by Claudius vom Creutz in the Imperial City of Nuremberg circa 1591. The legal context surrounding development of the technique can be traced through details set forth in imperial privileges (which were similar in effect to modern patents) from 1591, 1653, and 1714, and in relevant historical literature, particularly in books summarizing decisions of the Nuremberg administration and the imperial administration in Prague and Vienna. Two glass vessels in the collections of the Bavarian National Museum in Munich and the Passau Glass Museum (Passau, Germany) are adorned with red stones using a technique attributed to Creutz. These were examined at the museums using a portable X-ray fluorescence analyzer, and it was found that rose-cut Bohemian garnets were affixed by layers of reddish brown or yellow lead glass to the bodies of the engraved glass goblets. This process entailed using heat to melt the lead glass, which simultaneously heated the garnets and the glass objects to temperatures below melting point. A second glass goblet from the Passau collection was decorated with red glass stones imitating Bohemian garnets.