File:Post Medieval Blue Glass Intaglio (FindID 454370).jpg

English: A blue glass intaglio, or more properly, a cameo, since the design is in relief. It dates from the late Post Medieval to Modern period. This decorative item was designed to be inserted into a ring or brooch or other personal ornament.

The oval setting is made of bright blue translucent glass and has been made in a mould. This is evident from the concave reverse and the rounded edges to the design. It is decorated with a beetle, perhaps a scarab depicted from above sitting on a leaf. The background has fine horizontal lines across the field - again indicative of a fairly recent date. One end of the cameo is broken and missing.

This is probably an example of a mass produced intaglio made in the 18th or 19th century when classical designs, upon which these were modelled, were very popular. James Tassie and his nephew and successor William Tassie produced several thousand moulded glass pastes: there is a catalogue by R E Raspe, which however has very few illustrations and those only of famous stones. The Edinburgh NPGallery has a collection of Tassie casts in red sulphur, which is, however, not published. It is very likely that this piece is one of those moulded glass casts dating from the 1760s to the 1850s, though Tassie was not the only manufacturer of such items. Tassie made his pastes in both opaque and transparent forms and coloured them to resemble a great variety of gems. He made both the sunken, engraved designs known as intaglios and the relief designs called cameos. Another example of a Tassie past on the database is LANCUM-01B715.

In contrast, Roman examples tend to be either a darker colour, or clear glass, and are often made of semi-precious stones. They are decorated in a different style to this example. Compare SUR-912A23, LON-429146 and SOMDOR-20B086.