A FRAGMENTARY ROMAN SARDONYX INTAGLIO WITH LOWER HALF OF WARRIOR
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A FRAGMENTARY ROMAN SARDONYX INTAGLIO WITH LOWER HALF OF WARRIOR

CIRCA 1ST-2ND CENTURY A.D.

Details
A FRAGMENTARY ROMAN SARDONYX INTAGLIO WITH LOWER HALF OF WARRIOR
CIRCA 1ST-2ND CENTURY A.D.
The stone carved with the lower half of a warrior showing a pair of legs wearing greaves, the tips of flowing drapery shown behind, the remains of a three-line Greek inscription reading [K]OINTOC A*EIA E*OIEI, in late 18th/early 19th Century gold ring setting
2 x 1 cm. max.; 1.8 cm. across inner hoop
Provenance
Gian Gastone dei Medici (1671-1737); acquired from the Vettori collection.
Baron von Stosch collection (1691-1757).
Special notice
No VAT will be charged on the hammer price, but VAT at 17.5% will be added to the buyer's premium which is invoiced on a VAT inclusive basis
Sale room notice
Concerning the provenance: please note that it has been suggested that the intaglio was in the Vettori collection only, with an impression in the Stosch collection.

Lot Essay

PUBLISHED:
A. F. Gori, Gemmae antiquae ex thesauro Mediceo, 1731-1732, II, pl. 97, I.
R. E. Raspe, A Descriptive Catalogue of a Collection of Gems cast in coloured paste by James Tassie, 1791, no. 7406, pl. 44.
D. A. Bracci, Memorie degli antichi incisori che scolpirono i loro nomi in gemme e cammei, I, 1784, pl. 8.
H. Brunn, Geschichte der griechischen Künstler, II, 1859, p. 630ff.
A. Furtwängler, Jahrbuch des Deutschen Archäologischen Institutes, III, 1888, p. 56ff., pl. 10, 19 and IV, 1889, p. 56ff.; Kleine Schriften, II, 1913, p. 258ff., pl. 27,19; and Die Antiken Gemmen, 1900, III, p. 358.
S. Reinach, Pierres gravées des Collections Marlborough et d'Orléans, des recueils d'Eckhel, Gori, Gravelle, Mariette, Millin, Stosch, réunies et rééditées, 1895, p. 70, pl. 73.
G. M. A. Richter, Engraved Gems of the Romans, London, 1971, p. 145, no. 681.

Relatively few ancient gems bear the signatures of their engravers and, as a result, the signatures of the artists have always been highly prized by collectors. Practically all the names of gem-engravers that survive from the Roman period are Greek. Richter suggests that the few that are not are Latin praenomina, as with the present example [K]ointos (=Quintus), which were presumably adopted by Greek freedmen.
Although published by Richter and others as being in the Museo Archeologico, Florence, this gem never actually found a home there and its history is still clouded in some mystery. It was evidently acquired by the last of the Medici, Gian Gastone and was published by Gori as being part of the Medici collection of 1732. However, the gem was not listed by Migliarini in his 1837 inventory of the Museo Archeologico Fiorentino and there is no trace of it ever having been there. The gem was published by Furtwängler in 1888 as being in the Museo Florentinum, but he was relying on Gori's catalogue and stated that he had not seen the gem himself and used an image taken from a paste from the Stosch collection. The gem passed as a gift or in some other way to the colourful Baron von Stosch but its history over the ensuing two centuries is unrecorded.

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