Gemstone jewelling in a cameo example

The study was conducted to examine lapidary through the history of jewellery and its related accessories both based on examples of cameo which qualitatively identifies descriptively decorated works produced by the concerned technique and on a specific shaping process. The term ?cameo? stands for a variety of items created by glyptic descriptive reliefs and other associated pieces, most of which are miniaturised in dimension and in which hard gemstones with different colour layers are particularly used as well as alternative materials and production techniques in the process of development. Origin of cameo - produced pieces is estimated to date back to 4th and 3rd centuries B.C. and Hellenistic Greece. Stones, especially gemstones were primary and basic materials of important social development of civilizations until discovery of metals such that they have since been sustaining their privileged status in many respects. The fact that ancient people met their various needs by forming different types of stones long before dicovery of metals caused the first and important step currently known as Stone Age Industry to be accepted as the beginning of history of civilization. Human beings tend to identify stones with concepts such as immortality and challenge to unmercifully rapidly passing time just because of their strength and durability, attributing conceptional/symbolic values to them beyond the fact that they are just stuffs found in nature. Stones are therefore known to have historically been used to meet social, cultural and pyschcologic requirements for worshipping, religion and related rituals as well as prior neccesities such as social, industrial and domestic processes for making weapons, farming devices, pots and pans and shelter. Stones have been first and indispensable elements in culture of adornment and accessories believed to have been accounted for by guidance of human religious/magical rituals and primitive faiths. Thanks to their properties such as visual attractiveness, durability, strength and rarirty, gemstones have been evaluated by people to finally play a significant role in the process of jewellery and accessories in terms of livelihood, culture and symbolism. Gemstones and other alternative materials have to be shaped in order that they could be used in jewellery and accessories. Shaping gemstones and related stuffs is generally the subject of lapidary subbranch of glyptic art described as combination of techniques based on saving pieces to be wasted away as the result of glyptic processing. Lapidary is closely related to gemmology, which is a specific field of research and application involving gemstones in mineralogy. One of basic applications of lapidary and also the basic subject of the research study, gemstone processing in cameo technique requires sculpture to be handled together with the related research and processes above. Importance of cameo from Hellenistic art is that comprehensively descriptive features of high artistic value can be applied to materials which are minature-size and thus difficult to process. Artistic, cultural and historical importance of cameo and other descriptive gemmas can be further understood considering cultural and symbolic values of materials or descriptive subjects for the matter involved. Cameos and other describtive gemmas have long been evaluated as coins, vase paintings, sculptures and many other archeological finds owing to their describtive/narrative contents. The technique of cameo whose origin is attributed to 4th and 3rd centuries B.C. and Hellenistic culture and adopted by Romans who were influenced by Greek Antiquity is observed to have been developed by alternetive materials glass and some other synthtetics. Whenever Antique Hellen and Roman culture and arts have been rediscovered to rise through ages, antique cameos and other gemmas, that is descriptive decorative gemstones have been popularised as some of outstanding examples of Antiquity and often immitated during Renaissance in particular. Clasical and modern approaches to the technique in description, narration and theme can be said to occasionally form a synthesis especially in Art Neouveau. Cameo processing/art based on labor-intensive workmanship is an activity requiring great patience and mastery even in the present age of sophisticated technology. However, we had better exclude fully automatic CAD/CNC workbenches from the current agenda considering artistic quality. Ġngilizce Anahtar Kelimeler: 1- Cameo/Intaglio/Gem 2- Glyptic/Lapidary 3- Gemology/Archeogemology 4- Gemstones