Blue and gold glass medallion, cut background,... Lot 46

Blue and gold glass medallion, cut background, representing a couple holding hands on either side of a column. Inscription on the edge VIVATIS IN DEO (Live in God). Rome, Christian art, 4th century. Diameter: 9 cm. Small chips on the surround. More commonly called "gold glass", this type of object is a form of luxury glass whose technique consists of fusing a gold leaf between two layers of glass. If this technique has its roots in Hellenistic Greece, it was truly during the late Roman Empire of the 3rd and 4th centuries that this production developed. Reaching us in fragments, these pieces of glass probably came from the bottom of cups or other decorated containers. Sometimes of secular inspiration, a certain number of these medallions illustrate Christian subjects. This is how the Louvre Museum preserves a fragment on a transparent background, dating from the 4th century, decorated with Jonah and the whale (inv. n°. S 2053), another visible at the Landesmuseum in Wüttemberg represents the praying Virgin surrounded by Saint Paul and Saint Peter. A cup base with an identical subject but in transparent glass, probably found in the catacombs, was formerly kept at the Kircher Museum in Rome (fig.) Expert: Cabinet Fligny Paris.