Roman (Art): Portland Vase

Portland Vase

I was drawn to this piece by its beautifully delicate engravings. When I learned that it is one of the finest surviving pieces of Roman cameo glass, I was not surprised. It is well-preserved and is very finely made. It must have been quite an extensive project to make this piece and I can't even imagine how much time it would have taken to do it by hand, carefully engraving off the white layer of glass to reveal the dark layer beneath and to sculpt the scenes.

Probably made in Rome in about 15 BC - AD 25, the Portland vase is named after the Dukes of Portland, as the information plaque in the British Museum states, who owned it for over a century (from the late 18th century until the end of WWII) though loaned it to the British Museum for safe keeping in the early 19th century where it has remained since, though the museum didn't buy it until 1945. Before the Dukes of Portland owned it, the vase belonged to the Barberini family (thus it is also called the Barberini vase). The Portland vase is described, as I mentioned above, as the finest pieces of Roman cameo glass that still survive today. What the scenes depict is unknown, though they are either mythologically or historically set, and as they seem to have a marriage theme, it is assumed that the vase was a wedding gift. Some of the theories on the scenes include the story of Ariadne being found by and marrying the god Dionysus after she was abandoned by Theseus or a historical setting depicting Mark Anthony and Cleopatra with mythological themes.
A notable story about this vase occurred in 1845. Shortly after being entrusted to the care and safety of the British Museum by the owner, the fourth duke of Portland, a drunken young man (later identified as a student from Trinity College, Dublin, according to Wikipedia) smashed the case, and the vase was shattered. After much care, it was restored, though not all of the fragments were found for 100 years. When the British Museum bought the vase, they finally found the missing pieces and were able to restore most of it. However, it still remained fragile and unstable, so the museum had it dismantled and reconstructed to stabilize it with a stronger adhesive. For more information on the reconstruction and for pictures of the dismantled pieces, see this article from the British Museum.

In my post on Diana of Versailles, I listed several of Rome's accomplishments and artistic developments, including cameo glass. As demonstrated by this exquisite vase, the Roman artisans  became very good at it and perfected it. Also, the vase reflects other artistic characteristics they adopted from Classical Greek sculpture and art: the depiction of mythology in the piece and Greek-like figures.