Apart from those of the remote East, all the cloisonne enamels in our public and private collections are of Byzantine origin, and the Greeks seem to have begun to work in this manner so early as the sixth century. The golden altar given by Justinian to the Church of S. Sophia, and distributed among the Crusaders at the taking of Constantinople in 1204, is the oldest monument of which there is any record. Then come the Iron Crown given to the Cathedral of Monza, by Queen Theodolinda, who died in 625; the gold altar of S. Ambrose at Milan, made by Volvinius in 825; the votive Crown of S. Mark, Venice, executed between 886 and 911; the Limburg reliquary made for Basil II. before his accession to the throne in 976; lastly the celebrated "pala d'oro" of Venice begun in 976 and finished in 1105, by the Doge Ordelafo Faliero. Byzantine cloisonne enamels generally adorn the bindings of the gospels or crosses, partly executed by champleve, after a process first practised in Germany, according to M. A. Darcel. Our readers are referred to that work for further information; for we cannot here either discuss or write the history of enamelling, the object of what we have stated being simply to enable the curious to recognise the various processes, and assign to them an approximate date.

With respect to champleve enamels, they are found embellishing numerous reliquaries, some dating from the twelfth century. To Germany it would seem must also be attributed this style, which appears to have been first adopted simultaneously with the cloisonnage of the crosses of Essen, and upon that of Theophama (1041 - 1054). It is at least certain that when Suger (1137 - 1144) enriched the Church of S. Denis with new ornaments, he sent to Lorraine for workmen to execute the enamels.

No mention occurs of the Limoges works till about the second or third decade of the twelfth century. The Cluny Museum shows us two peculiarly interesting specimens from the Abbey of Grandmont. One represents the Adoration of the Magi; the other, which is still more characteristic, portrays S. Etienne de Muret in mystic conversation with S. Nicholas, the explanatory legend being in Limousin patois.

Next in importance to this is the ciboriuni of copper gilt and enamelled, now in the Louvre, and signed : "Magiter G. : alpais me fecit limovicarum." This beautiful specimen, in which the chased and perforated bronzes rival the incrusted enamels, seems to be a work of the thirteenth century. The bronzes of the stem are in the Oriental style in their entangled meanders enclosing figures of men and monsters. Thus the gilt crown encircling the opening is engraved with a design, to the interesting nature of which attention has been drawn by M. de Longperier. It reproduces decoratively and by unconscious imitation the general form of the device of the Kings of Granada. To the same epoch belong a number of reliquaries preserved in Cluny, crosiers, plaques forming part of the coverings of Evangeliaries, "gemellions," and custodes. In the old inventories the hand basins were called gemellions; they were always in pairs, one of them being provided with a spout to pour out the .water, the other to receive it under the hands of the person being ministered to.

In the Louvre may be examined a fourteenth century ciborium of spherical form, the body being adorned with four monograms of the Saviour, and the lid with four escutcheons. Here also is to be seen the curious casket on which the shields of England and France embellish the circumference/while the top is adorned with two groups formed of a young man and a young woman. On the rim of the lid are the lines in uncial letters on a blue ground: -

Dosse dame ie vos aym lealmant, Por die vos pri qve ne mobblie mia, Uet si mon cors a uos comandemant Sans mauueste et sans nulle folia.