Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 11.djvu/307

EXAMPLES OF MEDIAEVAL SEALS. 267 engraved on them, which wc might fancy almost to have been executed by barbarians ; and it is equally impossible to beheve, that the native artists who executed these carica- tures of human features, could have produced the admirable Greek head on the seal of Carloman, circa a.d. 768. Again, it is only necessary to compare the buUce used by the Carlovingian kings with their seals, to be made aware of the striking difference between the style of art exhibited in the former and the profile busts on the seals of Carloman, Charlemagne, Louis le Debonaire, Lothaire, Charles le Cliauve, Louis le Begue and Charles le Simple.'^ And further, if we take a later period, and examine the seals subsequent to Louis d'Outrcmer, after the middle of the tenth century, when the use of antique gems had ceased, we find on the seals of Lothaire, Robert IL and their successors, a complete middle-age type, imitated (like the bulla;) from the coins and medal- lions of the Lower Empire, and wholly dissimilar to the Carlovingian laurelled profiles. In supi^ort of this view it may be added, that antique gems are still in existence resembling in workmanship, form, and size, the seals found on the Carlovingian charters. One of these is preserved among the Towneley gems in the British Museum, a drawing of which has been made, fig. 2 of the adjoined plate. It is an antique paste cut in intaglio on a convex surface, and represents a profile bust very similar to those on the seals of Charlemagne ; so much so, indeed, that it might well have served that monarch, or one of his successors, for a signet. Yet how absurd would it be to argue on the authority of such a gem, what style of beard or hair was worn by the Carlovingian monarch, or on which shoulder his mantle was fastened ! On no better grounds, however, as it would seem, have the French anti- quaries (including the respectable names of jIabillon, ]Iont- faucon, and a host of later writers) drawn minute inferences as to the costume and fashion of the Carlovingian race of princes ; which, supposing the seals to be gems and not contemporary portraits, are wholly valueless, and without foundation. 3 Compare the eDgra^^ngs in Mabilloii, of Carloman, Charlemagne, and Lothaire pp. 14.5, and 146, and Noav. Tr., iv. 11-2, to be antique gems, and the latter to n-- with the Carlovingian seals engi-aved iu present the portrait ol Caracalla or Ak- l)e Wailly. The authors of the Tn'n'jr ander Severus. dt yuinisinali'juc, 1K34, admit the Seals