An Essex crystal, or reverse intaglio, bracelet in fourteen carat gold set with seven crystal panels with a different nautical flag in carved and hand painted in each. This type of technique requires a mastery of both hand carving of hard stones, as well as the ability to paint on a microscopic and detailed level.
The process begins with selecting crystals that are cut and polished into a flat back and cabochon front, in order to help magnify the final painting. The procedure could take as many as twenty different grades of polish, and the entire process is done by hand. Once the stone is shaped, the design is drawn on the reverse side of the crystal with water color. The image is then etched into the stone with a scribe pencil. Form here beings the process of hand engraving. As many as 250 of tools may be used to in order to create this master .
The crystal is carved with a paste made from a combination of oil and diamond dust. Once the carving has been completed the painting commences. Just as in the carving phase, the painting is done in reverse. Sometimes the brushes that are used have only a single hair. Once the painting is complete the painting is backed with a piece of mother of pearl that helps illuminate the work from the back.
The result is a magnificent, almost three dimensional, portrait that comes alive. The hours spent in completing just one of these miniature works of art is very hard to imagine today, and there are only a handful of artists on the planet today that are able to get anywhere near the quality of the finest early carving and paintings.
This is not only a very beautoful looking bracelet; fun, colourful and unique. It also bears a hidden message. The use here of these nautical flags is not just for the love of all things sailing. It has a hidden message in the flags themselves. Each flag spells out D E A R E A S T .
Long before radio communication, ships needed a simple and reliable way of speaking to one another at sea. The solution was a language of brightly colored flags, designed to be easily recognized from a considerable distance and understood regardless of the language spoken by the crew.
Early forms of naval flag signaling had been used for centuries, but during the nineteenth century the system became increasingly standardized as international shipping and trade expanded. Britain’s Commercial Code of Signals, introduced in 1857, was an important step toward what would eventually become the International Code of Signals used today.
The system assigns an individual flag to each of the 26 letters of the alphabet, along with separate numerical pennants. The flags can be combined to spell names and messages, although many have a specific meaning when flown individually. The letter O, or Oscar, for example, signals “man overboard,” while Q, or Quebec, was traditionally used by a vessel requesting clearance to enter port.
What makes these flags so appealing today is their wonderfully simple graphic quality. Bold colors and geometric patterns were born entirely from necessity, allowing each flag to be quickly distinguished even in difficult conditions at sea. Yet together they created an instantly recognizable visual language that has subsequently found its way into jewellery, clothing and decorative design.
By having DEAREST hidden in this bracelet is not a new theme that Cartier utlised here. Jewellery has long been used to express affection, but during the Victorian period it developed an especially rich and sometimes remarkably private language. Courtship was governed by social convention, particularly among the middle and upper classes, and jewellery offered a discreet means of communicating love, friendship, fidelity and remembrance. A piece could be beautiful to everyone who saw it while carrying an entirely different meaning for the person wearing it.
One of the most charming examples was acrostic jewellery, a fashion that had developed in Europe before Victoria came to the throne but flourished during the nineteenth century. Gemstones were selected so that the first letter of each stone spelled a word. A particularly popular combination spelled “REGARD” using ruby, emerald, garnet, amethyst, ruby and diamond. “DEAREST” jewels employed a similar principle. To anyone else these appeared simply as colourful gemstone jewels. Their true message was understood by the giver and recipient.
The Victorians also inherited and greatly expanded a visual language of symbols. Forget-me-nots represented remembrance, ivy suggested fidelity and enduring attachment, and clasped hands could signify friendship, love or marriage. Hearts naturally represented affection, while snakes, perhaps surprisingly to modern eyes, were associated with eternity and everlasting love. Prince Albert famously gave Queen Victoria a serpent engagement ring, its tail wrapped around itself as a symbol of eternal devotion.
Lockets provided an even more intimate form of communication. Miniature portraits, photographs and locks of hair could be concealed inside and worn close to the body. Hair jewellery became particularly important during the nineteenth century. Hair did not decay in the manner of flowers or other keepsakes, making it an unusually powerful physical connection to someone absent or deceased. It could be woven into bracelets, rings and brooches or placed discreetly beneath glass on the reverse of a jewel.
Mourning jewellery became another important part of this language. The tradition considerably predates Queen Victoria, but her prolonged mourning following Prince Albert’s death in 1861 had an enormous influence upon Victorian society and dress. Black enamel, jet, onyx and other dark materials became closely associated with remembrance. Memorial rings and brooches might carry initials, dates of death or inscriptions, sometimes hidden on the reverse where their significance remained entirely personal.
The period also embraced words themselves. Rings and brooches bearing phrases such as “Mizpah” became fashionable later in the nineteenth century. Taken from the biblical Book of Genesis, the word became associated with people separated from one another and was commonly used on jewellery exchanged between loved ones. Its meaning was far greater than the simple word visible on the jewel.
This is perhaps the great charm of Victorian jewellery. These pieces were not simply ornaments. They could be love letters, memorials and private promises made in gold and gemstones. Sometimes the message was obvious, but very often it was deliberately concealed beneath a setting, behind a locket or encoded within the stones themselves.
Today we frequently encounter these jewels without knowing the names of the people who originally exchanged them. The portrait has become anonymous, the lock of hair belongs to someone long forgotten and the meaning of an inscription may have disappeared with its original owner. Yet the sentiment survives.
There is something wonderfully human about that. More than a century later, the secret may remain hidden, but the romance of the message is still very much there.
The bracelet is signed Cartier on one of the backs of the flags, and is stamped 14k. This means that this was a piece made for Cartier New York, and made in one of their American workshops around the 1940's. An exceptionally rare, possibly unique piece of American jewellery history.
