cameo

cameo, hard or precious stone carved in relief, or imitations of such stones in glass (called pastes) and mollusk shell. The cameo is usually a gem (commonly agate, onyx, or sardonyx) having two different coloured layers, with the figures carved in one layer so that they are raised on a background of the other. The cameo is the converse of the intaglio, which consists of an incised, or sunken, engraving in the same class of materials.

Cameos exist in large numbers from the early Sumerian period (c. 3100 bc) to the decline of Roman civilization, from the Renaissance, and from the Neoclassical period in the 18th century. Greek cameos, made with coloured quartz, were purely decorative (as opposed to intaglios, which were used as seals) and reached a high artistic level. Roman cameos, chiefly of sardonyx, onyx, and glass paste, usually were carved with portraits and mythological scenes and were often signed by the artists.

Because of increased interest in classical civilization, the art of cameo engraving was again perfected in the Renaissance. Cameos were used to commemorate personages, as in ancient days; for example, in 16th-century England, cameos were made with the head of Queen Elizabeth to celebrate the victory over the Spanish Armada. In the 18th and 19th centuries, cameos adorned such jewelry as diadems, belts, brooches, and bracelets.