Object of the Day: Forget Me Not

 Click on image to forget.  Or not.

Hmmm...where to begin? This isn't a trade card per se. It's not a calling card or even a visiting card. It's simply a pretty little chromolithograph printed on card stock. Now, I do believe that this could have been used as a trade card. It looks like the sort which were available for over-printing or reverse printing through catalogs. But, this just wasn't a run-of-the-mill stock card. This one is beautifully embossed. This would have made printing on the reverse rather awkward, but that never stopped them.

This was the preferred Victorian image-- Cupid or some random putto (or perhaps just a winged baby, who can tell?) surrounded by a variety of symbolic flowers (none of which, oddly enough, is a forget-me-not), sitting on a quasi-funereal plinth, wistfully carving some sweet message into a tabula rassa with one of his arrows. On the plinth below him is inscribed "Forget me Not."

Regardless if this unused card was made as a blank trade card or as a never-used affectionate greeting, it is gorgeously printed. These bright, rich colors are, to me, the epitome of Victorian printing. Furthermore, the embossing is exceptional. A chromolithograph in relief of this quality doesn't seem to be the work of late Nineteenth-Century American printers. I'd say this was European.

Mastery of Design: An Annular Brooch, 13th C.

Annular Brooch
Gold, Rubies, Sapphires
Thirteenth Century, France
The British Museum

This late medieval brooch (Thirteenth Century) was made in France. Crafted of gold, ruby and sapphire, the brooch features punched decoration and enameling. It is inscribed:


IO SUI ICI EN LIU DAMI: AMO 
(I am here in the place of the friend I love)

This was the sort of jewelry which was exchanged between lovers in the Thirteenth Century. These jewels—brooches, or rings, mostly—were inscribed with sentimental sayings or “posies.” Brooches, like this one, were annular—in the shape of a ring—to show the eternity of the sentiment. 

This example was bequeathed to the British Museum by Sir Augustus Wollaston Franks in 1897.

Mastery of Design: A Sentimental Ring, 1830-60

Click on image for a larger size.Ring
French, 1830-1860
The Victoria & Albert Museum

Made between 1830 and 1860, this gold ring enameled with sprigs boasts a series of hinged top panels which conceal mottos of love including “Je T’aime.”

This sort of French love token was popular from the 1830s until the end of the Nineteenth Century. Many were made for export to Britain. 

Gifts of Grandeur: A REGARD Locket, c. 1830

Locket
Two-color gold, rubies, emeralds, garnets, amethysts, diamonds and turquoise.
The Victoria & Albert Museum

I have a special fondness for Victorian (and earlier) jewelry in general, but I’m always tickled by those British pieces which adhere to the "language of stones.”  This concept allowed a sentimental message to be conveyed using the initial letter of each stone in the design to spell out a word or phrase.

Here, for example, the stones adorning this heart-shaped  locket spell "Regard.”  Ruby, Emerald, Garnet, Amethyst, Ruby, Diamond.  The stones are set in two-color gold around a “forget-me-not” of five turquoises centered by a ruby.

Such a piece of jewelry would have been a brilliant way to declare affection for family and friends, passion for a lover.  Some pieces even showed loyalty to a monarch or a cause, and also religious devotion and grief.

Object of the Day, Caption Contest: Forget Me Not

 Click on image to forget.  Or not.

Hmmm...where to begin? This isn't a trade card per se. It's not a calling card or even a visiting card. It's simply a pretty little chromolithograph printed on card stock. Now, I do believe that this could have been used as a trade card. It looks like the sort which were available for over-printing or reverse printing through catalogs. But, this just wasn't a run-of-the-mill stock card. This one is beautifully embossed. This would have made printing on the reverse rather awkward, but that never stopped them.

This was the preferred Victorian image-- Cupid or some random putto (or perhaps just a winged baby, who can tell?) surrounded by a variety of symbolic flowers (none of which, oddly enough, is a forget-me-not), sitting on a quasi-funereal plinth, wistfully carving some sweet message into a tabula rassa with one of his arrows. On the plinth below him is inscribed "Forget me Not."

Regardless if this unused card was made as a blank trade card or as a never-used affectionate greeting, it is gorgeously printed. These bright, rich colors are, to me, the epitome of Victorian printing. Furthermore, the embossing is exceptional. A chromolithograph in relief of this quality doesn't seem to be the work of late Nineteenth-Century American printers. I'd say this was European.

So, let's have a caption contest. We've not done one yet this week. I'm ashamed, why don't you tell me what the little tyke is scrawling on the tablet...

Answers in the comments section, please.