Portrait Medallion of Julius Caesar (100-44 BC)

Entry

These small mother-of-pearl medallions represent portraits, in relief, of the first twelve Roman emperors: Julius Caesar (shown here), Augustus (BK-NM-5034-B), Tiberius (BK-NM-5034-C), Caligula (BK-NM-5034-D), Claudius (BK-NM-5034-E), Nero (BK-NM-5034-F), Galba (BK-NM-5034-G), Otho (BK-NM-5034-H), Vitellius (BK-NM-5034-I), Vespasianus (BK-NM-5034-J), Titus (BK-NM-5034-K) and Domitianus (BK-NM-5034-L). They are shown in profile, the first six facing to the right and the other six facing to the left. The portraits are based on prints by Jan Caspar Philips (1680/1700-1775) in Kornelis Westerbaen’s massive publication Algemeene histori.¹ The publishing date of the volume that was used (1745) provides a reliable terminus ante quem for the creation of the medallions, which like the book, were probably also made in the Northern Netherlands.

In the late seventeenth and the eighteenth century, carved portrait medallions were very popular with collectors, who often kept them in a special cabinet, called dactyliotheca.² However, the significantly small size of the medallions featured here would suggest a different use, for example in a necklace. Emperors’ medallions of this type are usually made of ivory, enamel or precious stones. Mother-of-pearl versions like these are extremely rare and possibly typical of the Northern Netherlands, which had a long-standing tradition in the craft of mother-of-pearl carving.³ The only other known series in this material is mentioned by the German scholar Zacharias Conrad von Uffenbach (1683-1734). In his travel journal the mentions a set of medallions with the first emperors and their companions carved in mother-of-pearl he saw in the collection of Petronella Oortmans (‘Frau del Court’) in Amsterdam, on 18 March 1711.⁴ It was said to have been made by one of the most celebrated mother-of-pearl carvers of the seventeenth century in the Northern Netherlands, Cornelis Bellekin (c. 1625?-1696/1711).⁵

Bieke van der Mark, 2025