Читать книгу The Book of the Pearl. The history, art, science, and industry of the queen of gems онлайн

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The luxuries of Mithridates, the treasures of Alexandria, the riches of the Orient were poured into the lap of victory-fattened Rome. From that time the pearl reigned supreme, not only in the enormous prices given for single specimens, but also in the great abundance in possession of the degenerate descendants of the victorious Romans. The interior of the temple of Venus was decorated with pearls. The dress of the wealthy was so pearl-bedecked that Pliny exclaimed in irony: “It is not sufficient for them to wear pearls, but they must trample and walk over them”;^[13] and the women wore pearls even in the still hours of the night, so that in their sleep they might be conscious of possessing the beautiful gems.^[14]

It is related that the voluptuous Caligula (12–41 A.D.)—he who raised his favorite horse Incitatus to the consulship—decorated that horse with a pearl necklace, and that he himself wore slippers embroidered with pearls; and the tyrannical Nero (37–68 A.D.), not content with having his scepter and throne of pearls, provided the actors in his theater with masks and scepters decorated with them. Thus wrote the observant Philo, the envoy of the Jews to the Emperor Caligula: “The couches upon which the Romans recline at their repasts shine with gold and pearls; they are splendid with purple coverings interwoven with pearls and gold.”