Short Picture Stories from Noble Coast Photography: Cameo Appearance

The first documented cameo carving dates back to 350 BC. Early cameos were worn by royalty in Greece and Italy and usually carved from a variety of gem stones. Eventually the cameo became a popular jewelry piece within the Roman Empire. With that, the cameo craftsman started to carve cameos from glass and less precious hard stones. It was in the 15th and 16th centuries that shells started to be used to create jewelry cameo carvings. Large conch shells were imported from all over the world to become Italian fine art jewelry. In the mid 1800's Queen Victoria of England forever popularized the cameo as it became her favorite jewelry.

Even today cameos are a popular jewelry piece found in many personal collections. In Italy, you can still find artists carving shells into beautiful cameos. The modern Italian cameo artist uses the same assortment of small hand chisels and files that have been used for centuries to create their jewelry from the hard sea shells.

During a visit to Pompeii, Italy I had the pleasure to meet and watch 70 year old Saverio work his artistry on some shells. In his broken English, Saverio told me he has been a cameo artist since his teen age years and some of his tools are older than he is. While one of Saverio's heavily calloused hands held the shell, his other hand chiseled the relief image to produce a beautifully detailed work of art.